Hybrid control in automotive applications: the cut-off control

A novel approach to the control of an automotive engines in the cut-off reg ion is presented. First, a hybrid model which describes the torque generati on mechanism and the powertrain dynamics is developed. Then, the cut-off co ntrol problem is formulated as a hybrid optimal control problem, whose solu tion is obtained by relaxing it to the continuous domain and mapping its so lution back into the hybrid domain. A formal analysis as well as experiment al results demonstrate the properties and the quality of the control law. ( C) 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.