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SAE TECHNICAL PAPER SERIES

2000-01-1633

Bosch ESP Systems: 5 Years of Experience

A. T. van Zanten
Robert Bosch G.m.b.H.

Reprinted From: Proceedings of the Automotive Dynamics & Stability Conference (P-354)

SAE Automotive Dynamics & Stability Conference Troy, Michigan May 15-17, 2000
400 Commonwealth Drive, Warrendale, PA 15096-0001 U.S.A. Tel: (724) 776-4841 Fax: (724) 776-5760

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2000-01-1633

Bosch ESP Systems: 5 Years of Experience

A. T. van Zanten
Robert Bosch G.m.b.H.
Copyright 2000 Society of Automotive Engineers, Inc.

ABSTRACT
Although the total number of car occupants involved in accidents in Germany has not significantly reduced during the past 10 years, the number of fatalities has steadily decreased. Most of the severe accidents result from a loss of control of the car. The problem of the driver losing control of his car will be explained. This problem is then used to formulate the goal for the vehicle dynamics control system ESP (Electronic Stability Program, also known as VDC). The approach chosen to reach this goal will then be shown. It will be shown that the vehicle slip angle is a crucial indicator for the maneuverability of the automobile. Since the complete vehicle state is not readily available, estimation algorithms are used to supply the control algorithms with sufficient information. With the automatic control of the slip angle the required yaw moment can be generated by individual wheel slip control. By using two examples it will be shown, that ESP can significantly improve vehicle handling in extreme maneuvers by automatically controlling the brakes and the engine.

at the limit of adhesion between the tires and the road. At this limit the tire behavior is extremely nonlinear and the linearized tire-wheel-brake system is unstable. As a result, the vehicle may suddenly spin and the driver is caught by surprise. Usually in these situations the driver tends to automatically steer too much and thus worsen the situation. In both cases the vehicle dynamics control system ESP helps the driver keep his car under control ([2], [3], [4]). Frster ([5]) demands putting the average driver and the human behavior at the center of all considerations regarding the concept of vehicle handling. ESP which , influences handling at the physical limit is also designed to follow that principle. Since the average driver has no idea of the frictional stability margin between the tire and the road he may panic if the physical limit is reached and if the car starts to spin. He cannot be expected to react in a thoughtful manner. On the contrary, his reaction is often wrong and he will usually steer too much. ESP must therefore also be designed from the point of view of preventing panic situations. Shibahata [6] has explained why the handling of cars at the physical limit is so difficult. He developed a simple method, the -method (Fig. 1) with which this difficulty can easily be explained. If the steering wheel is turned, then a yaw moment on the car is generated by the lateral forces on the tires. The yaw moment leads to a change in the yaw velocity of the car. However, the yaw moment also depends on the slip angle of the car. With increasing slip angles, the yaw moment gain decreases. At large slip angles the yaw moment can hardly be influenced by changing the steering angle. Typically, at the physical limit the steerability of the car is almost lost. On dry asphalt roads the physical limit is reached at a slip angle of approx. 12, while on ice this value is approx. 2. If the car slip angle nears this characteristic value control is virtually lost and the chances of the average driver in avoiding an accident are slim. Figure 1 shows the situation for dry asphalt. During normal driving average drivers will not exceed slip angles of 2. Beyond this value the driver has no experience.

INTRODUCTION
Since 1991 the number of injuries or fatalities in car accidents in Germany has remained at an almost constant level between 300,000 and 350,000 [1]. The number of occupant fatalities as a result of an accident has steadily been reduced from 7,000 in 1991 to 4,700 in 1998. Based on a study of approx. 17,000 car accidents, Langwieder showed that 20% - 25% of all car accidents with injuries or fatalities were the result of spinning cars. In approximately 60% of the accidents with spinning cars only a single car was involved. While inexperienced drivers tend to correct the spinning motion with a single steering wheel correction, experienced drivers perform a sequence of corrections to gain control of their car. Often the vehicle motion reaches the physical limit of adhesion between the tires and the road because of the panic reactions of the driver in dangerous traffic situations. It is rare for drivers with average driving experience to know when they are driving a car at the physical limit, i.e.

