Abstract
Use of navigation information, map information and Vehicle-to-Vehicle (V2V) communication will play an essential role in autonomous driving applications. In order to be able to flexibly conduct experiments in this research field, an experimental model vehicle has been built at the Institute of Automatic Control of RWTH Aachen University. The vehicle measures 1.0x0.8m and at a weight of approximately 50kg is able to accelerate up to 40km/h. It is equipped with two DC motors, each driving one rear wheel. The front wheels are unpowered but can be steered separately. Furthermore the vehicle is equipped with base functionality needed for navigation and autonomous driving applications.
The vehicle is fitted with a 9DOF inertial measurement unit (IMU), current and speed sensors. A microcontroller is used to access base functionality such as built-in decoding functions for NMEA Data delivered by a GNSS Receiver and a safety and operating concept. In order to conduct experiments in the area of navigation based ADAS (Advanced Driver Assistance Systems), the vehicle is designed to be very accessible for implementation of additional functionality. Through a CAN interface access to all sensor data and actuators is provided. In this paper, an implementation of a trajectory following controller and a satellite- and map-based cooperative adaptive cruise control system (CACC) is shown. The CACC system implements a distance control based on position data acquired from a Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS), a digital road map, and vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communication, while the trajectory following controller steers the vehicle along a pre-recorded track that is saved in a digital road map.
The combination of the satellite- and map-based CACC and trajectory following controller is used to autonomously guide the vehicle through a test track at the Aldenhoven Testing Center of RWTH Aachen University. First experimental results recorded at the test track will be presented.
KEYWORDS - autonomous driving; navigation-based ADAS; Vehicle-to-Vehicle communication; adaptive cruise control, experimental model vehicle