Seamless Functional Design for an Autonomous Vehicle using a Low-Cost RCP Platform

The advancement of cooperative autonomous vehicles has seen significant progress, often necessitating the use of high-cost tools. This paper investigates the utilization of a low-cost Rapid Control Prototyping (RCP) platform, LoRra, for the development of autonomous vehicle functionalities. A modular prototyping vehicle equipped with Mecanum wheels was designed to operate within a cyber-physical laboratory test field, enabling the exploration of intelligent driving functions. The LoRra platform facilitates seamless model-based development, encompassing modeling, function design, automatic code generation, and real-time implementation. The effectiveness of the LoRra platform in developing and validating autonomous driving functions is demonstrated through extensive simulations and real-time experiments. This study highlights the successful application of LoRra in the speed control of traction motors and trajectory-following control, underscoring its potential as a cost-effective and versatile tool for research and development in intelligent mobility.