Fuzzy predictive Stanley lateral controller with adaptive prediction horizon

The challenge of trajectory tracking of autonomous vehicles (AVs) is a critical aspect that must be effectively addressed. Recent studies are concerned with maintaining the yaw stability to guarantee the customers' comfort throughout the journey. Most of the geometrical controllers solve this task by dividing it into consecutive point stabilization problems, limiting the controllers' ability to handle sudden trajectory changes. One research presented a predictive Stanley lateral controller that uses a discrete prediction model to mimic human behavior by anticipating the vehicle's future states. That controller is limited in its use, as the parameters must be manually tuned for every change in the maneuver or vehicle velocity. This article presents a novel approach for trajectory tracking in autonomous vehicles, by introducing a fuzzy supervisory controller that automatically adapts to changes in the vehicle's velocity and maneuver by estimating the prediction horizon's length and providing different weights for each controller. The proposed method overcomes the limitations of traditional controllers that require manual tuning of parameters, making it ready for real-world experiments. This is the main contribution of the research in this paper. The suggested technique demonstrated an advantage over the Basic Stanley controller and the manually tuned predictive Stanley controller in terms of the total lateral error and the model predictive control (MPC) in terms of computational time. The performance is determined by performing various simulations on V-Rep and hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) experiments on an E-CAR golf bus. A broad selection of velocities is used to validate the behavior of the vehicle while working on different maneuvers (double lane change, hook road, S road, and curved road).