Scaled testbed for vehicle control: The IRS

This paper presents a novel testbed for vehicle control experiments: The Illinois Roadway Simulator (IRS). This is a scaled roadway suitable for easily visualizing preliminary vehicle control studies. The concept of the IRS is given along with the details of its design and construction. A review of vehicle dynamics gives the standard Bicycle Model for linear operating conditions. The parameters of the model are then obtained for representative IRS vehicles. The resulting vehicle dynamics are then compared with dynamics of full-scale vehicles for dynamic similitude. The dynamic similitude comparison is the key to gaining confidence in the scaled testbed as an accurate representation of actual vehicles. A series of experimental verifications are used to match the identified vehicle dynamics to the responses predicted by the standard vehicle model with some additional augmentations.