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Prevailing automotive development focus shifts towards passenger-centric development of vehicle systems. Comparative to autonomous driving development, the challenge evolves to describe all relevant driving situations with the necessary information and context to be able to develop and optimize vehicle systems to actual driving situations. The situational description or scenario, i.e., context or ambiance in which a vehicle is located, represents a fundamental factor in consideration of system behavior and respective system optimization opportunities. The challenge to solve the respective automotive engineering problems for nonlinear multidimensional parameter spaces or mixed integer classification problems is to describe and limit the possible solution space by suitable methodologies. Conventional methods prove inadequate solution as they can only be applied with significant financial resources and engineering time efforts, as known by autonomous driving system development.

Modern automotive development evolves beyond artificial intelligence for highly automated driving, and toward an interconnected manifold of data-driven development processes. Widely used analytical system modelling struggles with rising system complexity, invoking approaches through data-driven system models. We consider these as key enablers for further improvements in accuracy and development efficiency. However, literature and industry have yet to thoroughly discuss the relevance and methods along the vehicle development cycle. We emphasize the importance of data-driven system models in their distinct types and applications along the developing process, from pre-development to fleet operation. Data-driven models have proven in other works to be fast approximators, of high accuracy and adaptive, in contrast to physics-based analytical approaches across domains.

1. The present work introduces an approach for the analysis of the noise propagation behavior of mechatronic brake systems in modern passenger vehicles. While on the one hand, the number of features realized through the mechatronic brake system is strongly increasing; on the other hand, a continuous reduction of the overall vehicle interior noise level can be observed. This leads to an increase of interfering noise phenomena in the vehicle interior that customers might perceive as insufficient product quality. Therefore, noise elimination always plays an important role in vehicle development. The mechatronic brake system induces interfering noise that is transferred into the vehicle interior, differing from vehicle to vehicle and maneuver to maneuver. Supposedly, a wide frequency range, numerous components, and various branched transfer paths in the physical domains of airborne, structure-borne, and fluid-borne sound are involved in the noise propagation.

Due to increasing environmental awareness, standards for pollutant and CO2 emissions are getting stricter in most markets around the world. In important markets such as Europe, also the emissions during real road driving, so called “Real Driving Emissions” (RDE), are now part of the type approval process for passenger cars. In addition to the proceeding hybridization and electrification of vehicles, the complexity and degrees of freedom of conventional powertrains with internal combustion engines (ICE) are also continuing to increase in order to comply with stricter exhaust emission standards. Besides the different requirements placed on vehicle emissions, the drivability capabilities of passenger vehicles desired by customers, are essentially important and vary between markets.

In order to reduce development cost and time, frontloading is an established methodology for automotive development programs. With this approach, particular development tasks are shifted to earlier program phases. One prerequisite for this approach is the application of Hardware-in-the-Loop test setups. Hardware-in-the-Loop methodologies have already successfully been applied to conventional as well as electrified powertrains considering various driving scenarios. Regarding driving performance and energy demand, electrified powertrains are highly dependent on the dc-link voltage. However, there is a particular shortage of studies focusing on the verification of variable dc-link voltage controls by Hardware-in-the-Loop setups. This article is intended to be a first step towards closing this gap. Thereto, a Hardware-in-the-Loop setup of a battery electric vehicle is developed.

The growing number of passenger car variants and derivatives in all global markets, their high degree of software differentiability caused by regionally different legislative regulations, as well as pronounced market-specific customer expectations require a continuous optimization of the entire vehicle development process. In addition, ever stricter emission standards lead to a considerable increase in powertrain hardware and control complexity. Also, efforts to achieve market and brand specific multistep adjustable drivability characteristics as unique selling proposition, rapidly extend the scope for calibration and testing tasks during the development of powertrain control units. The resulting extent of interdependencies between the drivability calibration and other development and calibration tasks requires frontloading of development tasks.

The efficient operation of powertrain test benches in research and development is strongly influenced by the state of “health” of the functional test object. Hence, the use of Early Damage Detection Systems (EDDS) with Unit Under Test (UUT) monitoring is becoming increasingly popular. An EDDS should primarily avoid total loss of the test object and ensure that damaged parts are not completely destroyed, and can still be inspected. Therefore, any abnormality from the standard test object behavior, such as an exceeding of predefined limits, must be recognized at an early testing time, and must lead to a shutdown of the test bench operation. With sensors mounted on the test object, it is possible to isolate the damage cause in the event of its detection. Advanced EDDS configurations also optimize the predefined limits by learning new shutdown values according to the test object behavior within a very short time.

