B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

B.TECH SEMINAR REPORT

RATCHET MECHANISM IN
HILL HOLD ASSIST

Submitted in partial fulfilment for the award of the Degree of

Bachelor of Technology in Mechanical Automobile Engineering.

Submitted by
Arun R Nath (Roll No.13438011)

Under the guidance of

Mr. Sarun P Murali

Department of Mechanical Automobile Engineering

SNIT, Adoor
KERALA
NOVEMBER 2016

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

CERTIFICATE

This is to certify that the seminar entitled RATCHET MECHANISM IN

HILL HOLD ASSIST is a bonafied record of the seminar done by ARUN R NATH
(Roll No.13438011) under my super vision and guidance, in partial fulfilment for the
award of Degree of Bachelor of Technology in Mechanical Automobile Engineering
from the University of Kerala for the year 2014.

Mr Sarun P Murali
(Guide)
Asst. professor
Dept. of MAE

Place:
Date:

Mr Vipin D
(Co-ordinator)
Asst. Professor
Dept. of MAE

Mr Kevin Thomas
H. O. D
Dept. of MAE

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I owe my heartfelt gratitude to The God Almighty for all the blessings he had
showered on me during this humble endeavour.
I take this opportunity to thank the Management who played a major role in
my college learning life. I would also like to express my sincere thanks to my
Principal Dr S R Deepa for his constant support.
I express my sincere thanks to Associate Professor Mr Kevin Thomas Head of
the Department of Mechanical Automobile for her unparalleled guidance, relevant
suggestions and motivations.
I wish to express my deep sense of gratitude to my seminar co-ordinator Mr
Vipin D, Assistant professor of Mechanical Automobile department, without whom I
could not have completed this seminar in time.
I would like to express my whole hearted thanks to my seminar internal
supervisor Mr Sarun P Murali, Assistant Professor in Electronics and
Communication department to meet all challenges to come up with my seminar
victoriously.
I extent my sincere thanks to other staff members in the Electronics and
Communication department and friends who gave me all the help and support to
complete the seminar.

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

ABSTRACT
Most of the drivers experience an embarrassing situation when they try to start
the vehicle on a slope. The driver cannot easily move a vehicle after braking in a
slope. The effect of gravity, frictional force, air resistance etc. are affected on the
vehicle on a slope, for moving the vehicle on slope the vehicle has to overcome these
forces. There are two existing solutions for this; one is conventional hand brake
technique (manual transmission) and hill hold control for automatic transmission.
There are some drawbacks for the existing system as hand brake technique is not a
fool proof solution and it requires experience and skill to master it. The hill control is
mainly for automatic transmission and is hardly used in the manual one and cost of
electronic systems such as the hill hold is high to be installed in an economic segment
car.
We introduce a new solution that works efficiently for all type of vehicles
(manual and automatic transmission).By providing a brake locking, such as a ratchet
gear mechanism used like in torque wrench. It is very cost effective solution, Stress
free driving and it is an advantage for heavily loaded vehicle.
By devising a mechanism of this sort we could make driving easier and most
importantly this sort of technology could reach the common man who form the
majority in any economy.

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

CONTENT

Chapter No.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.

Title
INTRODUCTION
RATCHET AND PAWL
MECHANISM
RATCHETS AND
RATCHETS GEARING
THEORY OF OPERATION
BACKLASH
HOW A RATCHET WORKS
RATCHET AS AN ENGINE
HILL HOLD CONTROL
COMPONENT MODEL
RATCHET MECHANISM IN
HILL HOLD ASSIST
CONCLUSION
FUTURE SCOPE
REFERENCE

