Measurement 133 (2019) 383–395

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Measurement
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/measurement

Vehicle dynamics estimation via augmented Extended Kalman Filtering

Giulio Reina ⇑, Arcangelo Messina
a
Dept. of Engineering for Innovation, University of Salento, Via Arnesano, 73100 Lecce, Italy

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: The response of active safety systems of modern cars strongly depends on the estimation accuracy in the
Received 14 May 2018 key motion states of the vehicle. One common limitation of current systems is the lack of adaptability in
Received in revised form 21 August 2018 the parameters of the vehicle model that are usually treated as time-invariant, although they are not
Accepted 9 October 2018
exactly known or are subject to temporal changes. As a direct consequence, time invariant-parameter
Available online 11 October 2018
control systems may achieve sub-optimal performance and/or deteriorate according to the driving con-
ditions.
Keywords:
This paper presents a non-linear model-based observer for combined estimation of motion states and
Vehicle dynamics and handling
Combined state and parameter estimation
tyre cornering stiffness. It is based on common onboard sensors, that is a lateral acceleration and yaw rate
Extended Kalman filter sensor, and it works during normal vehicle manoeuvering. The identification framework relies on an aug-
Cornering stiffness identification mented Extended Kalman filter to deal with model parameter variability and noisy measurement input.
Nonlinear system identification Results are described to evaluate the performance and sensitivity of the proposed approach, showing an
improvement in the estimation accuracy that can reach an order of magnitude compared to standard
approaches.
Ó 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction This paper presents an approach for combined estimation of

The introduction of active control systems has dramatically
increased the safety level of modern cars. Current research efforts
are devoted to improve the performance of existing controls and
develop new trends in driving-assistant systems, such as coopera-
tive adaptive cruise controls, collision avoidance systems, and
lane-keeping assist systems [1]. For their continuous improvement
and successful integration, one critical aspect is connected with the
accurate knowledge of the parameters of the vehicle model. Con-
ventional approaches assume time-invariant parameters usually
obtained from data sheets or measurements. However, some
parameters are subject to change during operation, and therefore
they have to be regularly estimated and updated to improve model
quality.
One notable example is the tyre cornering stiffness that directly
affects the vehicle dynamic response during turning motion by
defining the relationship between tyre lateral force and the corre-
sponding drift angle. As cornering stiffness may change over time
or according to the driving conditions, the availability of an on-
line identification method would be of great value for improved
vehicle control and safety.
⇑ Corresponding author.
E-mail address: giulio.reina@unisalento.it (G. Reina).
vehicle states and tyre cornering stiffness that works on-line dur-
ing normal driving. The idea is that, as the car turns or passes an
obstacle or a slower vehicle, the system simultaneously estimates
the motion states and updates the model parameters. This objec-
tive is achieved resorting to ‘‘virtual” sensing that investigates cor-
relations between states and parameters using physical
relationships. In the context of this research, an Extended Kalman
filter (EKF) framework implementing the lateral dynamics of a
single-track model is used for tyre cornering stiffness identifica-
tion. The non-linear model-based observer can deal with hidden
(i.e., not directly observable) variables, noisy input measurements,
and gradual or abrupt drifts in the parameters.
2. Related work
In recent years, active safety systems have been largely devel-
oped to meet the increasing demand for higher performance and
safety. These control systems require accurate knowledge of the
vehicle states, such as longitudinal and lateral velocity, yaw rate,
and tyre side slip. However, only a few of these states can be mea-
sured in practice due to economic and physical reasons, thus some
of the states need to be estimated using a ‘‘virtual sensor” or obser-
ver that is built upon a model of the vehicle. The idea is that of
inferring information of a given variable of interest that is not
directly measurable by using physical relationships (i.e., a

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.measurement.2018.10.030
0263-2241/Ó 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
384 G. Reina, A. Messina / Measurement 133 (2019) 383–395

physics-based model) and only available sensor data. The Kalman stiffness in turn improves state estimation of vehicle handling
filter is one common solution to real-time observation problems dynamics.
with many applications in the automotive [2] and robotic [3] field. The proposed formulation is of general validity and, in principle,
However, the performance of model-based observers may be it may be used to track other vehicle parameters. For example in
limited under the assumption of time-invariant parameters of [18], it was applied by the authors to address the problem of vehi-
the vehicle model, such as inertial and tyre properties. While cle weight estimation.
approximate values for these parameters are known, they may
change over time, and therefore they need to be periodically esti-
3. Vehicle modelling
mated and adjusted to improve the model quality and, in turn,
the overall control system performance [4].
The model used in this paper that describes the vehicle lateral
Specifically, an observer for on-line estimation of tyre cornering
behaviour, is the ‘‘bicycle” or ‘‘single-track” model as shown in
stiffness would be of great utility since this parameter plays an
Fig. 1. This model is based on simplifications [19]: equal dynamics
important role in the response of a vehicle to steering input [5],
of the internal and external tyre of the same axle so that they can
and cornering stiffness enters most of the lateral dynamic models
be condensed, negligible weight transfer, constant longitudinal
that are used in the automotive control systems, including yaw sta-
velocity u, tyres working in their linear range, rear-wheel drive,
bility control, roll stability control, and active steering [6].
no motion resistance, and small angle approximation. Under these
In the literature, there are approaches to estimate cornering
assumptions, the vehicle dynamics can be expressed by the follow-
stiffness, but they generally depend on the availability of an addi-
ing equations in the two degrees of freedom b and r, respectively
tional measured state. For example, Ref. [7] shows that GPS and INS
the vehicle side slip angle and rate-of-turn,
measurements can be used to estimate adaptively tire cornering



