On The Benefits of Using Object-Oriented Programming For The Objective Evaluation of Vehicle Dynamic Performance in Concurrent Simulations

Article
On the Benefits of Using Object-Oriented Programming for

the Objective Evaluation of Vehicle Dynamic Performance in
Concurrent Simulations
Michele Perrelli 1,*, Francesco Cosco 1, Giuseppe Carbone 1, Basilio Lenzo 2 and Domenico Mundo 1
1 Department of Mechanical, Energy and Management, University of Calabria, Rende, 87036, Italy;
francesco.cosco@unical.it (F.C.); giuseppe.carbone@unical.it (G.C.); domenico.mundo@unical.it (D.M.)
2 Department of Engineering and Mathematics, Sheffield Hallam University, Sheffield S1 1WB, UK;
basilio.lenzo@shu.ac.uk
* Correspondence: michele.perrelli@unical.it
Abstract: Assessing passenger cars dynamic performance is a critical aspect for car industries, due
to its impact on the overall vehicle safety evaluation and the subjective nature of the involved han-
dling and comfort metrics. Accordingly, ISO standards, such as ISO 4138 and ISO 3888, define sev-
eral specific driving tests to assess vehicle dynamics performance objectively. Consequently, proper
evaluation of the dynamic behaviour requires measuring several physical quantities, including ac-
celerations, speed, and linear and angular displacements obtained after instrumenting a vehicle
with multiple sensors. This experimental activity is highly demanding in terms of hardware costs,
and it is also significantly time-consuming. Several approaches can be considered for reducing ve-
hicle development time. In particular, simulation software can be exploited to predict the approxi-
Citation: Perrelli, M.; Cosco, F.; mate behaviour of a vehicle using virtual scenarios. Moreover, motion platforms and detail-scalable
Carbone, G.; Lenzo, B.; Mundo, D.
numerical vehicle models are widely implemented for the purpose. This paper focuses on a custom-
On the Benefits of Using Object-
ized simulation environment developed in C++, which exploits the advantages of object-oriented
Oriented Programming for the
programming. The presented framework strives to perform concurrent simulations of vehicles with
Objective Evaluation of Vehicle
different characteristics such as mass, tyres, engine, suspension, and transmission systems. Within
Dynamic Performance in Concurrent
Simulations. Machines 2021, 9, 41.
the proposed simulation framework, we adopted a hierarchical and modular representation. Vehi-
https://doi.org/10.3390/ cles are modelled by a 14 degree-of-freedom (DOF) full-vehicle model, capable of capturing the
machines9020041 dynamics and complemented by a set of scalable-detail models for the remaining sub-systems such
as tyre, engine, and steering system. Furthermore, this paper proposes the usage of autonomous
Academic Editor: Hamid Reza virtual drivers for a more objective evaluation of vehicle dynamic performances. Moreover, to fur-
Karimi ther evaluate our simulator architectures efficiency and assess the achieved level of concurrency,
Received: 28 November 2020 we designed a benchmark able to analyse the scaling of the performances with respect to the num-
Accepted: 10 February 2021 ber of different vehicles during the same simulation. Finally, the paper reports the proposed simu-
Published: 15 February 2021
lation environments scalability resulting from a set of different and varying driving scenarios.
Publishers Note: MDPI stays neu-

Keywords: autonomous vehicle; vehicle dynamics; torque vectoring; object-oriented programming;
tral with regard to jurisdictional
real-time simulations
claims in published maps and insti-
tutional affiliations.
1. Introduction
Copyright: © 2021 by the authors. Over the last decades, automotive original equipment manufacturers (OEM) aimed
Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. to make their cars increasingly smarter, more autonomous, and safer by widening the use
This article is an open access article of efficient electronic control units (ECUs) and active systems to improve both vehicle
distributed under the terms and con- performance and passengers safety. Since the anti-lock braking system (ABS) was intro-
ditions of the Creative Commons At- duced for serial production, several advanced driver-assistance systems (ADASs) have
tribution (CC BY) license (http://cre-
been developed for vehicle longitudinal, lateral, and vertical stability control [13]. As a
ativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
result, modern cars, even those belonging to the city car segment, feature a plethora of
Machines 2021, 9, 41. https://doi.org/10.3390/machines9020041 www.mdpi.com/journal/machines

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