Advanced autonomous vehicle strings rely on inter-vehicle communication in order to decrease the necessary safety gap so that fuel consumption can be decreased and road capacity can be increased. In case of failures of some communication channels, the corresponding back-up control strategy must be switched on. Maximal spacing errors of such back-up modes are analyzed and compared. Robustness to platoon heterogeneity and communication delays are considered. The main conclusion we can draw is that, in the full communication mode, satisfactory spacing performance can be achieved by using simple output-feedback controllers designed without detailed knowledge on engine/brake characteristics, only utilizing the existing services available today in every commercial heavy trucks with automatic gearbox. Experimental verification of the designed controllers are presented.

 In this article a switching model predictive control scheme for an articulated vehicle under varying slip angles is being presented. For the non--holonomic articulated vehicle, the non--linear kinematic model that is able to take under consideration the effect of the slip angles is extracted. This model is transformed into an error dynamics model, which in the sequence is linearized around multiple nominal slip angle cases. The existence of the slip angles has a significant effect on the vehicle's path tracking capability and can significantly deteriorate the performance of the overall control scheme. Based on the derived multiple error dynamic models, the varying slip angle is being considered as the switching rule and a corresponding switching mode predictive control scheme is being designed that it is also able to take under consideration: a) the constrains on the control signals and b) the state constraints. Multiple simulation results are being presented that prove the efficacy of the overall suggested scheme.

 This paper presents innovative subsystems of the ER11 prototype urban vehicle, which is powered by hydrogen fuel cells and ultra-capacitors. The subsystems described here are: 1) the energy management system, which is responsible for the optimization of the fuel efficiency and the increased mileage of the vehicle, 2) the drivers monitoring and control panel and 3) the power transmission system, which offers the possibility of continuous change of gear. The powertrain of the test-bed vehicle consists of an electric motor, a fuel (Η2) cell system, an ultra-capacitor bank and a DC/DC converter. Testing verified that the proposed energy management system is benefitted by the variable transmission of power leading to less fuel consumption.

 In automotive applications the emission reduction and fuel consumption are relevant goals for manufactures so that several devices are introduce in the engine. One of such devices is Variable Valve Timing (VVT), modeled in this paper, that represents a complex multi physic system designed to control the intake camshaft: by opening and closing time of inlet and outlet valves are modified so that the engine conditions can satisfy the gaols in term of torque improvement in all the speed ranges as well as increasing fuel economy and reducing exhaust emission. In this paper the Power Oriented Graph (POG) technique has been used for modeling the considered electromechanical system allowing to detect some hide variables not readable by the sensors. The effectiveness of the proposed model has been validated using an experimental set-up.

 This paper deals with the sensorless control of Electric Power-Assisted Steering (EPAS) system with the permanent magnet synchronous motor (PMSM) using sliding mode techniques. Using steering wheel angle and motor currents measurements, two cascaded sliding mode observers with unknown inputs are designed. The whole observer generates the driver torque needed to determine the amount of the assistance and the other pieces of information needed to implement the controller. H-infinity sliding mode control is designed to generate the basic assist torque, improve damping characteristics of EPAS and attenuate the mismatched disturbances. Simulation results show the effectiveness of the proposed control.

 Up to now feedforward controllers are seldomly used for the control of automotive vehicle drivetrains. This is partially due to the fact that this popular approach which is based on the inversion of a nominal model may become rather involved. In this paper we illustrate the simplicity and effeciency of flatness based feedforward controller design for the drivetrains of electric and hybrid electric vehicles.