Intelligent controllers for vechicle suspension system using magnetorheological damper

Semi-active suspension control with magnetorheological (MR) damper is one of the most fascinating systems being studied in improving the vehicle ride comfort. This study aims to investigate the development of intelligent controllers for vehicle suspension system using MR damper, namely, the proportional-integral-derivative (PID) and fuzzy logic (FL) controllers optimized using particle swarm optimization (PSO), firefly algorithm (FA) and advanced firefly algorithm (AFA). Since the conventional optimization method always has a problem in identifying the optimum values and it is time consuming, the evolutionary algorithm is the best approach in replacing the conventional method as it is very efficient and consistent in exploring the values for every single space. The PSO and FA are among of the evolutionary algorithms which have been studied in this research. Nevertheless, the weakness of FA such as getting trapped into several local minima is an attractive area that has been focused more as a possible improvement during the evolutionary process. Thus, a new algorithm based on the improvement of the original FA was introduced to improve the solution quality of the FA. This algorithm is called advanced firefly algorithm. A parametric modelling technique known as Spencer model was proposed and employed to compute the dynamic behaviour of the MR damper system. The Spencer model was experimentally validated and conducted to capture the behaviour of the Lord RD-1005-3 MR damper with the same excitation input. A simulation of a semi-active suspension system was developed within MATLAB Simulink environment. The effectiveness of all control schemes were investigated in two major issues, namely the ability of the controller to reject the unwanted motion of the vehicle and to overcome the damping constraints. The result indicates that, the PID-AFA control scheme is more superior as compared to the PID-PSO, PID-FA, FL-PSO, FL-FA, FL-AFA and passive system with up to 27.1% and 19.1% reduction for sprung mass acceleration and sprung mass displacement, respectively. Finally, the performance of the proposed intelligent control schemes which are implemented experimentally on the developed quarter vehicle suspension test rig shows a good agreement with the results of the simulation study. The proposed control scheme of PID-AFA has reduced the sprung mass acceleration and sprung mass displacement over the FL-AFA and passive system up to 28.21% and 16.9%, respectively

Vibration isolation under isolator-structure interaction

This thesis analyses a general case of the vibration isolation (VI) problem, considering both a rigid and non-rigid supporting structures. The aim is to study changes on the behaviour of both systems isolators and supporting structure when the interaction phenomenon between them is considered. The influence of the VI task on the base response is evaluated. In addition, the effect of the base dynamics on the the VI and alignment problem is studied. The novel contribution to the knowledge of this thesis is formulation of a novel VI approach, which facilitates a holistic analysis of the problem considering all the systems involved on it. This approach is valid for any number of isolators and for any type of base structure. Moreover, different control objectives can be easily defined; evaluation of the interaction phenomenon on both the platform and base response for different VI techniques; demonstration of the importance of the isolator damping ratio on the influence that the VI task has on the base response; evaluation of the effects of the supporting structure dynamics on the VI and alignment problem when multiple isolators are involved; analysis of the Multiple-Input-Multiple-Ouput (MIMO) control strategy by comparison with the Single-Input-Single-Output (SISO) control strategy. This comparative has been made for the VI and alignment problem of multiple isolators on a non-rigid supporting structure and includes analysis of the effectiveness of the Coral Reefs Optimization algorithms to find nearly-optimal control gains in VI and alignment problems. Through the investigation made for this thesis, a number of significant results have been reached, which show the importance of the supporting structure dynamics on the VI and alignment task. Moreover, the interaction phenomenon, and its consequence on the base response, has been investigated experimentally. The results derived from this thesis conclude that, for most scenarios, the dynamics of the base affects the VI task. Also, the active VI (AVI) technique shows a greater influence on the base response than passive VI (PVI) technique, for most cases. It has been observed that the use of AVI technique can additionally be oriented to control vibrations of the supporting structure, while the VI task is developed. Significant differences have been found when multiple isolators are involved in the same task for the alignment and VI problem, depending on whether or not the dynamics of the base are considered. The best set of control gains for the rigid-support case (which lead to maximum damping ratio) differ from those obtained when the supporting structure is considered as a flexible system, for different cases analysed in this thesis. The MIMO control strategy has shown great improvement with respect to the use of the SISO control strategy. Also, the Coral Reefs Optimization algorithms have been demonstrated to be a suitable tool to find nearly-optimal solutions for this type of problems

Emerging Trends in Mechatronics

Mechatronics is a multidisciplinary branch of engineering combining mechanical, electrical and electronics, control and automation, and computer engineering fields. The main research task of mechatronics is design, control, and optimization of advanced devices, products, and hybrid systems utilizing the concepts found in all these fields. The purpose of this special issue is to help better understand how mechatronics will impact on the practice and research of developing advanced techniques to model, control, and optimize complex systems. The special issue presents recent advances in mechatronics and related technologies. The selected topics give an overview of the state of the art and present new research results and prospects for the future development of the interdisciplinary field of mechatronic systems

