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Design and Characterization of a Robotized Gearbox System Based on Voice

Coil Actuators for a Formula SAE Race Car

Article  in  IEEE/ASME Transactions on Mechatronics · February 2013

DOI: 10.1109/TMECH.2011.2162632

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IEEE/ASME TRANSACTIONS ON MECHATRONICS
Design and Characterization of a Robotized Gearbox
System Based on Voice Coil Actuators
for a Formula SAE Race Car
Federico Baronti, Member, IEEE, Andrea Lazzeri, Student Member, IEEE, Roberto Roncella, Member, IEEE,
Roberto Saletti, Member, IEEE, and Sergio Saponara
Abstract—This paper discusses the use of voice coil actuators to
enhance the performance of shift-by-wire systems. This innovative
purely electric actuation approach was implemented and applied
to a Formula SAE race car. The result was more compact and faster
than conventional solutions, which usually employ pneumatic ac-
tuators. The designed shift-by-wire system incorporates a control
unit based on a digital signal processor, which runs the control algo-
rithms developed for both gear shifting and launching the car. The
system was successfully validated through laboratory and on-track
tests. In addition, a comparative test with an equivalent pneumatic
counterpart was carried out. This showed that an effective use of
voice coil actuators enabled the upshift time to be almost halved,
thus proving that these actuators are a viable solution to improving
shift-by-wire system performance.
Index Terms—Digital signal processing (DSP), formula SAE,
robotized gearbox, voice coil actuators (VCAs), X-by-wire.
I. INTRODUCTION
HE shift-by-wire approach is acknowledged as a valid so-
T lution to improve the performance and reliability of both
race cars and commercial vehicles. The electronic control of
gear shifting has important benefits in terms of a reduction in
shift time, transmission chain efficiency, and savings in fuel con-
sumption [1]–[3]. In fact, the conventional mechanical link from
shift lever and clutch pedal to gearbox is replaced with sensors,
electronic control units, and actuators, which make the gearbox
robotized. This technique was even applied to the design of an
intelligent bicycle transmission system [4]. Thus, shift-by-wire
is as an effective application of X-by-wire, a very promising
automotive technology that can also be applied to other vehi-
cle functions, such as steering, braking, and throttle control [5].
Replacing the classic hydraulic or pneumatic actuators with
electrical ones controlled by an appropriate digital signal pro-
cessing (DSP) unit may lead to great improvements in all these
automotive subsystems [6]. The DSP unit can also be connected
Manuscript received February 8, 2011; revised May 6, 2011; accepted June
27, 2011. Recommended by Technical Editor G. Schitter.
The authors are with the Department of Information Engineering, University
of Pisa, 56126 Pisa, Italy (e-mail: f.baronti@iet.unipi.it; andrea_lazzeri@iet.
unipi.it; r.roncella@iet.unipi.it; r.saletti@iet.unipi.it; s.saponara@iet.unipi.it).
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this paper are available online
at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TMECH.2011.2162632
1083-4435/$26.00 © 2011 IEEE
1
to the vehicle dashboard for human–machine interfacing and,
through feedback sensors, to the controlled subsystem.
Steer-by-wire, brake-by-wire, and active suspension systems
are much more critical than shift-by-wire systems. This is be-
cause they have a dramatic impact on vehicle behavior and
thus on its safety [7], [8]. As a consequence, fault–tolerant ar-
chitectures to meet the very high demanding safety require-
ments of these X-by-Wire applications are currently being in-
vestigated in depth [9]–[11]. On the other hand, the research
focus on shift-by-wire systems is on improving their perfor-
mance, given that appropriate architectures for their implemen-
tation are already available. This aim can mainly be achieved
through an effective selection and control of the actuators em-
ployed [1], [5], [12]–[17].
Generally speaking, dc servomotors are the most commonly
used X-by-wire actuators because they are easy to control in
terms of speed, position, and torque [18]. Nevertheless, some
interest has also been shown in linear electromagnetic actua-
tors [1], [5], [12], [16], and particularly in voice coil actuators
(VCAs), which are able to provide a wide range of forces (from
less than 1 to 2000 N) together with very low inertia [19]–[23].