stiffness and simultaneously improve state estimation. A dual Kal- CF þ CR CF a  CR b CF d
b_ ¼  b þ 1 rþ
man filter algorithm working in conjunction with a GPS measure- Mu Mu 2 Mu
ment system is presented in [8] to estimate the cornering stiffness
 2
! ð1Þ
CF a  CRb CF a þ CRb
2
C F ad
for on-board identification. Similarly, a dual Extended Kalman fil- r_ ¼  b rþ
ter approach is proposed in [9] for combined estimation of vehicle I Iu I
states and parameters, including mass and moments of inertia. An
The other terms included in Eq. (1) are the vehicle mass M, the rota-
EKF estimator working in conjunction with a sliding-mode obser-
tional inertia I, the front steer angle d, the distance of the centre of
ver is proposed in [10] for sideslip angle and tire cornering stiffness
gravity G from the front and rear axle a and b, respectively, and the
estimation, using tyre forces as input to the filter. In [11], a method
front and the rear tire cornering stiffness, respectively C F and C R .
is presented for tire force and velocity estimation at each corner to
In this study, the front and the rear tire cornering stiffness, that
monitor wheel capacities individually under combined-slip. The
are typically considered as fixed parameters in conventional mod-
system is demonstrated to be robust to model uncertainties and
els, are treated as parameters subject to change over time. As a
it does not require knowledge of the road friction.
consequence, Eq. (1) expresses a non-linear relationship between
The use of load-sensing hub bearings has also been proposed to
the state variables b and r, and the parameters C F and C R . The state
directly measure tyre cornering stiffness. In [12], it is demon-
transition model of the nonlinear system can be represented in
strated that the performance of a conventional electronic stability
compact matrix form as
control system may be improved via measured wheel forces. Sim-
ilarly, estimation of lateral vehicle velocity and tire cornering stiff- x_ ðt Þ ¼ f ðxðtÞ; dðt ÞÞ ð2Þ
ness is achieved in [13] using sensing hub bearings. Sideslip angle
and tyre properties estimation is proposed as well as for electric where x is the state vector and f ð:Þ is the state evolution function
vehicles using recursive least squares and tire force measurements that will be developed later
[14]. A model-based estimation method that uses steering torque h iT
to identify a vehicle’s lateral handling limits is introduced in _ r_ ; C F ; C R
x ¼ b; r; b; ð3Þ
[15]. A similar approach to estimate the friction coefficient and
vehicle slip angle at the same time is discussed in [16] using the Note that in the proposed formulation, x includes both state vari-
lateral acceleration and the tire-aligning moment. ables and time-varying parameters.
Finally, Extended Kalman Filtering is presented in [17] for state The paper aims to estimate tyre cornering stiffness using com-
and adaptive parameters (cornering stiffness) estimation. The mon onboard sensors, that is one gyroscope and one accelerome-
adaptation is driven by steer-induced variations in the longitudinal ter. The first sensor will measure directly the yaw rate rg ,
vehicle accelerations given a reduced sensor set comprising three whereas the second one will estimate the lateral acceleration that
accelerometers with different placement and orientation onboard is related with the state variables through the relationship
the vehicle. ay ¼ ub_ þ ur. As both sensors are already integrated in the ESP sys-
Somewhat inspired by the latter research, this work introduces tem of modern cars, the proposed approach results very attractive,
an adaptive observer for state and cornering stiffness estimation requiring only software developments and no extra sensor.
using common onboard sensors that are already integrated in most By introducing the measurement vector z
modern cars, that is, a rate-of-turn and lateral acceleration sensor.  
Therefore, no extra and costly sensor modality, such as GPS, wheel rg
z¼ ð4Þ
torque transducer, or load sensing bearing, is required. On-line ay
parameter estimation is achieved by including cornering stiffness
in the ‘‘augmented” state vector of an EKF-based observer that a measurement equation can be drawn in compact matrix form as
deals with the non-linearities of the resulting vehicle model. Thus, zðt Þ ¼ hðxðt ÞÞ ð5Þ
motion states and tyre properties are simultaneously estimated
and updated using current sensory data. The adaptation is driven The set of Eqs. (2) and (5) represents the basis of a non-linear esti-
by the vehicle lateral dynamic response during normal manoeu- mation problem. In the context of this work, an extended Kalman
vering, which represents the other novel contribution of this filter is applied to solve this problem, as detailed in the following
research. It is shown that accurate knowledge of tyre cornering section.
 G. Reina, A. Messina / Measurement 133 (2019) 383–395 385

Fig. 1. Lateral vehicle dynamics.

