Research on the application of optimal control theory on parameters optimization of vehicle suspension

Based on optimal control theory, an optimizing algorithm for the parameters of a traditional passive suspension system is presented. The method is firstly illustrated through a model of a two-degree-of-freedom vehicle system. Then the random excitation of the road to the tyre is investigated, which is obtained by processing the power spectrum density of known road roughness. The results of simulations show that this optimizing algorithm can improve the performance of suspension systems in comparison with traditional passive suspensions, whenever the vehicle is running on the sinusoidal or the random surface sated in this paper. Moreover, it is easy to modify the existing suspension system via the concept put forward in this paper. Therefore, the proposed method is particularly applicable to on existing suspension system that needs modification. Finally, the possibility of applying this method to other engineering fields is pointed out.