Development And Verification Of Hardware-in-Loop Test Bench For Electrically Controlled Steering System

With the development of the automobile industry and electronic control technology, theautomobile is moving towards energy saving, environmental protection, lightweight andintelligent. As an important part of the automobile, steering system also shift from traditionalmechanical or hydraulic power system into electric power steering system, active frontsteering system, steer-by-wire system and other types of electronically controlled steeringsystem. Electrically controlled steering system can improve steering effort at low speed andsteering feel at high speed, thereby improving the handling stability of the automobile. It caneven improve the active safety of automobiles by active steering intervention in hazardousworking conditions.However, the development of electronically controlled steering system involvesmechanical, controller hardware, control algorithm and other aspects; therefore it need berevised repeatedly through several tests. At present, the development of electronicallycontrolled steering system is mainly based on the experiments of hardware-in-loop testbench and road tests. But in the early development of electrically controlled steering system,real vehicle tests may have security issues, cost more and take longer time. Thehardware-in-loop test bench can replace real vehicle to conduct experiments in variousconditions and to prepare for the road tests, thereby reducing the real vehicle tests,shortening development period, reducing development costs and gradually becoming theimportant part of research and development for electrically controlled steering system.This article relies on the national high technology research and development program(863programs)——"The Key Technology for Electric Automobile Chassis and VehicleControl"(No.2012AA110904), the985project "Development of Advanced AutomotiveElectronic Control Simulation Platform" and the project named "Research on the Joystickand the Bilateral Control Method for X-By-Wire Vehicle"(No.51105165). Based on theresearch of the existing steering system of our group, the related hardware-in-loop test benchfor electronic control steering at home and abroad is studied. Then a development scheme ofhardware-in-loop test bench based on dSPACE is proposed and the software and hardware ofthe test bench is developed. Then taking EPS system for example, the development andhardware-in-the-loop test of rapid control prototyping are verified on this test bench. Thisarticle mainly carries out the following research work: (1) The current situations of automotive electronic control steering systems andhardware-in-the-loop test benches have been comprehended. The development purposeand significance of the test bench are explicated and the research work of this paper isdetermined.(2) In accordance with development purposes and function requirements of thehardware-in-the-loop test bench for electrically controlled steering, combined with theactual situation of the research group, the overall concept design of the test bench isproposed and its working principle is described briefly.(3) The hardware-in-the-loop test bench for electrically controlled steering is developed anddesign and selection for the hardware are implemented according to the general schemeof the test bench and the target model matched. The hardware-in-the-loop real-timesimulation platform is built based on dSPACE. The hardware part of the test benchconsists of DS1103, MicroAutoBox II and the real vehicle’s steering system etc.(4) The software development of the hardware-in-the-loop test bench for electricallycontrolled steering is carried out. The software development is implemented according tothe general scheme of the test bench and the target model matched. EPS controller modeland steering resistance model of the test bench is modeled based on Matlab/Simulink andCarSim. The ControlDesk-based human-machine interface is designed.(5) In the test bench, the hardware-in-the-loop test for EPS control algorithm is conducted tosimulate real vehicle test for EPS system. Compared with the real vehicle tests, thereliability of the developed hardware-in-the-loop test bench for electronically controlledsteering is verified, which lays foundation for the development and test of the electricallycontrolled steering system in the test bench.