Novel Tornado-Like Vortex Generator with Intelligent Controller

Cooking fumes may cause multiple adverse health effects, and range hoods play central roles in controlling indoor air pollution caused by cooking fumes. However, the traditional design of the range hoods has a low efficiency due to its working principle, and the efficiency decreases rapidly as the mounting height of the exhaust hood increases. This thesis is aimed at design and building a novel tornado-like vortex generator (TLVG) with an intelligent controller to enhance the efficiency of traditional range hood. Both experimental results and numerical simulation indicate that most of the cooking fumes are spreading to surrounding areas when the traditional range hood is working alone, while the cooking fumes are drawn into the tornado-like vortex and exhausted through the range hood when the novel TLVG is on. The effects of various factors on the efficiency of sucking cooking fumes are analyzed by orthogonal experiment design. The results show that the key factor affecting the performance of the TLVG is the horizontal jet angle. A higher jet velocity results in a lower negative pressure, which helps concentrate and exhaust the fume. The results also reveal that the exhaust flow velocity marginally affects the pressure around the source of cooking fumes, but the tornado-like vortex cannot be produced when the value of the exhaust flow velocity is too high. In addition, the figures of the velocity field, pressure field, and tracking particle field are plotted and analyzed. In this thesis, an intelligent controller of TLVG is designed and simulated to adapt to various types of range hoods. Adaptive-Network-based Fuzzy Inference System (ANFIS) is used in this intelligent controller, which combines the merits of both Fuzzy Inference Systems and Neural Networks. The results from the numerical simulation of the TLVG can be used to train and test the neural fuzzy system. Besides, Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) is used for effective training in ANFIS networks. Digital simulation results demonstrate that the designed ANFIS-Swarm controller realizes a better prediction of the checking data than that from a basic ANFIS controller. This study provides information for improving the kitchen environment, and it can also be applied to different types of range hood, exhaust ventilation system, and air pollution control

A hybrid machine-learning model to estimate potential debris-flow volumes

Empirical-statistical models of debris-flow are challenging to implement in environments where sedimentary and hydrologic triggering processes change through time, such as after a large earthquake. The flexible and adaptive statistical methods provided by machine learning algorithms may improve the quality of debris flow predictions where triggering conditions and the nature of sediment that can bulk flows varies with time. We developed a hybrid machine-learning model of future debris-flow volumes using a dataset of measured debris-flow volumes from 60 catchments that generated post-Wenchuan Earthquake (Mw 7.9) debris flows. We input topographic variables (catchment area, topographic relief, channel length, distance from seismic fault, and average channel gradient) and the total volume of co-seismic landslide debris into the PSO-ELM_AdaBoost machine-learning model, created by combining Extreme learning machine (ELM), particle swarm optimization (PSO) and adaptive boosting machine learning algorithm (AdaBoost). The model was trained and tested using post-2008 Mw 7.9 Wenchuan Earthquake debris flows, then applied to understand potential volumes of post-earthquake debris flows associated with other regional earthquakes (2013 Mw 6.6 Lushan Earthquake, 2010 Mw 6.9 Yushu Earthquake). We compared the PSO-ELM_Adaboost method with different machine learning methods, including back-propagation neural network (BPNN), support vector machine (SVM), ELM, PSO-ELM. The Comparative analysis demonstrated that the PSO-ELM_Adaboost method has a higher statistical validity and prediction accuracy with a mean absolute percentage error (MAPE) less than 0.10. The prediction accuracy of debris-flow volumes trigged by other earthquakes decreases to 0.11–0.16 (absolute percentage error), suggesting that once calibrated for a region this method can be applied to other regional earthquakes. This model may be useful for engineering design to mitigate the risk of large post-earthquake debris flows

Optimal seismic retrofitting of existing RC frames through soft-computing approaches