These two features make VCAs very attractive if compared with
other linear electric actuators. Linear VCAs basically consist of
a permanent-magnet cylindrical frame and a coaxial moving
copper coil. Their working principle is based on the Lorentz
force. According to the amplitude and the direction of the cur-
rent flowing in the windings, the coil is subject to a coaxial force,
which enables it to push or pull a mechanical load. VCAs can
easily be scaled and adapted to different applications, in both in-
dustrial and scientific fields, because the force provided depends
on their geometrical parameters. Thanks to their high reliability,
small VCAs are commonly mounted inside cell phone cameras
for autofocusing functions [24], [25], or inside hard disk drives
to move head arms [26]–[28], whereas larger ones are used
to move loudspeaker cones (which is where their name comes
from) [29], for laboratory shock and vibration testing [30], or
generally in robotics and factory automation [31].
This paper discusses the use of VCAs as actuators of a shift-
by-wire system. In a case study, we robotized the gear and clutch
devices of the ET1 vehicle, the first student-built Formula SAE
race car [32]–[34] developed at the University of Pisa, Pisa, Italy.
To this end, a dedicated electronic Gear Control Unit (GCU) was
designed and implemented. To the best of our knowledge, this
is the first time that this kind of actuator has been employed
in a race car transmission system. In fact, the gear and clutch
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2 IEEE/ASME TRANSACTIONS ON MECHATRONICS

automation of Formula SAE vehicles is usually achieved by

pneumatic actuators, which are lighter and smaller than VCAs.
However, the use of VCAs—as will be shown later—may lead
to several significant advantages.
In fact, the complete assembly of a pneumatic system requires
the use of valves, air tanks, and even compressors if an unlimited
endurance is required. All these components may lead to a higher
overall weight when compared to a more compact VCA-based
system, which just comprises a power supply in addition to the
actuators. In addition, a purely electric solution is more flexible
and responsive than a pneumatic counterpart, and hence more
suitable for implementing advanced control strategies, which
may result in a higher performance [35]. Fig. 1. Clutch lever measurement: force versus displacement.
As this is a new application of VCAs, we developed the
numerical model reported in [36] to gather information on
their behavior and to evaluate the control strategy for the ET1
gearbox; a system-level analysis was also carried out. This pa-
per extends [36] by adding an in-depth description along with
new data regarding the GCU architecture and its hardware and
firmware implementation. This paper also presents experimen-
tal results on the VCA-based robotized gearbox system and
a performance comparison test with an equivalent pneumatic
counterpart, specifically designed for this purpose.
This paper is organized as follows. Section II discusses the
selection of the appropriate VCAs for our case study car, and
various design guidelines are evaluated using our numerical
model. Section III shows the architecture of the GCU, from both Fig. 2. Gear lever measurement: force versus displacement, 1-N-2 sequence.
a hardware and a firmware point of view. Details on the actual
implementation of the system are provided in Section IV. The
performance results obtained during test sessions are reported
and a comparison with an equivalent pneumatic counterpart is
made. Finally, conclusions are drawn in Section V.

II. DESIGN
The ET1 case study vehicle is equipped with an Aprilia four-
stroke V-twin-cylinder RXV 550 motorcycle engine, provided
with the original clutch and sequential gearbox. Thus, two VCAs
are required to actuate both the clutch and gearbox levers. The
first VCA is used to pull the lever of the clutch so as to dis-
engage it. The other is mounted so that its idle position is at
midstroke, and it is used to either push or pull the gear lever,
so as to scan the 1-N-2-3-4-5 gear sequence, where N is neutral
Fig. 3. Picture of the selected VCA: Accel Technologies, formerly Usas Mo-
gear. To choose the two VCAs in the most appropriate way, the tion, VLR0436-0250-00A.
