Title: Actuator fault reconstruction in an 8-DOF vehicle active suspension system using sliding mode observer

Authors: Salar Malekzadeh; Ali Ghaffari

Addresses: Department of Mechanical Engineering, K.N. Toosi University of Technology, MollaSadra St., Tehran, Iran ' Department of Mechanical Engineering, K.N. Toosi University of Technology, MollaSadra St., Tehran, Iran

Abstract: In this paper, an 8-DOF vehicle model including driver seat dynamics, subjected to random road disturbances, is introduced in order to aid the fault detection of actuators in the active suspension system. State feedback control approach is taken in the eight degrees of freedom active suspension system. To estimate the system unavailable states, a sliding mode observer is used. Also, using the sliding mode observer, fault detection of actuators in the active suspension system is performed. The most important specification of this method is its robustness against system uncertainties and external disturbances. In the used fault detection method a direct estimate of the size and severity of the fault is provided which can be important in many applications. The simulation results indicate that actuator faults in the full active suspension system in the presence of external disturbances and model uncertainties are well reconstructed.

Keywords: actuator fault reconstruction; 8-DOF vehicle modelling; vehicle suspension; active suspension; sliding mode observer; driver seat dynamics; random disturbances; road disturbances; fault detection; actuators; state feedback control; simulation; model uncertainties; vehicle safety.

DOI: 10.1504/IJVS.2015.068683

International Journal of Vehicle Safety, 2015 Vol.8 No.2, pp.101 - 114

Received: 20 Jan 2014
Accepted: 06 Aug 2014
Published online: 08 Apr 2015 *

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