Implementation of Reversing Control on a Doubly Articulated Vehicle

The problem of reversing vehicles with two trailers could be solved with a semi-autonomous assistance system for automatically steering the vehicle. In the literature found, no controllers have been implemented on a full-size vehicle with two trailers. In this paper, two simple path-tracking controllers are presented for automating the reversing of a “B-double” vehicle, consisting of a tractor and two trailers. One of the controllers is a heuristic “preview point” controller; the other uses a state feedback approach. The controllers steer the wheels on the front axle so as to stabilize the vehicle in reverse and control the path of the rearmost axle to follow a prescribed path. A tuning strategy is outlined where both controllers are tuned using the linear quadratic regulator and have the same closed-loop poles. The two controllers are implemented on a full-size B-double test vehicle. Experimental results are discussed, and the controller performances are evaluated against criteria. With the state feedback controller, the test vehicle was able to track target paths, consisting of a roundabout and a lane change, to within 50 mm.