Effect of communication delays and packet dropouts on vehicle platoon control

Abstract

The influence of both inter-vehicular communication delays and packet dropouts on platoon control performance is studied. The conditions for achieving platoon mean square stability (MSS) are derived for three cases: undirected information flow (UIF) topology with time delays and identical packet losses, general information flow topology (IFT) with time delays and identical packet losses, and general IFT with time delays and non-identical packet losses. These conditions explicitly reveal how packet dropout rates, time delays, and IFT jointly affect vehicular stability. In this paper, the provided conditions are easily determinable, and the offered controllers are simple to implement, with low computational complexity. Finally, simulations are conducted to compare different time delays and packet loss rates, which validate the theoretical discoveries, also demonstrate the robustness and feasibility of the proposed methods using a platoon of passenger cars and realistic vehicle dynamics.