force–displacement characteristics of the two levers need to be
measured. The experimental results are reported in Figs. 1 and
2, respectively. The first plot shows that a 300-N actuator with pull the gear lever from its idle position, a 20-mm actuator is
a stroke greater than 10 mm is needed to fully disengage the required.
clutch. Instead, the second plot refers to the 1-N-2 upshifting To simplify the mechanical implementation of the system, we
sequence. Note that neutral is a sort of special gear that falls adopted the same actuator for both the gear and clutch levers.
between first and second gears, as shown by the two 180-N The selected VCAs (Accel Technologies VLR0436-0250-00A,
peaks on the gear lever characteristic. Neutral is coded as gear 0 see Fig. 3) provide a continuous force up to 435 N with a
in the firmware of the GCU discussed in Section III-B. Neutral stroke of 25 mm. As the force sensitivity is about 37.2 N/A,
is shifted in at about 6 mm, and second gear at about 10 mm, the maximum continuous force is obtained with a coil current
which is also the displacement required by any other upshift or of 11.7 A. The series resistance and inductance of the coil are
downshift operation. As a consequence, to completely push and 2.7 Ω and 4.8 mH, respectively.
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BARONTI et al.: DESIGN AND CHARACTERIZATION OF A ROBOTIZED GEARBOX SYSTEM BASED ON VOICE COIL
Fig. 4. Simplified block diagram of the VCA model.
Fig. 5. Upshift and neutral selection time versus supply voltage, as derived by
the model in Fig. 4.
To determine the main design guidelines for the GCU hard-
ware and firmware, the VCA parameters, together with the ac-
tual lever force–displacement characteristics, were entered into
the numerical model described in [36]. As shown by the simpli-
fied block diagram in Fig. 4, the model enables the mechanical,
electrical, and thermal behavior of each actuator to be simulated.
It receives the supply voltage VS and the room temperature T0
as inputs, and it outputs the actuator displacement x and speed
ẋ, as well as the coil current I and temperature T .
As an example, Fig. 5 shows the time tS needed by the gear
actuator to reach the shift-in position of the neutral and second
gears, respectively, versus the supply voltage VS , as simulated by
the model. When the second gear is shifted in, tS can be kept well
below the typical 100-ms shift time of pneumatic systems [37]
by simply applying a VS greater than 16 V. To disengage the
clutch, a supply voltage of 21.8 V is needed to produce the
300-N force required. This voltage must carefully be controlled
to let the lever gradually move around the disengagement point
when the vehicle starts moving, thus avoiding wheel slip and
engine shutdown.
Taking all this into account, a 28 V, 350 W pulsewidth mod-
ulation (PWM) supply stage was adopted for each actuator.
Consequently, both the shifting time and the clutch disengage-
ment can be controlled by varying the related PWM duty cycle,
thus giving the system good flexibility. In addition, it follows
from Fig. 5 that both neutral and second gears can be selected by
controlling the actuator activation time, once the supply voltage
3
Fig. 6. ET1 robotized gearbox architecture.
of the gear VCA has been set. This is the solution we adopted
to implement the GCU shifting algorithms.
III. GCU ARCHITECTURE
The GCU has to implement an appropriate set of functions
to enable the driver to control both the gearshift and the launch
procedure by means of controls located on the steering wheel.
Thus, the block diagram shown in Fig. 6 was developed and im-
plemented on board the ET1 Formula SAE race car. The GCU is
divided into a Control Section and a Power Section (see Figs. 6
and 7). The Control Section is connected to the Engine Control
Unit (ECU), from which it receives information on the engine
RPM. In addition, by means of a dedicated control signal (i.e.,
cutoff trigger in Fig. 6), the GCU triggers the ECU for the tem-
porary suspension of the fuel injection and/or ignition, i.e. to cut
off the engine. This is very useful when upshifting, as it makes
clutch disengagement unnecessary. This means that the clutch
VCA can be kept off during the whole upshift procedure, thus
saving energy and significantly reducing the shift in time. The
Control Section is also connected to the wheel speed sensors and
to the driver’s interface. This interface has two flipper paddles
which trigger the shifting procedures, as well as a button to se-
lect neutral. A seven-segment display and a led bar mounted on
the dashboard show the currently selected gear and the engine
RPM, respectively.
