An optimal vibration control strategy for robust active suspension systems design with actuator delays and uncertainties

Abstract

In this paper, an optimal vibration control strategy for solving the robust active suspension systems with actuator delays as well as uncertainties in a light rail vehicles (LRVs) is investigated. A 9-DOF multibody dynamic model of a three-car train set with the active suspension systems is presented; in addition, the external perturbation from track irregularity, vehicle body mass uncertainty, such as the number of passengers, and time-delayed actuator force are simultaneous considered to guarantee robust performance of the proposed systems. By using the Bellman’s optimality principle for the zero-sum (ZS) game and Razumikhin theorem, the general robust control problem can be equivalently converted into an optimal control problem with the amount of matched uncertainties involved in the performance index. Moreover, sufficient conditions are derived under which not only the uncertain LRVs dynamical systems and time delays in the control input can achieve asymptotic stability, but also acquire the guaranteed level of performance for regulation. Extensive simulations show that the proposed active suspension systems can significantly suppress bodywork vertical acceleration, and ride comfort is improved when LRVs runs onto irregular tracks.