Finite-time stability control of an electric vehicle under tyre blowout

In this paper, the authors consider the problem of tyre blowout control via output feedback for an electric vehicle (EV) driven by four in-wheel motors to reduce fatal damage. First, an EV dynamic model in the case of a tyre blowout is established. The model considers the unmeasurable state, unknown added front wheel steering angle generated by a tyre blowout and uncertain external disturbances. Second, to address the difficulties in estimating the unmeasurable state, unknown parameters and disturbances for the EV, a finite-time observer is introduced. Then, by introducing a coordinate transformation, the state-space model of an EV with tyre blowout is converted into a simple form for which a state feedback control law is constructed by adding a power integrator method. Combining the finite-time observer with the finite-time control law, an output feedback controller is designed to stabilize the EV when a tyre bursts. A torque allocation method is also given to operate every wheel except the burst tyre to stabilize and stop the EV. Finally, computer simulations are given to validate the proposed finite-time output feedback controller for the EV tyre blowout control.