Hardware-in-the-Loop is a common and established testing method for automotive developments in order to study interactions between different vehicle components during early development phases. Hardware-in-the-Loop setups have successfully been utilized within several development programs for conventional and electrified powertrains already. However, there is a particular shortage of studies focusing on the development of inverter controls utilizing Hardware-in-the-Loop tests. This contribution shall provide a first step toward closing this gap. In this article, inverter controls with different pulse width modulations for varying modulation index are studied at a Hardware-in-the-Loop setup. Thereto, the inverter control for an interior permanent magnet synchronous machine is developed utilizing space vector pulse width modulation with overmodulation.

To achieve global market and brand specific drivability characteristics as unique selling proposition for the increasing number of passenger car derivatives, an objectified evaluation approach for the drivability capabilities of the various cars is required. Thereto, it is necessary to evaluate the influence of different engine concepts in various complex and interlinked powertrain topologies during engine load change maneuvers based on physical criteria. Such an objectification approach enables frontloading of drivability related engineering tasks by the execution of drivability development and calibration work within vehicle subcomponent-specific closed-loop real-time co-simulation environments in early phases of a vehicle development program. So far, drivability functionalities could be developed and calibrated only towards the end of a vehicle development program, when test vehicles with a sufficient level of product maturity became available.

In the last years the research activities in the field of lightweighting have been advancing rapidly. The introduction of innovative materials and manufacturing technologies has allowed significant weight reduction. Despite this, novel technologies and materials have not reached a wide distribution. The reasons for this are mainly high production costs and environmental impacts of manufacturing that do not compensate benefits during operation. The paper deals with the AffordabLe LIghtweight Automobiles AlliaNCE (ALLIANCE) project which has the goal of developing novel advanced automotive materials and production technologies, aiming at an average 25% weight reduction over 100 k units/year, at costs of <3 €/kg. The article is focussed on Work Package 1 (WP1) of the project, aimed at estimating the full attributes of innovative design solutions by assessing costs, energy demand and GWP over the entire vehicle Life Cycle (LC).

The use of state-of-the-art model-based calibration tools generate only limited benefits for seamless validation in powertrain calibration due to the often neglected system-level simulation of a closed-loop vehicle environment. This study presents a Hardware-in-the-Loop (HiL)-based virtual calibration approach to establish an accurate virtual calibration platform using physical plant models. It is based on a customisable real-time HiL simulation environment. The use of physical models to predict the behaviour of a complete powertrain makes the HiL test bench particularly suited for Engine Control Unit (ECU) calibration. With the virtual test rig approach, the calibration for the critical extended driving and ambient conditions of the new Real Driving Emissions (RDE) requirements can efficiently be optimised. This technique offers a clear advantage in terms of reducing calibration time and costs.

Direct injection (DI) compressed natural gas (CNG) engines are emerging as a promising technology for highly efficient and low-emission engines. However, the design of DI systems for compressible gas is challenging due to supersonic flows and the occurrence of shocks. An outwardly opening poppet-type valve design is widely used for DI-CNG. The formation of a hollow cone gas jet resulting from this configuration, its subsequent collapse, and mixing is challenging to characterize using experimental methods. Therefore, numerical simulations can be helpful to understand the process and later to develop models for engine simulations. In this article, the results of high-fidelity large-eddy simulation (LES) of a stand-alone injector are discussed to understand the evolution of the hollow cone gas jet better.

The complexity of automobile powertrains grows continuously. At the same time, development time and budget are limited. Shifting development tasks to earlier phases (frontloading) increases the efficiency by utilizing test benches instead of prototype vehicles (road-to-rig approach). Early system verification of powertrain components requires a closed-loop coupling to real-time simulation models, comparable to hardware-in-the-loop testing (HiL). The international research project Advanced Co-Simulation Open System Architecture (ACOSAR) has the goal to develop a non-proprietary communication architecture between real-time and non-real-time systems in order to speed up the commissioning process and to decrease the monetary effort for testing and validation. One major outcome will be a generic interface for coupling different simulation tools and real-time systems (e.g. HiL simulators or test benches).

