Modelling and Simulations of a Narrow Track Tilting Vehicle

Narrow track tilting vehicle is a new category of vehicle that combines the dynamical abilities of a passenger car with a motorcycle. In the presence of overturning moments during cornering, an accurate assessment of the lateral dynamics plays an important role to improve their stability and handling. In order to stabilise or control the narrow tilting vehicle, the demand tilt angle can be calculated from the vehicle’s lateral acceleration and controlled by either steering input of the vehicle or using additional titling actuator to reach this desired angle. The aim of this article is to present a new approach for developing the lateral dynamics model of a narrow track tilting vehicle. First, this approach utilises the well-known geometry ‘bicycle model’ and parameter estimation methods. Second, by using a tuning method, the unknown and uncertainties are taken into account and regulated through an optimisation procedure to minimise the model biases in order to improve the modelling accuracy. Therefore, the optimised model can be used as a platform to develop the vehicle control strategy. Numerical simulations have been performed in a comparison with the experimental data to validate the model accuracy