Page No.
1
2
3
4
5
5
7
10
14
16
17
18
19

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

LIST OF ABBREVATIONS

EPB

Electric Park Brake

HAS

Hill Start Assist

ECU

Electronic Control Unit

AMT

Automatic Mechanical Transmission

MT

Manual Transmission

AT

Automatic Transmission

ii

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

LIST OF FIGURES

Figure No
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9

Title

Page No

A ratchet gear

Variation of ratchet and

Pawl action

Variation of ratchet and

Pawl action

Ratchet and Pawl Machine

Angular velocity of the ratchet

as a function of torque

Vehicle with and without HAS

11

Diagram of the EPB control

system

13

The hill Start system

15

Torque wrench using ratchet

mechanism

16

iii

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

LIST OF TABLES

Figure No
1

Title
Summary of operation of ratchet and pawl

iv

Page No
8

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

1. INTRODUCTION
HILL HOLD ASSIST

Any device that prevents a car from rolling backward on a hill when the brake
pedal is released can be called a hill holder. The earliest hill holders were used in
horse-drawn carriages and early horseless carriages. They were often home-made or
made by a local blacksmith. These early hill holders were little more than a heavy iron
weight with a spike or other sharp end that could be quickly dropped behind a wheel
when the need arose, preventing the vehicle from rolling backward. Hill-Holder is a
name for the mechanism invented by Wagner Electric and manufactured by Bendix
Brake Company in South Bend, Indiana. Studebaker.
RATCHET MECHANISM

A ratchet mechanism is based on a wheel that has teeth cut out of it and a pawl
that follows as the wheel turns. Studying the diagram you will see that as the ratchet
wheel turns and the pawl falls into the 'dip' between the teeth. The ratchet wheel can
only turn in one direction - in this case anticlockwise. In engineering, machines that
alternately turn and stop often employ ratchet mechanisms in particular, free-play
ratchet mechanisms. They are used, for instance, in hoists, transport mechanisms,
supply mechanisms for metal cutting machines, hydrodynamic transmissions, starting
systems for internal combustion engines and gas turbines, bicycle and helicopter
transmissions, pulsed mechanical transmissions, and continuous mechanical
transmissions.
A ratchet mechanism with a gear knob connected by a mechanical linkage is
used in the design of RATCHET MECHANISM IN HILL HOLD ASSIST. The gear
knob which select the locking direction. The locking pin locks the direction of rotation
of wheel in the selected direction then it allows only rotate in the opposite direction
only.

1|Page

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

RATCHET AND PAWL MECHANISM

A ratchet is a mechanical device that allows continuous linear or rotary

motion in only one direction while preventing motion in the opposite direction.
Ratchets are widely used in machinery and tools. Though something of a misnomer,
"ratchet" is also often used to refer to ratcheting socket wrenches, a common tool with
a ratcheting handle.
A ratchet is composed of three main parts: a round gear (or a linear rack), a
pawl (also called a "click"), and a base (or mount).

1. Gear: Ratchets composed from gears are typically round and are
composed of uniform but asymmetric teeth designed to limit motion to a
single direction. The edges on one side of the gear's teeth have a steep
slope (oftentimes nearly perpendicular to the tangent of the gear's
circumference) while the other edges of the gear's teeth have a moderate
or gradual slope. Linear Rack: Some ratchet designs utilize a linear
rack in place of a round gear. The tooth design on a linear rack is exactly
the same as it is with a round gear.
2. Pawl ("Click"): The pawl is the part that makes contact with the gear
or linear rack. When the gear (linear rack) is rotated (linearly moved) in
one direction, the pawl will slide over the teeth without restricting the
natural motion of the device. When the direction of motion is reversed
the pawl will come into contact with the steep slope on the gear tooth
and will impede motion.
3. Mount: Gears or Linear Racks and Pawls are typically mounted in a
fixed relationship to one another on a mount.

There may be additional and distinct parts that make up a particular ratchet
device. In both types of ratchet describe above, a force is often applied to the pawl in
order to maintain contact with the gear. Springs or a lever system are usually used to
accomplish this. Lever systems involve turning the pawl into a first order lever. In this
capacity the pawl rotates into a position where it engages the gear. This type of design
can be used to create a mechanism where the direction of the restricted motion can be
changed.

2|Page

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

Figure 1: A ratchet featuring gear (1) and pawl (2) mounted on base (3).

The ratchet and pawl mechanism plays a crucial role in providing one way
transmission and safety against heavy loading conditions. At the mechanical hoists
ratchet when locked, allows only one way motion explicitly lifting of masses and
restricts its falling probability even if the tensions on counter sides are removed.