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the lateral force will be reduced to FS(0) where it is assumed, that neither the normal force FN nor the tire slip angle 0 are changed. As a result of the brake slip the brake force FB(0) is generated. FR(0) is the resultant force on the tire, which is the vectorial sum of FS(0) and FB(0). If the tire friction is saturated, i.e. at the limit of adhesion between the tire and the road, the magnitudes of FR(=0) and FR(0) are approximately equal. The influence of brake slip is now obvious: a change in the brake slip value results in a rotation of the resultant force on the tire. As a result of the rotation the yaw moment on the car is changed. However, also the lateral force and the longitudinal force on the car are influenced. The control concept determines by what amount the slip at each tire shall be changed to generate the required change in the yaw moment. Boundary conditions like keeping the velocity or the acceleration of the car constant as well as the accuracy with which the operating point (0,0) of the tire is known must be considered.

Figure 1.

(a-b) The -method

Inagaki [7] uses the phase plane method to show that if the steering angle is zero, the origin of the phase plane constitutes a stable convergence point. Within a certain area around the origin (the stability area) phase plane points converge to the origin. Outside the stability area phase plane points diverge from the origin and the vehicle behavior is unstable. During cornering, if the steering angle is not zero, the slip angle stability margin becomes asymmetric and reduced in the direction of steering. For the driver it becomes more difficult to keep his car under control. For large steering angles, the stability margin disappears, there is no stable
combination of and there is no stable solution of the vehicle motion. This situation then results in a spinning car.

The main task of ESP is to limit the slip angle in order to prevent vehicle spin. Another task of ESP is to keep the slip angle below the characteristic value to preserve some yaw moment gain. If the slip angle reaches the characteristic value the gain will be low and the driver may notice that he starts to lose control of his vehicle and he may start to panic. Therefore ESP has to start control before this characteristic slip angle value is reached. This starting time is not too late since, (at the characteristic slip angle value), ESP can also still generate large yaw moments by (active) control of brake and traction slip at selected wheels. This can be shown by the influence of some brake slip value 0 at the left front tire of a free rolling car in a right turn (Fig. 2). FR(=0) is the lateral force on the free rolling tire. Because of the brake slip 0

Figure 2.

Yaw moment change by slip control

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Unfortunately, no sensor is available to measure the slip angle of the car. Furthermore, no sensor is available to measure the limit of adhesion between the tire and the road. ESP uses estimation algorithms to generate such missing values. In particular it is not possible to always obtain a reliable value of the slip angle. For this reason a cascade control with a yaw velocity control, for which a sensor is available, at the inner loop is introduced. A precise inner loop yaw velocity control creates a good basis for the outer loop slip angle control. However, with the introduction of yaw velocity control new control problems like the determination of the nominal yaw velocity are introduced. ESP uses nominal yaw velocity values which are derived from measurements of the car handling. These measurements are plotted and approximated using the bicycle model of the car. The inner loop yaw velocity control is thus a model following control. During the lifetime of the car its characteristic handling behavior may change for example because of tire wear or even because of a change of tires. Then the fixed model does not exactly represent the real handling behavior of the car and these changes have to be carefully considered in the inner loop yaw velocity control.

Figure 3.

ESP components mounted in the car

CONTROL CONCEPT
ESP uses the components of the antilock brake system (ABS) and of the traction control system (ASR), Fig. 3, Fig. 4. These components are: sensors to derive the rotational velocity of the wheels, a hydraulic unit to modify the pressure in the wheel brakes and an electronic control unit to realize the control algorithm, to process the sensor signals and stimulate the hydraulic unit. An interface to the engine management controller is also used to measure and modify the engine torque output. Additionally four ESP sensors are required to derive the handling desire of the driver and to derive the actual handling behavior of the car. These sensors are a steering wheel angle sensor, a yaw velocity sensor, a lateral acceleration sensor and a pressure sensor (Fig. 4).

Figure 4.

