REPLACEMNT OF RACK AND PINION MECHANISM IN STEERING BY LINEAR ACTUATRS

Hi, someone has asked this already..dunno if it was you...the obvious big problem is safety. Power assisted systems still work if power is lost...

Not sure if you can provide sufficient redundancy in a design to ensure safety?

Ok for a low speed test vehicle I s'pose, I'd duplicate just about the whole system for safety certainly the feedback sensors and control pot' (or whatever you are using...optical encoder?)

There are plenty of actuators that could do the job... ball screw types would probably do nicely.

Some cars have electric power assist..maybe one of those would be a good start point.

As a footnote:- A few tears back there was a joystick controlled car (merc I think) that had 'push to accelerate' 'pull back' to brake reported in the electronics press

.... I wrote an outraged letter about the lunacy of this...

Just think about weight transfer under braking!

(Standard hand controls on vehicles adapted for the disable are push to brake)

My instincts are against this but I've driven many thousands of miles in Citroens which have braking systems run on the same lines, at least they won't stop if the system depressurises. Steering is a level even more critical I guess. When Rools Royce adopted pressurised braking on the Silver Shadow it was with a duplicated system using two pumps, accumulators, pipework and calipers. In fact there was a third system which was, I belive, there only to provide the brake pedal with a semblence of 'feel'.

PS and by the way, WHY? Is this as part of some kind of autonomous self-driving vehicle without the option of manual control? If not then I seen no advantage or benefit in it. Unless of course in the age of consumer choice you want to give all the passengers in a car the ability to drive it. Maybe sharing driving on long tiring journeys without having the undoubted hassle of having to stop it to change places? Could be just the kind of marketing edge someone like Chrysler is dreaming of.