Abstract
The electronic wedge brake system (EWB) used in the automotive industry is a new structure designed for brake-by-wire systems. This paper proposes a novel EWB system which is mainly composed of a screw-driven wedged inner brake pad, a fixed outer brake pad, a fixed caliper-flexible brake rotor and a hybrid stepper motor. The proposed EWB system does not have a planetary gear set or a ball screw mechanism, it simplified the existing EWB systems. The proposed EWB system is designed to take advantage of the self-interlocking ability of the screw mechanism to hold the brakes with zero-overhauling and the self-energizing ability of the wedge brake pad to reduce the braking effort. In the braking phase, the screw driven wedge inner brake pad forces the flexible rotor against a fixed flat brake pad. The rotor is elastically deformed to make the contact against the fixed pad. Except for the applied force, the friction force between the brake rotor and the wedge pad exerts additional force as the wedge is pulled along the direction of rotation, thus requiring a lower brake actuation force. In this paper, the active disturbance rejection control (ADRC) algorithm is introduced to improve the response ability and stability of the proposed EWB. Simulations are performed to demonstrate the effectiveness of the ADRC controller in the proposed EWB system.