RATCHETS AND RATCHETS GEARING

A ratchet is a form of gear in which the teeth are cut for one-way operation or
to transmit intermittent motion. The ratchet wheel is used widely in machinery and
many mechanisms. Ratchet-wheel teeth can be either on the perimeter of a disk or on
the inner edge of a ring.
The pawl, which engages the ratchet teeth, is a beam member pivoted at one end, the
other end being shaped to fit the ratchet tooth flank.
Ratchet Gear Design. In the design of ratchet gearing, the teeth must be designed so
that the pawl will remain in engagement under ratchet-wheel loading. In ratchet gear
systems, the pawl will either push the ratchet wheel or the ratchet wheel will push on
the pawl and/or the pawl will pull the ratchet wheel or the ratchet wheel will pull on
the pawl. See Figs. 8.1a and b for the four variations of ratchet and pawl action. In the
figure, F indicates the origin and direction of the force and R indicates the reaction
direction.

3|Page

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

Figure 2: Variation of ratchet and pawl action (F = force; R = reaction).

Figure 3: Variation of ratchet and pawl action (F = force; R = reaction).

THEORY OF OPERATION
A ratchet consists of a round gear (see Figure 1) or linear rack with teeth, and a
pivoting, spring-loaded finger called a pawl that engages the teeth. The teeth are
uniform but asymmetrical, with each tooth having a moderate slope on one edge and a
much steeper slope on the other edge.
When the teeth are moving in the unrestricted (i.e., forward) direction , the
pawl easily slides up and over the gently sloped edges of the teeth, with a spring
forcing it into the depression between the teeth as it passes the tip of each tooth.
When the teeth move in the opposite (backward) direction, however, the pawl will
catch against the steeply sloped edge of the first tooth it encounters, thereby locking it
against the tooth and preventing any further motion in that direction.

4|Page

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

BACKLASH
Because the ratchet can only stop backward motion at discrete points (i.e., at
tooth boundaries), a ratchet does allow a limited amount of backward motion. This
backward motion which is limited to a maximum distance equal to the spacing
between the teeth is called backlash. In cases where backlash must be minimized, a
smooth, toothless ratchet with a high friction surface such as rubber is sometimes
used. The pawl bears against the surface at an angle so that any backward motion will
cause the pawl to jam against the surface and thus prevent any further backward
motion. Since the backward travel distance is primarily a function of the
compressibility of the high friction surface, this mechanism can result in significantly
reduced backlash.

HOW A RATCHET WORKS

In Carnol's argument, the fact that more than a certain amount of work cannot
be extracted in going from one temperature to another is deduced from another axiom,
which is that if everything is at the same temperature, heat cannot be converted to
work by means of a cyclic process. First, let us back up and try to see, in at least one
elementary example, why this simpler statement is true.
A device which will violate the Second Law of Thermodynamics, that is, a
gadget which will generate work from a heat reservoir with everything at the same
temperature. Let us say we have a box of gas at a certain temperature, and inside there
is an axle with vanes in it. (See Fig. 4 but take T I = T: I = T, say.) Because of the
bombardments of gas molecules on the vane, the vane oscillates and jiggles. All we
have to do is to hook onto the other end of the axle a wheel which can turn only one
way-the ratchet and pawl. Then when the shaft tries to jiggle one way, it will not turn,
and when it jiggles the other, it will turn. Then the wheel will slowly turn, and perhaps
we might even tie a flea onto a string hanging from a drum on the shaft, and lift the
flea! Now let us ask if this is possible. According to Carnol's hypothesis, it is
impossible. But if we just look at it, we see that it seems quite possible. So we must
look more closely. Indeed, if we look at the ratchet and pawl, we see a number of
complications. First. Our idealized ratchet is as simple as possible, but even so, there
is a pawl, and there must be a spring in the pawl. The pawl must return after coming
off a tooth, so the spring is necessary.

