Platooning control based on two-layer controller

This paper proposes the control of vehicles' behaviors regarding platooning such as forming and splitting a platoon, switching lateral control between vehicle-following control and road-following control. The proposed control architecture is composed of two layers. The upper layer is a state controller which circumstantially switches vehicle's states such as a stand-alone vehicle, a platoon leader and a platoon follower. The lower layer is feedback controller for controlling the traction forces, braking forces and steering angle of a vehicle for keeping a velocity, an inter-vehicle distance and tracking a road center or a trajectory of the preceding vehicle. The lower layer has several kinds of feedback controllers. The feedback controllers working under each vehicle's state are settled in advance, and they are automatically switched according to the vehicle's state. Thus the vehicle's behavior regarding platooning can be easily controlled by changing vehicle's states without considering vehicle motion control. The proposed control is validated by experiments using small electric vehicles.