Search Results

The aim of this work is to apply an innovative adaptive ℒ1 techniques to control flutter phenomena affecting highly flexible wings and to evaluate the efficiency of this control algorithm and architecture by performing the following tasks: i) adaptation and analysis of an existing simplified nonlinear plunging/pitching 2D aeroelastic model accounting for structural nonlinearities and a quasi-steady aerodynamics capable of describing flutter and post-flutter limit cycle oscillations, ii) implement the ℒ1 adaptive control on the developed aeroelastic system to perform initial control testing and evaluate the sensitivity to system parameters, and iii) perform model validation and calibration by comparing the performance of the proposed control strategy with an adaptive back-stepping algorithm. The effectiveness and robustness of the ℒ1 adaptive control in flutter and post-flutter suppression is demonstrated.

The current trend towards an increasing electrification of road vehicles brings to life a whole series of unprecedent design issues. Among these, the ageing process that affects the lifetime of lithium-ion based energy storage systems is of particular importance since it turns out to be extremely sensitive to the variation of battery operating conditions normally occurring especially in hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs). This paper aims at analyzing the impact of operating conditions on the predicted lifetime of a parallel-through-the-road plug-in HEV battery both from thermal and ageing perspectives. The retained HEV powertrain architecture is presented first and modeled, and the related energy management system is implemented. Dedicated numerical models are also discussed for the high-voltage battery pack that allow predicting its thermal behavior and cyclic ageing.

The battery of a vehicle with an electrified powertrain (Hybrid Electric Vehicle or Battery Electric Vehicle), is required to operate with highly dynamic power outputs, both for charging and discharging operation. Consequently, the battery current varies within an extensive range during operation and the battery temperature also changes. In some cases, the relationship between the current flow and the change in the electrical energy stored seems to be affected by inefficiencies, in literature described as current losses, and nonlinearities, typically associated with the complex chemical and physical processes taking place in the battery. When calculating the vehicle electrical energy consumption over a trip, the change in the electrical energy stored at vehicle-level has to be taken into account. This quantity, what we could call the vehicle electricity balance, is typically obtained through a time-based integration of the battery current of all the vehicle batteries during operation.

Hybrid electric vehicle (HEV) powertrains are characterized by a complex design environment as a result of both the large number of possible layouts and the need for dedicated energy management strategies. When selecting the most suitable hybrid powertrain architecture at an early design stage of HEVs, engineers usually focus solely on fuel economy (directly linked to tailpipe emissions) and vehicle drivability performance. However, high voltage batteries are a crucial component of HEVs as well in terms of performance and cost. This paper introduces a multitarget assessment framework for HEV powertrain architectures which considers both fuel economy and battery lifetime. A multi-objective formulation of dynamic programming is initially presented as an off-line optimal HEV energy management strategy capable of predicting both fuel economy performance and battery lifetime of HEV powertrain layout options.

New methodologies have been developed to optimize EGR rate and injection timing in diesel engines, with the aim of minimizing fuel consumption (FC) and NOx engine-out emissions. The approach entails the application of a recently developed control-oriented engine model, which includes the simulation of the heat release rate, of the in-cylinder pressure and brake torque, as well as of the NOx emission levels. The engine model was coupled with a C-class vehicle model, in order to derive the engine speed and torque demand for several driving cycles, including the NEDC, FTP, AUDC, ARDC and AMDC. The optimization process was based on the minimization of a target function, which takes into account FC and NOx emission levels. The selected control variables of the problem are the injection timing of the main pulse and the position of the EGR valve, which have been considered as the most influential engine parameters on both fuel consumption and NOx emissions.

The selection and tuning of the Fuel Injection System (FIS) are among the most critical tasks for the automotive diesel engine design engineers. In fact, the injection strongly affects the combustion phenomena through which controlling a wide range of related issues such as pollutant emissions, combustion noise and fuel efficiency becomes feasible. In the scope of the engine design optimization, the simulation is an efficient tool in order to both predict the key performance parameters of the FIS, and to reduce the amount of experiments needed to reach the final product configuration. In this work a complete characterization of a solenoid ballistic injector for a Light-Duty Common Rail system was therefore implemented in a commercially available one-dimensional computational software called GT-SUITE. The main phenomena governing the injector operation were simulated by means of three sub-models (electro-magnetic, hydraulic and mechanical).

