An Extended Kalman Observer for

the In-Cylinder Air Mass Flow Estimation

Osvaldo Barbarisi1 , Alessandro di Gaeta2 , Luigi Glielmo2 , and Stefania

Santini1
1
Dipartimento di Ingegneria, Università degli Studi del Sannio in Benevento,
{barbarisi, glielmo}@unina.it
2
Dipartimento di Informatica e Sistemistica, Università degli Studi di Napoli
Federico II, {digaeta, santini}@unina.it.

Abstract. Nowadays, every new gasoline car sold in US, Canada and Europe is
equipped with a three-way catalytic converter (TWC) in combination with a fuel
control system in order to reduce the pollutant emissions. For the maximum TWC
conversion efficiency, the engine control has to furnish a stoichiometric air fuel
mixture to the cylinders. For this purpose an estimation of the air incoming into
cylinders becomes necessary in every driving condition, not only in steady-state
operations, but especially during rapid throttle transients. A conventional speed-
density equation, that evaluates the air incoming engine, depends on the engine
speed and intake manifold pressure. The pressure signal is influenced by sensor
dynamic and by pumping fluctuations due to periodic moving masses as engine
valves. In this work, an Extended Kalman Filter is proposed as observer of the
in-cylinder air mass flow rate.

1 Introduction
Automotive emission regulations are becoming stricter and stricter in USA
and Europe. Figure 1 shows the evolution of legal limits on vehicle pollutant
emission imposed by European Commitment since 1994 to 2005. Vehicle pol-
lutant emissions are tested on special drive cycles composed by urban and
extraurban parts.
In order to meet emissions statements, gasoline engines are equipped by
a Three Way Catalyst (see figure 2). Since the TWC conversion efficiency is
maximal when a stoichiometric Air-Fuel Ratio (AFR) is fed to cylinders (see
figure 3), a tight control of the injected fuel feds to the cylinders is required.
Conventional AFR control strategies use a feedback control based on the
signal of an oxygen-sensor, placed in the exhaust pipe, to ensure that the
AFR will remain in the neighborhood of the stoichiometry value (see figure
4). In all AFR controller a in-cylinder air mass flow rate has to be perfectly
estimated in order to calculate the exact fuel amount to be injected.
In current commercial the air mass flow rate calculation is based on the
measure of a intake manifold pressure sensor and engine speed. Unfortunately
for the pressure, the low-pass characteristic of automotive commercial sensor
makes the pressure signal affected by a delay which introduces, during fast
2 Barbarisi et al.

Fig. 1. Emission regulation of pollutant emission of vehicle

Fig. 2. Engine and Three Way Catalyst

transients, errors in the air estimation and, consequently, in the fuel quantity
to be injected to obtain the stoichiometry ratio of the mixture.
If using a fast pressure sensor, another problem arises. This sensor captures
pressure oscillation caused by the periodic motion of valves and pistons. The
amplitude of the fluctuations is about 10% of the mean pressure value and
is not negligible. This pumping fluctuations have to be filtered in order to
reconstruct the mean pressure necessary for the proper working of the AFR
 Extended Kalman Observer for Air Estimation 3

Fig. 3. Conversion efficiency of TWC depends on Air-Fuel Ratio (for

commercial gasoline ΛStoich = 14.56)

Fig. 4. A simple block scheme of the conventional AFR control

control algorithms. This operation again introduces an undesirable delay in

the information. A physically reliable filter, that can be on-line implemented,
always would introduce a delay.
Taking into account the above considerations, the goal of this work is to
design an on-line observer, based only on the measure provided by a com-
monly used automotive “slow” pressure sensor. The observer will be able to
reconstruct the mean value of the real signal without introducing additional
delay. The non linearity of the manifold dynamics suggested the use of an
Extended Kalman Filter to estimate manifold pressure. The in-cylinder air
mass flow rate is computed by the correct pressure information by the well
known and commonly used speed-density equation [3]. The overall strategy
has been designed and validated on experimental data along an european
4 Barbarisi et al.

drive cycle and fast transient operations in order to test the effectiveness of
the approach.

2 Model Plant
In this section, a mathematical model will be provided in order to describe
dynamics of the inlet manifold. In figure 5, plant representation is shown.
The model will be taken in account for the Extended Kalman Filter imple-
mentation. Figure 6 shows a diagram block describing manifold dynamics.
Any block will be described below.

Fig. 5. Inlet manifold

2.1 Air mass flow through throttle

Under the hypothesis of isentropic flow, the air mass flow rate through the
throttle ṁat is described by the follow equation (see figure 5) [3]
 
pa pm
ṁat = √ Cd (α)Aθ (α)β , (1)
RTa pa
where pa and Ta are respectively the ambient pressure and temperature; pm
is the inlet manifold mean pressure; α is the angle position of the throttle
plate; Aθ is the effective section area of the throttle corrected by the discharge
coefficient Cd (α), experimentally identified; the term β models the correction
due to sonic ( ppm
a
6 xc ) and subsonic ( ppma
> xc ) regime of the air flow as
  γ+1
 12 γ−1
γ 12 γ+1
 2
if x 6 xc ,
β(x) = r  2 γ+1
 (2)
 2γ x γ − x γ

if x > xc ,
γ−1
 Extended Kalman Observer for Air Estimation 5

Fig. 6. Plant model

 γ
 γ−1
2
with xc = γ+1 (γ = 1.46 is the adiabatic coefficient of the air; xc =
0.518).