5|Page

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

Figure 4: The ratchet and pawl machine

Another feature of this ratchet and pawl, not shown in the figure, is quite
essential. Suppose the device were made of perfectly elastic parts. After the pawl is
lifted off the end of the tooth and is pushed back by the spring, it will bounce against
the wheel and continue to bounce. Then, when another fluctuation came, the wheel
could turn the other way, because the tooth could get underneath during the moment
when the pawl was up! Therefore an essential part of the irreversibility of our wheel is
a damping or deadening mechanism which stops the bouncing. When the damping
happens, of course, the energy that was in the pawl goes into the wheel and shows up
as heat. So, as it turns, the wheel will get hotter and hotter. To make the thing simpler,
we can put a gas around the wheel to take up some of the heat. Anyway, let us say the
gas keeps rising in temperature, along with the wheel.
The pawl and wheel, both at some temperature T, also have Brownian motion.
This motion is such that, every once in a while. By accident, the pawl lifts itself up
and over a tooth just at the moment when the. Brownian motion on the vanes is trying
to turn the axle backwards. And as things get hotter, this happens more often. So, this
is the reason this device does not work in perpetual motion. When the vanes get
kicked, sometimes the pawl lifts up and goes over the end. But sometimes, when it
tries to turn the other way, the pawl has already lifted due to the fluctuations of the
motions on the wheel side, and the wheel goes back the other way. The net result is
nothing. It is not hard to demonstrate that when the temperature on both sides is equal,
there will be no net average motion of the wheel. Of course the wheel will do a lot of
jiggling this way and that way, but it will not do what we would like, which is to turn
just one way. Let us look at the reason. It is necessary to do work against the spring in
order to lift the pawl to the top of a tooth. Let us call this energy E, and let 0 be the
angle between the teeth. The chance that the system can accumulate enough energy, E,
to get the pawl over the top of the tooth, is e-E-kT But the probability that the pawl
will accidentally be up is also e-E-kT. So the number of times that the pawl is up and
the wheel can turn backwards freely is equal to the number of times that we have

6|Page

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

enough energy to turn it forward when the pawl is down. We thus get a "balance," and
the wheel will not go around.

RATCHET AS AN ENGINE
Let us now go further. Take the example where the temperature of the vanes is
T1 and the temperature of the wheel, or ratchet, is T2, and T 2 is less than T 1.
Because the wheel is cold and the fluctuations of the pawl are relatively infrequent, it
will be very hard for the pawl to attain an energy E. Because of the high temperature T
h the vanes will often attain the energy E, so our gadget will go in one direction, as
designed.
We would now like to see if it can lift weights. Onto the drum in the middle
we tie a string, and put a weight, such as our flea, on the string. We let L be the torque
due to the weight. If L is not too great, our machine will lift the weight because the
Brownian fluctuations make it more likely to move in one direction than the other. We
want to find how much weight it can lift, how fast it goes around, and so on.
First we consider a forward motion, the usual way one designs a ratchet to run.
In order to make one step forward, how much energy has to be borrowed from the
vane end? We must borrow an energy E to lift the pawl. The wheel turns through an
angle 0 against a torque L, so we also need the energy LO. The total amount of energy
that we have to borrow is thus E + LO. The probability that we get this energy is
proportional to e-(E+Ul/kTt Actually, it is not only a question of getting the energy,
but we also would like to know the number of times per second it has this energy. The
probability per second is proportional to e-(HL8l/kTJ, and we shall call the
proportionality constant liT. It will cancel out in the end anyway. When a forward step
happens, the work done on the weight is LO. The energy taken from the vane is E +
LO. The spring gets wound up with energy E, then it goes clatter, clatter, bang, and
this energy goes into heat. All the energy taken out goes to lift the weight and to drive
the pawl, which then falls back and gives heat to the other side.
Now we look at the opposite case, which is backward motion. To get the
wheel to go backwards all we have to do is supply the energy to lift the pawl high
enough so that the ratchet will slip. This is still energy E. Our probability per second
for the pawl to lift this high is now (lIT) e-E/ kT2. Our proportionality constant is the
same, but this time kT2 shows up because of the different temperature. When this
happens, the work is released because the wheel slips backward. It loses one notch, so
it releases work LO. The energy taken from the ratchet system is E, and the energy
given to the gas at T 1 on the vane side is LO + E. It takes a little thinking to see the
reason for that. Suppose the pawl has lifted itself up accidentally by a fluctuation.
Then when it falls back and the spring pushes it down against the tooth, there is a
force trying to turn the wheel, because the tooth is pushing on an inclined plane. This