4. Estimation of the vehicle states and parameters the continuous time process and measurement noise covariance,
respectively. The noise input matrix Bx depends on the process
Due to cost and/or technical issues, not all states governing the noises that affect the states, as explained later. First, the above con-
vehicle dynamic response can be directly measured. In addition, tinuous time non-linear equations need to be converted in a
there are some vehicle parameters that are subject to change over stochastic discrete-time state-space representation
time, resulting in a higher uncertainty. In all those cases, a virtual
observer can be very helpful to generate an optimal estimate of the xkþ1 ¼ f ðxk ; dk Þ þ Cwk ;
ð7Þ
variables of interest based on available data only. It prevents com- zk ¼ hðxk Þ þ v k
mon problems connected with the use of mathematical models
that are not perfect (e.g., parameter variations, un-modelled h iT
dynamics, external disturbances, etc) and that typically introduce where xk ¼ bk ; r k ; b_ k ; r_ k ; C F;k ; C R;k is the state vector at time k; dk is
some mismatch. Another important problem is related to the sen- the steering angle at time k, and zk is the observation sampled at
sor noise. All sensors are noise corrupted and they do not provide time k. If the first-order Euler approximation with sampling time
perfect and complete data about the system behaviour. This sug- Dt is adopted to discretise the system, f ð:Þ is
gests the use of a stochastic closed-loop observer.
In this paper, an Extended Kalman Filter is adopted to estimate
simultaneously the vehicle states and the tyre cornering stiffness.
f 1 : bkþ1 ¼ bk þ b_ k Dt
The block diagram of Fig. 2 explains the main idea: the observer f 2 : r kþ1 ¼ r k þ r_ k Dt



runs in parallel with the system. The steer angle, d, and the longi- C F;k þ C R;k C F;k a  C R;k b C F;k dk
f 3 : b_ kþ1 ¼  bk  þ 1 rk þ
tudinal speed, u, and measurements of the vehicle’s response Mu Mu 2 Mu
(r g ; ay ) are input to the filter that recursively outputs the states
 !
2
C F;k a  C R;k b C F;k a þ C R;k b
2
C F;k adk
(b and r) and parameters (C F and C R ) of the vehicle during normal f 4 : r_ kþ1 ¼  bk  rk þ
driving.
I Iu I
f 5 : C F;kþ1 ¼ C F;k
4.1. Model-based estimator f 6 : C R;kþ1 ¼ C R;k
ð8Þ
A Kalman estimator can be developed that operates on the vehi-
cle dynamic model (i.e., Eqs. (2) and (5))
Similarly, hð:Þ can be obtained as
x_ ðt Þ ¼ f ðxðtÞ; dðt ÞÞ þ Bx xðtÞ
ð6Þ h1 : r g;k ¼ r k
zðt Þ ¼ hðxðt ÞÞ þ v ðt Þ ð9Þ
h2 : ay;k ¼ ub_ k þ ur k
where xðt Þ and v ðtÞ represent the process noise and sensor noise,
respectively. They are assumed to be zero-mean white Gaussian The Kalman filtering estimation operates through the well known
distributions, temporally independent of each other, Q and R being prediction-correction cycle expressed by an a priori estimation [20]:
386 G. Reina, A. Messina / Measurement 133 (2019) 383–395

Fig. 2. Block diagram of the proposed approach for state/parameter estimation using an EKF running in parallel with the system.

^xkþ1 ¼ f ð^xk ; dk Þ where

ð10Þ 2 3
P kþ1 ¼ Ak Pk ATk þ Q d 0 0 0
6 7
and a measurement update that provides an a posteriori estimation: 6 0 0 07
6 C F;k 7
 1 6 0 07
6 Mu 7
K kþ1 ¼ P kþ1 HTk Hk Pkþ1 HTk þ Rd Bx ¼ 6 aC F;k 7 ð15Þ
6 0 07
 ð11Þ 6 I 7
^xkþ1 ¼ ^xkþ1 þ K kþ1 zkþ1  Hkþ1 ^xkþ1 6 7
4 0 1 05
P kþ1 ¼ ðI  K kþ1 Hkþ1 ÞP kþ1 0 0 1

^
x
kþ1 being the predicted state vector, P kþ1 the variance matrix for and Q is the continuous process noise covariance matrix that is
^xkþ1 ; K kþ1 the gain matrix, ^xkþ1 the updated state vector, and Pkþ1
  
assumed as Q ¼ diag r2d ; r2CF ; r2CR . The process noise covariance
is the updated estimate covariance. In these equations, Ak and Hk
are, respectively, the process and measurement Jacobian (matrix measures the plant uncertainty, whose true value cannot be per-
of partial derivatives of f (h, respectively) with respect to x) at step fectly known. Therefore, an estimate of the process disturbance
k of the nonlinear equations around the estimated state has to be selected. In this research, the process noise was set higher
than that of typical steer angle sensor noise to account for other
2 3
1 0 Dt 0 0 0 errors such as unmodelled dynamics. A process noise standard devi-
6 0 1 0 Dt 0 0 7 ation, rd ¼ 0:3 deg on the input steer angle was adopted. For the
6 7
6 7 cornering stiffness of the front and rear tires the following standard
6 A31 A32 0 0 A35 A36 7
Ak ¼ 6
6A
7 ð12Þ deviations were chosen, rCF ¼ rC R ¼ 500 N/rad.
6 41 A42 0 0 A45 A46 7
7
6 7
4 0 0 0 0 1 0 5 4.2. Observability analysis
0 0 0 0 0 1
Before addressing any estimation problem, it is necessary to
  verify its observability. The observability ensures that the internal
0 1 0 0 0 0
Hk ¼ ð13Þ states can be properly derived from the knowledge of the input and
0 u u 0 0 0 external output of the system. This property is often discussed as a
where the terms Ai;j in Ak are developed in the Appendix. rank condition on the observability matrix. For a nonlinear obser-
The uncertainty in the sensor measurements is defined by the ver, the observability definition is local and refers to the Lie deriva-
discrete measurement noise covariance Rd , i.e. tive [23]. If the time derivative of measurement z is introduced:
 
