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Automotive electronics penetration in commercial vehicle segment, in India and other developing countries is in a primitive stage. Introducing a new technology into automobile applications may involve unpredictable failure modes, imposing several risks on the OEM (acronyms are mentioned in the last section) and causing financial losses. Low failure rates can only be achieved by rigorous testing before the product launch. This will help to achieve the required safety and reliability at the system level. The conventional method of testing has some drawbacks. This paper briefs on an advanced testing methodology, as well as a low cost system using telemetry for a trip-information computing unit. It also brings out the merits and demerits on using this system compared to conventional testing as well as other sophisticated testing systems. Towards the end, the paper proposes an alternate testing method and also relevant future works in this domain.

Automotive Infotronics Private Limited (AIPL is a Joint Venture between Ashok Leyland, India and Continental AG, Germany) has been working on a body control solution for the commercial vehicle segment over the last few years. The units developed meet the stringent IP66 ingress protection requirement (dust and water) for Indian market applications. Due to the “closed” nature of the enclosure, thermal design for the device is done in such a way so that heat can be dissipated through the metallic enclosure. The electronic design is modular so that a variety of applications can be handled with the same basic design. Finally, a big step is taken in the creation of the application software that is fully model-based and “auto-coded” [6]. With the adoption of model-based design, this unit makes itself completely flexible where a host of customer specific (and/or customer owned) strategies can be seamlessly integrated with the basic application software.

The rapid development of automotive electronics has increased the number of electronic control units in the vehicle and the complexity of overall wiring harness. Automotive Multiplexing system is being adopted and customized by all global automotive OEMs to address the growing electrical/electronic complexity in automobiles. Adopting globally available off-the-shelf multiplexing products for Indian market requires heavy customization to meet the functional requirements and the Indian environmental condition requirements. And, the cost factor is also significant. This has driven Ashok Leyland to develop a low cost Multiplexing solution that meets the global standards in terms of performance, regulation and quality to cater to the local and global market needs.

In tropical conditions, twelve numbers of ten ton intermediate commercial vehicles run at regular interval from zero to 60000 kilometer. Vehicle field run data were composed and analyzed with intended duty cycle for engine oil drain life estimation. The intermediate commercial vehicle trucks with sump capacity 0.083- 0.104 liter/HP and SAE 15W40 viscosity of oil meeting API CH-4, API CI-4+ from group-I and group-II base stocks are considered. The engine wear is more a function of silica concentration, load factor and age than the API category of the oil. Oil drain interval is found to be proportional to the sump volume for the same stress on the oil. Iron concentration and kinematic viscosity decide to be useful oil life with respect to the limits fixed by the engine manufacturer. In tropical conditions, field trials are carried out on 10 ton payload vehicles at higher temperature, humidity, dust levels and payload factor.