One of the first steps in powertrain design is to assess its best performance and consumption in a virtual phase. Regarding hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs), it is important to define the best mode profile through a cycle in order to maximize fuel economy. To assist in that task, several off-line optimization algorithms were developed, with Dynamic Programming (DP) being the most common one. The DP algorithm generates the control actions that will result in the most optimal fuel economy of the powertrain for a known driving cycle. Although this method results in the global optimum behavior, the DP tool comes with a high computational cost. The charge-sustaining requirement and the necessity of capturing extremely small variations in the battery state of charge (SOC) makes this state vector an enormous variable. As things move fast in the industry, a rapid tool with the same performance is required.

As an era of autonomous driving approaches, it is necessary to translate handling comfort - currently a responsibility of human drivers - to a vehicle imbedded algorithm. Therefore, it is imperative to understand the relationship between perceived driving comfort and human driving behaviour. This paper develops a methodology able to generate the information necessary to study how this relationship is expressed in highway overtakes. To achieve this goal, the approach revolved around the implementation of sensor Data Fusion, by processing data from CAN, camera and LIDAR from experimental tests. A myriad of variables was available, requiring individuating the key-information and parameters for recognition, classification and understanding of the manoeuvres. The paper presents the methodology and the role each sensor plays, by expanding on three main steps: Data segregation and parameter selection; Manoeuvre detection and processing; Manoeuvre classification and database generation.

In this study, a new EGR control technique, based on the estimate of the oxygen concentration in the intake manifold, was firstly investigated through numerical simulation and then experimentally tested, both under steady state and transient conditions. The robustness of the new control technique was also tested and compared with that of the conventional EGR control technique by means of both numerical simulation and experimental tests. Substantial reductions of the NOx emissions under transient operating conditions were achieved, and useful knowledge for controlling the EGR flow rate more accurately was obtained.

Different EGR system layouts (a Long Route, a Short Route, and a combination of the two) were evaluated by means of both numerical simulation and experimental tests. In particular, a one-dimensional fluid-dynamic engine model was built in order to evaluate the potential of a Long Route EGR system as well as the potential of different EGR combinations between Long and Short Route. By means of the one-dimensional model, used as a virtual test bench, the estimations of the NOx emissions, based on the Extended Zeldovich Mechanism (EZM), for the different solutions, were compared and valuable information for the calibration of the coordinated EGR LR, EGR SR and Variable Geometry Turbine (VGT) control systems was obtained.

A new predictive zero-dimensional low-throughput combustion model has been applied to both PCCI (Premixed Charge Compression Ignition) and conventional diesel engines to simulate HRR (Heat Release Rate) and in-cylinder pressure traces on the basis of the injection rate. The model enables one to estimate the injection rate profile by means of the injection parameters that are available from the engine ECU (Electronic Control Unit), i.e., SOI (Start Of main Injection), ET (Energizing Time), DT (Dwell Time) and injected fuel quantities, taking the injector NOD (Nozzle Opening Delay) and NCD (Nozzle Closure Delay) into account. An accumulated fuel mass approach has been applied to estimate Qch (released chemical energy), from which the main combustion parameters that are of interest for combustion control in IC engines, such as, SOC (Start Of Combustion), MFB50 (50% of Mass Fraction Burned) have been derived.

The effects of using a B30 blend of ultra-low sulfur diesel and two different Fatty Acid Methyl Esters (FAME) obtained from both Rapeseed Methyl Ester (RME) and Jatropha Methyl Ester (JME) in a Euro 5 small displacement passenger car diesel engine on both full load performance and part load emissions have been evaluated in this paper. In particular the effects on engine torque were firstly analyzed, for both a standard ECU calibration (i.e., without any special tuning for the different fuel characteristics) and for a specifically adjusted ECU calibration obtained by properly increasing the injected fuel quantities to compensate for the lower LHV of the B30: with the latter, the same torque levels measured under diesel operation could be observed with the B30 blend too, with lower smoke levels, thus highlighting the potential for maintaining the same level of performance while achieving substantial emissions benefits.

This paper presents the design and experimental validation of a localization method for autonomous driving. The investigated method proposes and compares the application of the Extended Kalman Filter (EKF) and Unscented Kalman Filter (UKF) to the sensor fusion of onboard data streaming from a Global Positioning System (GPS) sensor and an Inertial Navigation System (INS). In the paper, the design of the hardware layout and the proposed software architecture is presented. The method is experimentally validated in real time by using a properly instrumented all-wheel-drive electric racing vehicle and a compact Sport Utility Vehicle (SUV). The proposed algorithm is deployed on a high-performance computing platform with an embedded Graphical Processing Unit that is mounted on board the considered vehicles.