ESP components

Furthermore, the system entails a TCS-OFF (Traction Control System) switch, to prohibit brake slip control of the driven wheels during traction control, a (redundant) brake light switch, a hand brake switch, a brake fluid level switch, a serial interface for diagnosis and a data bus connection (CAN). If a smart booster is used to realize a brake assistant, then an additional relay is required to prevent the brake lights from being lit during the precharging of the ESP hydraulic unit. The vehicle dynamics controller part of ESP (Fig. 5) constitutes the upper part of a hierarchical control. In the lower part the slips of the tires are controlled. The vehicle

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dynamics controller part consists of several processing blocks. In the first block the sensor signals are processed (e.g. filtered). An observer based on a simple but full car model is used to estimate the slip angle of the car and of each tire as will be shown below. Also the normal and lateral forces on each tire are estimated. The slip controller supplies the required information for the observer like the vehicle velocity and acceleration, and the longitudinal tire forces.
Vw SAS PMC MMOT
.

the car velocity is constant however, the equation can be reduced and integrated to result in the simple estimate:
t t
vy

(t ) = 0 + dt = 0 + dt v 0 0 v

Together with the measured variables v y (t ) , (t ) and

the estimated variable

v v (t ) , their errors v y (t ) ,

Vw SAS PMC MMOT ay

Driver Desire
M Vv M
.

Car Motion
Vv ay 1 4

(t ) and v v (t ) , respectively, are integrated also.

. . .

Observer

Offset and other errors in the sensor signals may thus quickly lead to large errors in the estimate of the slip angle (t ) . Furthermore, during full braking the car deceleration and the pitch angle cannot be neglected and during heavy cornering, the car roll angle cannot be neglected. In order to obtain a more reliable estimate of the slip angle of the car an observer is used. The observer is based on a full four-wheel model of the car and uses two dynamic equations, one for the yaw velocity and the other for the lateral velocity of the car. The differential equation for the lateral motion is:


mv v y v x =

Limiter
M
.

ay Vv

M
+ -

M Vv No

M +

No
. .

No

No

Car Motion Controller

MYawNo Noi i MYawNoi

No1

. . .

No4

Brake Slip Controller Traction Slip Controller

PWhlNo1

(FS1 + FS 2 ) cos( w ) (FB1 + FB 2 ) sin ( w ) + FS3 + FS 4

The differential equation for the yaw motion is:


Jv =

. . .

PWhlNo4

Hydraulic Model/ EHB-Pressure Controller

tEV1, tAV1 . . IEV1,IAV1

. . .

tEV4, tAV4 . . IEV4,IAV4

[(FS1 + FS 2 ) cos( w ) a (FS1 FS 2 ) sin ( w ) b ] + (FS 3 + FS 4 ) c + (FB1 + FB 2 ) sin ( w ) a + (FB1 FB 2 ) cos( w ) b + (FB 3 FB 4 ) b
In these equations the side forces

Hydraulic Unit with Valve Stimulation

Figure 5.

Simplified block diagram of the ESP control

As a first approach in estimating the slip angle of the car, the following differential equation may be solved:

=

v 1 vy

x 2 2 vv 1+ v v

FS1 ,

longitudinal forces FB1 ,  FB 4 on the tires are unknown. The vehicle mass m v , the moment of inertia of the vehicle J v about the vertical axis and the distances a,b,c (see Fig. 2) are supposed to be approximately known. The longitudinal force FB at any wheel can be estimated by the following generic equation:

F

S4

and the

This differential equation is valid only if the pitch and roll angles of the car are zero and furthermore, if the car moves on a horizontal plane, i.e. the slope of the road in longitudinal and lateral direction is zero. In this equation
v y is its lateral acceleration and v x is its longitudinal


acceleration, v v is its lineal velocity and is its yaw velocity. The equation is valid during panic braking and also during acceleration. If the slip angle is small and if

FB = c p

p whl M CaHalf J whl d + 2 v whl R R R dt

Here cp denotes a known constant, Pwhl denotes the brake fluid pressure in the brake wheel cylinder, R denotes the known tire radius, MCaHalf denotes half of the engine torque at the axle, Jwhl denotes the known

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moment of inertia of the wheel and v whl denotes the wheel speed which is the product of the wheel angular velocity and the tire radius. The engine torque value can be obtained from the engine management system, while the rotational wheel velocity is measured by the wheel velocity sensor. By modeling the hydraulic unit, measuring the brake master cylinder pressure and knowing the valve stimulation times of the hydraulic unit the wheel brake pressure can be estimated at each wheel using a hydraulic model. Thus the longitudinal forces can be estimated at any time for each wheel. The side forces are not readily available. Therefore a tire model is used. Specifically, the HSRI tire model as described in [8] is used which allows the computation of the side and longitudinal forces in a closed form.