Rd ¼ diag r2gyro ; r2acc . Sensor noise can be found in the sensor spec- dz @h dx @h
¼ ¼ f ðxÞ ð16Þ
ification sheet or it can be obtained from data analysis during dt @x dt @x
steady-state manoeuvring. In this research, the following value of the operator Lf (Lie derivative) can be used to define higher deriva-
measurement uncertainty was assumed that reflects the current
tives of z
order of magnitude in automotive applications, [7,17,21]:
Lf ½h ¼ @h f ðxÞ = time derivative of h along the system trajectory
rgyro = 1 deg/s, and racc = 0.5 m/s2. An output rate of 100 Hz is @x
x.
assumed for both sensor types.
The discrete process noise matrix (Q d ) can be approximated as

2
d z @ @h

[22], ) ¼ f ðxÞ f ðxÞ ¼ Lf Lf ½h ¼ L2f ½h
dt
2 @x @x
Q d  DtBx QBTx ð14Þ Therefore:
 G. Reina, A. Messina / Measurement 133 (2019) 383–395 387

k
dz 5. Observer evaluation
k
¼ Lkf ½h ð17Þ
dt
In this section, results are presented to evaluate the perfor-
mance of the proposed observer for combined state and tyre stiff-
A system with state vector x of dimension n can be considered ness estimation. First, the EKF observer is compared with data
locally observable at x0 if the observability matrix: obtained from a standard bicycle model featuring constant tyre
cornering stiffness. Then, it is validated against a higher order vehi-
h iT cle handling model.
0 1 i n1
Oðx0 Þ ¼ dLf ½h ¼ dh; dLf ½h; . . . ; dLf ½h; . . . ; dLf ½h ð18Þ As an example, a common passing manoeuver is considered
that can be expressed by a sine function for steering wheel input

has full rank n. The observation matrix Oðx0 Þ for the proposed obser- ds ðt Þ ¼ d0 sin xt
ver is analytically determined using the function diff(.) of the 2p L ð19Þ
Matlab Symbolic ToolBox. It results in a row rank of 6 proving the x¼
u
local observability of the system.
where u is the forward velocity of the vehicle, and L is the moving
length during the lane change. It is assumed a speed of 80 km/h,
Table 1 L ¼ 33 m, and steering wheel angle ranging between 60 and 60°
Parameters of a typical passenger car, for more (steering ratio s ¼ 1=20).
details the reader is referred to Fig. 1.
The parameters of the passenger car used in the simulations are
a 1.22 m collected in Table 1. The value of the front and rear tyre stiffness
b 1.04 m refers to nominal conditions. However, C F and C R are not always
CF 117,240 N/rad
known and, although they are treated as constant parameters in
CR 142,720 N/rad
M 1400 kg conventional vehicle models, they can vary substantially depend-
I Mab ing on various variables, including tyre size, type and manufac-
turer, inflation pressure, and road surface [24]. This points to the

Fig. 3. Slip angle estimation obtained with an observer based on a vehicle model with: (a) incorrect tyre stiffness, and (b) correct tyre stiffness.
388 G. Reina, A. Messina / Measurement 133 (2019) 383–395
utility of a system that continuously updates the tyre stiffness
online during normal manoeuvering.
In the simulations referring to the standard bicycle model, the
vehicle truth states are generated by integrating Eq. (1) corrupted
by process noise. Sensor noise is also added to the measurements
in order to provide realistic measurements to the estimator. The
filter runs in parallel with the system using the correct process
noise and providing recursive estimation of the vehicle states
and parameters.
5.1. System sensitivity to parameter accuracy
The effects of erroneous values in the parameters of the vehicle
model are evaluated for an observer that assumes a time-invariant
tyre stiffness reduced of 20% with respect to actual nominal value,
that is C F ¼ 93; 792 N/rad and C R = 114,176 N/rad. In Fig. 3(a), the
observer response (denoted with a gray solid line) is compared
against the actual vehicle behaviour (marked by a solid black line)
in terms of slip angle b, showing that an incorrect value of param-
eters results in biased state estimation. When correct tyre stiffness
is assigned to the model of the observer, b estimation is greatly
improved even in the presence of noisy sensor measurements
and it matches very well the actual trend, as shown in Fig. 3(b).
One error metric that can be used to quantitatively evaluate the
observer performance is the Mahalanobis distance [25], which can
be defined for a given observation as
Fig. 4. Mahalanobis distance associated with the estimates of an observer using: (a) incorrect tyre stiffness, and (b) correct tyre stiffness.
qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
T 
M ð xk Þ ¼ xk  lk P1 k xk  lk ð20Þ
xk being the estimated state vector at time k; lk the corresponding
ground truth, and Pk the estimate covariance. Mðxk Þ can be con-
trasted with a chi-squared distribution with the same number of
variables m to set the cutoff threshold for outlying observations
as the v2m quantile p (in our case, p = 0.01 or 1%)
qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
Lp ¼ v2m;p ð21Þ
which means that values of Mðxk Þ greater than (or equal to) Lp appear
with a probability equal to 1%. Therefore, any observation with asso-
ciated Mahalanobis distance satisfying the inequality M ðxk Þ P Lp
may be suspected to be an outlier. If the observer provides estimates
out of the threshold for more than 1% than the filter is inconsistent.
This is the case for the observer using incorrect parameters (Fig. 4
(a)). In contrast, estimates obtained from the observer with correct
parameters generally fall below the cutoff threshold (Fig. 4(b)). These
figures clearly show the negative impact of model parameter inaccu-
racies on the vehicle state estimation obtained with ‘‘static” obser-
vers that adopt time-invariant constants.
5.2. Adaptive estimation
A solution to improve the quality of the vehicle model and
therefore the performance of the associated control systems is to
 G. Reina, A. Messina / Measurement 133 (2019) 383–395 389