A set of manganese oxide catalysts was synthesized and doped with Cu and/or Fe by means of the citric acid sol-gel preparation method. The samples were studied by means of several characterization techniques: field-emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM), X-ray powder diffraction (XRD), N2-physisorption at -196 °C, H2 and soot temperature-programmed reduction (H2-TPR, soot-TPR) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS). The catalytic performance of the prepared catalysts was investigated in the oxidation of a probe VOC molecule (propylene) and carbon soot singularly and simultaneously. The catalytic performances were studied as well assuring a content of 5 vol.% of water in the gaseous reactive mix. The investigations evidenced that the best soot catalytic oxidation rates occurred over the Mn2O3 sample, while the copper-doped manganese oxide (i.e. the MnCu15) showed the best performance in the decomposition of propylene.

A fast measurement of the car handling performance is highly desirable to easily compare and assess different car setup, e.g. tires size and supplier, suspension settings, etc. Instead of the expensive professional equipment normally used by car manufacturers for vehicle testing, the authors propose a low-cost solution that is nevertheless accurate enough for comparative evaluations. The paper presents a novel measuring system for vehicle dynamics analysis, which is based uniquely on the sensors embedded in a smartphone and therefore completely independent on the signals available through vehicle CAN bus. Data from tri-axial accelerometer, gyroscope, GPS and camera are jointly used to compute the typical quantities analyzed in vehicle dynamics applications.

Active Roll Control (ARC) is one of the most promising active systems to improve vehicle comfort and handling. This paper describes the simulation based procedure adopted to conceive a double-channel Active Roll Control system, characterized by the hydraulic actuation of the stabilizer bars of a sedan. The first part of the paper presents the vehicle model adopted for this activity. It is Base Model Simulator (BMS), the 14 Degrees-of-Freedom vehicle model by Politecnico di Torino. It was validated through road tests. Then the paper describes the development of the control algorithm adopted to improve the roll dynamics of the vehicle. The implemented control algorithm is characterized by a first subsystem, capable of obtaining the desired values of body roll angle as a function of lateral acceleration during semi-stationary maneuvers.

It is well known that backpressure is one of the important parameters to be minimised during the exhaust system development. Unfortunately, during the first phases of an engineering process of a new engine, engine prototypes are not available yet. Due to this the exhaust system backpressure is generally evaluated using simulation software, and/or measuring the backpressure by a flow rig test at room temperature. Goal of this paper is to compare exhaust backpressure results obtained respectively: i) at the room temperature flow rig; ii) at the engine dyno bench; iii) by simulation with one of the most common 1D fluidodynamics simulation tool (Gt-Power). A correlation of the three different techniques is presented.

Different diagnostic techniques were experimentally tested on a common rail automotive 4 cylinder diesel engine in order to evaluate their capabilities to fulfill the California Air Resources Board (CARB) requirements concerning the monitoring of fuel injected quantity and timing. First, a comprehensive investigation on the sensitivity of pollutant emissions to fuel injection quantity and timing variations was carried out over 9 different engine operating points, representative of the FTP75 driving cycle: fuel injected quantity and injection timing were varied on a single cylinder at a time, until OBD thresholds were exceeded, while monitoring engine emissions, in-cylinder pressures and instantaneous crankshaft revolution speed.

Antilock Braking System (ABS) is designed to prevent wheels from locking, in order to enhance vehicle directional stability during braking manoeuvres. Basically, ABS closed-loop control logic uses tyres slip as control variable. Slip is estimated by comparing vehicle reference speed with the angular speed of each wheel. Thus it is crucial to correctly estimate the longitudinal vehicle speed, in order to get a control system capable of good performance. The control is also affected by road condition; since vehicles are not equipped with sensors able to measure the tyre/road friction coefficient, an other estimation has to be performed. The paper presents an algorithm for the estimation of longitudinal speed, based on the measurements of the four wheel angular speed. A method to assess the road friction, commonly known as “learning phase” is also described: it is carried out during the early stage of the active control intervention and relies on the wheel rotation sensors as well.

In the powertrain technology, designers must be careful on oil pan design in order to obtain the best noise, vibration and harshness (NVH) performance. This is a great issue for the automotive design because they affect the passengers' comfort. In order to reduce vibration and radiated noise in powertrain assembly, oil pan is one of the most critical components. The high stiffness of the oil pan permits to move up the natural modes of the component and, as a consequence, reduce the sound emission of the component itself. In addition, the optimized shape of the component allows the increase of natural frequency values of the engine assembly. The aim of this study is the development of a methodology to increase the oil pan stiffness starting from a sketch of the component and adding material where it is needed. The methodology is tested on a series of different models: they have the same geometry but different materials.