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An agricultural tractor is often modified for special farming applications such as horticulture where the standard design is not suitable or accessible. In such cases, farm equipment manufacturers are demanded frugal and cost effect Engineered farming solutions. One such design is the innovative High Ground Clearance Tractor (HGCT) kit offered to increase the Tractor height without damaging the crop during farming operations. In this paper, the author proposes a durability assessment method to evaluate the HGCT kit attachments to meet the durability criteria. Road load data acquisition is done to measure the acceleration and strain levels for various horticulture operations such as tillage, spraying and transportation. Actual operating conditions are simulated with the help of four poster durability setups inside the lab which helps to reduce the field testing for design iterations.

This project was undertaken with an objective to develop methodology by formulating set of procedures that would help in achieving the end goal. Once methodology is established, it paves way to optimize the end results more effectively which results in reduced lead time during product development. Methodology can either be based on pure experimental investigations or by simulations. Combination of mathematical and empirical approach is inherently followed in simulations, which helps in reducing the testing time and overall cost. Commercial vehicles (CV) have seen paradigm shift in the fuel consumption (FC) certification approaches, with an intention to align with 2016 Paris climate agreement. Use of simulation tool like VECTO for commercial vehicle FC certification has gained momentum in Europe. Overall experience gained in commercial vehicle FC simulation has motivated us to leverage the learnings for off-road applications like agricultural tractors.

The cost of fuels used for automobile are rising in India on account of high global crude oil prices. The fuel cost constitutes major portion of total cost of operation for Heavy commercial vehicles. Hence, the trend is to carry the goods transport through higher payload capacity rigid/straight trucks that offer lower transportation cost per unit of goods transported. This is driving the design of multi-axle heavy trucks that have lift axles. In addition, improved network of highways and road infrastructure is leading to increase in average operating speed of heavy commercial vehicles. It has made increased focus on occupant as well as road safety while designing the heavy trucks. Hence, the analysis of lift axle suspension from the point of view of vehicle handling and stability is essential. There are two basic kinds of lift axle designs used in heavy commercial vehicles: self-steered lift axle having single tire on each side and non-steered lift axle with dual tires on each side.

Construction equipment off highway vehicles are heavy industry vehicles that run on diesel engines. To meet the emission norms, these engines have the Exhaust After Treatment System (EATS) which includes two primary subassemblies, i.e., a Diesel Oxidation Catalyst (DOC) subassembly to reduce the HC and CO emissions and a Selective catalytic Reduction (SCR) subassembly to reduce NOx emissions. Because of the excessive vibrations in the engine and continuous heavy-duty usage of the Construction equipment, any failures in the EATS system leading to escape of exhaust gas is a statuary non-compliance. Hence, understanding the effect of engine vibrations and proposing a cost-effective solution is paramount in designing the EATS system including the SCR assembly. A field-testing failure of an SCR assembly has been taken in consideration for this study.

The implementation of TREM/CEV 5 emission norms on farm equipment will bring in cost pressure due to the need for exhaust after treatment systems. This cost increase needs to be reduced by bringing in more efficient and effective processes to shorten the development phase and to provide better fuel efficiencies. In this work ETAS ASCMO Online DoE with Constraint Modelling (ODCM) was applied to execute smart online DoE on a new common rail diesel engine with EGR, whose exact bounds of operation was not available. A Global test plan with ASCMO Static was created without much focus on detailed constraints of engine operation, other than the full load curve. The parameters which were selected were Speed, Torque, Rail Pressure, Main Timing, EGR Valve Position, Pilot Separation and Quantity and Post Quantity and Separation. For these parameters, the safe operating bounds were not available. This ASCMO Static test plan is automated and executed on engine test cell with ETAS INCAFlow.

Usually conventional iterative methods of optimization will consume more time to optimize the given design. Mostly, it becomes very difficult if multiple loads are acting on the structure contradicting each other. CAE based optimization technique becomes more useful in such cases to optimize the given design and achieve weight reduction. Optimization methods offers guidance to expedite solutions, resulting in a substantial reduction in product development time. Nowadays, optimization became inevitable part among the virtual validation processes of design in industries. A wide range of optimization methods have been effectively employed in the design of tractor components, especially mounting brackets, chassis and skid housing for the development of off-road vehicle. Based on the design stage, various optimization techniques were followed i.e. Topology, size and shape. Depending upon the available analysis time & Design freedom, determines the type of optimization approach to be used.

