Backstepping control of a vehicle with active suspensions

Abstract

In this study, a backstepping control design is presented for the control of a vehicle active suspension system. A seven degrees of freedom (DoF), non-linear full vehicle model is used. Backstepping control is preferred in this study since it offers a systematic procedure for the construction of the Lyapunov functions and related feedback control laws, which guarantee the stability of the system with a very successful improvement in ride comfort. Additionally, some implementation issues concerning the controller design are addressed to improve the applicability and performance of the controller. Thereafter, the efficiency of the controller is evaluated both in time and frequency domains. For the time domain analysis, different road conditions are considered in order to reveal the performance of the controller in detail. Finally, some concluding remarks are given at the end of the paper. (c) 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.