MODELING AND SIMULATION OF FOUR-WHEEL STEERING SYSTEM FOR A PASSENGER CAR

Authors

R. Sakthivel, V. Ganesh, Ramanjaneyulu Kolla, Boobalasenthilraj,
Department of Automobile Engineering, Sri Venkateswara College of Engineering, Sriperumbudur, Tamil Nadu, India.
Venkata Ramarao Mutyala
Department of Automobile Engineering, Vallurupalli Nageswara Rao Vignana Jyothi Institute of Engineering
&Technology, Hyderabad, Telangana, India.
A.Vadivel
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Sri Krishna College of Engineering and Technology, Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, India.

Abstract

The steering system plays a vital role in a car, allowing the driver to turn the vehicle effortlessly, and it is the most important system for handling. In a conventional steering system, the driver has to put more effort into steering on small and narrow roads. In this paper, we propose an idea to implement a steering system for the rear wheels in addition to the front wheels, resulting in a four-wheel steering system. This will enable the driver to seamlessly turn the vehicle without any extra effort. To construct this model, we have considered the specifications of the Maruti Alto K10 car. The working principle of our model is based on the Rack and Pinion mechanism. The model consists of two rectangular-shaped racks: one is connected to the front wheels, and the other is connected to the rear wheels. During parking and low-speed maneuvers (less than 40 km/h), when the front wheels are steered, the rear wheels turn in the opposite direction, reducing the turning radius and allowing the car to take sharper turns. In this study, modeling is done using SolidWorks software and vehicle behaviour is analyzed using a MATLAB Simulink model. Simulation results show that the proposed model reduced the turning radius by 30% and also enhances vehicle handling performance.