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Mathematical modeling of the mesh friction of a rack and pinion system has been carried out in order to predict the mesh friction of a steering gear. The three dimensional gear geometry and force diagram of a rack and pinion gear is represented in vector form. With proper boundary conditions applied to the equations, the mathematical model simulates the friction forces resulting from the mesh. An experimental apparatus was also built to measure mesh friction between a rack and pinion. A number of rack and pinion steering gears have been tested under several load conditions. Experimental results are then compared with the simulation results to verify the mathematical model.

This paper describes the operation of an advanced CMOS opto-ASIC used in a digital torque and angle sensor. Its purpose is to resolve the relative and absolute angular position of two bar-coded disks rotationally coupled by a stiff torsion bar. The resulting digital output of the sensor comprises two absolute angle measurements with up to 18-bit accuracy, and a torque measurement calculated from the difference of the two angular measurements. The measurement of torque and absolute angle in a single sensor eliminates the need for additional steering angle sensors for other vehicle dynamic systems such as dynamic stability control (DSC) or intelligent cruise control (ICC).