An investigation of intelligent cruise control laws for passenger vehicles

This paper describes intelligent cruise control (ICC) laws for passenger vehicles. ICC systems consist of a vehicle detection sensor, a controller and throttle/brake actuators. For the control of a throttle/brake system, a solenoid valve controlled electronic vacuum booster (EVB) and a step motor controlled throttle actuator have been used. A non-linear computer model for the electronic vacuum booster has been developed and the simulations were performed using a complete non-linear vehicle model. The proposed control law in this paper consists of an algorithm that generates the desired acceleration/deceleration profile in an ICC situation, a throttle/brake switching logic and a throttle/brake control algorithm. The control performance has been investigated through computer simulations and vehicle tests. The test vehicle is equipped with a millimetre wave radar distance sensor, an Intel 80C196 controller, a solenoid valve controlled EVB and a step motor controlled throttle actuator. The results indicate that the proposed throttle/brake control laws can provide satisfactory vehicle-to-vehicle distance and velocity control performance.