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Vehicle manufacturers strive hard to achieve best in class fuel economy. Apart from light weighting of the structures, driveline optimization and reduction of tire rolling resistance, tapping of parasitic losses is also important and helps to optimize the design of auxiliary power consuming systems. One of such system studied in this work is power steering system. The effect of parasitic losses on fuel economy is predominant for small commercial vehicle compare to heavy vehicles. The evaluation of deterioration in the fuel economy due to implementation of power steering system on one of the small commercial vehicle is carried out using multiple virtual simulation tools. Virtual route profile is modelled using longitude, latitude and altitude data captured through GPS and steering duty cycle is mapped in terms of steering rotation angle. A system level model of hydraulic power steering system is developed.

In India, around 70 million people travel by public transport buses. With rising air pollution across cities, there is a need to safeguard passengers from inhaling polluted air. Contaminants in such polluted air could be fine to coarse dust (2.5 micron to 100 micron), exhaust gases (oxide of sulphur, nitrogen and carbon), total volatile organic compounds, bacteria and viruses arising out of covid-19 pandemic. Passengers commuting in buses are continuously inhaling air that is re-circulating through the Air Conditioning system (AC) and also comes in contact with multiple co-passengers and touch points. This air potentially carries a high dose of contaminants and inhalation of such air can lead to health issues. Vehicle manufacturers intend to provide clean air inside the vehicle cabin by configuring various Air Purification systems (AP) which reduce air contaminants in the closed space of a cabin.

HVAC system design has an accountability towards acoustic comfort of passengers of a vehicle. Owing to larger cabin volume of a bus, multiple air blowers have to be installed to ensure comfort of passengers. Such multiple blowers produce significant flow induced noise inside the cabin. For commercial success, it becomes essential to predict intensity of such a flow induced noise at very early stages in product development. Conventionally sliding mesh based CFD approach is deployed to predict flow and turbulence noise around each blower. However due to complexity, this method becomes computationally intensive resulting in cost and time inefficiency. Hence it is desirable to innovate around an alternative rapid, reliable prediction method, which ensures quick turnaround of prediction.

Leaf springs are used for vehicle suspension to support the load. These springs are made of flat sections of spring steel in single or in stack of multiple layers, held together in bracketed assembly. The key characteristics of leaf spring are defined as ability to distribute stresses along its length and transmit a load over the width of the chassis structures. The most common leaf spring steels are carbon steels alloyed with Cr and micro-alloyed with Ti, V and Nb. The specific thermomechanical process and alloying elements result in specific strength and fatigue properties for spring steels. The unique properties which facilitate use of spring steel in leaf spring suspensions are ability to withstand considerable twisting or bending forces without any distortion. The microstructure of these steel determines the performance and reflects the process of steel manufacturing. The performance is mainly determined by evaluating fatigue life durability.

The Indian automotive industry has taken a big leap towards stringent Bharat Stage VI (BS VI) emission standards by year 2020. A digital driven design and development focusing on innovative and commercially viable technologies for combustion and exhaust after-treatment system is the need of the time. One-dimensional (1D) simulation serves as a best alternative to its counterparts in terms of obtaining faster and accurate results, which makes it an ideal tool for carrying out optimization studies at system level. In this work, 1D chemical kinetics modelling and analysis of exhaust after-treatment system (EAT) for a heavy-duty diesel has been performed using GT-Power. Initially, a single site 1D model for a diesel oxidation catalyst (DOC) has been developed and then, a two-site, 1D model for a selective catalytic reduction (SCR) catalyst was also developed based on reactor data.

The commercial vehicle sector (especially trucks) has major role in economic growth of a nation. With improving infrastructure, increasing number of commercial vehicles and growing amount of Vulnerable Road Users (VRUs) on roads, accidents are also increasing. As per RASSI (Road Accident Sampling System India) FY2016-21 database, commercial vehicles are involved in 43% of total accidents on Indian roads. One of the major causes of these accidents is Driver Drowsiness and Inattention (DDI) (approx. 10% contribution in total accidents). This paper describes novel driver-in-loop performance assessment methodology for comprehensive verification of Driver Monitoring System (DMS) for commercial vehicle application. Novelty lies in specification of test subjects, driving styles and variety of road traffic scenarios for verification of DMS system. Test setup is made modular to cater to different platform environments (Heavy, Intermediate, Light) with minor modifications.

The small commercial vehicle business is driven by demand in logistic, last mile transportation and white goods market. And to cater these businesses operational and safety needs, they require closed container on vehicle. As of now, very few OEM’s provide regulatory certified container vehicle because of constrains to meet inertia class of the vehicle. This paper focuses on design of a durable and extremely reliable container, made of the low-cost economy class glass fibre & core material. The present work provides the means to design the composite container for the N1 category of the vehicle. The weight of after-market metal container ranges between 300-350 Kg for this category of vehicle, which affects the overall fuel economy and emission of the vehicle. A detailed CAE analysis is done to design composite container suitable to meet inertia class targets and to achieve weight reduction of 30-40% as compared to metal container.