2.2 Speed Density

In spite of the complexity of the fluid dynamic phenomena occurring during
a transient (due to fast opening or closing of the throttle), the conventional
volumetric efficiency η (function of the engine working point), identified dur-
ing steady-state conditions, is used to describe carefully the inlet air mass
flow rate. So the speed-density gives an accurate description of the air mass
flow rate through inlet valves
V d N pa
ṁap = η(pm , N ) , (3)
120 RTm
where Vd is engine displacement and N is the engine speed; R is the universal
gas constant; Tm and pm are the mean manifold temperature and pressure;
the volumetric efficient η is highly nonlinear function of the engine velocity
(N ) and manifold pressure (pm ). It can be only calculated via experimental.
Figure 7 shows the volumetric efficient of a commercial gasoline engine.

2.3 Manifold Model

Considering figure 5, the mass balance inside the inlet manifold is described
by
dmm
= ṁat − ṁap . (4)
dt
6 Barbarisi et al.

Fig. 7. Volumetric efficiency η(p,m , N )

where mm is the air mass inside the inlet manifold. By using the gas law

pm Vm = mm RTm (5)

(where Vm is the manifold volume) and neglecting temperature variation we

have

Vm ṗm = RTm ṁm . (6)

By considering (4) finally we have the classical filling-empty model [4]

RTm
ṗm = (ṁat − ṁap ) , (7)
Vm

2.4 Pumping fluctuations

Pumping fluctuations are caused by any disturbance initiated at the bound-

ary of inlet manifold such as moving piston, moving valve and moving throttle
plate. These disturbances travel along the pipe experiencing many reflections.
When the engine is operated in the steady-state, they finally settle down into
a standing wave.
The source of pumping noise is periodic and so the pumping fluctuations
are frequency locked to the engine event frequency. This is illustrated in
figure 8 where a steady pressure signal is shown in angle domain and in
corresponding frequency domain.
 Extended Kalman Observer for Air Estimation 7

Fig. 8. Measured pressure signal. First frame: crankshaft angle domain;

second frame: magnitude of density spectrum.

A second order model can describe dynamic of the fundamental compo-

nent in the the time domain (180[deg] is the engine phase duration).
 2
2πN 2πN
q̈ + 2ζ q̇ + q = νq (8)
30 30

Notice that, for time based equation, the fundamental harmonic is varying
30
with engine speed as 2πN . The model (8) is a oscillatory filter with a poorly
damping (ζ = 0.01) where νq (t) is the white noise excites it.

2.5 Sensor

Automotive intake manifold air pressure (MAP) sensor can be modeled by a

first order system

1 1
ṗms = − pms + pm , (9)
τMAP τMAP

where pms is the measured pressure and τMAP is the time constant.
8 Barbarisi et al.

3 Intake Air Observer

3.1 Choice of operating domain
Some phenomena in the engine show particular properties if described in
crank-shaft angle θ domain expressed in degree unit. Thus, time-based models
introduced above will be described in angle-domain.
Generally, given a generic time invariant non linear system

ẋ (t) = f (x(t), u(t))

let
1
dt = dθ
ω(θ)
with ω > 0, the relation between time and angle domain is given by
Z θ
dζ
t(θ) =
0 w(ζ)

Let

xθ (θ) = x(t)|t=t(θ) , uθ (θ) = u(t)|t=t(θ) ,

we have
dxθ (θ) 1
= f (xθ (θ) , uθ (θ)) . (10)
dθ ω(θ)

3.2 Discrete model plant in the angle domain

In order to derive the discrete EKF, a discrete angle based plant model has
to be furnished by letting ω = 6N where N is the engine speed expressed in
round per minute unit (RPM), whether ω is expressed in deg/s unit.
Let we discretize the state equations (7) by Euler method, (9) by using
backword method and (8) by using matching zeros/poles method. Thus, by
choosing a sample angle θs = 45deg, we obtain the corresponding plant model

θs RTm h

pm (k + 1) =pm (k) + ṁat pm (k), α(k) +
6N Vm (11a)

i
− ṁap pm (k), N + δm + wpm (k)


pms (k + 1) =aMAP pms (k) + (1 − aMAP ) pm (k) + q1 (k) + wps (k),
(11b)
δm (k + 1) =δm (k) + wδm (k) (11c)
   
q1 (k+1) q1 (k)
q2 (k+1)
=Aq q2 (k)
+ Gq wq (k), (11d)
 Extended Kalman Observer for Air Estimation 9

with output equations

z(k) = pms + νp (k), (12)
 −1
θs 1
where aMAP = 1 + 6N τMAP .
0
In (11) and (12), the process noise w(k) = ( wpm (k) wpms (k) wδm (k) wq1 (k) wq2 (k )
and measure noise ν(k) = νpms (k) have been introduced. Notice that, in or-
der to compensate the unavoidable inaccuracy of the speed density (3) a
δm air mismatch parameter has been considered. Since pumping fluctuations
are so explicitly inclose in the model, noises are modelled as white gaussian
processes with the follow statistical properties
E[wk ] = 0, E[wk wk0 ] = Qk , (13)
E[νk ] = 0, E[νk νk0 ] = rk , (14)
with Qk > 0 and rk > 0 respectively positive semi-definite and definite
matrixes.