The discretization integration:

is

approximated

by

an

Euler

v y ,k +1 = (A 11 T + 1) v y ,k + A 12 T k + u 1,k T

k +1 = A 21 T v y ,k + (A 22 T + 1) k + u 2,k T

in which T is the sampling time and k is the time index. Since the yaw velocity is measured, it is possible to obtain the measurement equation for the lateral velocity of the car by linear extrapolation of the yaw velocity and substituting the result in the last equation:



k +1 = 2 k k 1

FS =

1 1 1 C tan 2 1 H 4H 1 1 C 2 1 H 4H
1

After substitution, the measurement equation for the lateral velocity is obtained:


A 21 T v y ,k = k (1 A 22 T ) k 1 T u 2 ,k

FB =

2 2 2 C 1 C H = tan + 1 FN 1 FN

Using these equations, a simple relation between the lateral and the longitudinal force can be found:

However, a prerequisite for using the observer is that the longitudinal tire slip is not too small. Otherwise the relation between the lateral and longitudinal force cannot be used. Experience has shown, that the slip angle estimation during full braking results in quite accurate slip angle estimates. However during the free rolling of the tires the observer cannot be used and slip angle estimates have to be derived from the lateral acceleration of the car as shown at the beginning of this chapter by integration of the slip angular velocity. Thus depending on the driving situation, the accuracy of the vehicle slip angle estimation is different. For this reason, the vehicle dynamics controller has as an inner loop a model following control of the yaw velocity of the car. Using the bicycle model of the car a first value for the
nominal yaw velocity No is obtained:

No =

FS =

C tan FB C

In these equations, C and C are the slip and cornering stiffness of the tire respectively, and are the tire slip and tire slip angle respectively, FN is the normal force on the tire and is the maximum coefficient of friction between the tire and the road surface. The above relation between the lateral and longitudinal tire force is not only valid for the initial linear region of the -slip curve, but also for the nonlinear region. Since the tire slip and cornering stiffness are mainly determined by the tire material, the ratio of the two is robust with respect to changes from summer to winter tires and changes due to tire wear. In the following, the tangent of the slip angle is approximated by the slip angle itself: tan = . The differential equations of the full car model can be rearranged and the solution discretized to be used as the model for a Kalman filter. It can be shown that rearranging the equations results in


v y = A 11 v y + A 12 + u 1


= A 21 v y + A 22 + u 2

v v tan w v 2 l 1 + v v ch

The wheelbase l and the characteristic speed vch are parameters which depend on the car design. However the characteristic speed depends also on the tire characteristics like the lateral tire stiffness C . Therefore, the nominal yaw velocity depends on the tire type, make and state (new or worn). Introducing the model following control thus introduces a complication in obtaining the nominal yaw velocity. To correctly function, ESP must therefore be checked with all released tires. The steering angle w is not directly measured but is instead derived from the steering wheel angle . Usually the steering angle is obtained by division of the steering wheel angle by the steering gear ratio. However, in combination with the scrub radius longitudinal tire forces

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may corrupt this value so that a correction is required to account for this property. Furthermore, the steering column has two Hookes joints. If the ingoing and outgoing shafts are not parallel, then a superimposed error of sinusoidal shape is introduced. The vehicle forward velocity, v x is estimated by the slip controller. Since the lateral acceleration of the car cannot exceed the maximum coefficient of friction between the tire and the road , the nominal yaw velocity must be limited to a second value. The steady state lateral acceleration of the car can be expressed as follows:

