Controlling the longitudinal dynamics of a vehicle using sensor based haptic feedback

This paper considers a sensor based haptic feedback law for control of the longitudinal dynamics of a vehicle. The environment impedance is implemented in parallel as force feedback to the vehicle throttle as well as haptic feedback to the accelerator pedal. A non-linear gain is used in the feedback design to introduce a singularity in the energy dissipation relationship collocated with an observed obstacle. A consequence of this is that the vehicle would theoretically have to dissipate infinite energy to impact an obstacle. Using this approach we prove that the vehicle cannot impact an obstacle given no actuator saturation. The proposed control architecture has the potential to enhance vehicle safety while adding to the driving experience.