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Abstract
The purpose of this paper is to provide a report on a capstone deign project for the
Milwaukee School of Engineering’s [MSOE] Master of Science in Engineering program. The purpose and justification of this project are discussed in detail. The
methods and results of this project are reviewed along with relevant published literature.
The purpose of this project was to model a tractor with an internal combustion engine
[ICE] and dual independent rear wheel hydrostatic transmission [HST]. This modeling,
control, and analysis were performed with MATLAB and Simulink. The control
algorithm was loaded into a physical tractor that is currently housed at the MSOE Fluid
Power Institute [FPI], and experimental data were compared to simulation results. This
project is intended as a first step to model the complete tractor system and to provide
basic speed control, so that future MSOE, or FPI, projects may add additional advanced
features, such as semi-autonomous or fully autonomous controls, possibly with Radio
Detection and Ranging [RADAR] or Light Detection and Ranging [LiDAR] sensors. The
primary goal of the simulation was to produce stable results of hydraulic and mechanical
states under normal operator conditions.