ToheedGh/Multitrailer-Vehicle-Simulation: Generation and Integration of Differential Equations

This code generates all differential equations describing the dynamic motion of a multitrailer vehicle, for simulation, optimization, and optimal control purposes. The code was generated using MATLAB R2019b, and works in this or higher versions of MATLAB.

Latest release: https://zenodo.org/badge/latestdoi/286326444 

Please cite this code directly and the following paper when referring to this code: T. Ghandriz, B. Jacobson, P. Nilsson, L. Laine, N. Fröjd, "Computationally efficient nonlinear one- and two-track models for multitrailer road vehicles," IEEE Access, vol. -, pp. –, 2020 (Refer to the journal to find the missing information).

Explanation of the vehicle model and equations can be found in the above paper.

The latest release (v1.0.1) of the code includes four MATLAB files:

generateEqs.m, parameters.m, vehicleSimulation.m, animateSimulation.m.

The file "generateEqs.m" generates the equations of motion, based on the
user-defined vehicle, in the form of implicit ODEs, and stores them in MATLAB function "equationsOfMotion.m", which is created automatically. The MATLAB function "equationsOfMotion.m" is constructed in such a way that it can be directly called by the MATLAB DAE solver, i.e., ode15i, to simulate the vehicle motion.

In order to facilitate the simulation, we added a simple proportional speed controller that controls the forces of the second axle of the first unit to track a reference desired speed. Moreover, the steering input of the first axle reads the user-defined steering angle reference trajectory.

As a simulation example, we provided files "parameters.m", "vehicleSimulation.m" and "animateSimulation.m".
The file "parameters.m" defines parameters of the vehicle, and the file "vehicleSimulation.m" integrates the ODEs and shows the result. The file "animateSimulation.m" creates a simple animation These two files are valid for a single-track 4-unit 6-axle vehicle, and need to be updated by the user for simulating a different vehicle.

In the version v1.0.1 of the code, a user has options to create a model including:

• any number of vehicle units;
• any number of axles in each vehicle unit;
• a single-track vehicle or a two-track vehicle;
• linear or nonlinear tyre models;
• inclusion of lateral load transfer;
• inclusion of combined slip tyre model;
• inclusion of the force caused by the road grade, and air and rolling resistance forces.