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The paper presents linear and non-linear driveline models for Heavy Goods Vehicles (HGVs) in order to evaluate the main parameters for optimal tuning, when considering the drivability. The implemented models consider the linear and non-linear driveline dynamics, including the effect of the engine inertia, the clutch damper, the driveshaft, the half-shafts and the tires. Sensitivity analyses are carried out for each driveline component during tip-in maneuvers. The paper also analyses the overall frequency response using Bode diagrams and natural frequencies. It is demonstrated that the most basic model capable of taking into account the first order dynamics of the driveline must consider the moments of inertia of the engine, the transmission and the wheels, the stiffness and the damping properties of the clutch damper, driveshaft and half-shafts, and the tires (which link the wheel to the equivalent inertia of the vehicle).

In 2006, there were approximately 23,500 rear-end crashes involving heavy trucks (i.e., gross vehicle weight greater than 4,536 kg). The Enhanced Rear Signaling (ERS) for Heavy Trucks project was developed by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) to investigate methods to reduce or mitigate those crashes where a heavy truck has been struck from behind by another vehicle. Visual warnings have been shown to be effective, assuming the following driver is looking directly at the warning display or has his/her eyes drawn to it. A visual warning can be placed where it is needed and it can be designed so that its meaning is nearly unambiguous. FMCSA contracted with the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute (VTTI) to investigate potential benefit of additional rear warning-light configurations as rear-end crash countermeasures for heavy trucks.

Recently Michelin has been developing a new airless, integrated tire and wheel combination called the Tweel® tire. The Tweel tire aims at performance levels beyond those possible with conventional pneumatic technology because of its shear band design, added suspension, and potentially decreased rolling resistance. In this paper, we will focus on the environmental impact of the Tweel tire during its life-cycle from manufacturing, through use and disposal. Since the Tweel tire is currently still in the research phase and is not manufactured and used on a large scale, there are uncertainties with respect to end-of-life scenarios and rolling resistance estimates that will affect the LCA. Nevertheless, some preliminary conclusions of the Tweel tire's environmental performance in comparison to a conventional radial tire can be drawn.

The Michelin Tweel tire structure has recently been developed as an innovative non-pneumatic tire which has potential for improved handling, grip, comfort, low energy loss when impacting obstacles and reduced rolling resistance when compared to a traditional pneumatic tire. One of the potential sources of vibration during rolling of a non-pneumatic tire is the buckling phenomenon and snapping back of the spokes in tension when they enter and exit the contact zone. Another source of noise was hypothesized due to a flower petal ring vibration effect due to discrete spoke interaction with the ring and contact with the ground during rolling as the spokes cycle between tension and compression. Transmission of vibration between the ground force, ring and spokes to the hub was also considered to be a significant contributor to vibration and noise characteristics of the Tweel.

Intelligent tires are envisioned to be an important part of the future vehicle control systems and the three dimensional wireless MEMS accelerometers embedded inside the tire stand out as a promising candidate for the development of intelligent tires. The first part of the paper focuses on accelerometer based tire sensors for the estimation of slip angle and tire/road friction coefficient. We use a simple tire finite element model to generate lateral, tangential and radial tire accelerations for a fixed load and slip angle. The profiles are validated by using experimental data. The simulated acceleration profiles are used for the estimation of slip angle and tire/road friction coefficient. We present the estimation algorithms, promising simulative results and output sensitivities studies focused on the effects of changes in normal load, tire pressure and vehicle velocity.

This paper describes a driving controller to improve vehicle lateral stability and maneuverability for a six wheel driving / six wheel steering (6WD/6WS) vehicle. The driving controller consists of upper and lower level controller. The upper level controller based on sliding control theory determines front, middle steering angle, additional net yaw moment and longitudinal net force according to reference velocity and steering of a manual driving, remote control and autonomous controller. The lower level controller takes desired longitudinal net force, yaw moment and tire force information as an input and determines additional front steering angle and distributed longitudinal tire force on each wheel. This controller is based on optimal distribution control and has considered the friction circle related to vertical tire force and friction coefficient acting on the road and tire.

This paper presents an integrated design method for active trailer steering (ATS) systems of articulated heavy vehicles (AHVs). Of all contradictory design goals of AHVs, two of them, i.e. path-following at low speeds and lateral stability at high speeds, may be the most fundamental and important, which have been bothering vehicle designers and researchers. To tackle this problem, a new design synthesis approach is proposed: with design optimization techniques, the active design variables of ATS systems and passive design variables of trailers can be optimized simultaneously; the ATS controller derived from this approach has two operational modes, one for improving lateral stability at high speeds and the other for enhancing path-following at low speeds. To demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed approach, it is applied to the design of an ATS system for an AHV with a tractor and a full trailer.

