A multisensing setup for the intelligent tire monitoring

The present paper offers the chance to experimentally measure, for the first time, the internal tire strain by optical fiber sensors during the tire rolling in real operating conditions. The phenomena that take place during the tire rolling are in fact far from being completely understood. Despite several models available in the technical literature, there is not a correspondently large set of experimental observations. The paper includes the detailed description of the new multi-sensing technology for an ongoing vehicle measurement, which the research group has developed in the context of the project OPTYRE. The experimental apparatus is mainly based on the use of optical fibers with embedded Fiber Bragg Gratings sensors for the acquisition of the circumferential tire strain. Other sensors are also installed on the tire, such as a phonic wheel, a uniaxial accelerometer, and a dynamic temperature sensor. The acquired information is used as input variables in dedicated algorithms that allow the identification of key parameters, such as the dynamic contact patch, instantaneous dissipation and instantaneous grip. The OPTYRE project brings a contribution into the field of experimental grip monitoring of wheeled vehicles, with implications both on passive and active safety characteristics of cars and motorbikes

Next-Generation Pedal: Integration of Sensors in a Braking Pedal for a Full Brake-by-Wire System

This article presents a novel approach to designing and validating a fully electronic braking pedal, addressing the growing integration of electronics in vehicles. With the imminent rise of brake-by-wire (BBW) technology, the brake pedal requires electronification to keep pace with industry advancements. This research explores technologies and features for the next-generation pedal, including low-power consumption electronics, cost-effective sensors, active adjustable pedals, and a retractable pedal for autonomous vehicles. Furthermore, this research brings the benefits of the water injection technique (WIT) as the base for manufacturing plastic pedal brakes towards reducing cost and weight while enhancing torsional stiffness. Communication with original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) has provided valuable insights and feedback, facilitating a productive exchange of ideas. The findings include two sensor prototypes utilizing inductive technology and printed-ink gauges. Significantly, reduced power consumption was achieved in a Hall-effect sensor already in production. Additionally, a functional BBW prototype was developed and validated. This research presents an innovative approach to pedal design that aligns with current electrification trends and autonomous vehicles. It positions the braking pedal as an advanced component that has the potential to redefine industry standards. In summary, this research significantly contributes to the electronic braking pedal technology presenting the critical industry needs that have driven technical studies and progress in the field of sensors, electronics, and materials, highlighting the challenges that component manufacturers will inevitably face in the forthcoming years.This work has been partially supported by the grant “Ayudas para el desarrollo de proyectos de I+D mediante la contratación de personas doctoradas y la realización de doctorados industriales, programa BIKAINTEK 2019” by the Department of Economic Development, Sustainability, and Environment of the Basque Government. Additionally, this work has been partially supported by the Government of Spain, through the Center for the Development of Industrial Technology (CDTI) under grant agreement IDI-20200198 and by Eusko Jaularitza-Gobierno Vasco (SOC4CRIS KK-2023/00015)

Active suspension control of electric vehicle with in-wheel motors

In-wheel motor (IWM) technology has attracted increasing research interests in recent years due to the numerous advantages it offers. However, the direct attachment of IWMs to the wheels can result in an increase in the vehicle unsprung mass and a significant drop in the suspension ride comfort performance and road holding stability. Other issues such as motor bearing wear motor vibration, air-gap eccentricity and residual unbalanced radial force can adversely influence the motor vibration, passenger comfort and vehicle rollover stability. Active suspension and optimized passive suspension are possible methods deployed to improve the ride comfort and safety of electric vehicles equipped with inwheel motor. The trade-off between ride comfort and handling stability is a major challenge in active suspension design. This thesis investigates the development of novel active suspension systems for successful implementation of IWM technology in electric cars. Towards such aim, several active suspension methods based on robust H∞ control methods are developed to achieve enhanced suspension performance by overcoming the conflicting requirement between ride comfort, suspension deflection and road holding. A novel fault-tolerant H∞ controller based on friction compensation is in the presence of system parameter uncertainties, actuator faults, as well as actuator time delay and system friction is proposed. A friction observer-based Takagi-Sugeno (T-S) fuzzy H∞ controller is developed for active suspension with sprung mass variation and system friction. This method is validated experimentally on a quarter car test rig. The experimental results demonstrate the effectiveness of proposed control methods in improving vehicle ride performance and road holding capability under different road profiles. Quarter car suspension model with suspended shaft-less direct-drive motors has the potential to improve the road holding capability and ride performance. Based on the quarter car suspension with dynamic vibration absorber (DVA) model, a multi-objective parameter optimization for active suspension of IWM mounted electric vehicle based on genetic algorithm (GA) is proposed to suppress the sprung mass vibration, motor vibration, motor bearing wear as well as improving ride comfort, suspension deflection and road holding stability. Then a fault-tolerant fuzzy H∞ control design approach for active suspension of IWM driven electric vehicles in the presence of sprung mass variation, actuator faults and control input constraints is proposed. The T-S fuzzy suspension model is used to cope with the possible sprung mass variation. The output feedback control problem for active suspension system of IWM driven electric vehicles with actuator faults and time delay is further investigated. The suspended motor parameters and vehicle suspension parameters are optimized based on the particle swarm optimization. A robust output feedback H∞ controller is designed to guarantee the system’s asymptotic stability and simultaneously satisfying the performance constraints. The proposed output feedback controller reveals much better performance than previous work when different actuator thrust losses and time delay occurs. The road surface roughness is coupled with in-wheel switched reluctance motor air-gap eccentricity and the unbalanced residual vertical force. Coupling effects between road excitation and in wheel switched reluctance motor (SRM) on electric vehicle ride comfort are also analysed in this thesis. A hybrid control method including output feedback controller and SRM controller are designed to suppress SRM vibration and to prolong the SRM lifespan, while at the same time improving vehicle ride comfort. Then a state feedback H∞ controller combined with SRM controller is designed for in-wheel SRM driven electric vehicle with DVA structure to enhance vehicle and SRM performance. Simulation results demonstrate the effectiveness of DVA structure based active suspension system with proposed control method its ability to significantly improve the road holding capability and ride performance, as well as motor performance

