Torque Vectoring Control Strategies Comparison for Hybrid Vehicles with Two Rear Electric Motors

Abstract

In today’s automotive industry, electrification is a major trend. In-wheel electric motors are among the most promising technologies yet to be fully developed. Indeed, the presence of multiple in-wheel motors acting as independent actuators allows for the implementation of innovative active systems and control strategies. This paper analyzes different design possibilities for a torque vectoring system applied to an originally compact front-wheel drive hybrid electric vehicle with one internal combustion engine for the front axle and two added electric motors integrated in the wheels of the rear axle. A 14 degrees of freedom vehicle model is present o accurately reproduce the nonlinearities of vehicle dynamic phenomena and exploited to obtain high-fidelity numerical simulation results. Different control methods are compared, a PID, an LQR, and four different sliding mode control strategies. All controllers achieve sufficiently good results in terms of lateral dynamics compared with the basic hybrid version. The various aspects and features of the different strategies are analyzed and discussed. Chattering reduction strategies are developed to improve the performance of sliding mode controllers. For a complete overview, control systems are compared using a performance factor that weighs control accuracy and effort in different driving maneuvers, i.e., ramp and step steering maneuvers performed under quite different conditions ranging up to the limits.