Remote controlled braking actuation for motorcycle safety system development

Amongst various initiatives in the last 20 years for the improvement of the safety of any road vehicles, Autonomous emergency braking for Motorcycles (MAEB) could provide a significant reduction in the number of crashes or the mitigation of crash injury outcomes. User acceptance of this system, however, is still subjected to a number of uncertainties due to the peculiar needs of two-wheel riding. The activity proposed in this paper is inspired by the need to build a laboratory motorcycle to be used in teaching, research and learning activities. A braking device to be used for testing of remote-activated braking events in real-world conditions is presented. The device was conceived in order to be low-cost, removable and not invasive in the vehicle, since it would act on existing levers. A simple control system based on commercial components is introduced; the device targeted a deceleration of 5 m/s2 (expected to be a safe value for most riding conditions); the system would be tested within not-professional riders. Our results include a brief characterization of existing braking system, a description of calibration method and the discussion of data obtained during real-world testing.