A Comparison of Driving Response Between a Bus and a Personal Motor Vehicle

The purpose of the study was to compare the important driving characteristics of buses and personal vehicles and, more specifically, their transient steering responses at constant driving speed. The study sought to define these characteristics in terms of time and frequency values which could be measured in open-loop, driving tests.

Experimental results precede a theoretical treatment of driving yaw (i.e., deviation from a straight path). A comparison of driving parameters is related to frequency and transient response of the two vehicle types. The results show that the primary differences between the two are caused by differences in wheelbase and in structural moments of inertia. These differences lead to quite different processes in the bus from those of the automobile; they consequently preclude a simple comparison of the two vehicle types by use of the introduced response values.