Design and validation of active trailer steering systems for articulated heavy vehicles using driver-hardware-in-the-loop real-time simulation

Abstract

To improve the low-speed maneuverability and high-speed lateral stability of Double Trailer Articulated Heavy Vehicles (DTAHVs), an Active Trailer Steering (ATS) system has been designed. To date, investigations on ATS systems are mainly focused on numerical simulations. To advance this research towards real-world applications, a Driver-Hardware-In-the-Loop (DHIL) real-time simulation platform is developed for the design and validation of ATS system for DTAHVs. The real-time simulation results derived under the emulated low-speed path-following test maneuvers demonstrate the effectiveness of the DHIL platform and the distinguished features of the ATS system. This thesis examines the applicability of two single lane-change test maneuvers specified in ISO-14791 for acquiring rearward amplification, which is an important indicator for the high-speed lateral stability. Simulation results indicate that the closed-loop test is more applicable for DTAHVs with ATS systems. This thesis also proposes a new ATS controller using the model reference adaptive control technique. Numerical simulations illustrate that the proposed MRAC controller can achieve robust performance under the variations of vehicle forward speed and trailer payload.