During driving on roads with a split- coefficient of friction traction can be improved by active braking of the driven wheels on the low- side. As a result, a yaw moment on the car is generated which is not desired by the driver and which pushes the car to the low- side of the road. In order to prevent this, the driver has to countersteer. If the countersteering angle is too large or if the driver reacts too slow, then ESP reduces the yaw moment by reducing the brake pressure. But in order to prevent the low- side wheel from spinning, the engine torque has to be reduced as well. The slip controller controls tire slip. During braking and also during traction control the slip is controlled by the brake slip controller except for the driven wheels where the traction slip controller controls the slip values. For the brake pressure modulation the magnetic valves of the hydraulic unit are stimulated while for the modulation of the drive torque the engine management system is used to realize the torque request from the traction slip controller. If an Electro Hydraulic Brake system (EHB) is available, then the nominal brake pressures can be requested directly.

v2v v v

= vv = vv vy Rt Rt
in which Rt is the radius of the turn. It follows that the yaw rate must be limited by the following value:

No g v v

(1)

Since is unknown the measured lateral acceleration ay is taken instead. A first limit value for the slip angle of the car is derived as discussed using the -method from the coefficient of friction between the tires and the road. This value is reduced depending on of the velocity of the car to a second value M , in order to increase the support of the driver in keeping his car stable at high speeds. If the state of the car described by its yaw velocity and

its slip angle differs from its nominal state M and M respectively, then the vehicle dynamics controller checks if this difference is within some tolerable dead zone. If not, a yaw moment has to be generated to reduce this difference to within this tolerable dead zone. Human behavior is included in the algorithm. As an example, on slippery roads the car reacts only slowly to steering angle changes. As a result the driver tends to steer too much and thus worsens the situation. In order to keep him from his natural but undesirable reaction, ESP reduces the response time of the yaw velocity for a short moment until the nominal slip angle of the car is reached. Test drivers also use this technique by steering too much for a short moment. As shown above each tire can contribute to a change in the yaw moment by changing its slip value. However, since the gains at the individual tires are different the slip changes at the individual tires can be chosen to minimize undesirable effects like deceleration of the car. Unfortunately as shown above, the gains cannot always be estimated with sufficient accuracy. Simulation studies with full vehicle models have been used in order to obtain design rules for the choice of the distribution of the slip among the individual tires. For instance, during full braking, (ABS) slip changes at the front wheel on the outside of the turn and at the rear wheel on the inside of the turn are used to generate the required yaw moment. The tire slips of the other two wheels are not modified.

PERFORMANCE REQUIREMENTS
Performance requirements relate primarily to the support which the average driver can observe. The driver must feel secure in the directional control of his car in all driving situations like panic braking combined with panic steering or panic acceleration combined with panic steering etc. In order to achieve this security a precise yaw moment must be quickly generated during panic braking as well as during panic acceleration etc. Furthermore the yaw velocity must immediately respond to the steering input of the driver (see above). Usually, full control performance is required in the ambient temperature range of 20C to 120C and in the ambient pressure range above 0.75 bar which corresponds to an altitude of approx. 2500 m above sea level. ESP must support the driver in all situations, during braking and coasting, on all road surfaces, on split surfaces and on surfaces with jumps in the coefficient of friction. The support must be such, that the steering effort required from the driver is substantially reduced. However the driver must not have the impression that he is slower with ESP during sporty driving on handling courses than without the system. The system must be tolerant of environmental changes like rough roads, deep or wet snow, hydroplaning, gravel etc. and must not intervene if the physical limit is not reached. While it is possible to estimate the slip angle of the car and of the tires during full braking as shown above there are driving situations where the slip angles cannot be estimated with sufficient accuracy. In those cases the absolute value of the slip angular velocity is often required to remain smaller than a prescribed value. Or alternatively, the absolute value of the slip angle is required to remain smaller than some maximum value 6