Model-based powertrain design and control system development for the ideal all-wheel drive electric vehicle

The transfer case based all-wheel drive electric vehicle (TCAWDEV) and dual-axle AWDEV have been investigated to balance concerns about energy consumption, drivability and stability of vehicles. However, the mentioned powertrain architectures have the torque windup issue or the wheel skidding issue. The torque windup is an inherent issue of mechanical linked all-wheel drive systems. The hydraulic motor-based or the electric motor-based ideal all-wheel drive powertrain can provide feasible solutions to the mentioned issues. An ideal AWDEV (IAWDEV) powertrain architecture and its control schemes were proposed by this research; the architecture has four independent driving motors in powertrain. The IAWDEV gives more control freedoms to implement active torque controls and traction mode controls. In essence, this research came up with the distributed powertrain concept, and developed control schemes of the distributed powertrain to replace the transfer case and differential devices. The study investigated the dual-loop motor control, the hybrid sliding mode control (HSMC) and the neural network predictive control to reduce energy consumption and achieve better drivability and stability by optimizing the torque allocation of each dependent wheel. The mentioned control schemes were respectively developed for the anti-slip, differential and yaw stability functionalities of the IAWDEV powertrain. This study also investigated the sizing method that the battery capacity was estimated by using cruise performance at 3% road grade. In addition, the model-based verification was employed to evaluate the proposed powertrain design and control schemes. The verification shows that the design and controls can fulfill drivability requirements and minimize the existing issues, including torque windup and chattering of the slipping wheel. In addition, the verification shows that the IAWDEV can harvest around two times more energy while the vehicle is running on slippery roads than the TCAWDEV and the dual-axle AWDEV; the traction control can achieve better drivability and lower energy consumption than mentioned powertrains; the mode control can reduce 3% of battery charge depleting during the highway driving test. It also provides compelling evidences that the functionalities achieved by complicated and costly mechanical devices can be carried out by control schemes of the IAWDEV; the active torque controls can solve the inherent issues of mechanical linked powertrains; the sizing method is credible to estimate the operation envelop of powertrain components, even though there is some controllable over-sizing

