Theoretical And Experimental Study Of Automobile Electrical Energy-Regenerative Active Suspension

Although passive suspensions are still used in the majority of vehicles currently, the performance improvements of active suspensions have been proved both theoretically and practically, in terms of their adaptive ability to the changes on various conditions, by controlling vehicle body attitude or height, and also by changing spring or damping characteristics for ride comfort, tire adhesion, etc. However, because of their high energy consumption, cost and additional weight, and their complexity, active suspensions have not been widely used in vehicles so far.Hence, a novel energy-regenerative electrical active suspension is proposed, which can not only take advantage of the characteristics of electrical motor to regenerate electric power from the vibration excited by road unevenness, but also implement active control easily to improve suspension performances. The research can be taken into two parts: one is a theoretical and experimental study on energy regenerative characteristic and suspension performance of the electrical suspension in passive mode, and the other is a theoretical study on its active control.Firstly, based on modeling and simulation, the vibration energy dissipation of a passive suspension via damper and the energy demand for an LQG optimal vehicle active suspension are investigated, showing valuable potentials for an active suspension with vibration energy regeneration. Then, the feasibility of energy regenerative approaches is discussed. Correspondingly, an electrical active suspension configuration is proposed, and its working principle and structure are described.Secondly, the actuator prototype is designed based on the rear suspension structure of a typical passenger car with consideration of actual structure and work characteristics. The designed actuator is mainly composed of a brushless DC motor, along with some auxiliary parts, including a lead screw, a rebound buffer-block, a compression buffer-block and so on. The experiments of the motor actuator prototype show that it can be used in full-vehicle experiments. Meanwhile, a main parameter for active control algorithm study is obtained.Thirdly, taking Passat B5 as example, the full-vehicle experiments are performed in 4-wheel vibration test rig. By comparing the designed electrical rear suspension with the...