Road Weather Management Program
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Best Practices for Road Weather Management Version 2.0

Title:

Automated Winter Road Maintenance using Road Surface Condition Measurements

Abstract:

In this project, a wheel-based tire-road friction coefficient measurement system is first developed for snowplows. Unlike a traditional Norse meter, this system is based on measurement of lateral tire forces, has minimal moving parts and does not use any actuators. Hence, it is reliable and inexpensive. A key challenge is quickly detecting changes in estimated tire-road friction coefficient while rejecting the high levels of noise in measured force signals. Novel filtering and signal processing algorithms are developed to address this challenge including a biased quadratic mean filter and an accelerometer based vibration removal filter. Detailed experimental results are presented on the performance of the friction estimation system on different types of road surfaces. Experimental results show that the biased quadratic mean filter works very effectively to eliminate the influence of noise and quickly estimate changes in friction coefficient. Further, the use of accelerometers and an intelligent algorithm enables elimination of the influence of driver steering maneuvers, thus providing a robust friction measurement system. In the second part of the project, the developed friction measurement system is used for automated control of the chemical applicator on the snowplow. An electronic interface is established with the Force America applicator to enable real-time control. A feedback control system that utilizes the developed friction measurement sensor and a pavement temperature sensor is developed and implemented on the snowplow.

Source(s):

University of Minnesota, Prepared for the Minnesota DOT

http://www.its.umn.edu/Publications/ResearchReports/pdfdownload.pl?id=770

Date: 2007

Author:

Erdogan, et al

Keywords:


Pavement friction
Anti-icing/Deicing

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