Active Control of Aerodynamic Surfaces for Ride Control in Sport Vehicles

This work investigates the use of Active Aerodynamic Surfaces (AAS) to enhance ride comfort in sport vehicles. Four AAS's generate lift forces that control the vertical acceleration of the sprung mass without negatively affecting the unsprung mass. It is shown that the AAS system can overcome the trade-off between comfort and road holding. In this work a preliminary analysis of the control system is presented along with a mechatronic feasibility analysis. The required controller bandwidth, airfoils size and power requirements are analyzed in simulation. The system is validated on a complete vehicle model showing improvements of the order of 30% in ride comfort with no negative effects on road-holding at high speed.