Study on a linear relationship between limited pressure difference and coil current of on/off valve and its influential factors

A Novel Double Redundant Brake-by-Wire System for High Automation Driving Safety: Design, Optimization and Experimental Validation

The high redundant brake-by-wire system reveals vehicular safety handling ability and rarely emerges in the automotive area at the present time. This paper presents a novel brake-by-wire system, DREHB (Double Redundant Electro-Hydraulic Brake), with extensible fail-safe operations for high-automation autonomous driving vehicles. The DREHB is designed as a decoupled-architecture system containing three-layer cascaded modules, including a hydraulic power provider, a hydraulic flow switcher, and a hydraulic pressure modulator, and each of the modules can share dual redundancy. The operating principles of the DREHB in normal and degraded initiative braking modes are introduced, especially for the consideration of fail-safe and fail-operational functions. The matching and optimization of selected key parameters of the electric boost master cylinder and the linear solenoid valve were conducted using computer-aided batched simulations with a DREHB system modeled in MATLAB/Simulink and AMESim. The prototype of the DREHB was tested in hardware-in-the-loop experiments. The test results of typical braking scenarios verify the feasibility and effectiveness of the DREHB system, and the hydraulic pressure response as 28.0 MPa/s and tracking error within 0.15 MPa and the desirable fail-safe braking ability fully meets the requirements of higher braking safety and efficiency.

A Real-Time Realization Method for the Pneumatic Positioning System of the Industrial Automated Production Line Using Low-Cost On–Off Valves

In the industrial automated production line, how to use the existing low-cost pneumatic equipment to obtain the best positioning effect has become a significant engineering problem. In this paper, a differential switching method is proposed in a pneumatic servo system consisting of four low-cost on–off valves for more precise control and lower prices. All valves are simultaneously open at the initial stage of each control period, and the differential closing time of the desired valves is calculated through the theoretical models. A sliding mode controller is applied with the proposed method, and the system stability is proven. The real-time control setup including three software layers is proposed to implement the algorithm. Several experiments are performed on a real-time embedded controller. Average 0.83% overshoot and 0.18 mm steady-state error are observed in the step response experiment. The highest frequency of sine wave that can be tracked is 1 Hz, and the average error is 1.68 mm. The maximum steady-state error is about 0.5 mm in the step response under payloads of 5.25 kg. All the simulation and experimental results prove the effectiveness of the control method.

An Electro-Pneumatic Force Tracking System using Fuzzy Logic Based Volume Flow Control

In this paper, a fuzzy logic based volume flow control method is proposed to precisely control the force of a pneumatic actuator in an electro-pneumatic system including four on-off valves. The volume flow feature, which is the relationship between the duty cycle of the pulse width modulation (PWM) period, pressure difference, and volume flow of an on-off valve, is based on the experimental data measured by a high-precision volume flow meter. Through experimental data analysis, the maximum and minimum duty cycles are acquired. A new volume flow control method is introduced for the pneumatic system. In this method, the raw measured data are innovatively processed by a segmented, polynomial fitting method, and a newly designed procedure for calculating the duty cycle is adopted. This procedure makes it possible to combine the original data with fuzzy logic control (FLC). Additionally, the method allows us to accurately control the minimum and maximum opening pulse width of the valve. Several experiments are performed based on the experimental data, instead of the traditional theoretical models. Only 0.141 N (1.41%) overshoot and 0.03 N (0.03%) steady-state error are observed in the step response experiment, and 0.123 N average error is found while tracking the sine wave reference.

Actuator stiction compensation via variable amplitude pulses

A novel model free stiction compensation scheme is developed which eliminates the oscillations and also reduces valve movement, allowing good setpoint tracking and disturbance rejection. Pulses with varying amplitude are added to the controller output to overcome stiction and when the error becomes smaller than a specified limit, the compensation ceases and remains in a standby mode. The compensation re-starts as soon as the error exceeds the user specified threshold. The ability to cope with uncertainty in friction is a feature achieved by the use of pulses of varying amplitude. The algorithm has been evaluated via simulation and by application on an industrial DCS system interfaced to a pilot scale process with features identical to those found in industry including a valve positioner.

Simulation and experimental control of a 3-RPR parallel robot using optimal fuzzy controller and fast on/off solenoid valves based on the PWM wave

In this paper, a robust optimal fuzzy controller based on the Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) technique is proposed to control a laboratory parallel robot using inexpensive on/off solenoid valves. The controller coefficients are determined using Modified Cuckoo Optimization Algorithm. The objective function of this method is considered such that the results show the position tracking by the robot with less force and more efficiency. Regarding the results of experimental tests, the control strategy with on/off valves indicates good performance such that the maximum value of RMS of error for a circular path with increasing force on the system is 3.1mm. Furthermore, the results show the superiority of the optimal fuzzy controller compared with optimal PID controller in tracking paths with different conditions and uncertainties.

Modelling and experimental validation of Textile Pockets based active inflatable device

This paper aims with the mathematical modelling of an active inflatable device. This device is composed of a compressor, an Electro-pneumatic Pressure Converter (EPC) and an Inflatable Textile fabric Pocket (ITP). The later has interesting mechanical properties and is fabricated using Jacquard knitting technique which allows automatic production of unlimited varieties of pattern weaving without any mould. Thanks to these features, these ITPs have provided a better alternative to the classical airbags made by stretchable polymer material. The proposed mathematical model is obtained by combining sub-models of two main parts of the whole system. In this way, a generalised and flexible model is obtained which can easily take into consideration the ITPs of different shapes. The pressure dynamics inside the ITP are considered by taking into account the air flow rate, variation of the volume of ITP and the length of pneumatic lines joining ITP with compressed air source. The parameters of the whole mathematical model are obtained via identification techniques. The effectiveness of the model is assessed through several experimental tests with the help of a servo hydraulic fatigue testing machine.