Title: Driver model characterisation at tunnel exit with crosswind using a dynamic driving simulator

Authors: Antonio Cioffi; Anirudh Raghu Prakash; Michele Vignati; Edoardo Sabbioni

Addresses: Department of Mechanical Engineering, Politecnico di Milano, Via G. La Masa, 1, 20156, Milano, MI, Italy ' Department of Mechanical Engineering, Politecnico di Milano, Via G. La Masa, 1, 20156, Milano, MI, Italy ' Department of Mechanical Engineering, Politecnico di Milano, Via G. La Masa, 1, 20156, Milano, MI, Italy ' Department of Mechanical Engineering, Politecnico di Milano, Via G. La Masa, 1, 20156, Milano, MI, Italy

Abstract: Often, strong crosswind could lead to unsafe operation of heavy vehicles. For this reason, the crosswind-high-sided lorry interaction was studied, with focus on the driver reaction. With the aid of a dynamic driving simulator, an ad-hoc scenario was created and tested. It reproduced a wind gust at the exit of a tunnel. The test was performed by 28 drivers at different vehicle and wind speeds. The gathered data were analysed to understand the general response of the driver. In the case studied, it was composed by an uncontrolled and a controlled phase. A metric based on the yaw rate signal was used to rank the drivers as 'Quick' or 'Slow'. Finally, a path-follower driver model was tuned using the experimental data. The model was able to qualitatively reproduce the controlled phase exhibited by the human drivers. More effort is needed to increase the overall accuracy of the model.

Keywords: crosswind; tunnel exit; driver model; high-sided lorry; driving simulator.

DOI: 10.1504/IJHVS.2024.141418

International Journal of Heavy Vehicle Systems, 2024 Vol.31 No.5, pp.622 - 640

Received: 05 Jun 2023
Accepted: 30 Aug 2023
Published online: 12 Sep 2024 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article