An Intrinsically Stable MPC Approach for Anti-Jackknifing Control of Tractor-Trailer Vehicles

Tractor-trailer vehicles are affected by jackknifing, a phenomenon that consists in the divergence of trailer hitch angle and ultimately causes vehicle to fold up. For case backward motions, which jackknifing can occur at any speed, we present control method drives along generic reference Cartesian trajectories while avoiding angle. This is obtained thanks feedback law combines two actions: tracking term, computed using input–output linearization, corrective generated via IS-MPC, an intrinsically stable MPC scheme effective for inversion non-minimum phase systems. The successful performance proposed anti-jackknifing verified through simulations experiments on purposely built one-trailer prototype. To show generality approach, also apply test two-trailer vehicle.