3.3 Extended Kalman Filter

The model of inlet manifold is described by equations (11) and (12). From
0
now on, we will indicate the state vector as xk = ( pm (k) pms (k) δm q1 (k) q2 (k) )
and the manipulable input as uk = α(k). So the plant model equations can
now rewritten as
xk+1 = fk (xk , uk ) + Gwk (15a)
zk = H 0 xk + vk (15b)
Let the conditioned means be x̂k|k = E[xk |z0 , . . . , zk ], x̂k+1|k = E[xk+1 |z0 , . . . , zk ],
and Σk|k , Σk+1|k the corresponding error covariance matrix; and impose that
the initial state is a gaussian aleatoric variable so x0 ∈ N (x̄0 , P0 ). The recur-
sive equations of the extended Kalman filter [2] are listed below
x̂k|k = x̂k|k−1 + Lk (zk − H 0 x̂k|k−1 ), (16a)
x̂k+1|k = fk (x̂k|k , uk ), (16b)

where

−1
Lk = Σk|k−1 H H 0 Σk|k−1 H + rk , (16c)
0

−1 0
Σk|k = Σk|k−1 − Σk|k−1 H H Σk|k−1 H + rk H Σk|k−1 , (16d)
Σk+1|k = Fk Σk|k Fk0 + GQk G0 , (16e)

with

Σ0|−1 = P0 , (16f)
x̂0|−1 = x̄0 , (16g)
10 Barbarisi et al.

∂fk (x,uk ) 
where Fk = ∂x  . In figure 9 is shown the block diagram of the
x=x̂k|k
plant model (equations (15)) and the relative EKF block scheme (equations
(16)).

Fig. 9. Block sceme representation of plant model and extend Kalman

filter

3.4 Numerical results

The EKF has been tested on an experimental data set obtained by a com-
mercial vehicle driven along an european extra-urban drive cycle. The vehicle
was equipped with a four cylinders engine 1282cc. The ambient temperature
and pressure, during tests, were respectively 30 [K] and 1.011 · 105 [Pa].
Figure 10 shows the measured throttle angle α and engine speed N , while
in figure 11 is represented the measured pressure and the estimated manifold
pressure by observer. Figure 12 shows the estimated throttle air mass flow
rate ṁat and the in-cylinder air mass flow rate ṁap adjusted by the air
correction parameter δm .
Notice that EKF estimates the mean manifold pressure upstream sensor;
this is more relevant during the transients, as shown in figure 13. It can
estimate correctly the in-cylinder air mass flow rate ṁap by the speed-density
(3) (see figure 14). Figure 15 shows a comparison between the estimated
air mass flow rate by the EKF and by speed-density computed using the
measured pressure signal. Last method introduces a percentage error till 40%
during transient conditions.
 Extended Kalman Observer for Air Estimation 11

Fig. 10. First frame: measured throttle angle position; Second frame:
measured engine speed

Fig. 11. Measured and estimated manifold pressure

4 Conclusions
Conventional AFR control strategies, to ensure the stoichiometry of the air
fuel mixture, need a measure of the in-cylinder air mass flow rate. An eventu-
12 Barbarisi et al.

Fig. 12. First frame: estimated throttle air mass flow rate ṁat and esti-
mated in-cylinder air mass flow rate ṁap ; Second frame: in-cylinder air
correction parameter δm

Fig. 13. Measured and estimated manifold pressure.

 Extended Kalman Observer for Air Estimation 13

Fig. 14. Estimated air mass flow throttle ṁat and estimated inlet air mass
ṁap corrected by parameter of correction δm .

Fig. 15. First frame: in-cylinder air mass flow rate ṁap estimated via
speed density based on measured pressure and via EKF; Second frame:
percentage error between two methods.
14 Barbarisi et al.

ally error strikes again on an increasing of emission pollutant during transient.

In this paper has been designed an algorithm, based on extended Kalman fil-
ter, to estimate the air incoming into cylinders. The EKF observes the intake
manifold mean pressure, upstream commercial sensor, and then evaluates the
speed-density equation to furnish an estimate of the air mass flow rate. The
algorithm has been tested on experimental data set of a commercial vehicle
and good air estimate has been reached during steady and transient states.
In future work, is our intention to test the performances of commercial
AFR controller in which the air estimation will be substitute by EKF pre-
sented. We will wait a reduction of those AFR excursions, depending on
uncorrect air estimation, and then a reduction of the emission pollutant.

References
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Hill, New York.
4. Hendricks H.(1995) Engine Modelling for Control Applications: a Critical Sur-
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