One of the most important challenges for electronic stability control (ESC) systems is the identification and monitoring of tire rolling environment, especially actual tire-road friction parameters. The presented research considers an advanced variant of the ESC system deducing the mentioned factors based on intelligent methods as fuzzy sets. The paper includes: Overview of key issues in prototyping the algorithms of Electronic Stability Control. Case study for vehicle model. Procedures for monitoring of tire rolling environment: theoretical backgrounds, computing methods, fuzzy input and output variables, fuzzy inference systems, interface with ESC algorithm. Case study for ESC control algorithm. Examples of simulation using Hardware-in-the-Loop procedures. The proposed approach can be widely used for the next-generation of ESC devices having the close integration with Intelligent Transport Systems.

Torsional stiffness properties were developed for both a 53-foot box trailer and a 28-foot flatbed control trailer based on experimental measurements. In order to study the effect of torsional stiffness on the dynamics of a heavy truck vehicle dynamics computer model, static maneuvers were conducted comparing different torsional stiffness values to the original rigid vehicle model. Stiffness properties were first developed for a truck tractor model. It was found that the incorporation of a torsional stiffness model had only a minor effect on the overall tractor response for steady-state maneuvers up to 0.4 g lateral acceleration. The effect of torsional stiffness was also studied for the trailer portion of the existing model.

A truck-trailer combination is modeled using ADAMS/Car from MSC Software for handling and ride comfort performance simulations. The handling events include a double lane change and lateral roll stability. The ride comfort performance events include several sized half-rounds and various RMS courses. The variables for handling performance evaluation include lateral acceleration, roll angles and tire patch normal loads. The variables for ride performance evaluation are absorbed power and peak acceleration. This study considers the trailer spring stiffness, anti-roll bar and jounce bumper gap as the design variables. Through DOE simulations, we derived the response surface models of various performance variables so that we could consider the performance sensitivities to the design variables.

The paper presents a method for the indoor testing of road vehicle suspension systems. A suspension is positioned on a rotating drum which is located in the Laboratory for the Safety of Transport at Politecnico di Milano. Special six-axis load cells have been designed and used for measuring the forces/moments acting at each suspension-chassis joints. The forces/moments, wheel accelerations, displacements are measured up to 100 Hz. Two different types of test can be performed. The tire/wheel unbalance effect on the suspension system behavior (Vibration and Harshness, VH) has been analyzed by testing the suspension system from zero to the vehicle maximum speed on a flat surface and by monitoring the forces transmitted to the chassis. In the second kind of test, the suspension system has been excited as the wheel passes over different cleats fixed on the drum.

A method to improve the computational efficiency of analyzing wheeled vehicle systems on three-dimensional (3-D) roads has been developed. This was accomplished by creating a technique to incorporate the tire on a 3-D road in a multibody dynamics model of the vehicle with an approach that formulates the governing equations using symbolic formulation. For general handling analysis performed on the vehicle, the tire forces and moments are determined using a tire model that represents the tire as a set of mathematical expressions. Since these expressions need numerical values to determine the forces and moments, a symbolic solution does not exist. Therefore, the evaluation of the tire forces and moments needs to be done during simulation. However, symbolic operations can be used when the governing equations are formulated to develop an efficient method to evaluate these forces.

The advancements made in modeling and parameter identification of nonlinear isolation components in the underlying investigation confirm the importance of accurate Multibody Dynamics modeling of these components for reducing vibration and/or improving ride comfort. Considering dynamic stiffness and loss angle characteristics, the proposed nonlinear isolation component uses the Bouc/Wen hysteresis model for excitation amplitude dependency and a transfer function for excitation frequency dependency. Various combinations of Bouc/Wen hysteresis parameters result in different shapes for hysteresis loops and allows for modeling a wide range of soft and stiff isolator characteristics. The effect of the proposed isolation component on ride studies is illustrated by simulating a maneuver on a road profile using the OpenCRG road description with SimXpert Motion Workspace and Adams/Car. Tire belt dynamics are captured by adding a rigid ring part to the PAC2002 tire model [ 1 ].