2016 - 2017Ph.D. Thesis proposes a Soft-Computing approach capable of supporting the engineer judgement in the selection and design of the cheapest solution for seismic retrofitting of existing RC framed structure. Chapter 1 points out the need for strengthening the existing buildings as one of the main way of decreasing economic and life losses as direct consequences of earthquake disasters. Moreover, it proposes a wide, but not-exhaustive, list of the most frequently observed deficiencies contributing to the vulnerability of concrete buildings. Chapter 2 collects the state of practice on seismic analysis methods for the assessment the safety of the existing buildings within the framework of a performancebased design. The most common approaches for modeling the material plasticity in the frame non-linear analysis are also reviewed. Chapter 3 presents a wide state of practice on the retrofitting strategies, intended as preventive measures aimed at mitigating the effect of a future earthquake by a) decreasing the seismic hazard demands; b) improving the dynamic characteristics supplied to the existing building. The chapter presents also a list of retrofitting systems, intended as technical interventions commonly classified into local intervention (also known “member-level” techniques) and global intervention (also called “structure-level” techniques) that might be used in synergistic combination to achieve the adopted strategy. In particular, the available approaches and the common criteria, respectively for selecting an optimum retrofit strategy and an optimal system are discussed. Chapter 4 highlights the usefulness of the Soft-Computing methods as efficient tools for providing “objective” answer in reasonable time for complex situation governed by approximation and imprecision. In particular, Chapter 4 collects the applications found in the scientific literature for Fuzzy Logic, Artificial Neural Network and Evolutionary Computing in the fields of structural and earthquake engineering with a taxonomic classification of the problems in modeling, simulation and optimization. Chapter 5 “translates” the search for the cheapest retrofitting system into a constrained optimization problem. To this end, the chapter includes a formulation of a novel procedure that assembles a numerical model for seismic assessment of framed structures within a Soft-Computing-driven optimization algorithm capable to minimize the objective function defined as the total initial cost of intervention. The main components required to assemble the procedure are described in the chapter: the optimization algorithm (Genetic Algorithm); the simulation framework (OpenSees); and the software environment (Matlab). Chapter 6 describes step-by-step the flow-chart of the proposed procedure and it focuses on the main implementation aspects and working details, ranging from a clever initialization of the population of candidate solutions up to a proposal of tuning procedure for the genetic parameters. Chapter 7 discusses numerical examples, where the Soft-Computing procedure is applied to the model of multi-storey RC frames obtained through simulated design. A total of fifteen “scenarios” are studied in order to assess its “robustness” to changes in input data. Finally, Chapter 8, on the base of the outcomes observed, summarizes the capabilities of the proposed procedure, yet highlighting its “limitations” at the current state of development. Some possible modifications are discussed to enhance its efficiency and completeness. [edited by author]XVI n.s

Shortest Route at Dynamic Location with Node Combination-Dijkstra Algorithm

Abstract— Online transportation has become a basic requirement of the general public in support of all activities to go to work, school or vacation to the sights. Public transportation services compete to provide the best service so that consumers feel comfortable using the services offered, so that all activities are noticed, one of them is the search for the shortest route in picking the buyer or delivering to the destination. Node Combination method can minimize memory usage and this methode is more optimal when compared to A* and Ant Colony in the shortest route search like Dijkstra algorithm, but can’t store the history node that has been passed. Therefore, using node combination algorithm is very good in searching the shortest distance is not the shortest route. This paper is structured to modify the node combination algorithm to solve the problem of finding the shortest route at the dynamic location obtained from the transport fleet by displaying the nodes that have the shortest distance and will be implemented in the geographic information system in the form of map to facilitate the use of the system. Keywords— Shortest Path, Algorithm Dijkstra, Node Combination, Dynamic Location (key words

Fuzzy logic with a novel advanced firefly algorithm and sensitivity analysis for semi-active suspension system using magneto-rheological damper

Semi-active suspension control with magnetorheological (MR) damper is one of the fascinating systems being studied in improving the vehicle dynamics. By using the MR damper system, a controllable system can be produced dynamically and the majority of the performance of a fully active system can potentially be achieved. Since the conventional optimization method always has a problem in identifying the optimum values and it is time consuming, the evolutionary algorithm is the best approach in replacing the conventional method as it is very efficient and consistent in exploring the values for every single space. In this study, the semi-active control schemes, namely fuzzy logic based controllers tuned using a novel optimization algorithm called advanced firefly algorithm (AFA) is proposed to regulate the body of the vehicle’s suspension from any disturbances acted to the system. The AFA is to be introduced based on the improvement of the original firefly algorithm (FA) to enhance the solution quality of the FA. The comparative assessment study of the proposed optimizer with other evolutionary algorithm, called the particle swarm optimization (PSO) is also presented. A simulation of semi-active suspension system with two degree of freedom is developed within MATLAB Simulink environment. The simulation result indicates that the FL-AFA exhibits an improvement in terms of sprung acceleration and sprung displacement response, with 51.4% and 52.3% as compared with the FL-FA controller, FL-PSO controller, FL controller and passive systems

Recent Development of Hybrid Renewable Energy Systems

Abstract: The use of renewable energies continues to increase. However, the energy obtained from renewable resources is variable over time. The amount of energy produced from the renewable energy sources (RES) over time depends on the meteorological conditions of the region chosen, the season, the relief, etc. So, variable power and nonguaranteed energy produced by renewable sources implies intermittence of the grid. The key lies in supply sources integrated to a hybrid system (HS)