Electric Power Assist Steering System Parameterization and Optimisation Employing Computer-Aided Engineering

The automotive industry strives to develop high quality vehicles in a short period of time that satisfy the consumer needs and stand out in the competition. Full exploitation of simulation and Computer-Aided Engineering (CAE) tools can enable quick evaluation of different vehicle concepts and setups without the need of building physical prototypes. Addressing the aforementioned statements this paper presents a method for optimising the Electric Power-Assisted Steering (EPAS) ECU parameters employing solely CAE. The objective of the optimisation is to achieve a desired steering response. The developed process is tested on three specific steering metrics (friction feel, torque build-up and torque deadband) for two function parameters (basic steering torque and active return) of the EPAS. The optimisation method enabled all metrics to fall successfully within the target range.