Depending on the driver’s shift request and the vehicle’s sta-
tus, the Control Section produces the appropriate PWM con-
trol signals for the two VCAs. These signals are amplified by
the Power Section, and finally routed to the actuator coils. The
Power Section directly drives the VCAs by means of two NMOS
full H-bridge drivers (ST VNH3SP30), which are supplied by
two external 12/28 V, 350 W dc/dc converters connected to the
car battery.
A. Hardware of the GCU
The Control Section is implemented with off-the-shelf com-
ponents. We opted for a DSP-based platform in order to sim-
plify the implementation of the control algorithms with the
available on-chip resources. The selected board (GAO Tek
2812EVM-I) features a 150 MHz 32 bit fixed-point Texas Instru-
ments TMS320F2812 DSP, which embeds an advanced multi-
channel PWM peripheral, as well as some 16-bit timer/counters
 This article has been accepted for inclusion in a future issue of this journal. Content is final as presented, with the exception of pagination.
4 IEEE/ASME TRANSACTIONS ON MECHATRONICS
Fig. 7. GCU architecture: Control and Power Sections.
and a 12-bit analog-to-digital converter (ADC). A set of header
connectors also enables a custom-designed daughter board to
be plugged in and interfaced to the DSP peripherals. This is the
solution we adopted to implement the Power Section, which not
only has two H-bridge drivers, but also a 5 V voltage regulator
to supply the Control Section itself, as well as some signal-
conditioning circuits to interface the different kinds of sensor to
the DSP.
Fig. 7 shows the final GCU architecture and the main internal
DSP blocks employed to implement the system. The GPTimer2
Capture Units are used to measure the frequency of the square-
wave signals coming from the wheel sensors and the ECU RPM
output and hence to detect the angular speed of the wheels
and the camshaft. Each Capture Unit implements an efficient
frequency meter continuously running in the background, so
that no computational resources of the DSP are needed for this
purpose.
PWM signals are obtained by the dedicated PWM State
Machines. The PWM period is determined by the GPTimer1,
whereas the duty cycle of each output is directly controlled
by the DSP through the Compare Units. The DSP also han-
dles two control signals for each VCA driver, which enable the
H-bridge operation and set the direction of the current in the
coil. Two Hall-effect current sensors (Allegro ACS756) mea-
sure the amplitude of the current flowing in each VCA coil.
Their outputs are routed to the on-chip ADC, thus allowing the
Control Section to get feedback from the actuators.
The ADC also receives the gear sensor signal, so as to detect
which gear is currently selected. This resistive-type sensor is
embedded in the gearbox and is simply made up of a set of
different resistances—one per gear—and a rotary switch directly
operated by the gearbox. While shifting, i.e., while the rotary
switch is moving, the sensor output remains open till the end of
the operation. This means that open circuit will be detected if the
gearbox gets stuck between two gears, thus allowing the GCU to
recover by repeating the shift procedure. The ADC conversion
is periodically triggered by the GPTimer4. The acquired data
are low-pass filtered for denoising and are immediately made
available to the main program, which implements the control
algorithms.
The flipper paddles and the neutral selection button, as well
as the ECU connections (RPM and engine cutoff signals), are
handled with General Purpose I/O (GPIO) pins. The GPIO
Fig. 8. Simplified flow diagram of the GCU main program loop. Neutral is
coded as gear 0.
block provides a built-in input debouncing feature, which avoids
multiple-hit detections when the driver operates the GCU con-
trols. We decided to assign the neutral gear to a dedicated control
rather than to the paddles, so that the driver cannot accidentally
select it during a rapid downshift sequence. Note that the GCU
and the ECU communicate by means of dedicated wired con-
nections that use GPIO pins (see Fig. 7). In fact, the ECU of
the ET1 Formula SAE race car (Walbro TDD - HPUH-1) is
not equipped with a controller area network (CAN) interface.
