Combined decentralized longitudinal and lateral controller design for truck convoys

We consider the combined longitudinal and lateral controller design for a convoy of truck-trailers. The controller is developed for an application where the truck ahead has a target at its end which the following truck tracks. The target, in this case, is a radar reflecting patch and a transmitter/receiver radar system is used to measure the relative velocity and the inter-vehicle distance as well as the offset angle between the radar reflecting patch and the longitudinal axis of the follower. The longitudinal controller accelerates or decelerates the controlled vehicle to keep the interspacing distance at a safety level whereas the lateral controller automatically steers the vehicle based on the offset angle information. The proposed control logic is simulated for a convoy of two truck-trailers and the illustrative simulation results are presented.