Influence of Driver Muscle Tension on His Ride Comfort

Abstract

Vibration and ride comfort is usually evaluated for vehicle passengers in passive state, in particular the human passenger is considered as a passive mechanical system. However, several experiments and experience with them indicated that the human passenger is an active participant of the dynamic process of comfort creation. This paper builds on these results with the novelty that the ultimate consequence of human muscle tension change is the improvement of ride comfort impression. Multibody model of human passenger body was developed and calibrated based on carried out experiments. The activity of passenger body is modeled as its muscle tension. The positive influence of muscle tension level on vibration and ride comfort is evaluated. It corresponds to the measured activities of human passenger bodies during carried out experiments.