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For years powder metal (P/M) nickel steel sprockets have been in use in the SUV Transfer Case market. The heat-treated, nickel steel powder metal provides a high strength and high wear resistant material for this very demanding application. Recently the cost of nickel has increased from $5 / lb Oct'05 to $24 / lb May'07. Because of this almost 5 fold increase in the commodity price a replacement material for the powder metal nickel steel was sought that would have comparable properties, comparable processing steps at a raw material cost that would be equal to the nickel steel powder metal prices of 2005. A replacement material was found that has comparable properties at a competitive price. Material composition, testing data and microscopic analysis will be presented.

This paper summarizes the Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) methodology, special equipment, set-up and testing that is recommended to properly characterize the surface of bearing journals that will not result in objectionable noise or vibration. Traditional surface profiles and finish callouts do not capture some of the key characteristics for addressing what is often the customer's greatest complaint, noise. Noise can vary based on the sensitivity of the vehicle but understanding how to accurately describe (design, test, and measure) a surface for a given vehicle can result in an optimized design and reduce process time during manufacturing. Furthermore, this paper will recommend techniques for determining the proper limits of the FFT callouts.

An ignition delay correlation was developed for a toluene reference fuel (TRF) blend that is representative of automotive gasoline fuels exhibiting two-stage ignition. Ignition delay times for the autoignition of a TRF 91 blend with an antiknock index of 91 were predicted through extensive chemical kinetic modeling in CHEMKIN for a constant volume reactor. The development of the correlation involved determining nonlinear least squares curve fits for these ignition delay predictions corresponding to different inlet pressures and temperatures, a number of fuel-air equivalence ratios, and a range of exhaust gas recirculation (EGR) rates. In addition to NO control, EGR is increasingly being utilized for managing combustion phasing in spark ignition (SI) engines to mitigate knock. Therefore, along with other operating parameters, the effects of EGR on autoignition have been incorporated in the correlation to address the need for predicting ignition delay in SI engines operating with EGR.

The double linear damage model developed by Manson and Halford helps to determine the knee point, which is the intersection between the two straight lines. The damage to the component is then calculated based on this knee point. The new approach mentioned in this paper helps to evaluate the damage on the component in a slightly different way. It uses the knee points as mentioned by Manson and Halford and decomposes the damage to the component for Phase I & Phase II. It then uses the equivalent damage approach and establishes the damage to the component. This will be explained with an example.

The AUTomotive Open System ARchitecture (AUTOSAR) Development Partnership has published early 2008 the specifications Release 3.0 [1], with a prime focus on the overall architecture, basic software, run time environment, communication stacks and methodology. Heavy developments have taken place in the OEM and supplier community to deliver AUTOSAR loaded cars on the streets starting 2008 [2]. The 2008 achievements have been: Improving the specifications in order to secure the exploitation for body, chassis and powertrain applications Adding major features: safety related functionalities, OBD II and Telematics application interfaces.

A high voltage battery is an essential part of hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs). It is imperative to precisely estimate the state of charge (SOC) and state of health (SOH) of battery in real time to maintain reliable vehicle operating conditions. This paper presents a method of estimating SOC and SOH through the incorporation of current integration, voltage translation, and Ah-throughput. SOC estimation utilizing current integration is inadequate due to the accumulation of errors over the period of usage. Thus voltage translation of SOC is applied to rectify current integration method which improves the accuracy of estimation. Voltage translation data is obtained by subjecting the battery to hybrid pulse power characterization (HPPC) test. The Battery State of Health was determined by semi-empirical model combined with accumulated Ah-throughput method. Battery state of charge was employed as an input to estimate damages accumulated to battery aging through a real-time model.

This paper presents results on how the Equivalent Consumption Minimization Strategy (ECMS) penalty factor effects Lithium ion battery aging. The vehicle studied is the Honda Civic Hybrid. The battery used is A123 Systems’. Vehicle simulation using multiple combinations of highway and city drive cycles. For each combination of drive cycles, six ECMS penalty factor values are used. Battery aging is evaluated using a semi-empirical model combined with accumulated Ah-throughput method which uses, as an input, the battery state of charge trajectory from the vehicle simulations. The tradeoff between fuel cost and battery aging cost is explicitly displayed. In addition, the results provide insight into how driving behavior affects battery aging. The paper concludes with a discussion of the optimal balance between fuel cost and battery aging.

Advanced High-Strength Steels (AHSS) have become an essential part of the lightweighting strategy for automotive body structures. The ability to fully realize the benefits of AHSS depends upon the ability to aggressively form, trim, and pierce these steels into challenging parts. Tooling wear has been a roadblock to stamping these materials. Traditional die materials and designs have shown significant problems with accelerated wear, galling and die pickup, and premature wear and breakage of pierce punches. [1] This paper identifies and discusses the tribological factors that contribute to the successful stamping of AHSS. This includes minimizing tool wear and galling/die pick-up; identifying the most effective pierce clearance (wear vs. burr height) when piercing AHSS; and determining optimal die material and coating performance for tooling stamping AHSS.