7|Page

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

force is doing work, and so is the force due to the weights. So both together make up
the total force, and all the energy which is slowly released appears at the vane end as
heat. (Of course it must, by conservation of energy, but one must be careful to think
the thing through!) We notice that all these energies are exactly the same, but
reversed. So, depending upon which of these two rates is greater, the weight is either
slowly lifted or slowly released. Of course, it is constantly jiggling around, going up
for a while and down for a while, but we are talking about the average behaviour.

Table 1: Summary of operation of ratchet and pawl

Suppose that for a particular weight the rates happen to be equal. Then we add
an infinitesimal weight to the string. The weight will slowly go down, and work will
be done on the machine. Energy will be taken from the wheel and given to the vanes.
If instead we take off a little bit of weight, then the imbalance is the other way. The
weight is lifted, and heat is taken from the vane and put into the wheel. So we have the
conditions of Carnot's reversible cycle, provided that the weight is just such that these
two are equal. This condition is evidently that
(f + LO)/T1 = fiT2. Let us say that the machine is slowly lifting the weight. Energy
Q1 is taken from the vanes and energy Qz is delivered to the wheel, and these energies
are in the ratio (f + LO)/f. If we are lowering the weight, we also have Qd/Qz = (E +
LB)/f. Thus (Table 1) we have

Qd/Qz = Td/Tz.
Furthermore, the work we get out is to the energy taken from the vane as LO is
to LO + E, hence as (T1 - T z)/T1. We see that our device cannot extract more work
than this, operating reversibly. This is the result that we expected from Carnot's
argument, and the main result of this lecture. However, we can use our device to

8|Page

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

understand a few other phenomena, even out of equilibrium, and therefore beyond the
range of thermodynamics. Let us now calculate how fast our one-way device would
turn if everything were at the same temperature and we hung a weight on the drum. If
we pull very, very hard, of course, there are all kinds of complications. The pawl slips
over the ratchet, or the spring breaks, or something. But suppose we pull gently
enough that everything works nicely. In those circumstances, the above analysis is
right for the probability of the wheel going forward and backward, if we remember
that the two temperatures are equal. In each step an angle 0 is obtained, so the angular
velocity is 0 times the probability of one of these jumps per second. It goes forward
with probability (l/r) e-(t+L8)/kT and backward with probability (l/r) e-t/ kT, so that
for the angular velocity we have

w = (O/r) e-(E+L6)/kT _ e-t /kT

(O/r) e-E/kT (e-L6/kT - I).
If we plot w against L, we get the curve shown in Fig. 5. We see that it makes a
great difference whether L is positive or negative. If L increases in the positive range,
which happens when we try to drive the wheel backward, the backward velocity
approaches a constant. As L becomes negative, w really "takes off" forward, since e to
a tremendous power is very great. The angular velocity that was obtained from
different forces is thus very unsymmetrical. Going one way it is easy: we get a lot of
angular velocity for a little force. Going the other way, we can put on a lot of force,
and yet the wheel hardly goes around.

9|Page

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

Figure 5: Angular velocity of the ratchet as a function of torque.