Design of a Smart Tire Sensor System

A research project is conducted that involves the design of a smart tire sensor system that can determine six tire outputs, including tire longitudinal force, tire lateral force, tire vertical force, tire aligning moment, tire / road friction coefficient and tire air inflation pressure. All of these quantities are estimated using in-tire deformation sensors. The rationale for conducting the smart tire research project is that its results have the potential to improve ground vehicle safety. The objectives of the research project are to identify the quantity and types of sensors required, determine the sensor locations and orientations in the tire, develop post-processing methods for the raw sensor output and confirm correct operation of the sensor system, which involves prototyping and physical testing. Strain is predicted in the tire inner liner as part of a tire finite element analysis study. The tire finite element model is used to calculate strain (inputs) and tire forces (outputs) for use in artificial neural networks. Results from the radial basis function networks studied are excellent, with calculated tire forces within 1% and tire aligning moment within 1%. The conclusion is that radial basis function networks can likely be used effectively for analysis of strain sensor measurements in the smart tire sensor system. Further studies using virtual strain show that the system should have two in-tire strain sensors located near one another at the outside sidewall, with one oriented longitudinally and the other oriented radially, along with an angular position sensor. Commercially available piezoelectric deformation sensors are installed in this layout, along with a rotary encoder, in a smart tire physical prototype. On-road data collected during physical testing are used with radial basis function neural networks to estimate the three orthogonal tire forces and the tire aligning moment. The networks are found capable of predicting the correct trends in the tire force data over several testing events. While the smart tire sensor system in its current state of development is not production-ready, the research project has resulted in new scientific knowledge that will be the foundation of future smart tire work. Contributions include the identification of in-tire sensor quantity, locations and orientations, confirmation that an angular position measurement is necessary and the determination of the artificial neural network architecture. The most significant remaining smart tire technical hurdle is the identification of a sufficiently durable strain sensor for in-tire use. If this strain sensor can be found, the next steps will include validation of the non-force tire estimates and studies of temperature effects, wireless data transmission and energy harvesting for a battery free design. Despite these outstanding concerns, the results of the smart tire research project show that the concept is feasible and further work is justified.1 yea

Reaaliaikaisen mittausmenetelmän kehittäminen renkaan maaperäkontaktin vaikutuksen analysoimiseksi maatalouden maataloustraktorien liikkuvuuteen

Tämän tutkielman tavoitteena oli suunnitella, rakentaa ja testata helposti asennettava ja käytettävä mittauslaitteisto, joka pystyisi mittaamaan reaaliajassa yksinkertaisia suureita, joiden avulla olisi mahdollista arvioida renkaiden ja maaperän välisen kontaktin vaikutusta maataloustraktorien liikkuvuuteen. Kehitetty mittauslaitteisto perustuu Arduino Uno mikrokontrolleriin kytkettyihin kiihtyvyys- ja etäisyys antureihin sekä traktorin väylätietojen lukemiseen. CAN-väylän lukeminen ja tietojen tallentaminen tapahtui RaspberryPi pienoistietokoneeseen liitetyn CAN-väylä kortin avulla. Anturit kalibroitiin ja niiden herkkyys tarkistettiin ennen kokeiden suorittamista peltoajossa. Kiihtyvyysanturit sijoitettiin traktorin taka-akselin päälle molempiin päihin koteloihin ja etäisyysanturit kiinnitettiin akselin takapuolelle. Kaikkia antureita luettiin RaspberryPi:n sarjaporttiin liitetyn Arduinon välityksellä ja tiedot tallennettiin tehdyllä python ohjelmalla. Raspberry Pi valittiin tietokoneeksi sen vähäisen tilavuusvaatimuksen, alhaisen hinnan sekä liitäntöjen monipuolisuuden vuoksi. Pellon ominaisuuksia seurattiin kuukausittain suoritetuilla penetrometri mittauksilla sekä maahan upotetuilla SoilScout antureilla, jotka kertoivat maan kosteuden sekä lämpötilan kyseisessä syvyydessä reaaliajassa. Tämän tarkoituksena oli saada selville pellossa kasvukauden aikana tapahtuvat muutokset, jotka vaikuttaisivat myös traktorin liikkumiskykyyn. Mittaukset onnistuivat hyvin ja tulokset arvioitiin olevan laadultaan luotettavia, joten ne tarjoavat monia muita mahdollisuuksia tulevaisuudessa. Tulokset osoittivat selvästi traktorin liikkuvuuteen vaikuttavat tekijät ja maanmuokkauksen eri vaiheet pystyttiin havainnoimaan. Tulevaisuuden haasteina säilyvät edelleen suuren tietomäärän suodattaminen sekä mittauslaitteiden soveltaminen jatkotutkimuksissa. Työssä kehitetty mittauslaitteisto soveltuu tarkoitukseensa mittaustarkkuuden sekä kustannustehokkuutensa puolesta hyvin. Tulevaisuudessa parempaan tarkkuuteen voitaisiin päästä tarkemmilla mittalaitteilla sekä tämän työn pohjalta saaduilla tiedoilla.The purpose of this thesis was to design, build and test a system, which is capable of measuring in real time simple quantities influencing on tire-soil contact of agricultural tractors mobility. The measuring equipment is based on acceleration and distance sensors connected to the Arduino Uno microcontroller. The tractor’s CAN bus was logged and the data was saved using a CAN bus card connected to a Raspberry Pi minicomputer. The sensors were calibrated, and their sensitivity checked before performing the experiments while driving in the field. Accelerometers were placed on top of the rear axle of the tractor at both ends in housings printed for them and distance sensors were mounted behind the rear axle. All sensors were logged by using Raspberry's Raspbian operating system with a python program. The Raspberry was chosen as a computer because of its demanding low space, low cost, and versatility of interfaces. The properties of the field were monitored by monthly penetrometer measurements as well as SoilScout sensors embedded in the ground, which indicated the moisture and temperature of the ground at that depth in real time. The purpose of this was to find out the changes in the field during the growing season, which would also affect the tractor's mobility. The measurement were carried out successfully and the result were considered to be reliable and provide many other opportunities for the future. The results clearly indicated the factors influencing the tractor’s mobility and the different stages of the tillage could be recognized. Future challenges remain the filtering of large amounts of data and the application of measuring equipment in further research. The measurement equipment developed in the work is well suited for its purpose in terms of measurement accuracy and economical affordability. In the future, better accuracy could be achieved with more accurate measuring devices as well as data obtained from this work