The properties of Cold drawn electric resistance welded, as drawn (CEW-AD) tubes and Electric resistance welded (ERW) tubes are vastly different. Deformation resistance of ERW tube is less than half that of CEW-AD tube, hence not preferred for structural applications, common practice being the use of CEW-AD tubes for Chassis cross members in vehicles. A new cost effective high strength ERW tube was developed which has been proved to be superior to the currently used CEW-AD tubes in terms of mechanical properties, formability, consistency and uniformity of the properties over the tube length. The newly developed tube through use of special micro alloy grade in ERW has made it possible to eliminate some of the manufacturing processes like annealing, phosphating, cold drawing etc. which has led to considerable cost saving.

The automotive world is moving towards electric powertrain systems. The electric powertrain systems have emerged as a promising alternative to the conventional powertrain system. The performance of electric vehicle is highly dependent on operating temperature of electric and electronic components of the vehicle. All power electronics and electric components in EV generate heat during operation and it must be removed to prevent overheating of components. Higher temperatures raise safety concerns whereas lower temperatures deteriorate the performance of power electronics & electric components. These power electronics & electrical components perform efficiently and safely if operated within certain temperature range. This paper presents an advanced efficient cost-effective thermal technique for small commercial electric vehicle (SCEV) to improve the performance & life of major electric components.

In automobile design, a rear-engine layout mainly espoused for small entry-level cars and light commercial vehicles for three reasons - packaging, traction, and ease of manufacturing. The aim of this paper is to strategize cooling system of rear-mounted engine of a small gasoline car. Radiator and cooling fan packaged close to engine at rear of the car for simple packaging. Efficient thermal management ensured by robust overheat protection stratagem using EMS software. DFSS, a disciplined problem prevention approach that helps in achieving the most optimum design solution and provides improved and cost effective quality products; is used to finalize an optimum design based on the analysis of the various tests carried out as per DOE [1]. This paper is about designing a distinctive cooling system of a car having rear-mounted engine with rear radiator but front mounted HVAC system [2].

In a current competitive automotive market, weight and cost optimization is the need of an hour. Therefore it is important to explore use of alternative material which has less weight, low manufacturing cost and better strength. This paper presents methodology to achieve cost & weight reduction through use of Austempered Ductile Iron (ADI) instead of alloy forging. ADI casting has lower density, physical properties at par with alloy forgings and lower manufacturing cost. Pivot arm is the one of the critical component of twin axle steering system which transfers the hydraulic torque from steering gearbox to second forward axle via linkage system. In order to design lightweight pivot arm, existing chromium alloy steel material is replaced with the Austempered ductile iron (ADI). Pivot arm is designed and validated digitally as well as bench test and results are found to be meeting cost and weight targets.

Battery cooling system plays a vital role in all kind of Electric vehicles. For Indian applications where vehicles will be subjected to slower speeds due to heavy traffic, higher ambient conditions and excess loading pattern in commercial vehicles, designing a Battery cooling system (BCS) is a challenging task. There are various options for cooling of battery i.e. Natural air cooled, forced air cooled, indirect cooling. This paper discusses about indirect coolant based cooling of battery of a small commercial vehicle. Battery cooling system works on the principle of Indirect cooling with the combination of vapor compression cycle and water-coolant mixture path. R134a gas used for VCRS system and for cooling system used 50-50% water glycol coolant mixture. For this type of battery cooling system typically There are challenges of packaging of various battery cooling parts, hose routing, pipe bends which may result in de aeration issues.

Lift axles of heavy commercial vehicles are deployed to handle increased payload. These axles of Commercial vehicles are made of low alloy carbon steel materials. Lift axles are designed in hollow condition for weight reduction opportunity. Two types of tube materials are used for the manufacturing of lift axles. These are either Cold Drawn Seamless (CDS) tubes or Hot Finished Seamless (HFS) tube material. The vanadium micro-alloyed steel grade, 20MnV6 is an excellent choice for the manufacturing of lift axles. The 20MnV6 has favorable mechanical properties for lift axles and also offers good weldability. However, lift axles made of 20MnV6 when manufactured in hot-finished condition, shows significant scatter in terms of durability performance. This requires further heat treatment of 20MnV6 to be deployed for reducing the scatter in the material properties to reduce scatter in durability performance and thus increasing the reliability of the lift axles.