We find the same thing in an electrical rectifier. Instead of the force, we have
the electric field, and instead of the angular velocity, we have the electric current. In
the case of a rectifier, the voltage is not proportional to resistance, and the situation is
unsymmetrical. The same analysis that we made for the mechanical rectifier will also
work for an electrical rectifier. In fact, the kind of formula we obtained above is
typical of the current-carrying capacities of rectifiers as a function of their voltages.
Now let us take all the weights away, and look at the original machine. If T 2
were less than T 1> the ratchet would go forward, as anybody would believe. But what
is hard to believe, at first sight, is the opposite. If T 2 is greater than T 1> the ratchet
goes around the opposite way! A dynamic ratchet with lots of heat in it runs itself
backwards, because the ratchet pawl is bouncing. If the pawl, for a moment, is on the
incline somewhere, it pushes the inclined plane sideways. But it is always pushing on
an inclined plane, because if it happens to lift up high enough to get past the point of a
tooth, then the inclined plane slides by, and it comes down again on an inclined plane.
So a hot ratchet and pawl is ideally built to go around in a direction exactly opposite
to that for which it was originally designed
In spite of all our cleverness of lopsided design, if the two temperatures are
exactly equal there is no more propensity to turn one way than the other. The moment
we look at it, it may be turning one way or the other, but in the long run, it gets
nowhere. The fact that it gets nowhere is really the fundamental deep principle on
which all of thermodynamics is based.

HILL HOLD CONTROL

Most of the drivers experience an embarrassing situation when they try to start
the vehicle on a slope. The driver cannot easily move a vehicle after braking in a
slope. The effect of gravity, frictional force, air resistance etc. are affected on the
vehicle on a slope, for moving the vehicle on slope the vehicle has to overcome these
forces. There are two existing solutions for this; one is conventional hand brake
technique (manual transmission) and hill hold control for automatic transmission.
There are some drawbacks for the existing system as hand brake technique is not a
fool proof solution and it requires experience and skill to master it. The hill control is
mainly for automatic transmission and is hardly used in the manual one and cost of
electronic systems such as the hill hold is high to be installed in an economic segment
car.

10 | P a g e

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

The research on hill start assistance systems is basically divided into two
mainstreams depending on the type of transmission adopted in the vehicle: automatic
or manual. With an automatic transmission system, the torque transmitted to the
wheels can be estimated with a high degree of confidence, thanks to the fact that all
the necessary information is known. Henceforth, the hill assistance system is much
simpler, When a manual transmission is adopted, the driver is inevitably in the loop,
since the torque transmitted is governed by the driver. In this situation, open loop
configurations have been explored the EPB is on for few seconds to allow the driver
to manage the brake and the acceleration of the vehicle. Alternatively proposed the
possibility to using a closed loop strategy based on fast modulation of the EPB force
and on the measure of the transmitted torque.

Figure 6: vehicle with and without HSA

The vehicle will move backward, start with jerk, or cause engine stalling if
failed on the slope road. For the manual transmission, the hill-start depends on the
driver's skilled driving technology to coordinate the brake pedal, the clutch pedal and
the throttle pedal to achieve a smooth start.
Mainly the Hill Hold Assist Which is implemented in the automatic
transmission vehicle which works on the basis of ECU and other controlling sensors.
The system which actuate when the vehicle on a slope and the driver can select the
selecting switch or knob, the control unit which actuates the system. The system
which hold the brakes for an additional 2 seconds, after the driver release the brake
pedal thus the driver can easily control the accelerator and clutch. The vehicle can
easily move through the slope without rolling back.

11 | P a g e

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

The system object of this work is a commercial vehicle equipped with a manual
transmission and an electric parking brake which can be automatically commanded.
As depicted in Fig. 7, the full system comprising the hill start assistance is constituted
by the following subsystems.

The driver commands manually the vehicle by the means of the requested
torque, the clutch position and the selected gear. The driver acts according to
vehicle behaviour.

The engine can be viewed as a system (internally controlled by the engineECU) whose inputs are the requested throttle and the torque limiter, and whose
outputs are the actual torque and the rotary velocity of the engine.

The driveline delivers the actual torque to the wheels. The inputs are the clutch
position, the selected gear and the engine torque, the force delivered by the
EPB, the gravity effect according to the road slope and to the vehicle mass

The EPB (internally controlled by an appropriate microcontroller) receives an

On-Off command and delivers a braking force to the wheels. Notice that the
EPB is implemented with a cost effective motor and it has a time response
(namely the time required by the actuator to reach the 90% of the requested
force) of 1.3 seconds. Due to the electrical limits, the EPB must be considered
as an on-off actuator with a necessary idle time of 2 second (neither modulation
nor reapply of the braking force is possible).