Development of Integrated Systematic Approach Conceptual Design and TRIZ using Safety Principles in Embodiment Design for Complex Products

There are many conceptual design methods available for the engineering design world. Of all the methods, two significant methods are chosen to be integrated for the effective conceptual design process. These are the systematic Approach (SA) and the Theory of Inventive Problem Solving (TRIZ). SA consists of the Systematic Approach Conceptual Design (SACD) and Systematic Approach Embodiment Design (SAED), which were established by Pahl and Beitz, and widely used in industry and by academics. In addition, TRIZ is actively practiced in companies that wish to innovate creative and inventive designs. Although both methods have contrasting features there are some similarities that enable them to be united and harmonized. Many scholars have attempted to develop a new methodology by combining SA and TRIZ but none have integrated the safety principles of SAED with the inventive principles of TRIZ. In designing complex artefacts, constraints and safety are the main issues in the design change process. Implementing safety at a later stage might compromise the concept ideas and end up being a conventional and common concept design. This study developed a conceptual design method, TRIZ-SA, with a specialized safety approach combining the Function Constraint Model (FCM) and the Safety Principle Guide (SPG) as the method’s tools. The method aims to encourage the intervention of safety in the conceptual design process to stimulate ideas for solutions that are efficient in safety and creativity. The development of TRIZ-SA is through qualitative content analysis of the work of many scholars and patents. The pairwise comparative analysis is also conducted in the development of the 8-Step. The validation of the combined method for the safety approach is done through a conceptual design case study on the geometric and shape design of an aircraft’s Main Landing Gear (MLG). The combination of SA and TRIZ resulted in an easier solution finding process for an artefact that requires high concern in terms of safety, thereby opening up a new perspective in the designing concept of a complex artefact and shaping the design path towards a safe and creative concept design. The implications of this study will help designers optimize and develop a safe and inventive concept design in an effective and creative way

Volume 3 – Conference

We are pleased to present the conference proceedings for the 12th edition of the International Fluid Power Conference (IFK). The IFK is one of the world’s most significant scientific conferences on fluid power control technology and systems. It offers a common platform for the presentation and discussion of trends and innovations to manufacturers, users and scientists. The Chair of Fluid-Mechatronic Systems at the TU Dresden is organizing and hosting the IFK for the sixth time. Supporting hosts are the Fluid Power Association of the German Engineering Federation (VDMA), Dresdner Verein zur Förderung der Fluidtechnik e. V. (DVF) and GWT-TUD GmbH. The organization and the conference location alternates every two years between the Chair of Fluid-Mechatronic Systems in Dresden and the Institute for Fluid Power Drives and Systems in Aachen. The symposium on the first day is dedicated to presentations focused on methodology and fundamental research. The two following conference days offer a wide variety of application and technology orientated papers about the latest state of the art in fluid power. It is this combination that makes the IFK a unique and excellent forum for the exchange of academic research and industrial application experience. A simultaneously ongoing exhibition offers the possibility to get product information and to have individual talks with manufacturers. The theme of the 12th IFK is “Fluid Power – Future Technology”, covering topics that enable the development of 5G-ready, cost-efficient and demand-driven structures, as well as individual decentralized drives. Another topic is the real-time data exchange that allows the application of numerous predictive maintenance strategies, which will significantly increase the availability of fluid power systems and their elements and ensure their improved lifetime performance. We create an atmosphere for casual exchange by offering a vast frame and cultural program. This includes a get-together, a conference banquet, laboratory festivities and some physical activities such as jogging in Dresden’s old town.:Group 8: Pneumatics Group 9 | 11: Mobile applications Group 10: Special domains Group 12: Novel system architectures Group 13 | 15: Actuators & sensors Group 14: Safety & reliabilit

Regenerative Dampers for FSAE Race Car

Master'sMASTER OF ENGINEERIN