Design Requirements of Human-Driven, Hybrid, and Autonomous Trucks for Collision-Avoidance in Platooning

Abstract

The trucking industry faces many challenges, the most pressing of them being the rising costs to run the fleets. This is mainly caused by driver shortage, low driver retention and high wages for the drivers as well as rising fuel costs. Autonomous trucks promise to solve these issues by eliminating this bottleneck in the industry and bringing some relief to logistics companies and fleet owners. A prelude to fully autonomous trucks is expected to be seen as part of a hybrid platoon where a human driver would lead one or more autonomous trucks close behind them thus enabling higher tonnage to be transported by one driver. This enables early autonomous software to be tested and phased onto highways in a more controlled manner since present software can maintain set distances behind vehicles and respect lane markers already. Platooning also enables significant fuel savings from reduced aerodynamic drag on all vehicles at close distances. Since vehicle functionality is largely built around the driver, the removal of this piece affords the opportunity to rethink parts of the design to suit the needs of the future more favorably. Based on the prevalent literature as well as simulation of platooning scenarios under various vehicle and environmental conditions, the thesis will analyze the development of autonomous vehicles with a focus on the opportunities to rethink conventional design constraints of a truck and to design one that is better suited to the functions it will be carrying out autonomously and in the context of technologies that are in development and would be available in the future with a special emphasis on platooning scenarios. In this thesis, a MATLAB model was used to simulate a 2-vehicle platoon where the lead truck is a conventional class 8 vehicle while the key parameters of the following truck was tested in various road conditions to minimize Inter Vehicular Distance (IVD) and maximize fuel savings while ensuring safety. The study was able to conclude that an alternative design to autonomous trucks would result in maximum benefits from synergistic technologies like platooning and battery powered trucks. The results showed the most benefits from a reduction in perception-reaction time and communication technology followed by strategic configuration of vehicles in a platoon by Gross vehicle weight (GVW). Also, the need to account for coefficient of friction due to non-ideal environmental conditions with an adjustment in IVD is observed.