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Due to current progresses in the field of driver assistance systems and the continuously growing electrification of vehicle drive trains, the evaluation of driver behavior has become an important part in the development process of modern cars. Findings from driver analyses are used for the creation of individual profiles, which can be permanently adapted due to ongoing data processing. A benefit of data-based dynamic control systems lies in the possibility to individually configure the vehicle behavior for a specific driver, which can contribute to increasing customer acceptance and satisfaction. In this way, an optimization of the control behavior between driver and vehicle and the resulting mutual system learning and -adjustment hold great potential for improvements in driving behavior, safety and energy consumption.

Energy politics and environmental circumstances demand novel strategies for private transport. Several studies have shown that one of these possibilities can be an electric vehicle with a range extender - REX. Today these REX engines are under way as derivation from modern internal combustion engines. As the need for an optimized usage of energy will further increase in the future, alternative energy converter systems have to be investigated. For DENSO, as supplier of components, it is of strong interest how the basic layout of these concepts could look like. This is necessary in order to be prepared for the specific needs of these concepts in terms of auxiliaries, electric / electronic components as well as for the cabin climate & various control strategies. In these REX-concepts all energies have to be considered. A sophisticated usage of energy inside a REX vehicle is required which leads to the investigation of a combined heat and power usage on-board.

Research and development engineers have paid much attention to coupling commercial tools for examining complex systems, recently. The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate an automated coupling of a CFD program with a commercial thermal radiation tool. Based on a previous work the coupling behaviour of a parallelized CFD code is being demonstrated. The automation thus speeds up the calculation procedure even for transient simulations not relying on codes of just one vendor. The simulation is then compared with measurements of temperatures of an actual SUV and conclusions are drawn.

Measurements of ultrafine particles (diameter < 300 nm) and total suspended particulates (TSP) were performed in 2 tunnels (Lundby, Gothenborg, S, and Plabutsch, Graz, A). The measurements in the Lundby tunnel were performed directly in the tunnel tube at the roadside whereas the measurements at the Plabutsch tunnel took place at the top of a 90 m high ventilation shaft. There was good correlation for all diameters (7.91 nm - 300 nm) between ultrafine particles and TSP for the measurements at the Lundby tunnel. At the Plabutsch site a correlation between ultrafine particles and TSP was detected only for particles > 35 nm. The maximum of the particle size distribution function for Lundby was at 30 nm and for the Plabutsch tunnel at 80 nm.

A large number of testing procedures have been developed to ensure vehicle safety in common and extreme driving situations. However, these conventional testing procedures are insufficient for testing autonomous vehicles. They have to handle unexpected scenarios with the same or less risk a human driver would take. Currently, safety related systems are not adequately tested, e.g. in collision avoidance scenarios with pedestrians. Examples are the change of pedestrian behaviour caused by interaction, environmental influences and personal aspects, which cannot be tested in real environments. It is proposed to use augmented reality techniques. This method can be seen as a new (Augmented) Pedestrian in the Loop testing procedure.

Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) for collision avoidance/mitigation have already demonstrated their benefit on vehicle safety. Often those systems have an additional functionality for comfort to assist the driver in non-critical driving. The verification of ADAS functionality using different test scenarios is currently investigated in many different projects worldwide. A harmonization of test scenarios and evaluation criteria is not yet accomplished. Often, these test scenarios focus on objective collision avoidance and not on the subjective interaction between driver and vehicle. The present study deals with the development of an experimental validation plan for the systems Automatic Cruise Control (ACC), Lane Departure Warning (LDW) and Lane Keeping Assist (LKA). Standardized driving maneuvers with two or more vehicles equipped with synchronized measurement are performed by professional test drivers.

Small combustion engines can be found in various applications in daily use (e.g. as propulsion of boats, scooters, motorbikes, power-tools, mobile power units, etc.) and have predominated these markets for a long time. Today some upcoming competitive technologies in the field of electrification can be observed and have already shown great technical advances. Therefore, small combustion engines have to keep their present advantages while concurrently minimizing their disadvantages in order to remain the predominant technology in the future. Whereas large combustion engines are most efficient thermal engines, small engines still suffer from significantly lower efficiencies caused by a disadvantageous surface to volume ratio. Thus, the enhancement of efficiency will play a key role in the development of future small combustion engines. One promising possibility to improve efficiency is the use of a longer expansion than compression stroke.