Finally the Hill Start Assistance monitors the measurable signals and on this
basis triggers the EPB. The assistance subsystem is implemented in an ECU
specifically designed for this kind of application which runs at a sampling
frequency of 0.02 seconds (50Hz).

12 | P a g e

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

Figure 7: DIAGRAM OF THE EPB CONTROL SYSTEM.

It is worth noticing that the driver inputs are not fully measurable. Moreover,
the vehicle mass is a non-measurable parameter and it can vary from 2500Kg to
5000Kg. This represents the main uncertainty affecting the system.
The adopted sensor layout is minimal, since compared to a standard vehicle the
only required sensor is an accelerometer able to detect the road slope (due to the
gravity offset induced by the slope) and the vehicle longitudinal dynamic. Roughly
speaking, this makes the system plug-and-play, since the mechanical parking brake
may be changed with an electric actuator and the ECU of the hill start assistance is
simply interfaced to the vehicle ECU, without any action on the vehicle layout.
The AMT (Automatic Mechanical Transmission) has attracted increasing
interesting from automotive researches, because it has some advantages of MT
(Manual Transmission) and AT(Automatic Transmission), such as low cost, high
efficiency, easy to use and good comfort. And the AMT can be manufactured by
manual transmission product line with low equipment investment. Thus, the heavy
trucks equipped AMT are spreading in recent years, especially in Europe, Japan and
China.
The hill-start is very important for the AMT. The vehicle will move backward,
start with jerk, or cause engine stalling if failed on the slope road. For the manual
transmission, the hill-start depends on the driver's skilled driving technology to

13 | P a g e

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

coordinate the brake pedal, the clutch pedal and the throttle pedal to achieve a smooth
start. However, the AMT removes the clutch pedal, thus the driver cant perceived the
clutch position. So it is difficult to hill-start for the driver with AMT without hill-start
control strategy.
There have been some researches with hill-start control strategy. The Toyota
use the HAS (Hill-start Assist System) to achieve the hill-start. It uses a sensor to
monitor the wheel state. If the wheel begins to roll backwards, the ECU controls the
brake the system to engage the brake on the wheel. However, the hill-start is not
perfect, because it cant avoid the rolling back. Ge proposed an optimal control
strategy by identification the driving resistance, however, the driving resistance is not
easy to achieve when the vehicle drives on the road. Wang designed a hill-start control
strategy with the reconstruction of the breaking system. However, the strategy cant
coordinate the clutch, brake and the engine very well. It will also cause vehicle move
backwards or engine stalling. This paper presents a new control strategy for the heavy
truck with the AMT. Compared with other types of hill-start strategy, the control
strategy in this paper have some advantages such as more safe, start smoothly and less
impact when start.

COMPONENT MODEL
The vehicle equipped AMT system consists of complicated component
subsystems such as the engine, clutch, gears, wheels and vehicle road load. These
component models are described in the following.
Engine model it is very difficult to described a very detailed engine model.
Because there are combustion, thermo dynamics, friction, etc. inside the
engine. To simplify the modelling process, this paper use the experiment data
to represent the engine. The output torque of the engine is interpolated
corresponding to engine speed and throttle position from an engine map
modelled as a 2 dimension look-up table. For each throttle opening, the engine
torque from idle to redline is a function of engine angular velocity, which is
described in the following:
Te = f (, we) (1)
Where, e T is the output torque of the engine, is the throttle position which is from 0
to 1, and e w is the rotational speed of the engine.
Clutch model the function of an engaging friction clutch is to transmit torque
gradually, to avoid high accelerations or jerks, when the engine is connected to