Nonetheless, the proposed GCU has a CAN interface, so that
it could easily be used in a vehicle provided with a CAN com-
munication network. Finally, as the dashboard is equipped with
a serial peripheral interface, it is connected to the DSP by the
multichannel buffered serial port (McBSP).
B. Firmware of the GCU
A simplified flow diagram of the main program loop is shown
in Fig. 8. First, the inputs of the GCUs are sampled. Then,
depending on the driver’s request (through flipper paddles for
Upshift or Downshift, or through the button for neutral) and
the vehicle’s status, i.e., the current gear and speed, one of four
main procedures—namely Launch, UpShift, DownShift, and
Neutral—is executed.
UpShift and DownShift procedures are activated by pulling
the right and the left paddle, respectively. UpShift is executed
only if the gearbox is neither in fifth gear nor in neutral, coded
as gear 0. Initially, the ECU is triggered for engine cutoff. Then,
a 19-V voltage with an appropriate polarity is applied to the gear
actuator for about 45 ms (see Fig. 5) to enable the gear lever
to be fully pushed. Finally, the gear sensor signal is acquired to
check if the new gear has been correctly shifted in, and if not,
the procedure is retried for a programmable number of times
before aborting.
On the other hand, as can be seen from Fig. 8, DownShift
is executed only if the first gear is not in, and if the vehicle is
not standing in neutral. This procedure is exactly the same as
the previous one, except that it does not trigger the ECU for the
engine cutoff and it disengages the clutch before pulling the gear
 This article has been accepted for inclusion in a future issue of this journal. Content is final as presented, with the exception of pagination.
BARONTI et al.: DESIGN AND CHARACTERIZATION OF A ROBOTIZED GEARBOX SYSTEM BASED ON VOICE COIL
lever. Initially, the clutch VCA is powered with a 28-V voltage.
The gear VCA is then actuated and the gear sensor is checked.
If the correct gear has been shifted in, the clutch is reengaged
by turning the VCA OFF; otherwise, a new gear actuation is
retried for a programmable number of times before aborting. In
the case of gear-shifting failure, an error condition is generated
and signalled to the driver. The gear variable shown in the flow
diagram in Fig. 8 is updated only if the gear sensor reading is
valid (i.e., 0–5), so that the next shifting request can be correctly
handled by the algorithm.
Unlike Upshift and Downshift, the Neutral procedure is acti-
vated by a dedicated button, and is executed only if the gearbox
is in the first gear. The clutch is initially disengaged, and then
the gear VCA is powered at 19 V for 30 ms. As shown in Fig. 5,
this is enough time to select neutral but too short to get into the
second gear. At the end, the clutch is reengaged.
The proposed feed-forward algorithm based on controlling
the gear lever displacement by the VCA power activation time
is simple, but well suited for achieving high performance in a
race car application. This is because the system can be cali-
brated before each race. Thus, the VCA activation time can be
programmed to be as short as possible keeping the likelihood
of a successful shifting at a reasonable value. The shifting fail-
ure probability can then be decreased by repeating the shifting
procedure, if necessary. The number of times before ending the
shifting procedure with an error was set to three in the ET1
Formula SAE race car case study. Since each shifting procedure
is carried out with very fast shifting times and a high proba-
bility of success, the maximum number of trials can be kept
low to have a high system responsiveness in the case of gear-
shifting failures. The system was capable of completing more
than 1000 shifting operations without aborting, as demonstrated
by the on-track endurance competition discussed in Section IV,
and by the many tests performed before the race. Note that as
the VCA activation time during an Upshift procedure is set to
45 ms, the Upshift time is bounded by that value, which is a very
significant result, as it will be shown by comparing the system
with an equivalent pneumatic counterpart in the next section.