track over time possible changes in the cornering stiffness. This is
the main idea behind the proposed observer. The same passing
manoeuver of the previous section is repeated using the adaptive
EKF observer. The starting guess for the tyre stiffness is set approx-
imately 30% less than the actual value. Simultaneous estimation of
the states r and b, and the parameters C F and C R is shown in Fig. 5.
The observer becomes more and more accurate as the cornering
stiffness (solid grey line in Fig. 5(b)) is updated to the actual value
(dashed black line), and the difference between state estimates of r
and b (solid grey line in Fig. 5(a)) and their true value (solid black

Fig. 5. Results obtained from the adaptive EKF observer. The accuracy in the state estimation (a) improves as the cornering stiffness is updated to the actual value (b).

Fig. 6. Smoothing of the noisy measurements as obtained from the EKF observer.
390 G. Reina, A. Messina / Measurement 133 (2019) 383–395
line) decreases. In these figures, uncertainty in the estimation,
expressed as standard deviation (3r), is also shown denoted by a
grey shaded area along the corresponding curve.
Finally, Fig. 6 shows a comparison of the noisy measurements
given in input to the filter (denoted with a solid grey line) with
the output obtained from the estimator (marked by a solid black
line) in terms of yaw rate r and lateral acceleration ay , respectively.
This plot demonstrates the good work of the EKF-based estimator
in ‘‘cleaning” the input sensory data.
5.2.1. Comparison with a conventional observer
To show the advantages of the proposed system, the EKF obser-
ver is compared against a standard filter that uses an erroneous
constant tyre stiffness reduced of 20% with respect to the actual
value. In Fig. 7(a), the slip angle b as estimated by the EKF filter
Fig. 7. The EKF observer is contrasted with a conventional filter using time-
invariant parameters: (a) slip angle estimation, (b) estimation error, (c) Maha-
lanobis distance.
is shown by a solid black line, whereas the standard observer
response is denoted by a dashed black line. The actual value of b
is marked by a solid grey line. The accuracy of the EKF observer
improves as the tyre stiffness is adjusted to the true value. In con-
trast, the standard filter lacks in parameter adaptability providing
substantially biased estimates. This is also demonstrated when
analysing the error in the slip angle estimation, as shown in
Fig. 7(b). After an adaptation window of about 1 s, the root mean
square error in the adaptive EKF observer results in 0.02°, whereas
the conventional filter is affected by an error with a definite corre-
lation and RMSE of 0.9° (an order of magnitude higher). Finally,
Fig. 7(c) shows the Mahalanobis distance associated with the
observations as obtained from the adaptive EKF filter that fall
below the cutoff threshold, thus, confirming the robustness of
the system to model parameters.
5.2.2. Influence of the operating conditions
The performance of the adaptive EKF observer is evaluated by
changing the excitation to the system in terms of longitudinal
speed u and steering wheel angle ds . Different single step-steer
tests are solved by varying the command input. First, u is increased
while keeping ds constant (ds = 30°). Results are shown in Fig. 8(a).
The faster the car, the better the accuracy and the settling time in
the front cornering stiffness estimation. Similar results can be
obtained for the rear cornering stiffness and they are not reported
here. Fig. 8(b) summarises the filter response for increasing ds at
constant u (u = 80 km/h). For these simulations, the larger the
steering wheel angle the better the filter outcome. A quantitative
evaluation of the observer performance can be obtained by refer-
ring to the average estimation error, which can be defined as the
mean relative difference between the actual and the estimated
value of the states r; b, and parameters C F and C R . Tables 2 and 3
collect the results that highlight the critical role played by system
excitation. The lower the excitation, the worse the estimation
accuracy. Nevertheless, even in the worst-case scenario that corre-
sponds to a manoeuver at moderate speed (u = 50 km/h) and steer-
ing angle (ds ¼30°), the error in the estimation of u; b; C F , and C R is,
respectively, of 0.15%, 18.41%, 10.41%, and 9.31%, which is a rea-
sonable result.
It should be noted that the error in the state estimation of b is
generally larger. This behaviour can be explained when consider-
ing that b is not directly observable but it is indirectly estimated
via the vehicle model. As a consequence, its estimation is more
sensitive to parameter accuracy.
5.3. System validation using a truth model
The adaptive observer is evaluated by running in parallel with a
more realistic model following the scheme previously illustrated in
Fig. 2. As for the truth model, a two-track vehicle model is adopted
with seven degrees of freedom: the motion in the longitudinal
direction x, motion in the lateral direction y, yaw rate around the
vertical axis z, and the four wheel velocities. Roll and pitch are
neglected but weight transfer is included to determine individual
wheel vertical loads. The four-wheel-vehicle model represents a
good trade-off between prediction accuracy and computational
efficiency, as demonstrated in [26,27] where it was compared
against high-order multi-body models, producing similar results
in a wide range of maneuvers.
The relationship between the dynamic vehicle parameters can
be expressed as differential equations that can be found in the
standard literature, for example in [21, Chapter 6.15], and there-
fore they are not repeated here.
The vehicle dynamic response is greatly affected by the knowl-
edge of the forces acting at the tyres. Evaluation of these tyre forces
remains a major challenge in the study of vehicle dynamics. A large
 G. Reina, A. Messina / Measurement 133 (2019) 383–395 391

