Takamasa Suetomi

A Kansei Engineering approach to a driver/vehicle system

Abstract In every process of car development, Kansei Engineering has turned out to be a good tool for adapting car products to the tastes or lifestyles of customers. Kansei Engineering approaches to car development have already been applied in some areas, for example, tuning the exhaust sound of a sports car. A Kansei Engineering approach to a driver/vehicle system is a difficult research area because it involves handling a full-range of human feelings or emotions and evaluating many car product parameters. To assist such an approach, an advanced driving simulator which has a large amplitude motion system has been developed at Mazda Technical Research Center (Yokohama). In this initial stage, a study on the human perception mechanism for vehicle yaw motion has been conducted as a basic study of human senses. This paper describes the concepts of the Kansei Engineering approach to a driver/vehicle system using a driving simulator, and the results of an application study on human perception. Relevance to industry If the relationship between full range human feelings or emotions and the physical parameters of vehicle motion were clarified, car designs based on the characteristics of human senses or feelings would be easier and the car development process would be greatly changed to fit car products to human Kansei.

Active-steering control system based on human hand impedance properties

This paper proposes an active-steering control method that uses human hand impedance properties. In this method, the dynamic properties of a steering device manipulated by the upper limbs are automatically regulated according to the damping coefficient of the human-steering system. Human hand impedance in steering operations is measured and modeled depending on the steering angle and torque for use in the proposed control structure. The effectiveness of the proposed method was demonstrated by performing an emergency avoidance task using a stationary driving simulator.

Subjective evaluation of engine acceleration sound with driving simulator

Abstract The vehicle acceleration performance, the accelerator pedal controllability etc. have influence on the engine sound evaluation besides the sound level and quality. Subjective evaluation of the engine sound by the design of experiments was conducted with a driving simulator. As a result, the effects of the vehicle performance and the accelerator pedal controllability for the engine sound evaluation were measured quantitatively. It became clear that these factors could improve both “quiet feeling” and “sporty feeling” which show the evaluation of engine sound.

A study of dynamics performance improvement by rear right and left independent drive system

In this study, methods of motion control on a rear right and left independent electric motor drive vehicle and the benefit for drivers when using this configuration were researched. The system offers direct yaw moment control (DYC) function and it is possible to compensate for the vehicle turning motion. On the other hand, a rear drive vehicle often becomes unstable at a situation of acceleration in a turn. Even if the DYC system controls the vehicle motion, there are performance limits. One of the cause considered is that the characteristics of rear tyres are changed by the driving force. Control methods that focused especially on this point were examined, and the performance of independent drive system was evaluated by a simulation. Moreover, the effects on driver were confirmed with a driving simulator. The effectiveness of the system was confirmed from these results.