Robust Differential Steering Control System for an Independent Four Wheel Drive Electric Vehicle

This research investigates a robust differential steering control system (DSCS) for an independent four wheel drive electric vehicle (EV). The DSCS will maneuver the independently actuated (IA) four wheel drive EV without the help of any conventional steering mechanism (CSM) via the input torque of the four wheels. The differential angular rotation speed between left and right wheels is used to generate the CSM effects. The DSCS is designed using the linear model of the vehicle with linear tire dynamics and is tested in simulations using a nonlinear vehicle model with nonlinear tire dynamics. The proposed DSCS is a combination of forward speed and yaw rate controllers, designed using the robust H∞ control methodology. The effectiveness of the proposed robust controller is analyzed by comparing the performance of the all-wheel drive (AWD), the rear wheel drive (RWD), and the front wheel drive (FWD) vehicles during simulations. The simulations results indicates that the proposed system can successfully maneuver the vehicle under different driving conditions by tracking the desired parameters without the use of any CSM.