Fig. 8. Cornering estimation as obtained from the EKF observer in different step-steer maneuvers: (a) by increasing forward velocity u at constant steering wheel angle
(ds = 30deg), (b) by increasing steering wheel angle ds at constant forward speed (u = 80 km/h).

Table 2
body of research has been devoted to this area to develop appropri-
Errors in the state and tyre cornering estimation as obtained from the EKF observer by ate tyre models. Among these are the ‘‘Magic Formula”, developed
increasing forward velocity u at constant steering wheel angle ðds ¼ 30 degÞ. by Pacejka [28]. In the truth model, the ‘‘Pac96” version is used that
Speed u Error r Error b Error C F Error C R
explicitly takes into account the tyre cornering stiffness as
km/h % % % %    
C y ¼ pKy1 F z0 sin 2atan F z = pKy2  F z0  kFz0 1  pKy3  absðcÞ kFz0 kC y
50 0.15 18.41 10.41 9.31
80 0.12 3.25 2.15 2.10
ð22Þ
100 0.1 2.84 1.89 1.90

Table 3
Errors in the state and tyre cornering estimation as obtained from the EKF observer by
increasing steering wheel angle at constant forward speed (u = 80 km/h).

Steering angle Error r Error b Error C F Error C R

deg % % % %
10 0.19 2.45 3.53 3.13
30 0.14 3.24 2.15 2.10
50 0.12 2.30 1.44 1.45

Table 4
Parameters for the Magic Formula tyre model PAC96.

Parameters Front axle Rear axle

215/45-ZR18 275/40-ZR18

F z0 ðkN Þ 4 4
c (°) 0 0
pKy1 38.3662 56.5973
pKy2 2.78605 3.33342
pKy3 0.41595 0.314768
kFz0 1 1
kC y 1 1 Fig. 9. Tyre model according to the Magic Formula: lateral force as a function of the
sideslip angle for Fz = 4000 N. Solid line-PAC96 model, Dashed line-Linear model.
392 G. Reina, A. Messina / Measurement 133 (2019) 383–395

being F z0 the reference vertical load, c the camber angle, k-
coefficients scaling factors, and p-coefficients tire parameters.
Table 4 collects the values of the parameters used in the truth
model that refers to the Bridgestone Potenza 215/45-ZR18 and
275/40-ZR18 for the front and rear tyres, respectively. To visualise
the tyre behaviour according to the Magic Formula, Fig. 9 shows
the lateral force (denoted by a solid line) as a function of the sideslip
angle for the rear tyres. A vertical load of Fz = 4670 N is assumed.
The relationship between the side force and slip angle is initially
linear, with a constant slope determined by the cornering stiffness
C y , as expressed by Eq. (22). This region of handling is refereed to
as the linear operating region. As the slip angle increases, the force
tends to saturate entering the nonlinear region that represents the
tire limit and it is hardly reached under normal driving conditions.
It is important to note that the proposed EKF observer assumes
linear behaviour of the tyres (dashed line in Fig. 9). Therefore, pre-
diction accuracy in vehicle dynamic state estimation is expected to
degrade during aggressive maneuvering.
We will start by considering a 40 km/h double lane change
manoeuvre, where the measured steering wheel input from a test
vehicle has been extracted and applied to the truth model as a
time-dependent handwheel rotation. During the simulation, sen-
sor readings (i.e., r and ay ) acquired by virtual sensors onboard
the four-wheel-vehicle model are recorded and fed to the EKF

Fig. 10. Combined state and parameter estimation obtained from the EKF observer in a 40 km/h passing manoeuvre: (a) Front and rear tyre stiffness, (b) slip angle and yaw
rate. Solid grey line-EKF observer; Dashed black line-Truth model.
 G. Reina, A. Messina / Measurement 133 (2019) 383–395 393

