Application of wavelet analysis to the impact harshness of a vehicle

Abstract

The impact harshness of cars is an important factor in ride comfort. Traditionally, impact harshness is evaluated via subjective measurements based on the experience of test drivers. Objective evaluations are more efficient and reproducible than subjective measurements. Thus, this paper develops an objective measure based on a few signal parameters, specifically the initial peak values and damping ratios of the major vibration modes. A method based on the continuous wavelet transform is presented for the measurement of damping ratios. The performance of the method for estimating damping ratios is illustrated by the use of synthetic data, while performance of the objective measure is assessed on the basis of a series of trials on real vehicles.