A comparative study of equivalent modelling for multi-axle vehicle

ABSTRACTIn this paper, equivalent modelling methods of a multi-axle vehicle are presented and compared. Firstly, for the sake of comparison, a single-track model of a three-axle and a two-axle vehicle is developed, and then existing equivalent modelling derivations are presented and discussed. Next, the proposed model-based dynamic equivalence of force/moment at the centre of gravity (CG) is introduced and optimised. It represents the approximately equivalent steady-state and transient response of the yaw rate and side slip angle, which allows different cornering stiffness on the central and rear axle. Finally, to demonstrate how the proposed method is advantageous to the other equivalent models available in the literature, different simulation cases are compared in the dimension of time-domain, eigenvalues characteristics and frequency-domain. Furthermore, the proposed method is extended to any multi-axle vehicle configurations and a general expression is formulated.