observer following the framework described in Fig. 2. Recursive
estimation of the cornering stiffness and the associated uncertainty
(denoted by a grey shaded area), as obtained from the filter is
shown in Fig. 10(a). An initial value of 65% of the actual cornering
stiffness is assumed for both the front and rear axis. In addition,
estimated states including vehicle sideslip angle and yaw rate
can be compared with measurements taken from the truth model
to assess the accuracy of the filter, as shown in Fig. 10(b), where
the EKF estimation is marked by a solid grey line, whereas the
truth state is denoted by a dashed black line.
As seen from these figures, the observer corrects the erroneous
starting guess towards the actual value of the cornering stiffness in
about 7 s. As the tire properties are adjusted, the prediction accu-
racy in the estimation of b and r gradually improves, matching
more closely the truth data. To evaluate the filter response when
the tyres operate in the nonlinear region, a more aggressive
manoeuvre is considered with the vehicle overtaking a slower
vehicle at 100 km/h. In this case, the observer partially corrects
the erroneous initial guess of the tyre cornering stiffness (Fig. 11)
(a), leading to a final estimation error of 25.1% and 12.1% for the
front and rear tyre stiffness, respectively. As a consequence, the
prediction accuracy in the vehicle dynamic states decreases with
a root mean square error of 0.25° and 1:22  =s, respectively, for
the sideslip angle and rate of turn (Fig. 11(b)).
These figures highlight one limitation of the proposed system
due to the underlying assumption of linear behaviour of the tyres.
Therefore, predictions obtained from the EKF observer out of the
linear region of the tyre behaviour should be carefully considered

Fig. 11. Combined state and parameter estimation obtained from the EKF observer in a 100 km/h passing manoeuvre: (a) Front and rear tyre stiffness, (b) slip angle and yaw
rate. Solid grey line-EKF observer; Dashed black line-Truth model.
394 G. Reina, A. Messina / Measurement 133 (2019) 383–395

or discarded. This limitation may be solved by adopting a nonlinear Appendix A

differentiable tyre model, as, for example, the Dugoff model [29].
However, this is out of the scope of the research. Nevertheless, b F;k þ C
C b R;k
although the tyre forces are modelled with a simple linear model, A31 ¼ 
Mu !
the error in the EKF observer estimation is reasonable during mod- b F;k a  C
C b R;k b
erate/aggressive manoeuvering (i.e., with ay < 0:4 g). In addition, A32 ¼  þ1
Mu2
the filter response is consistent with the actual dynamic behaviour
of the vehicle, providing an estimate in defect for both the stiffness dk ^k
b a^r k
A35 ¼  
of the front and rear tyres. This can be explained when considering Mu Mu Mu2
that in the nonlinear zone, tyre cornering stiffness is expected to b^r k ^k
b
grow less than the linear zone or even decrease with the vertical A36 ¼ 2

