Active disturbance rejection control in steering by wire haptic systems

This paper introduces a steering by wired haptic system based on disturbance rejection control techniques. High gain Generalized Proportional Integral (GPI) observers are considered for the estimation of tire and steering wheel dynamic disturbances. These disturbances are on line canceled to ensure tracking between the commanded steering wheel angle and the tire orientation angle. The estimated disturbances at the steering rack are feedback to the steering wheel to provide a haptic interface with the driver. The overall system behaves as a bilateral master-slave system. Very few sensors and minimum knowledge of the dynamic model are required. Experimental results are presented on a prototype platform that consists on: (1) half of the steering rack of a beetle VW vehicle, (2) a steering wheel.