Study of the open and closed loop characteristics of a tractor and a single axle towed implement system

Accurate automatic guidance of towed implements is important for performing agricultural field operations and for gaining the ultimate benefit from such systems. The study of open and closed loop system responses of a vehicle-implement system can be helpful in the design of practical guidance controllers. Open loop analysis of the kinematic and dynamic models revealed that the higher order dynamics captured by the tractor and implement dynamic model had an impact on simulated responses at higher operating velocities and on higher input frequencies. In addition, a dynamic model with tire relaxation length dynamics was also studied. The various model responses were compared with the experimental responses. Closed loop system characteristics were studied by using a linear quadratic regulator (LQR) controller. The tractor position and heading and implement heading states along with respective rate states were fed back to close the loop. Steering dynamics were also added to the dynamic model closed loop analysis, which helped to achieve a realistic closed loop steering angle history. The closed loop system dynamics became faster as the forward velocity was increased. The open and closed loop response analysis performed in this work provided an understanding about the system at various forward velocities, which will help to design and develop efficient and robust tractor and towed implement guidance controller. (C) 2010 ISTVS. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.