Subject paper focuses primarily on non uniform tire wear problem of front steered wheels in a pickup model. Cause and effect analysis complemented with field vehicle investigations helped to identify some of the critical design areas. Investigation revealed that steering geometry of the vehicle is undergoing huge variations in dynamic condition as compared to initial static setting. Factors contributing to this behavior are identified and subsequently worked upon followed by a detailed simulation study in order to reproduce the field failures on test vehicles. Similar evaluation with modified steering design package is conducted and results are compared for assessing the improvements achieved. In usual practice, it is considered enough if Steering Geometry parameters are set in static condition and ensured to lie within design specifications.

Success of the vehicle in the market depends on comfort provided while usage, which also includes noise, vibration and harshness (NVH). In order to achieve comfort level, the NVH levels have to be as low as possible. Powertrain is the main source of NVH, in which internal combustion engine consists of crank shaft and balancer shaft. Crank shaft gear is connected and driven by crank shaft and balanced by integral eccentric mass coupled with gear. Balancer shaft is used for additional balancing of rotating masses. Pair of crank shaft and balancer shaft gears generates noise and vibration when unbalance in the system and backlash in the gears increase while usage. The practice of interposing a vibration isolator on the surface of gear has been so far resorted for preventing transmission of vibration, therefore reduction in noise. In the work presented, balancer gear was made with sandwich design to reduce noise. Sandwich design comprises of Inner hub and outer ring with lug projections.

Transportation has significant and long-lasting economic, social and environmental impacts which makes it an important dimension of urban sustainability. The World is witnessing rapid changes in modern traveling behavior, and efforts are continuously being made to stimulate sustainable mobility solutions with smart policies, new business models, and advanced technologies (connected cars, sensors, electrification). However, the shift is gradual in India when compared to developed countries due to unique barriers to emerging green mobility solutions. This paper empirically investigates public travel satisfaction and the primary factors for the selection of modes for different types of commutes. Quantitative data were collected including socio-demographic, travel mode choices, and preferred future mobility solutions from the western states of India.

The commercial vehicle market in India is shifting to higher payload capacity vehicles due to a lower transportation cost per unit goods. To cater this requirement, the vehicle manufacturers are designing the heavy multi-axle commercial vehicles and with higher per axle loading capacity. One of such a vehicle design involves five-axle vehicle with non-steerable, twin tire, lift axle. Though using a twin tires have increased loading capacity of lift axle compared to a single tire self-steerable lift axle, it can cause tire scrub while vehicle is turning and leads to a significant tire wear. The tire wear possibility due to use of non-steerable lift axle is estimated through simulation using full vehicle model in ADAMS. The operating zone of the vehicle, where maximum tire wear can occur, is identified through simulation. Different alternatives to reduce tire wear for this scenario are also discussed.

Modern day diesel engines use systems like Exhaust Gas Recirculation (EGR), Variable Geometric Turbo Charger (VGT), inlet throttle for air regulation, multiple injection strategies, high pressure rail systems for fuel regulation to optimize the combustion for meeting the strict emission and fuel consumption demands. Torque based ECU structures which are commonly used for diesel engines require a large amount of calibration work. Conventional manual methods for emission and fuel consumption optimization (Full factorial or Line search method) results in increased test bed usage and it is almost impossible to use these methods as the number of parameters to optimize are very high. The conventional DoE tests have been limited by the necessity of calibration engineer’s expertise and manual prescreening of test points to be within thermal & mechanical limits of engine systems. This subsequently leads to excessive screening of variables; which is time consuming.

Diesel engine fuel hose return line is considered as a low pressure line and consists of two layers. The inner layer is used to carry the excess fuel, thereby hose material shall have resistance to fuel and its residues. The outer layer is used to protect inner layer from heat, ozone and oil spillage, thereby outer cover material shall have resistance against the heat, ozone and engine oil. Currently NBR PVC, NBR and FKM materials have been used as inner layer materials in diesel engine fuel hose outer cover application, according to service temperature. Halogen contained CSM material has been used for outer cover application and the production of CSM material was withdrawn by one of the major manufacturer recently. Current global challenge is to use environment friendly material in vehicle components to make hazardous free environment. To replace CSM material, which contains Halogen, the available options are CPE, CR, HNBR and AEM materials.

The public transport in India is gradually shifting towards electric mobility. Long range in electric mobility can be served with High Voltage Battery (HVB), but HVB can sustain for its designed life if it’s maintained within a specific operating temperature range. Appropriate battery thermal management through Battery Cooling System (BCS) is critical for vehicle range and battery durability This work focus on two aspects, BCS sizing and its coolant flow optimization in Electric bus. BCS modelling was done in 1D CAE software. The objective is to develop a model of BCS in virtual environment to replicate the physical testing. Electric bus contain numerous battery packs and a complex piping in its cooling system. BCS sizing simulation was performed to keep the battery packs in operating temperature range.