Control strategy for vibration suppression of a vehicle multibody system on a bumpy road

The demand of accurate and real-time dynamics model has recently become critical for implementing effective vibration control in vehicles. The multibody dynamics method provides an appealing alternative for accurate modelling of closed-loop vehicles. In this work, vibration-suppression strategies for a vehicle traversing a bumpy road are proposed, which use a semi-recursive multibody model and a series of control algorithms. First, a 17-degree-of-freedom vehicle is modelled using a semi-recursive multibody method to perform real-time simulation. The vehicle multibody model is verified by using the results from a commercial software package. Second, the PID, fuzzy, and optimal control algorithms are tailored using the obtained vehicle states for vibration suppression. By applying different initial speeds and driving torques, the simulations of the vehicle traversing the bumpy road are performed. The results show that the controllers effectively suppress the vehicle's vibration, and the optimal controller has the best performance. Furthermore, the effect of mass uncertainty on vibration-suppression is discussed. Numerical experiments are performed to verify the effectiveness of the optimal control strategy. The vibration-suppression method based on the vehicle multibody model and the optimal control algorithm can be used to improve the ride comfort in worse road conditions.