Semi-active H∞ control of high-speed railway vehicle suspension with magnetorheological dampers

Abstract

In this paper, semi-active H∞ control with magnetorheological (MR) dampers for railway vehicle suspension systems to improve the lateral ride quality is investigated. The proposed semi-active controller is composed of a H∞ controller as the system controller and an adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system (ANFIS) inverse MR damper model as the damper controller. First, a 17-degree-of-freedom model for a full-scale railway vehicle is developed and the random track irregularities are modelled. Then a modified Bouc–Wen model is built to characterise the forward dynamic characteristics of the MR damper and an inverse MR damper model is built with the ANFIS technique. Furthermore, a H∞ controller composed of a yaw motion controller and a rolling pendulum motion (lateral motion+roll motion) controller is established. By integrating the H∞ controller with the ANFIS inverse model, a semi-active H∞ controller for the railway vehicle is finally proposed. Simulation results indicate that the proposed semi-active suspension system possesses better attenuation ability for the vibrations of the car body than the passive suspension system.

Keywords:

• railway vehicles
• semi-active suspension
• H∞control
• magnetorheological fluid damper
• ANFIS inverse model

Acknowledgements

Financial supports from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 11125210) and the Fund of the Chinese Academy of Sciences for Key Topics in Innovation Engineering (Grant No. KJCX2-EW-L02) are gratefully acknowledged.