During recent years the accident simulation program PC-Crash was developed. This software simulates vehicle movement before, during and after the impact, using 3D vehicle and scene models. When reconstructing car accidents, quite often questions arise regarding occupant movement and loading. Especially important is the influence of different types of restraint systems on the occupant. MADYMO® is a software tool which was developed by TNO in the Netherlands and which is well known in the automotive industry for the simulation of occupant movement. It allows the simulation of all kinds of modern restraint systems such as airbags and seatbelts with and without pretensioners. As the software is used in the automotive industry quite extensively, a huge validated database of dummy and human models is available. Since MADYMO® demands the setup of quite complicated input files, its use normally requires a high level of expertise.

Car driver’s behavior and its influence on driving characteristics play an increasing role in the development of modern vehicles, e.g. in view of efficient powertrain control and implementation of driving assistance functions. In addition, knowledge about actual driving style can provide feedback to the driver and support efficient driving or even safety-related measures. Driving patterns are caused not only by the driver, but also influenced by road characteristics, environmental boundary conditions and other traffic participants. Thus, it is necessary to take the driving circumstances into account, when driving patterns are studied. This work proposes a methodology to cluster and evaluate driving patterns under consideration of vehicle-related parameters (e.g. acceleration and jerk) in combination with additional influencing factors, e.g. road style and inclination. Firstly, segmentation of the trip in distance series is performed to generate micro cycles.

The pulse-echo method of non-destructive ultrasonic material testing is modeled by an iterative coupling scheme combining analytical and numerical methods in different domains. The approach offers significant advantages in terms of computational efficiency compared to volumetric mesh-based numerical models if the distance between transducer and specimen is large compared to the wavelength in the coupling medium. Excitation and results are given in the time domain while computations are performed in the frequency domain and are compatible with usual FEM solvers for linear elasticity. Due to the use of interpolated phase-shifted transfer functions only a small number of frequency lines is required in comparison to a direct Fourier transform of signals. The method is illustrated alongside a typical application on a steel structure embedded in water.

In the next 20 years the share of small electric vehicles (SEVs) will increase especially in urban areas. SEVs show distinctive design differences compared to traditional vehicles. Thus the consequences of impacts of SEVs with vulnerable road users (VRUs) and other vehicles will be different from traditional collisions. No assessment concerning vehicle safety is defined for vehicles within European L7e category currently. Focus of the elaborated methodology is to define appropriate test scenarios for this vehicle category to be used within a virtual tool chain. A virtual tool chain has to be defined for the realization of a guideline of virtual certification. The derivation and development of new test conditions for SEVs are described and are the main focus of this work. As key methodology a prospective methodical analysis under consideration of future aspects like pre-crash safety systems is applied.

Real world operating scenarios have a major influence on emissions and fuel consumption. To reduce climate-relevant and environmentally harmful gaseous emissions and the exploitation of fossil resources, deep understanding concerning the real drive behavior of mobile sources is needed because emissions and fuel consumption of e.g. passenger cars, operated in real world conditions, considerably differ from the officially published values which are valid for specific test cycles only [1]. Due to legislative regulations by the European Commission a methodology to measure real drive emissions RDE is well approved for heavy duty vehicles and automotive applications but may not be adapted similar to two-wheeler-applications. This is due to several issues when using the state of the art portable emission measurement system PEMS that will be discussed.

Currently, emission regulations for the LVs using standard spark ignited ICEs considering only gaseous pollutants, just as CO, HC and NOx. Following the upcoming legislation for personal vehicles sector, the LVs might also include limits of PN and PM. Regarding fuel injection strategies, the MPFI which was previously excluded from particulate control will be incorporated into the new regulation [1]. In terms of social harm, there will be a necessity to reduce engine particulate emissions, as they are known for being carcinogenic substances [2, 3, 4]. Generally, the smaller the particulate diameter, the more critical are the damages for human health therefore, the correct determination of PN and particulate diameter is essential. Beside future challenges for reducing and controlling particulates, the reduction of fossil fuel usage is also an imminent target, being the replacement by eFuels one of the most promising alternatives.