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SAE Paper On Compliance
SAE Paper On Compliance
SAE Paper On Compliance
CITATION: Yi, Y., Park, J., and Hong, K., "Design Optimization of Suspension Kinematic and Compliance Characteristics,"
SAE Technical Paper 2014-01-0394, 2014, doi:10.4271/2014-01-0394.
double wishbone and McPherson type front suspension. Table 1. List of the location of hard points to be modified.
However, they considered only a limited number of kinematic
characteristics and did not consider compliance characteristics
at all. Since the location of hard points affects not only
kinematic characteristics but also compliance characteristics,
the optimized results obtained by these schemes cannot be
regarded as the final solution of suspension design. Moreover,
in case the compliance characteristics are included in the
optimization target, the number of objectives becomes very big
and consequently the complexity of multi-objective function
gets extremely large.
Objectives
In this research, we tried to establish a new methodology in There are tens of K&C characteristics which are relevant to the
which one can find the set of design variables which meets R&H performances of a vehicle. Normally, each carmaker has
both kinematic and compliance characteristics targets by its own selected list of criteria for these characteristics, which is
separating the whole optimization problem into partial ones. determined from abundant vehicle development experiences
We design a new McPherson type front suspension using this accumulated for a long time.
methodology and the result is very promising.
In this research, 8 characteristics, which are known to affect
Problem Definition R&H performances most greatly, are selected for objectives to
be optimized. As listed in Table 2, 4 of them are kinematic and
For the test problem, the optimization of a McPherson type
the rest 4 of them are compliance characteristics.
front suspension for a newly developed C-class hatchback is
carried out. At the initial design stage, we originally intended to Table 2. List of the K&C characteristics to be optimized.
carry over the suspension of cousin car which shares the same
platform. Considering the increasing needs for more dynamic
handling and more comfortable ride performances for this class
vehicle in the market, the original suspension is not competent
enough in many aspects and needs to be improved from the
fundamental.
In some of former researches [2,3], Pearson's correlation The other one is more interesting. If Table 3 is divided into two
coefficients are regarded as sensitivity metrics. However, they parts of the first 4 rows and the last 4 rows, there are no
are metrics which represent only the linearity between input common columns shadowed in grey color between two parts.
and output variables and do not show any quantitative That means the most influential design variables on the
information. Even if the influence of design variable on a kinematic characteristics do not affect compliance
certain property is very small, correlation coefficient can be characteristics much, and vice versa. Therefore the original
very large (nearly one) only if their relationship is linear optimization problem for 8 suspension characteristics can be
enough. divided two partial and independent problems, namely, one for
kinematic and the other for compliance. Note that this complete
In the other hand, ANOVA can show the quantitative independence between kinematic and compliance
contribution of each design variable by partitioning the total characteristics cannot be expected always. For further study,
sum of squares into components generated by changes on we are now trying to apply the same design process for other
design variables [4]. From this viewpoint, ANOVA is much more suspension systems such as multilink suspension for rear axle.
effective and adequate tool for the understanding of the
influence of each design variable. In order to check if there exist any interactions between design
variables, another ANOVA with L16(215) orthogonal array is
conducted again for major 5 design variables for two partial
Sensitivity Analysis Results problem respectively. The results for compliance characteristics
Sensitivity analysis results are shown in Table 3. The number are shown in Table 4 and it can be easily found that there are
in each cell represents the proportion of effect of the no major interactions. The results for kinematic characteristics
corresponding design variable in terms of sum of square in show the same results, but are omitted in this paper for lack of
percent, and consequently larger number means bigger effect. space.
The cells which have relatively large number (over 10%) are
shadowed in grey color. Reviewing the table, two major
observations can be found. The first one is that only 26 cells 2nd Design Stage - Optimization
are shadowed among 144 cells (8 characteristics × 18 design The second stage of design process is the optimization. In
variables) in total. It means that only a few number of design order to find the optimum effectively, gradient-based
variables have most of influence and we don’t need to consider optimization algorithm is applied for both partial problems.
all the design variables in optimization process as a result. If
the optimization process is carried out with fewer design
variables, it can be accelerated much.
Table 3. Sensitivity analysis results represented in percent from ANOVA. (A∼F: location of hard point as shown in Figure 1, 1∼8 : K&C characteristics as
listed in Table 2). Relatively large number (over 10%) is shadowed in grey color.
Still there is an issue of how the target value for each where
characteristic should be determined. To resolve this, subjective
comparison evaluation and bench-marking results of
competitor's vehicle and original prototype vehicle are used.
