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The design and development of vehicle suspensions significantly influences vehicle handling and ride comfort. Suspension system design excellence follows the basic laws of physics using design synthesis techniques, a methodical process for suspension geometry development. Suspension geometry is the foundation of vehicle performance from which high-confidence suspension components and tunings can be developed. Suspension component design continues to move toward mass and cost efficient designs with high levels of stiffness being essential to achieving design requirements.

EDR's were first installed in 1994 and are now installed in 99% of new light vehicles sold in the US. In the US EDR’s are not required, but vehicles with EDR’s made after 9/1/2012 must meet minimum standardized content requirements of 49 CFR, Part 563 including speed, throttle, brake on/off and Delta V.  Data must be retrievable with a publicly available tool.  Only a few manufacturers install EDR’s worldwide currently, but the EU and China are adopting regulations to require them in the next few years.  

This course will present an introduction to vehicle dynamics from a vehicle system perspective. The theory and applications are associated with the interaction and performance balance between the powertrain, brakes, steering, suspensions and wheel and tire vehicle subsystems.  The role that vehicle dynamics can and should play in effective automotive chassis development and the information and technology flow from vehicle system to subsystem to piece-part is integrated into the presentation. Governing equations of motion are developed and solved for both steady and transient conditions.

Take notes! Take the wheel! There is no better place to gain an appreciation for vehicle dynamics than from the driver’s seat. Spend three, intense days with a world-renowned vehicle dynamics engineer and SAE Master Instructor, his team of experienced industry engineers, and the BMW-trained professional driving instructors. They will guide you as you work your way through 12 classroom modules learning how and why vehicles go, stop and turn. Each classroom module is immediately followed by an engaging driving exercise on BMW’s private test track.

Electronic brake control systems are required standard equipment on cars and trucks. Vehicles benefit from optimized braking, enhanced acceleration, and improved stability that these systems provide. The instructor introduces participants to system-level design considerations, vehicle interface requirements, and inevitable performance compromises that need to be addressed when implementing these technologies. Participants will begin by defining the tire-road interface and analyzing fundamental vehicle dynamics.

Active safety and (ADAS) are now being introduced to the marketplace as they serve as key enablers for anticipated autonomous driving systems. Automatic emergency braking (AEB) is one ADAS application which is either in the marketplace presently or under development as nearly all automakers have pledged to offer this technology by the year 2022. This one-day course is designed to provide an overview of the typical ADAS AEB system from multiple perspectives.

Many technical projects, most vehicle and component testing, and all accident reconstructions, product failure analyses, and other forensic investigations, require photographic documentation. Roadway evidence disappears, tested or wrecked vehicles are repaired, disassembled, or scrapped, and components can be tested for failure. Photographs are frequently the only evidence that remains of a wreck, or the only records of subjects before or during tests. Making consistently good images during any inspection is a critical part of the evaluation process. 

Crash reconstruction is a scientific process that utilizes principles of physics and empirical data to analyze the physical, electronic, video, audio, and testimonial evidence from a crash to determine how and why the crash occurred. This course will introduce this reconstruction process as it gets applied to various crash types - in-line and intersection collisions, pedestrian collisions, motorcycle crashes, rollover crashes, and heavy truck crashes. Methods of evidence documentation will be covered. Analysis methods will also be presented for electronic data from event data recorders and for video.

Safety continues to be one of the most important factors in motor vehicle design, manufacturing, and marketing.  This course provides a comprehensive overview of these critical automotive safety considerations: injury and anatomy; human tolerance and biomechanics; occupant protection; testing; and federal legislation. The knowledge shared at this course enables participants to be more aware of safety considerations and to better understand and interact with safety experts. This course has been approved by the Accreditation Commission for Traffic Accident Reconstruction (ACTAR) for 18 Continuing Education Units (CEUs).

Photographs and video recordings of vehicle crashes and accident sites are more prevalent than ever, with dash mounted cameras, surveillance footage, and personal cell phones now ubiquitous. The information contained in these pictures and videos provide critical information to understanding how crashes occurred, and  analyze physical evidence. This course teaches the theory and techniques for getting the most out of digital media, including correctly processing raw video and photographs, correcting for lens distortion, and using photogrammetric techniques to convert the information in digital media to usable scaled three-dimensional data.

Design and development of a modern steering system influences vehicle response to steering wheel input, driver effort, comfort, safety and fuel economy. In this interactive course participants will analyze the steering system from the road wheel to the steering wheel. Day one will begin with a deep dive into the anatomy and architecture of the lower steering system (wheel end, suspension geometry, linkages and steering gear), its effect on vehicle response and how forces and moments at the contact patch are converted to a torque at the pinion.

Driving simulators allow the testing of driving functions, vehicle models and acceptance assessment at an early stage. For a real driving experience, it's necessary that all immersions are depicted as realistically as possible. When driving manually, the perceived haptic steering wheel torque plays a key role in conveying a realistic steering feel. To ensure this, complex multi-body systems are used with numerous of parameters that are difficult to identify. Therefore, this study shows a method how to generate a realistic steering feel with a nonlinear open-loop model which only contains significant parameters, particularly the friction of the steering gear. This is suitable for the steering feel in the most driving on-center area. Measurements from test benches and real test drives with an Electric Power Steering (EPS) were used for the Identification and Validation of the model.

Increasing urbanisation and the growing environmental awareness in society require new and innovative vehicle concepts. In the present work, the design freedoms of additive manufacturing (AM) are used to develop a front axle wheel suspension for a novel modular vehicle concept. The development of the suspension components is based on a new method using industry standard load cases for the strength design of the components. To design the chassis components, first the available installation space is determined and a suitable configuration of the chassis components is defined. Furthermore, numerical methods are used to identify component geometries that are suitable for the force flow. The optimisation setup is selected in a way that allows to integrate information, energy and material-carrying conductors into the suspension arms. The conductors even serve as load-bearing structures because of the matching design of the components.

The courier express parcel service industry (CEP industry) has experienced significant changes in the recent years due to increasing parcel volume. At the same time, the electrification of the vehicle fleets poses additional challenges. A major advantage of battery electric CEP vehicles compared to internal combustion engine vehicles is the ability to regenerate the kinetic energy of the vehicle in the frequent deceleration phases during parcel delivery. If the battery is cold the maximum recuperation power of the powertrain is limited by a reduced chemical reaction rate inside the battery. In general, the maximum charging power of the battery depends on the state of charge and the battery temperature. Due to the low power demand for driving during CEP operation, the battery self-heating is comparably low under cold ambient conditions. Without active conditioning of the battery, potential regenerative energy is lost as a result of the cold battery.