Today, automated vehicles mostly rely on ego vehicle sensors such as cameras, radar or LiDAR sensors that are limited in their sensing capability and range. Vehicle-to-everything (V2X) communication has the potential to appropriately complement these sensors and even allow for a cooperative, proactive interaction of vehicles. As such, V2X communication might play a vital role on the way to smart and efficient traffic solutions. In the public funded research project UK Autodrive, we are currently investigating and experimentally evaluating V2X-based applications based on dedicated short range communication (DSRC). Moreover, the novel application intersection priority management (IPM) is part of the research project. IPM aims at automating intersections in such a way that vehicles can pass safely and even more efficiently without the use of traffic lights or signs.

Modern vehicles become increasingly software intensive. Software development therefore is critical to the success of the manufacturer to develop state of the art technology. Standards like ISO 26262 recommend requirement-based verification and test cases that are derived from requirements analysis. Agile development uses continuous integration tests which rely on test automation and evaluation. All these drove the development of a new model-based software verification environment. Various aspects had to be taken into account: the test case specification needs to be easily comprehensible and flexible in order to allow testing of different functional variants. The test environment should support different use cases like open-loop or closed-loop testing and has to provide corresponding evaluation methods for continuously changing as well as for discrete signals.

This paper will present a multi-domain (electrical and thermal) model of a three phase voltage source converter and its implementation in Modelica language. An averaged model is utilised for the electrical domain, and a power balance method is used for linking the DC and AC sides. The thermal domain focuses in deriving the converter losses by deriving the analytical equations of the space vector modulation to derive a function for the duty cycle of each converter leg. With this, the conduction and switching losses are calculated for the individual switches and diodes, without having to model their actual switching behaviour. The model is very fast to simulate, as no switching events are needed, and allows obtaining the simulation of the electrical and thermal behaviour in the same simulation package..

Auto transformer rectifier units (ATRUs) are commonly used in aircraft applications such as electric actuation for harmonic mitigation due to their high reliability and relative low cost. However, those components and the magnetic filter components associated to it are the major contributors to the overall size and weight of the system. Optimization of the magnetic components is essential in order to minimize weight and size, which are major market drivers in aerospace industry today. This requires knowledge of the harmonic content of the current. This can be obtained by simulation, but the process is slow. In order to enable fast and efficient design space exploration of optimal solutions, an algebraic calculation process is proposed in this paper for multi-pulse ATRUs (e.g. 12-pulse and 18-pulse rectifiers), starting from existing solution proposed for 6 pulse rectifier in the literature.

New combustion processes require an understanding of the highly three-dimensional flow field to effectively decrease fuel consumption and pollutant emission. Due to the complex spatial character of the flow the knowledge of the development of the flow in an extended volume is necessary. Previous investigations were able to visualize the discrete three-dimensional flow field through multi-plane stereoscopic PIV. In this study, cycle resolved tomographic particle-image velocimetry measurement have been performed to obtain a fully resolved representation of the three-dimensional flow structures at each instant. The analysis is based on the measurements at 80°, 160°, and 240° after top dead center(atdc) such that the velocity distributions at the intake, the end of the intake, and the compression stroke at an engine speed of 1,500 rpm are discussed in detail.

Although spark-ignited engines have a considerable development history, the relevant flow physics and geometry design implications are still not fully understood. One reason is the lack of experimental and numerical methods with sufficiently high resolution or capabilities of capturing stochastic phenomena which could be used as part of the development cycle. More recently, Large-Eddy simulation (LES) has been identified as a promising technique to establish a better understanding of in-cylinder flow variations. However, simulations of engine configurations are challenging due to resolution as well as modeling requirements and computational cost for these unsteady multi-physics problems. LES on full engine geometries can even be prohibitively expensive. For this reason, the size of the computational LES domain is here reduced to the region of physical interest and boundary conditions are obtained from a RANS simulation of the whole experimental flow domain.

The noise performance of fully electric vehicles is essential to ensure that they gain market acceptance. This can be a challenge for several reasons. Firstly, there is no masking from the internal combustion engine. Next, there is pressure to move to cost-efficient motor designs such as Switched Reluctance Motors, which have worse vibro-acoustic behaviour than their Permanent Magnet counterparts. Finally, power-dense, higher speed motors run closer fundamental frequency to the structural resonances of the system [1]. Experience has shown that this challenge is frequently not met. Reputable suppliers have designed and developed their “quiet” subsystems to state of the art levels, only to discover that the assembled E-powertrain is unacceptably noisy. The paper describes the process and arising results for the noise simulation of the complete powertrain.