Commanding lateral acceleration: a natural paradigm for automobile steering

Due to the character of the original source materials and the nature of batch digitization, quality control issues may be present in this document. Please report any quality issues you encounter to digital@library.tamu.edu, referencing the URI of the item.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 51).This thesis describes a joystick automobile steering phics. controller which allows the driver to command the lateral acceleration of the vehicle directly, as opposed to controlling the front tire angle. The purpose of the controller is to improve joystick steering controls available to handicapped drivers, The controller design uses feedback from a chassis mounted accelerometer to sense actual vehicle lateral acceleration and cause the vehicle to achieve the lateral acceleration commanded by the driver. The thesis explains how a joystick and servo system utilizing the lateral acceleration command concept was analyzed, designed, built, and tested. Subjective and quantitative results are presented which show that a practical system was achieved and that commanding lateral acceleration is a natural way to steer a car. A1l test drivers preferred this system over joystick systems currently available to handicapped drivers which require the driver to command front wheel turn angle