Multi Actuation Scheme for Path-Following Control of Autonomous Vehicles

This paper presents a Multi actuation scheme for path following control of autonomous vehicles. Steering angle of front and rear axles accompanied with wheel torques of front axle and individual left and right wheels of the rear axle are the five control inputs of the system. The required feedback outputs of the system consist of lateral offset, heading angle error and forward speed of the vehicle and their time derivative. In the high-level layer of the controller, zeroing the two path states: lateral offset and heading angle error, and tracking in the longitudinal velocity are targeted by decentralization of proportional-derivative controllers. The high-level part outputs the desired generalized forces and moment on the vehicle body-fixed coordinate. These desired values are tackled by the control inputs through an allocation scheme. The capability of the proposed closed-loop system is analyzed through nonlinear numerical simulations.