K&C characteristics of each vehicle are measured in the same
testrig and subjective evaluations are carried out by several
(3)
expert test drivers. We try to find out what is the main cause for
difference in evaluation results through referring the K&C and when gi is smaller-the-best or larger-the-best
characteristic measurement data. Then the specific target
values for each characteristic are set with full use of a long
time experiences together.
List of final target is shown in Table 5. Note that the specific (4)
value is replaced by relative value for confidentiality.
where
Table 5. List of the target values for each K&C characteristic. (Category
- N: Nominal-the-best, C: Constraint, S: Smaller-the-best. 1∼8: K&C
characteristics as listed in Table 2)
(5)
and
(6)
nominal-the-best terms only, it is clear that there exists the there must be distribution in geometry such as length and the
global optimal point where f goes to zero when every gi location of hole and properties such as bushing stiffness due to
achieves its goal only if it is located in feasible domain. tolerance and error in manufacturing process. It is almost
impossible to verify the robustness by testing actual vehicle
In this viewpoint, we try to minimize the number of smaller-the- with every possible combination of distribution and driving
best and larger-the-best term included in the objective function conditions. The worst combination can be found through
by changing them as constraints. As a result, the first partial sensitivity analysis proposed in this paper, and if the effect of
problem for kinematic characteristics is composed of 3 this is predicted and then tested in real vehicle, the robustness
nominal-the-best terms and 1 constraint, and the second one can be verified efficiently.
for compliance characteristics is composed of 1 smaller-the-
best term and 3 constraints as categorized in Table 5. Summary/Conclusions
Two-stage optimization process for suspension K&C
Optimization Results characteristics is proposed in this research. In the first stage,
As the optimization algorithm, Sequential Two-point Diagonal sensitivity analysis is carried out using DoE scheme, and then
Quadratic Approximate Optimization (STDQAO) presented in the whole problem is divided into 2 partial independent
the optimization software PIAnO is selected. This algorithm is problems. In the second stage, multi-objective function is
developed for the optimization problem which has nonlinearity defined for effective optimization process, and then gradient-
and a kind of sequential approximate optimization technique based algorithm is applied to each partial problem. Since the
[5]. number of design variables of each partial problem is much
smaller compared to that of original problem, the optimization
The optimization process is carried out with full-size MBS in the process is much faster and more stable.
loop. Since the number of design variables concerned for each
partial problem is only 6 respectively and that makes the size This scheme is verified by designing new McPherson strut type
of the problem very small, computation time is affordable even front suspension. It shows successful results, even though total
without using meta-model such response surface method number of objective is relatively high compared to that
(RSM). considered in former researches. Moreover, not only kinematic
but also compliance characteristics are optimized
Optimized results are listed in Table 6, and it can be observed simultaneously.
that every K&C characteristic matches well with each target
value. Considering the producibility, the final design is modified This scheme can be used to verify the robustness of
a little from the optimum, and its properties are listed in Table 6 suspension characteristics to the production distribution and
as well. Even if they are somewhat different with optimal value, tolerances.
still much more improved from initial prototype design.
References
Table 6. Optimized results and properties of final design
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2. Sancibrian, R., Garcia, P., Viadero, F., Fernandez, A.
and De-Juan, A., “Kinematic design of double-wishbone
suspension systems using a multiobjective optimization
approach,” Vehicle System Dynamics 48(7):793-813, 2010,
doi:10.1080/00423110903156574.
3. Reinalter, W., Wölfel, G., Angrosch, B. and Plöchl, M.,
“Application of Design of Experiments and numerical
optimization in the kinematics design process of
suspension systems,” Chassis.Tech Plus 2011:237-252,
Other Applications 2011.
In this research, only one type of front suspension is optimized 4. Mason, R. L., Gunst, R. F. and Hess, J. L., “Statistical
for example problem. However, there are many other Design and Analysis,” John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken,
applications where the proposed scheme can be applied. New Jersey, ISBN 0-471-37216-1, 2003.
5. PIAnO User's Manual, Framax Co. Ltd.
For example, only with sensitivity analysis using DoE, we can
verify the robustness of suspension onto the production Contact Information
distribution and tolerances. Though the performance of a
vehicle is predicted before prototype production and tested with Corresponding author:
prototype unit on the assumption that all the parts are Yong-Sub Yi
produced and assembled perfectly according to design guides, miserere@hyundai.com
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ISSN 0148-7191
http://papers.sae.org/2014-01-0394