Fuzzy neural control for unmanned robot applied to automotive test

Purpose – The paper aims to overcome the shortcomings that proportional‐integral‐derivative (PID) control for unmanned robot applied to automotive test (URAT) needs a priori manual retuning, has large speed fluctuations and is hard to adjust control parameters. A novel control approach based on fuzzy neural network applied to URAT was proposed. Design/methodology/approach – According to the target vehicle speed and driving command table, the multiple manipulator coordinated control model was established. After that, the displacement of throttle mechanical leg, clutch mechanical leg, brake mechanical leg and shift mechanical arm for URAT was used as input of fuzzy neural network (FNN) model, and vehicle speed was used as output of FNN model. The number of membership functions was three, and the type of that was generalized bell membership function (gbellmf). The hybrid learning algorithm which combined with back propagation algorithm and least square method was applied to train the model. The Sugeno model was selected as fuzzy reasoning model. Findings – Experimental results demonstrated that compared with PID control method, the proposed approach can greatly improve the accuracy of vehicle speed tracking. The approach can accurately realize the vehicle speed tracking of given driving test cycle. Therefore, it can ensure the accuracy and effectiveness of automotive test results. Research limitations/implications – Future work will focus on improving the efficiency of this learning algorithm. Practical implications – The paper provides effective methods for improving the accuracy of speed tracking and repeatability. Originality/value – After establishing the multiple manipulator coordinated control model, this paper proposes a novel control approach based on FNN for URAT.