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during the first couple of seconds after the incipient instability is detected. These values are further reduced depending on the car speed, lateral acceleration, steering wheel angle, steering wheel angular velocity etc. Particularly on very slippery roads (<0.25) it is difficult to differentiate unstable car behavior using the bicycle model for the nominal yaw velocity from driving through a banked turn. Therefore, in general, on very slippery roads the sensitivity of the control is reduced in order not to have unnecessary interventions during banked turn driving. In order to limit the reduction in the ESP sensitivity, the ESP is tuned so as not to intervene on public roads. On special roads like racing tracks, the larger lateral slope of the road is recognized by ESP and the system is shut off. However, during full braking where the slip angle can be determined using the observer without the use of the lateral acceleration signal this reduction is not required. Thus also on very slippery roads during panic braking, the full performance of ESP is available. During driving in reverse gear the sign of the yaw velocity is opposite to that in forward gear. This situation is detected by ESP and interventions are prohibited. If the absolute values of the slip angles at the tires are larger than those at the maximum of the -slip angle curves, then the radius of the turn is not minimal. In panic situations drivers usually steer too much. Therefore ESP
gives the driver immediate response of to his steering maneuver in order to reduce his tendency to steer too much. Corresponding to the smaller steering angles the requirement to reduce the steering angle drastically if the road friction suddenly turns from low to high is then reduced as well. It turned out that this concept is not sufficient for all driving situations, in particular for J-turns in which the turning radius is continuously reduced along the trajectory (this is typical for exits from the highway). In those cases the requirement of the ESP- intervention to have a minimal influence on the car speed is reduced in its priority. And by reducing the speed of the car, the radius of the turn may be reduced correspondingly. Since in principle ESP cannot increase the magnitude of the tire forces if the physical limit is reached only the yaw moment on the car may be controlled. If the slip is reduced then the absolute value of the lateral force on the tire and on the car is increased and the radius of the turn may be reduced. Conversely, if the tire slip is increased the lateral force on the tire and on the car is reduced. In general this will increase the radius of the turn. In case of brake slip, the car will slow down and this has a compensating effect. During the transient however, the radius will be increased. This increase must be kept small for the car not to leave the nominal track by more than say 0.5 m. ESP interventions disturb smooth driving particularly during cruising and accelerating since the brake forces on the tires may rock the car. The advantage or disadvantage of the rocking behavior can be seen from the safety or the comfort point of view. Often the drivers 7

cannot relate the unusual motion of the car to the driving safety. Therefore, car manufacturers require different ESP performance at different driving situations. During braking at high speeds, the deceleration is of utmost importance on straight line braking and stability is of utmost importance during handling. In both cases comfort has the least importance. The driver must not get the impression, that because of the steering maneuver the car deceleration is reduced. It has been shown however, that also during braking while handling, the stopping distance can also be reduced as compared to production ABS (e.g. by more than 15% during braking while cornering). During partial braking in combination with ESP interventions the car deceleration must relate to the increase or decrease of the brake pedal force. Comfort can in some way be improved by handling dependent brake force distribution to increase the lateral stability margin of the car. ESP interventions can thus be reduced in their frequency of occurrence during sporty driving. Split- braking presents a special situation for ESP since the steering angle cannot be interpreted as a cornering desire. Production ABS uses open loop control of the asymmetric brake force gradient on the front tires and select low control on the rear tires to keep the car under control with good deceleration performance. ESP has a closed loop control of the asymmetric brake forces on the front and the rear axle. This control depends on the drivers countersteering input by which the yaw moment from the asymmetry of the brake forces is balanced by the yaw moment from the lateral forces on the tires. If the driver reacts slowly, then the yaw moment from the asymmetric brake forces must not be increased fast and conversely, if the driver reacts fast the brake force asymmetry may be increased fast. By this closed loop control the braking distance can be reduced as compared to production ABS by more than 15% at comparable steering effort. During driving while handling and at high speeds stability of the car is of prime importance. Control must be such that the magnitude of the slip angle of the car does not exceed 6. At high speeds traction is the least important while at low speeds and during handling comfort is of the lowest importance. Only at low speed straight line driving traction is of the highest importance. Traction on split- roads is improved by braking the wheel on the low- side of the driven axle. The resulting asymmetric longitudinal forces exert an involuntary yaw moment on the car which must be compensated by countersteering. Similarly as during split- braking, the yaw moment must not increase too fast in order to allow the driver sufficient time to perform this task. This is in conflict with driving off on a steep road with split- since it is also not allowed to have the car roll back too much. The model following control using the bicycle model to compute the nominal yaw velocity is sensitive to changes in the tire characteristics. If winter tires are used, the nominal yaw velocity is different from that if summer tires

