A New Steering and Braking Control Strategy for Tractor Semi-Trailer Truck During a Critical Lane Change Maneuver

Document Type : Dynamics, Vibrations, and Control

Authors

1 Ph.D. Student, Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Shahid Rajaee Teacher Training University, Tehran, Iran

2 Corresponding author: Associate Professor, Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Shahid Rajaee Teacher Training University, Tehran, Iran

3 Associate Professor, Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, K.N. Toosi University of Technology, Tehran, Iran

Abstract

In this study, a new integrated control for the steering and braking of semi-trailer trucks for tracking in longitudinal and lateral combined maneuvers is proposed. For this purpose, a nonlinear model of a tractor semi-trailer with 10 degrees of freedom including the longitudinal, lateral and yaw motion of the tractor unit, the articulation angle and the rotational motion of each wheel is used. Then the active steering and braking controller is designed with the purpose of tracking and utilizing the sliding mode method. Also, for the yaw stability of the vehicle, a lateral stability controller is proposed using the sliding control method. Then, by utilizing multi-objective optimization, a new integrated control strategy is presented in order to optimally allocate the longitudinal and lateral forces of the tires. This strategy is designed based on achieving the purposes of tracking and stability by using the capacity of tire forces in the optimum slip range by using variable weight coefficients. In order to implement the integrated controller, the tractor semi-trailer model presented in the TruckSim software is used. The obtained results indicate the excellent performance of the integrated controller strategy designed for tracking by maintaining lateral stability when performing the lane change maneuver with braking. So, by using the proposed controller, the maximum tracking error of the longitudinal and lateral position, the yaw angle of the tractor and the articulation angle are equal to 1.83, 0.56, 4.42 and 9.53%, respectively. This is while in the case of a vehicle without a controller, due to lateral instability, the reference path is not tracked.

Highlights

  • Integrated controller design for tractor semi-trailer in order to track the maneuver path in high ‌speed and low friction conditions with lateral stability guarantee.‌
  • Optimal distribution of tire forces in order to use the maximum capacity of longitudinal and lateral forces using ‌multi-objective optimization.

Keywords


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Volume 20, Issue 1 - Serial Number 75
Serial No. 75, Spring
April 2024
Pages 59-75
  • Receive Date: 09 July 2023
  • Revise Date: 29 July 2023
  • Accept Date: 10 October 2023
  • Publish Date: 15 April 2024