Should the system be transferred from race cars to produc-
tion vehicles, the control strategy needs to be made more robust
against component variability, as the calibration of each car
model (which has also to be repeated periodically due to com-
ponent ageing) would not be feasible. In addition, increasing
the VCA activation times and the number of trials before abort-
ing would be a viable solution, as a reduction in gear-shifting
speed is acceptable, but, unfortunately, is not enough to fully
tackle this issue. The gear VCA activation time required to shift
from first to neutral must fall between the two plotted curves in
Fig. 5, at a given VCA voltage supply. Thus, shifting from first
to neutral is a very critical procedure, which could permanently
fail if the previous condition is no longer verified. Considering
the ET1 case study, the choice to supply the gear VCA with
19 V guarantees a good separation between the two curves (the
time to engage first is about twice that required for neutral), so
the feed-forward control is robust enough for the requirements
of a Formula SAE race car. To improve control robustness, it is
possible to apply an adaptive feed-forward approach, in which
5
Fig. 9. Simplified block diagram of the Launch procedure main loop.
the VCA activation times are adjusted according to the shift fail-
ures, which are detected by the control algorithm. For instance,
if the shifting procedure from first to neutral had no effect, then
the relevant activation time should be increased, whereas the
VCA activation time should be decreased, if the result was to
shift in the second gear. Other strategies, based on a closed
control loop regulating the VCA supply voltage by the PWM
driver, or combining both PWM and activation time controls,
are very promising and viable without changing the hardware,
with a little increase in the algorithm complexity.
A more sophisticated control strategy (namely Launch pro-
cedure) is indeed applied to make the car start moving from
standstill, as shown in Fig. 8. The clutch VCA current is in-
deed controlled by a feedback loop to smoothly release the
clutch device. This prevents the engine from turning off and
makes it possible to fast accelerate the vehicle. Going into more
detail, the Launch Procedure is initiated while the car is sta-
tionary by disengaging the clutch and shifting in the first gear.
Then, the clutch is slowly reengaged by lowering the actuator
current—and thus the pulling force on the lever—in a time-linear
way. The current variation is controlled by the loop reported in
Fig. 9. The GCU monitors the speed v of the rear wheels. As
long as v is lower than the vT1 threshold (which we set at
0.1 km/h), the slope S1 (which we set at −2.84 A/s) for the ac-
tuator current I0 is selected and integrated. Next, I0 is applied to
the clutch VCA by a proportional-integrative-derivative control
loop, which acts on the PWM duty cycle of the actuator driver.
Thus, the clutch lever is slowly released. When the wheels start
moving, i.e., v reaches vT1 , the lever is near to the engagement
point. As a consequence, the slope is forced to 0, so that the
current flowing in the actuator, as well as the lever position,
is locked, and the car can accelerate. To make this operation
easier, the driver applies light pressure to the accelerator pedal.
Finally, when v is greater than vT2 (which we set at 2 km/h),
S1 is selected again, and maintained until the actuator is finally
switched OFF. The designed Launch Procedure proved to be
reliable providing good acceleration performance on a dry track
surface. The algorithm parameters (the two speed thresholds
vT1 and vT2 and the slope S1 ) can be fine tuned to the differ-
ent conditions of the wheels and race track, thus making the
procedure very flexible and also suitable for a fast acceleration.
IV. GCU IMPLEMENTATION AND RESULTS
The Control Section board and the custom-made Power Sec-
tion plug-in board are shown in Figs. 10 and 11, respectively.
They are approximately 165 mm × 100 mm large, and are
 This article has been accepted for inclusion in a future issue of this journal. Content is final as presented, with the exception of pagination.
6 IEEE/ASME TRANSACTIONS ON MECHATRONICS
Fig. 10. Control Section board (GAO Tek 2812EVM-I): 1. TMS320F2812
DSP, 2. analog input header, and 3. digital I/O header.