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are used. If the tires on the front axle are different from the tires on the rear axle, i.e. because of different wear at the axles, then the yaw velocity is also different from that if equal tires are used on both axles. Since the changes in tires cannot be identified by the control program, the control sensitivity must be reduced. This is realized by introducing a dead zone for the nominal yaw velocity. Since the dead zone also reduces the performance of ESP the type and make of the tires which can be , released for the car must be carefully checked. A high level of performance of ESP in cases where the slip angle cannot be adequately estimated, such as during cruising, can be maintained. Fortunately the observer uses the ratio between the lateral and longitudinal tire stiffness only. Therefore, the estimation of the slip angle is much less sensitive to changes in the tires than the nominal yaw velocity. This means that ESP control for example during panic braking is robust with respect to tire changes. ESP also maintains excellent performance during panic braking for different tires. A further difficulty is the determination of the stopping conditions of the control during acceleration. Often the control continues to keep the engine torque at a low value after a stabilizing ESP intervention even if the driver steers again straight ahead. Careful tuning of the control is required to have ESP quickly recognize that the car motion is stable again and that the engine torque can be quickly increased again to its desired value. Changes in the tire and car data such as resulting from usual wear and tear or even from small accidents must not reduce the ESP performance or at least must not result in adverse behavior. Before the system is released, a catalog of special test maneuvers must be checked. Flat tires and trailers should be included in the catalog. Also the Moose Test has become a part of the catalog. Particularly at low ambient temperatures where fast active braking is hampered by the increasing viscosity of the brake fluid the interventions must be checked to be fast enough to achieve the required yaw moment on the car in time. Since ESP must function for both manual and automatic transmissions the gear ratio is always estimated, thus resulting in a backup solution for automatic transmission if the communication between the two systems fails. The estimation routine works so well that it can also be used for CVT (Continuously Variable Transmission) and for semi automatic transmissions.

initiated both the yaw velocity and the slip angle become so large that the driver has to heavily countersteer. As a result, the slip angle grows again rapidly in the other direction and the driver has to react fast by countersteering again. He is barely able to stabilize the car before it comes to a stop in the other lane. The ESP maneuver in Figure 6b also shows a stable vehicle trajectory. However the steering effort required to perform the stable lane change is much lower than with the production ABS maneuver. ESP helps to prevent the driver from steering too much. Both the yaw velocity and the slip angle remain small while the latter hardly exceeds the characteristic value of 2. This result shows that the precision with which the observer can estimate the slip angle at full braking is quite adequate. For the average driver this slip angle value fits to his daily experience where 2 is seldom exceeded. Even the stopping distance of the ESP maneuver is shorter than that of the production ABS maneuver. This can be explained because of the fact, that with the production ABS maneuver large slip angles occur which reduce the coefficients of friction between the tires and the road. Improvement of vehicle stability by using ESP does not necessarily increase the stopping distance as compared with production ABS control. On the contrary, stopping distances of ESP are in general shorter than those of production ABS.

Figure 6.

Lane change at full braking with ABS (a) and with ESP (b) from an initial velocity of approx. 50 km/h on polished ice ( 0,15)

RESULTS
Figure 6 shows the result of a lane change maneuver during full braking on ice and compares the results of production ABS and ESP. During full braking, sufficient information is available to use the observer for the estimation of the vehicle slip angle. A satisfactory control of the slip angle can therefore be expected. In Figure 6a the results of the maneuver with production ABS (i.e. without ESP) are shown. Shortly after the maneuver is 8

Figure 7 shows the simulation result of a steady state maneuver of a rear wheel driven car in which its speed is gradually increased while driving on a circular track of constant radius. In this maneuver, the observer cannot be used to estimate the slip angle of the car and ESP has to rely on the model following control. Comparison is made between a conventional vehicle without ESP (Fig. 7a) and the same vehicle with ESP (Fig. 7b). The track is homogeneous and the coefficient of friction is high ( = 1.0). This is a closed loop maneuver in which the driver has to keep the vehicle on the track. The diagrams show the required steering wheel angle, the resulting vehicle slip angle and the resulting lateral deviation from the track. The dashed curves in both graphs are the collections of stationary points which are iteratively

