Dynamic Stability and Control of Tripped and Untripped Vehicle Rollover (Synthesis Lectures on Advances in Automotive Technology)

Vehicle rollover accidents have been a serious safety problem for the last three decades.

Although rollovers are a small percentage of all traffic accidents, they do account for a large proportion of severe and fatal injuries. Specifically, some large passenger vehicles, such as large vans, pickup trucks, and sport utility vehicles, are more prone to rollover accidents with a high center of gravity (CG) and narrow track width. Vehicle rollover accidents may be grouped into two categories: tripped and untripped rollovers. A tripped rollover commonly occurs when a vehicle skids and digs its tires into soft soil or hits a tripping mechanism such as a curb with a sufficiently large lateral velocity. On the other hand, the untripped rollover is induced by extreme maneuvers during critical driving situations, such as excessive speed during cornering, obstacle avoidance, and severe lane change maneuver. In these situations, the forces at the tire-road contact point are large enough to cause the vehicle to roll over. Furthermore, vehicle rollover may occur due to external disturbances such as side-wind and steering excitation. Therefore, it is necessary to investigate the dynamic stability and control of tripped and untripped vehicle rollover so as to avoid vehicle rollover accidents.

In this book, different dynamic models are used to describe the vehicle rollover under both untripped and special tripped situations. From the vehicle dynamics theory, rollover indices are deduced, and the dynamic stabilities of vehicle rollover are analyzed. In addition, some active control strategies are discussed to improve the anti-rollover performance of the vehicle.

Zhilin Jin is currently an Associate Professor at Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, focusing on vehicle system dynamics and control and by-wire systems for intelligent connected vehicles. He received his Ph.D. in Vehicle Engineering from Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Nanjing, China in 2008. Dr. Jin has more than 17 years of research experience in and has written 40 papers on vehicle rollover dynamics, vehicle rollover warning, vehicle rollover prevention, electro hydraulic braking system, and steer by-wire system. He has been a reviewer of many international journals, including Vehicle System Dynamics, IEEE Transactions on Vehicle Technology, IEEE Transactions on Human-Machine Systems, Mechatronics, International Journal of Heavy Vehicle Systems, IET Intelligent Transport Systems, and so on.