Fig. 11. Custom-designed Power Section daughter board: 1. VNH3SP30
clutch VCA driver, 2. VNH3SP30 gear VCA driver, and 3. power regulators for
5 V and 3.3 V logic.
mounted inside a rugged aluminum case featuring two separate
multipolar automotive connectors. The first connector is used to
handle the power signals, such as the 28 V and the 12 V supplies
from the dc/dc converters and the battery, as well as the H-bridge
outputs to drive each VCA coil. Instead, the second connector
is used to handle other control signals from the driver interface
or from the vehicle sensors. The final assembly was installed on
board the ET1, which is shown in Fig. 12 for a previous Formula
SAE Italy event at the Ferrari race track in Fiorano (Modena,
Italy). On that occasion, the ET1 successfully completed the
22 km run of the endurance event, which represents a tough
robustness and reliability test for all the car subsystems, partic-
ularly for the engine, the gearbox, and the proposed control and
actuation electronics. Indeed, the heat required about 500 shift
operations, which were all performed correctly by the designed
shift-by-wire system.
Before the Formula SAE event, the GCU functionality and the
robotized gearbox were extensively tested both in a laboratory
and during the vehicle’s tuning with the chassis dynamometer.
As a significant example of the test campaign, the results for
second to third gear upshift sequence are reported in the first
plot of Fig. 13, which shows the activation signal of the gear
VCA and the voltage provided by the gear sensor versus time.
This voltage is obtained through a linear 5 V voltage divider,
made up of a 2.2 kΩ pull-up resistor and the gear sensor itself. A
Fig. 12. ET1 during the past Formula SAE Italy event at the Fiorano race
track.
Fig. 13. Second to third gear upshift performance: comparison between the
proposed VCA-based system and an equivalent pneumatic counterpart.
1-nF capacitor is used to filter the output of the voltage divider.
When the second gear is shifted out, the gear sensor opens, and
the measured voltage starts rising to 5 V with an exponential
transient. Then, as soon as the third gear is in, the sensor voltage
changes slope, as a falling transient starts. The time at which
the voltage peak occurs identifies the shifting time, which is
about 40 ms. As the VCA was powered at 19 V, this result is in
good agreement with the expected performance provided by the
model (see Fig. 5).
Finally, the VCA-based shift-by-wire system was compared
with an equivalent pneumatic system. To make a fair compar-
ison, we replaced the gear VCA with a pneumatic actuator
and performed all the tests on board the ET1. We adopted a
25 mm-diameter cylinder with the same stroke as the VCA, and
a 5.3-bar regulated air supply. Thus, the achievable peak force,
i.e., about 260 N, was the same provided by the VCA when pow-
ered at 19 V. Also, a fast-switching high-flow ON/OFF solenoid
valve was used to control the air flow path toward the cylinder
by a dedicated activation signal. A connection between the valve
outlet and the cylinder was made with a short 15 cm pipe, which
represents a reasonable distance between the two devices when
they are mounted on board. The second plot in Fig. 13 shows
that the upshift time in this case is about 74 ms, which is shorter
 This article has been accepted for inclusion in a future issue of this journal. Content is final as presented, with the exception of pagination.
BARONTI et al.: DESIGN AND CHARACTERIZATION OF A ROBOTIZED GEARBOX SYSTEM BASED ON VOICE COIL
TABLE 1
COMPARISON TEST SUMMARY
than the typical 100 ms value for pneumatic systems [37], but
almost double that achieved with the VCA solution. This longer
shifting time is mainly due to the inherent propagation delay of
the air flowing from the valve to the cylinder, which can only be
slightly reduced by using advanced pneumatic solutions, such
as valves with a higher flow coefficient. Thus, the 46% reduction
obtained using our approach could lead to a significant improve-
ment in the overall vehicle performance, particularly in terms of
acceleration time [37]. The 40 ms upshift time of our shift-by-
wire unit is also interesting when compared to state-of-the-art
mechatronic systems, such as [14] where 76 ms are needed just
to send the shift command from the lever-based man–machine
interface to the gearbox.
Table I summarizes the comparison between the proposed
VCA-based shift-by-wire system and the pneumatic system.