Commercial transportation is the key pillar of any growing economy. Light and Small commercial vehicles are increasing every day to cater the logistics demand, but there is always a gap between customer’s actual and desired operational efficiency. This is because of lack of organized fleet and efficient fleet operation. The major requirement of fleet owners is timely delivery, high productivity, downtime reduction, real time tracking, etc., Automakers are now providing fleet management application in modern LCV & SCV to satisfy the fleet operator requirement. However, any feature malfunction, consignment mismatch, wrong notification, missed alerts, etc., can incur huge loss to fleet operator and disrupt the entire supply chain. Hence it is very critical to extensively validate the telematics features in fleet management application. This paper explains the approach for exhaustive validation strategy of fleet management applications (B2B) from end user perspective.

The commercial vehicles market is dominated by manual transmission, due to lower ownership cost. Generally, commercial vehicles are used in large numbers by the fleet owners. The transmission endurance life is very important to a vehicle owner. On the other hand, driver fatigue can be reduced with a smooth gear change process. The gear change process in a manual transmission is carried out with the help of the synchronizer pack. The crucial function of a synchronizer pack in an automotive transmission is to match the speed of the target gear for smooth gear shifting. In a transmission, the loose and the weakest part is the synchronizer ring. The failure of the synchronizer affects smooth gear shifting and it also affects the endurance life of the transmission. The synchronizer ring can fail due to poor structural strength, synchronizer liner wear, synchronizer liner burning, etc.

In developing countries, the commercial vehicle industry is one of the key drivers for economic growth. The commercial vehicle industry in India is expected to reach 11,80,000 units by 2025 with a CAGR of 18% from CY 2020 to CY 2025 [1]. In the price sensitive segment of small commercial vehicles, it is imperative to incorporate accurate fuel economy measurement techniques during product development stage to deliver maximum value to the customer. In this approach, measuring the fuel consumption of small commercial vehicles in real world driving conditions in real time is one of the most critical aspects in engine calibration development and fine tuning. One of the challenges in measuring fuel consumption in sub 1 liter diesel engines is the very low fuel flow rate in the fuel feed line which keeps varying as per the driver demand.

Tractor lease is an attractive proposition for farmers with small land holdings in India as initial investment required for purchasing a tractor is high [1]. The tractor is wet leased on a daily basis with the driver paid by the hour. Thus, there is a natural tendency by the driver to prolong the operation by taking frequent breaks adding to the overall input cost for the marginal farmer. Therefore, there is need to monitor these operations in real-time to ensure maximum utilization of tractors. The advent of connected and data driven technologies have positively disrupted several sectors including agriculture [2]. Vehicular and GPS (Global Positioning System) data from connected tractors powered by telematic devices can be effectively used for monitoring tractor’s health and position in real time using a mobile application. Moving beyond real-time monitoring, data obtained from connected tractors allow the computation of total field area and on-road distance covered during the day.

Traffic awareness of the driver is one of the prime focus in terms of pedestrian and road safety. Driver experience plays a significant role and driving requires careful attention to changing environments both within and outside the vehicle. Any lapse in driver attention from the primary task of driving could potentially lead to an accident. It is observed that, lack of attention on the ongoing traffic and ignorant about the traffic information such as traffic lights, road signs, traffic rules and regulations are major cause for the vehicle crash. Traffic signals & signage are the most appropriate choice of traffic control for the intersection, it is important to ensure that driver can see the information far away from the intersection so that he/she can stop safely upon viewing the yellow and red display. Then, upon viewing the signal operations and conditions the motorist can stop his/her vehicle successfully before entering the intersection.

Virtual assessment of an occupant postural ergonomics has become an essential part of vehicle development process. To design vehicle for different market is one of the primary reason for manufacturers using digital tools to address the specific needs of the target market including cultural background, road and traffic conditions. RAMSIS is a widely used software for creating digital human models (DHM) of different target population which allows manufacturers to assess design with unique customer requirements in product design. Defining these requirements with RAMSIS human module helped development team to accurately define occupant targets such as occupant space, visibility and reachability etc. Occupant behavior and usage scenario are factors which are unique to target market and they influence the occupant posture and usage pattern inside the vehicle. This paper defines the methodology towards the development of Indian Digital Simulation model for vehicle ergonomic evaluations.