Mu Mu ð23Þ
load. Moreover, the vehicle under analysis features an understeer-
b F;k a  C
C b R;k b
ing behaviour (with an understeer gradient of K us ¼ 0:3 ), further A41 ¼
explaining why the error for the front tyre is almost double with I
respect to the rear tyre. b F;k a2 þ C
C b R;k b2
A42 ¼
Iu
dk a a2^rk b ^k a
6. Conclusions A45 ¼  
I Iu I
^k b b2^r k
b
This paper presented a non-linear model-based observer that A46 ¼ 
aims to estimate tyre cornering during normal vehicle manoeuver- I Iu
ing and using only standard onboard sensors. The proposed
approach uses an Extended Kalman filter framework that allows
not only states that are not directly observable to be estimated, References
but also changes in the vehicle model parameters to be quickly
[1] R. Rajamani, Vehicle Dynamics and Control, Springer, 2012.
tracked. The system adaptability is crucial to address the increas- [2] M. Doumiati, A. Charara, A. Victorino, D. Lechner, Vehicle Dynamics Estimation
ing demand towards higher levels of safety and performance of using Kalman Filtering, Wiley, 2013.
[3] G. Reina, R. Galati, Slip-based terrain estimation with a skid-steer vehicle, Veh.
modern vehicles.
Syst. Dyn. 54 (10) (2016) 1384–1404.
Simulation tests were detailed to evaluate the system perfor- [4] G. Reina, A. Messina, A. Gentile, Tyre pressure monitoring using a dynamical
mance during common driving, including double-lane change model-based estimator, Veh. Syst. Dyn. 53 (4) (2015) 568–586.
and step-steer maneuvers. The sensitivity of the EKF observer to [5] F. Cheli, E. Sabbioni, M. Pesce, S. Melzi, A methodology for vehicle slip angle
identification: comparison with experiment data, Veh. Syst. Dyn. 45 (6) (2007)
varying drive conditions (i.e., longitudinal velocity and steering 549–563.
wheel angle) was also analysed. [6] U. Kiencke, L. Nielson, Automotive Control Systems, Springer, New York, 2000.
Results showed the advantage of the proposed system over a [7] D. Bevly, J. Ryu, J. Gerdes, Integrating INS sensors with GPS measurements for
continuous estimation of vehicle sideslip, roll, and tire cornering stiffness, IEEE
conventional observer that uses constant tyre stiffness with an Trans. Intell. Transp. Syst. 7 (4) (2006) 483–493.
accuracy in the slip angle estimation higher of an order of magni- [8] S. Lee, K. Nakano, M. Ohori, On-board identification of tyre cornering stiffness
tude. Even under low excitation conditions, the system performed using dual Kalman filter and GPS, Control Eng. Pract. 53 (4) (2015) 437–448.
[9] T.A. Wenzel, K.J. Burnham, M.V. Blundell, R.A. Williams, Dual extended Kalman
reasonably well with worst-case scenarios close to 10% in the esti- filter for vehicle state and parameter estimation, Veh. Syst. Dyn. 44 (2) (2006)
mation of tyre cornering stiffness.The adaptive EKF observer was 153–171.
also compared with a truth model, showing good accuracy in the [10] G. Baffet, A. Charara, D. Lechner, Estimation of vehicle sideslip, tire force and
wheel cornering stiffness, Control Eng. Pract. 17 (11) (2009) 1255–1264.
state and parameter estimation when tyres operate in their linear [11] E. Hashemi, M. Pirani, A. Khajepour, A. Kasaiezadeh, S. Chen, B. Litkouhi,
range, whereas performance tend to degrade during aggressive Corner-based estimation of tire forces and vehicle velocities robust to road
manoeuvring. conditions, Control Eng. Pract. 61 (2017) 28–40.
[12] A. Morgando, M. Velardocchia, A. Vigliani, G. van Leeuven, V. Ondrak, An
The EKF observer could be used to implement adaptive warning
alternative approach to automotive ESC based on measured wheel forces, Veh.
and safety systems and for accurate estimation of vehicle states Syst. Dyn. 49 (2011) 1855–1871.
and parameters. [13] K. Nam, Application of novel lateral tire force sensors to vehicle parameter
Further improvement of this research includes the investiga- estimation of electric vehicles, Sensors 15 (2015) 28385–28401.
[14] Y. Lian, Y. Zhao, L. Hu, Y. Tian, Cornering stiffness and sideslip angle estimation
tion of more accurate state estimators grounded, for example, based on simplified lateral dynamic models for four-in-wheel-motor-driven
in the unscented transform or in cubature integration [30]. electric vehicles with lateral force information, Int. J. Autom. Technol. 16 (4)
Although the EKF has been considered the de facto standard (2015) 669–683.
[15] Y.J. Hsu, S.M. Laws, J.C. Gerdes, Estimation of tire slip angle and friction limits
in the theory of nonlinear state estimation, many years of using steering torque, IEEE Trans. Control Syst. Technol. 18 (4) (2010) 896–
experience in the estimation community have also shown draw- 907.
backs: the high computational effort for the calculation of the [16] C. Ahn, H. Peng, H. Tseng, Robust estimation of road frictional coefficient, IEEE
Trans. Control Syst. Technol. 21 (1) (2013) 1–13.
Jacobian matrices as well as linearisation errors, which require [17] M. Best, T. Gordon, P. Dixon, An extended adaptive Kalman filter for real-time
small sampling times. A nonlinear Kalman filter which shows state estimation of vehicle handling dynamics, Veh. Syst. Dyn. 34 (2000) 57–75.
promise as an improvement over the EKF is the unscented [18] G. Reina, M. Paiano, J. Blanco, Vehicle parameter estimation using a model-
based estimator, Mech. Syst. Sig. Process. 87 (2017) 227–241.
Kalman filter (UKF). The UKF has been used for vehicle state [19] R. Jazar, Vehicle Dynamics, Springer-Verlag, New York, NY, USA, 2014.
estimation in [26] showing accuracy and computational costs [20] G. Welch, G. Bishop, An introduction to the kalman filter, SIGGRAPH.
comparable to the ones of EKF but without requiring the lineari- [21] M. Blundell, D. Harty, The Multi-body Systems Approach to Vehicle Dynamics,
Butterworth-Heinemann, Amsterdam, 2014.
sation of the underlying model. The absence of the linearisation
[22] G. Franklin, D. Powell, M. Workman, Digital Control of Dynamic Systems,
error further allows one to execute the filter with larger sam- Addison-Wesley, New York, 1997.
pling times. [23] H. Nijmeijer, A. Vanderschaft, Nonlinear Dynamical Control Systems, Springer,
Before practical implementation, the system should be evalu- New York, 1991.
[24] W. Sienel, Estimation of the tire cornering stiffness and its application to active
ated in road tests on a long-term basis and under various operating car steering, Proceedings of the 36th IEEE Conference on Decision and Control,
conditions using a full-size test vehicle. 1997, pp. 1–6.
 G. Reina, A. Messina / Measurement 133 (2019) 383–395
[25] A. Milella, G. Reina, J. Underwood, B. Douillard, Visual ground segmentation by
radar supervision, Robot. Auton. Syst. 62 (5) (2014) 696–706.
[26] S. Antonov, A. Fehn, A. Kugi, Unscented Kalman filter for vehicle state
estimation, Veh. Syst. Dyn. 49 (9) (2011) 1497–1520.
[27] T. Wenzel, T. Blundell, K. Burnham, R. Williams, Modelling and estimation of
automotive vehicle states, Proceedings of the International Conference on
Systems Engineering, Vol. 2, Coventry, UK, 2003, pp. 744–749.
[28] H. Pacejka, Tyre and Vehicle Dynamics, Butterworth-Heinemann, Oxford,
2002.
395
[29] H. Dugoff, P. Fancher, L. Segal, Tire performance characteristics affecting
vehicle response to steering and braking control inputs, Final Report,
Contract CST-460, Office of Vehicle Systems Research, US National Bureau of
Standards.
[30] I. Arasaratnam, S. Haykin, T. Hurd, Cubature Kalman filtering for continous-
discrete systems: theory and simulations, IEEE Sig. Process. 58 (10) (2010)
4977–4993.