THIS DOCUMENT IS PROTECTED BY U.S. COPYRIGHT It may not be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, distributed or transmitted, in whole or in part, in any form or by any means. Downloaded from SAE International by Bogazici University, Copyright 2012 SAE International Wednesday, February 29, 2012 11:41:44 AM

computed for each vehicle speed by the simulation program through variations of the steering wheel angle and the engine output torque value. These dashed curves represent limit curves for the maneuver with the slowly increasing speed.

deviations of the vehicle from the track are reduced by the steering actions of the driver. As can be seen from the results, the drivers actions at the lateral acceleration value of 7.5 m/s do not result in an unstable vehicle behavior. The resulting changes in the vehicle slip angle and the lateral deviations of the vehicle from the track stay both within a small range. Although ESP keeps the vehicle slip angle at approx. 5 and well below its maximum stationary value (approximately 8), the maximum average lateral acceleration of 7.5 m/s almost reaches its maximum value of 7.75 m/s.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The author would like to express his deep gratitude to Josef Mack, SAE organizer, for his in depth review of the paper and for his great help to put the paper from the initial rough draft into its final form.

REFERENCES
1. Langwieder, K.: Mit ESP schwere Unflle vermeiden oder mildern. ESP-Workshop, November 10, 1999, Boxberg, Germany. 2. Mller, A,; Achenbach, W,; Schindler, E.; Wohland, T.; Mohn, F.-W.:Das Neue Fahrsicherheitssystem Electronic Stability Program von Mercedes Benz,ATZ Automobiltechnische Zeitschrift 96 (1994) 11, pp. 656 - 670. 3. van Zanten, A.; Erhardt, R.; Pfaff, G.:VDC, The Vehicle Dynamics Control System of Bosch,SAE95, Nr. 950759 4. Fennel, H.; Gutwein, R.; Kohl, A.; Latarnik, M.; Roll, G.:Das modulare Regler- und Regelkonzept beim ESP von ITT Automotive,7. Aachener Kolloquium Fahrzeug- und Motortechnik, 5. - 7. Oktober, 1998, Aachen, S. 409 431 5. Frster, H. -J.:Der Fahrzeugfhrer als Bindeglied zwischen Reifen, Fahrwerk und Fahrbahn,VDI Berichte, Nr. 916, 1991 6. Shibahata, Y.; Shimada, K.; Tomari, T.:Improvement of Vehicle Maneuverability by Direct Yaw Moment Control,In: Vehicle Systems Dynamics, 22 (1993), pp. 465 - 481 7. Inagaki, S.; Kshiro, I.; Yamamoto, M.:Analysis on Vehicle Stability in Critical Cornering Using PhasePlane Method,AVEC94, International Symposium on Advanced Vehicle Control, Tsukuba Research Center,October 24 28, 1994, pp. 287 - 292 8. van Zanten, A.T.; Erhardt, R.; Pfaff, G.; Kost, F.; Hartmann, U.; Ehret, T.:Control Aspects of the Bosch-VDC,AVEC96, International Symposium on Advanced Vehicle Control, Aachen, June 24 - 28, 1996, pp. 576 - 607

Figure 7.

Comparison of vehicle behavior without ESP (a) and with ESP (b) during slowly increasing speed along a homogeneous circular track ( = 1.0)

Up to a lateral acceleration of approximately 7 m/s the behavior of the conventional vehicle and the ESP vehicle is identical and almost equal to the stationary behavior. Beyond this lateral acceleration value the behavior of the conventional vehicle becomes different from that of the ESP vehicle and from the stationary behavior. The vehicle slip angle and the steering angle increase rapidly and progressively. At the lateral acceleration of 7.5 m/s the conventional vehicle becomes unstable. Beyond the lateral acceleration value of 7 m/s the ESP system intervenes such that the required steering angle values are reduced and such that the vehicle slip angle value is limited. Although the driver still gradually increases the accelerator pedal stroke the value of the engine output torque is kept limited under the influence of ESP and the vehicle speed is no longer increased since the physical limit of the vehicle motion is reached. The small lateral