A cabin on an agricultural tractor is meant to protect the operator from harsh environment, dust and provide an air conditioned space. As it is an enclosed space, cabin structure should be a crashworthiness structure and should not cause serious injury to operator in case of tractor roll over. There are International standard like OECD Code 4, SAE J2194 which regulates the crashworthiness of this protective structure. The roll-over protective structure (ROPS) is characterized by the provision of space for a clearance zone large enough to protect the operator in case of tractor overturn. None of the cabin parts should enter into the clearance zone for operator safety. In addition to meeting ROPS test criteria, the cabin structural strength should be optimized for the required tractor life. In this paper, simulation process has been established to design an agricultural tractor cabin structure and its mountings to meet the above requirements.

In commercial vehicles which generally have large capacity fuel tank, sloshing of fuel and its effect on the tank structure is very important aspect during fuel tank design. Dynamic pressures exerted by the fuel on baffles, end plates and tank shell during sloshing can lead to structural failures and fuel leakage problems. Fluid structure interaction simulation of automotive fuel tank sloshing and its correlation with physical test is demonstrated in this study. During physical sloshing test of 350 L fuel tank, cracks were observed on center baffle and spot weld failures developed on fuel tank shell. Same sloshing test was simulated for one sloshing cycle using fluid structure interaction approach in LS Dyna explicit FE solver. Water was used instead of fuel. Mesh free Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH) method is used to represent water as it requires less computational time as compared to Eulerian or ALE method.

Regulations on pedestrian safety have been introduced globally since the year 1990 and in India it will have to be met around the year 2016. Process of making vehicle compliant to this regulation requires rigorous design development and testing. Testing involves propelling head-forms (Child and Adult) on bonnet at 35 km/h and 40 km/h and leg-forms (Upper and Lower) on bumper at 40 km/h according to the different National / International / NCAP regulatory requirements A pedestrian protection test rig has been indigenously designed and developed in-house to perform pedestrian protection impact testing in-house. The paper describes the salient features of the pedestrian protection test rig, its functioning, operation and process of acquiring the data for determination of the values required by crash safety regulations.

Brazil has implemented a new emission regulation for Light commercial vehicles named PROCONVE L6. This regulation follows Environmental Protection Act (EPA) driving cycle; FTP75. This cycle simulates an urban route of 12.07 km with frequent stops. The maximum speed is 91.2 km/h and the average speed is 31.5 km/h. The regulation has proposed that the gear shift pattern of the manual transmission vehicle can be varied according to the manufacturer's specification. This has lead to the strategy of optimizing gear shift pattern without compromising diesel combustion and engine-out emission with optimized exhaust-gas treatment-devices. The emission is demonstrated to Brazilan Authorities with good margins.

Airbags play a vital role in occupant protection during a crash event. Apart from the crash test the airbags have to additionally meet the requirements of the ECE R 12 headform impact test with Driver's Airbag (DAB) located in the steering wheel being deployed and the ECE R21 headform impact test for Passenger Airbag (PAB) in undeployed condition. Improper location of the PAB module below the Instrument Panel, the design of the air bag housing and the Instrument Panel are some of the factors that could lead to non compliance of the components of the uninflated PAB. The paper deals with the investigation conducted for compliance of the PAB to ECE R 21 with the uninflated air bag in meeting the requirements of 80 g at 19.3 km/h by proper location, changes to the design of the PAB cover, air bag housing brackets, etc.

The scope of the project is to achieve SUV structural performance improvement to meet the offset frontal crash safety requirements as per ECE R 94 Regulation by design modifications in different Sub-systems of the vehicle structure suggested with the help of CAE crash simulations. The study can be classified in four main phases mentioned below. The first phase of the development is to conduct a crash test and CAE simulation for the baseline design. The second phase includes correlation activity among baseline test and CAE. The third phase is to achieve improvement by vehicle structure design modifications and new parts in chassis and BIW guided with CAE simulations and design iterations. Finally the forth phase deals with validation of new crashworthy vehicle design by last crash test.