14 | P a g e

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

the rest of the driveline. This torque is transferred from the engine through the
pressure plate onto one or more friction plates connected to the transmission
input shaft. There are three distinct modes of clutch: free, where the two plates
transmit no torque; slipping, where the two plates have differing angular
velocities; and lockup, where the two plates rotate together. The torque
capacity of the clutch is a function of its size, friction characteristics, and the
normal force that is applied.
Gear model the gears provide speed and torque conversion from a rotating
power source to another device using gear ratios. Considering the power loss
caused by the friction and gear teeth contact.
Wheel model the model structure we assume that the driving wheels and tyres
are modelled as an inertia connected to the vehicle mass through a linear
stiffness with coefficient b. This damper forms the slipping traction interface
between tyres and road.
Vehicle system model the longitudinal vehicle road load includes the rolling
resistance, aerodynamic resistance, and uphill resistance. The vehicle model
can be described as follows:
t r ma = F F

15 | P a g e

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

Figure 8: The hill Start system

RATCHET MECHANISM IN HILL HOLD ASSIST

The ratchet mechanism used in the hill hold assist which control the rolling of
the wheel, thus it prevents the rotation of the wheel in the direction of the lock. The
ratchet and pawl mechanism which allow rotation of the shaft in one direction only.
Ratchet wheel have a locking mount pin that pin control the pawl lever this locks the
gear. The shaft of the wheel connected to the ratchet gear wheel, by the locking of
ratchet which locks the wheel of the automobile also.
There is a gear knob in the driver cabin which connects the ratchet mechanism.
The knob controls the pin in the ratchet, knob which is used to select the direction of
lock.
The mechanism used in this is like the mechanism in the ratchet controlled
torque wrench. There are two levers on the ratchet wheel is controlled by the pin as
shown in the Figure 9. The pin select the direction of lock then the wheel freely rotate
in the opposite direction.

Figure 9: Torque wrench using ratchet mechanism

In this type vehicle the gear knob select the direction of lock and it locks the
wheel of the vehicle. The driver can control the knob after lock the wheel the driver
cannot control the brake of the wheel, he can only control accelerator and clutch
lever then the vehicle can easily drive in the slopes.

16 | P a g e

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

CONCLUSION
A ratchet mechanism is based on a wheel that has teeth cut out of it and a pawl
that follows as the wheel turns. Studying the diagram you will see that as the ratchet
wheel turns and the pawl falls into the 'dip' between the teeth. The ratchet wheel can
only turn in one direction - in this case anticlockwise. A ratchet mechanism with a
gear knob connected by a mechanical linkage is used in the design of RATCHET
MECHANISM IN HILL HOLD ASSIST. The gear knob which select the locking
direction. The locking pin locks the direction of rotation of wheel in the selected
direction then it allows only rotate in the opposite direction only. This which selected
by the driver and the system which helps the driver to drive the vehicle easily in the
slopes.

17 | P a g e

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

FUTURE SCOPE

Prevents accidents while starting on slopes.

Cost effective solution.
Stress free driving.
Actuate only when the system is switched on.
Easy implementation.
Simple design.
Can be used for all type of vehicles including heavy duty vehicles.

18 | P a g e

B Tech Mechanical Automobile, University of Kerala

REFERENCE
1. A CONTROL SYSTEM FOR HILL START ASSISTANCE FOR
COMMERCIAL VEHICLES Diego Delvecchio,Sergio M. Savaresi
Proceedings of the ASME 2009 Dynamic Systems and Control
Conference,DSCC2009,October 12-14, 2009, Hollywood, California,
USA.
2. Research on Hill Start Control for Heavy Truck with AMT Jiang
Xuefeng1,2, Xu Xian2, Jin Guodong1, Chen Wei11. Huazhong University
of Science &Technology, Wuhan, China2. Dongfeng Commercial Vehicle
Technical Center, Dongfeng Motor Co., Ltd.
3. Automatically
engaging
mechanical
hill
start
assist
Shino
George,Departmentof
Mechanical
&Aerospace
Engineering,Politechnico di Torino, Italy.
4. STRESS ANALYSIS OF RATCHET PAWL DESIGN IN HOIST
USING
FINITE ELEMENT ANALYSIS 1* Hariyali M.Patil, 2 P.A.Chandak
1(Department of Mechanical Engineering, DMIETR/ Nagpur, India)
2(Department of Mechanical Engineering, Nagpur University, India)

19 | P a g e