Evaluation of ride performance of PID controller in active suspension systems for an electric vehicle

In order to evaluate ride performance of an electric vehicle (EV) active suspension systems (ASSs), a 8-DOF full-vehicle dynamic model of EV under random road excitation is set for control ASSs of EV to enhance ride comfort. A PID controller is proposed for control. The parameters of the PID controller are tuned using the Ziegler-Nichols method. The achieved results indicate that the root mean square (RMS) values of the vertical driver's seat, vehicle body, pitching and rolling acceleration responses with ASSs using the proposed controller respectively reduce by 31.12 %, 24.76 %, 15.00 %, and 11.59 % in comparison with passive suspension systems (PSSs) under the investigated condition. In addition, these results will be the basis for optimizing the parameters for PID controller to improve the ride performance of ASS.