Int. J. Vehicle Autonomous Systems, Vol. 7, Nos. 3/4, 2009 141 Copyright © 2009 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd. Control strategy for ride improvement Ricardo Prado* Tecnologico de Monterrey, Campus Monterrey, Center for Innovation in Design and Technology, 64,849 Monterrey, NL, Mexico E-mail: ricardo.prado@itesm.mx *Corresponding author Ricardo A. Ramirez-Mendoza Tecnológico de Monterrey, Campus Ciudad de México, School of Engineering, 14,380, DF, México E-mail: ricardo.ramirez@itesm.mx Ruben Morales-Menendez Tecnologico de Monterrey, Campus Monterrey, Accreditations and Quality Enhancement, 64,849 Monterrey, NL, Mexico E-mail: rmm@itesm.mx Abstract: Riding comfort is a key issue when designing suspensions for commercial vehicles. It can be broadly defined as the degree of comfort of passengers during forward travel at cruise speed while exposed to road disturbances. Currently, this problem is addressed by suitable damping calibration, but even well-tuned suspensions perform badly beyond narrow speed ranges and regular road conditions. This paper proposes a novel control strategy for improving riding comfort in commercial vehicles, based on a semi-active system with heuristic properties. A case study is presented to validate the methodology, with overall good results. Keywords: ride; comfort; control; strategy; optimisation. Reference to this paper should be made as follows: Prado, R., Ramirez-Mendoza, R.A. and Morales-Menendez, R. (2009) ‘Control strategy for ride improvement’, Int. J. Vehicle Autonomous Systems, Vol. 7, Nos. 3/4, pp.141–171. Biographical notes: R. Prado received an MSc in Mechanics in 1992 and an MSc in Mechatronics in 2007, both from Instituto Tecnologico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey. He is currently Part-Time Professor at the Department of Mechatronics, and a Full-Time Researcher at the R&D Department of Vehicle Dynamics of Metalsa. His current research interest includes active and intelligent systems for automotive control.