Regarding the hardware implementation, our VCA-based so-
lution requires a few additional components besides the two
actuators, i.e., dc/dc converters to supply the coils at a voltage
higher than the standard vehicle battery voltage. The pneumatic
system is more complex, as it requires directional and propor-
tional valves or advanced control techniques [38] (to implement
the linear control of the clutch), an air tank, and several pres-
sure regulators. Nevertheless, the VCA-based system is heavier,
mainly because of the permanent magnet weight. Instead, the
total cost is similar for the two implementations. If we consider
as a figure of merit the product of the upshift time and the total
cost, the VCA-based system provides a better tradeoff between
cost and performance, thanks to its faster response. Finally, note
that the pneumatic system considered in Table I does not include
an air compressor. In fact, in a race car application, the maxi-
mum number of shift activations during a run can be estimated
in advance, and the air tank can be sized correctly so that the
unnecessary weight of an on board air refilling system is saved.
This does not happen in road vehicles, for which an unlimited
shifting endurance must be provided. As a consequence, if we
include the compressor in the pneumatic approach, the VCA
solution may outperform the other system in terms of all the
aspects considered.
V. CONCLUSION
A new implementation of a shift-by-wire system based on the
use of VCAs has been described and experimentally validated.
The automation of both the gear and the clutch of a Formula
SAE vehicle was achieved using a DSP-based electronic GCU,
7
which directly drives each VCA through a custom-made PWM
Power Section. The DSP implements both the shift and the vehi-
cle launch algorithms. In addition, thanks to efficient firmware
and to a dedicated connection with both the ECU and the speed
sensors, it provides a powerful and flexible platform to develop
advanced traction control algorithms, such as autoshift func-
tions or clutch-based fast acceleration procedures. The robotized
gearbox was implemented and assembled on board the ET1, the
first race car built by the University of Pisa. Laboratory and
on-track tests proved the full functionality of the system and
showed an outstanding performance in terms of upshift time.
The upshift time achieved was compared with an equivalent
pneumatic solution. Test results showed a considerable shift
time reduction of 46%, which allows for a significant improve-
ment in performance, particularly during acceleration. Finally,
the issues related to the application of this race car robotized
gearbox to a production car have been discussed.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The authors would like to thank Dr. F. Lenzi for his valuable
contribution to this work.
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 This article has been accepted for inclusion in a future issue of this journal. Content is final as presented, with the exception of pagination.
BARONTI et al.: DESIGN AND CHARACTERIZATION OF A ROBOTIZED GEARBOX SYSTEM BASED ON VOICE COIL
Roberto Saletti (M’10) was born in Grosseto, Italy,
in 1956. He received the Dr.Ing. degree (Hons.) in
electronic engineering from the University of Pisa,
Pisa, Italy, in 1981.
From 1983 to 1992, he was with the National Re-
search Council as a Research Scientist. In 1987, he
was with Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, as a Visiting
Scientist. In 1992, he became an Associate Professor
of digital system electronics in the Faculty of Engi-
neering, University of Pisa, where, in 2001, he was
appointed a Full Professor of electronics. His main
research activities include the fields of design and test of high-performance
integrated circuits, such as high-resolution delay-line circuits, and of electronic
systems for automotive and naval applications applied in the fields of two-wheel
vehicles and cruising yachts. His most recent work has been related to the de-
velopment of data acquisition and measurement systems for cruising boats and
innovative models of Li-Poly batteries for the electrical propulsion of vehicles.
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9
Sergio Saponara received the M.Sc. (cum laude)
and Ph.D. degrees in electronic engineering from
the University of Pisa, Pisa, Italy, in 1999 and 2003,
respectively.
In 2002, he was with IMEC, Leuven, Belgium,
as a Marie Curie Research Fellow. Since 2001, he
collaborates with Consorzio Pisa Ricerche in Pisa.
He is currently a Senior Researcher at the University
of Pisa, working in the field of electronic circuits and
systems. He holds the chair of “electronic systems for
automotive and automation” in the Faculty of Engi-
neering. He has coauthored more than 150 scientific publications and holds ten
patents. He is also a Research Associate of Consorzio Nazionale Interuniversi-
tario per le Telecomunicazioni (CNIT) and Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare
(INFN) and served as a Guest Editor of special issues of international journals
and as a Program Committee Member of international conferences.