In this study, a full vehicle with advanced LMS comfort and durability tire (CDT) model was established with ADAMS software to predict the spindle loads of the vehicle under a severe proving ground rough road event. From a series of simulations with various design changes, the spindle loads sensitivities to those design changes were identified. The simulated results were also compared with the measured data and a good correlation was achieved.

To realistically predict the dynamics of a vehicle, the forces and moments in the contact patch must be accurately computed. A two-dimensional semi-empirical transient tire model was previously developed in the Advanced Vehicle Dynamics Lab (AVDL) at Virginia Tech, and extended the capabilities of the steady-state tire model also developed at AVDL. In this paper, a three-dimensional semi-empirical transient tire model is presented. The tire structure is modeled by an elastic ring supported on a spring and damper system. The elastic ring represents the belt ring and the spring and damper system represents the sidewall and the tread element. The analysis of the deformation of the tire structure with camber angle is performed on a flat surface to obtain the geometry of the contact patch and the normal pressure distribution. The forces and the moments are formulated using empirical data and based on theoretical mechanics.

The objective of this study was to evaluate the concept of a heavy-duty tractor - motorized semi-trailer hybrid electric combination, which would have electric drive axles on the semi-trailer. The scope of the project included an analysis of the general concept of a power-driven semi-trailer, the positioning of the concept of the heavy-duty tractor - motorized semi-trailer hybrid electric combination in the general context of the technology, and the evaluation of the applicability of the concept for different duty cycles. Several transport activities were analyzed to determine specific duty cycles for heavy-duty vehicles: highway line haul and regional haul, construction haul, and off-highway hauling of raw materials, such as forestry transport with Class 8 and off-highway tractor-trailer combinations.

Currently, the ASTM P225/60R 97S Radial Standard Reference Test Tire (SRTT) is used as a control test tire for calibrating test track surfaces over time and for rank ordering the noise performance of different pavement designs. As a result, variation from one SRTT to another and the effects of tire aging are important to quantify. Measurements of tire noise sound intensity on eight asphalt and two concrete test sections were conducted for eleven new and six older SRTT tires. The range in level for the new tires on each of the ten pavements was determined and was found to be 1.1 dB when averaged over all pavements compared to 0.7 dB for a single tire tested multiple times. As a group, the older tires produced levels 0.5 dB higher than the new tires when averaged for all pavements. The older tires had higher tread rubber durometer hardness values than the new tires, however, within the old and new groupings, no consistent trends could be identified.

The demand to reduce noise in the passenger cars is increasing. Tire vibration characteristics must be considered when studying road noise because of the strong interaction between tire vibration characteristics and interior car noise. Car manufacturers are keenly interested in studies on the prediction of NVH (Noise, Vibration and Harshness) performance, including viewing tires as substructure. Recently, studies have illustrated the effect that tire lateral bending mode have has on road noise, while most past studies of tire vibration focused on the circumference mode, which excited the vertical spindle force. Therefore, further study of tire lateral bending mode is necessary. Modeling of the tire lateral bending mode is described in this paper. First, lateral spindle force is measured under tire rolling conditions. Second, experimental modal analysis is performed to grasp tire lateral bending mode. Finally, a tire vibration model is built using the cylindrical shell theory.

Road noise is one of the main vehicle interior noises. To minimize this, it is necessary to reveal the vibration characteristics of a rolling tire. Tire vibration has complex behavior due to tire contact with the road and rolling. In an earlier study, we clarified the effect of contact patch restriction for tire vibration characteristics in the non-rolling condition using the tire dynamical model. However, mode shapes were identified with circumferential wave number. Therefore, it is difficult to clarify the effect for tire vibration in the contact and rolling condition. In this paper, we will apply the receptance method, which is used as an analysis of the rotating disc and gear pair for the tire model toward the tire vibration analysis in the contact and rolling condition. Furthermore, the validity of the approach using this method will be verified from comparison with the result of an earlier study.

A non-pneumatic tire (NPT) has two advantages over a conventional pneumatic tire; it is flat proof and maintenance free of air-pressure. In this study, while determining other advantages inherent in NPTs, the static contact behavior of NPTs with hexagonal honeycombs is investigated as a function of vertical loading and is compared with that of a pneumatic tire. A finite element based numerical simulation is carried out on the contact pressure of NPTs with cellular spokes and the local deformation of cellular spokes. A commercial finite element code, ABAQUS, is used to vary the vertical forces and lattice spoke geometries. A lower contact pressure is obtained with the NPTs than with the pneumatic tire due to the decreasing spoke stiffness of the NPTs when they are designed to have the same load carrying capability.