Cooperative Control of Path Tracking and Driving Stability for Intelligent Vehicles on Potholed Road

When a vehicle hits a pothole, the reaction force of the pothole on the tire causes an
imbalance
in the driving forces on both sides of the vehicle and may cause the wheels to jump, potentially resulting in path deviation and roll instability. To address these issues, a cooperative control system for path tracking and driving stability is proposed. Roll stability is achieved by the roll moment generated by reasonably distributing the driving torque among the four IWMs. The necessary roll moment is calculated by the designed robust sliding mode control (RSMC), which enhances the transient performance of
H
_∞
by 48.9%. The path tracking is ensured by active front steering (AFS) based on model predictive control (MPC), and the front wheel angle is used as the disturbance of the stability control. Simulation and bench test results demonstrate that the developed controller can maintain vehicle stability even when the greatest path deviation is 0.03 m, whereas conventional direct yaw-moment control (DYC) and AFS controllers fail to achieve the same level of control. These findings provide a theoretical foundation and serve as a reference for cooperative control on potholed roads.