Scuffing is one of the major problems that influence the life cycle and reliability of several auto components, including engine cylinder kits, flywheels, camshafts, crankshafts, and gears. Ferrous casting materials, such as gray cast iron, ductile cast iron and austempered ductile cast iron (ADI) are widely applied in these components due to their self-lubricating characteristics. The purpose of this research is to determine the scuffing behavior of these three types of cast iron materials and compare them with 1050 steel. Rotational ball-on-disc tests were conducted with white mineral oil as the lubricant under variable sliding speeds and loads. The results indicate that the scuffing initiation is due to either crack propagation or plastic deformation. It is found that ADI exhibits the highest scuffing resistance among these materials.

High frequency ignition (HFI) and conventional transistor coil ignition (TCI) were investigated with an optically accessible single-cylinder research engine to gain fundamental understanding of the chemical reactions taking place prior to the onset of combustion. Instead of generating heat in the gap of a conventional spark plug, a high frequency / high voltage electric field is employed in HFI to form chemical radicals. It is generated using a resonant circuit and sharp metallic tips placed in the combustion chamber. The setup is optimized to cause a so-called corona discharge in which highly energized channels (streamers) are created while avoiding a spark discharge. At a certain energy the number of ionized hydrocarbon molecules becomes sufficient to initiate self-sustained combustion. HFI enables engine operation with highly diluted (by air or EGR) gasoline-air mixtures or at high boost levels due to the lower voltage required.

Hydraulic, mechanical, and electro-magnetic technologies have been the primary means for torque management in today's drivetrains. Recent advances in electronic controls have provided even greater performance benefits for these base technologies. These facts coupled with an extended period of design and development for these drivetrain systems make the introduction of a new technology very challenging. However, recent developments at Borg Warner's Powertrain Technical Center have shown that a new technology, hydro-mechanical technology, may hold great promise in solving some of the fundamental problems and limitations of today's torque management technologies. This paper illustrates drivetrain applications where hydro-mechanical technology offers new and improved performance benefits for some of drivetrain's oldest problems. The opportunity to bring a new technology to the market in drivetrains also provides a new opportunity for powdered metallurgy (P/M) content in same.

Optical imaging diagnostics of combustion are most often performed in the visible spectral band, in part because camera technology is most mature in this region, but operating in the infrared (IR) provides a number of benefits. These benefits include access to emission lines of relevant chemical species (e.g. water, carbon dioxide, and carbon monoxide) and obviation of image intensifiers (avoiding reduced spatial resolution and increased cost). High-speed IR in-cylinder imaging and image processing were used to investigate the relationships between infrared images, quantitative image-derived metrics (e.g. location of the flame centroid), and measurements made with in-cylinder pressure transducers (e.g. coefficient of variation of mean effective pressure). A 9.7-liter, inline-six, natural-gas-fueled engine was modified to enable exhaust-gas recirculation (EGR) and provide borescopic optical access to one cylinder for two high-speed infrared cameras.

The development process of a water pump impeller used on a sport utility vehicle engine is described. A review of the design process is presented in this paper including the computer-aided flow analysis together with testing procedures. By computer modeling, one can estimate the coolant flow characteristics of a given impeller blade shape for providing increased cooling performance and improved efficiency on the engine. It also provides directions for the improved design. The test data are used specifically to confirm the analysis results.

In an effort to improve the dent resistance of exterior body panels at reduced steel thicknesses, some automobile manufacturers have pursued the application of bake hardenable steels. Unfortunately, bake hardenable steels have only been available as cold rolled or with electro-zinc or electro zinc/iron coatings. This situation has been a deterrent for those automobile manufacturers that prefer the use of hot dip galvanneal coatings. Recently, the interest in hot dip galvanneal bake hardenable steels has led to the investigation and development of this more advanced steel grade. This paper presents the results of a stamping trial and dent testing on three exposed hot dip galvannealed materials; i) Regular Ultra Low Carbon (ULC), ii) Rephosphorized ULC, and iii) Rephosphorized Bake Hardenable ULC steel.

This paper presents a novel encoding scheme as an alternative to Analog amplitude encoding for communicating sensor signals. The scheme has the potential of becoming a non-proprietary industrial standard for communicating sensor information to electronic control modules. Key features of the encoding scheme are the ability to communicate two sensor values using only 3 wires (power, ground and signal) with 12 bit resolution within 1ms. The scheme includes a checksum for error detection and a mechanism for reporting serial data such as low rate sensor information, part numbers or fault codes. Data is communicated to the receiving module by varying the time between discrete (single edge polarity) transitions. The encoding is self-calibrating and does not require an expensive crystal in the sending module (assumed to be a low-cost ASIC) to maintain signal integrity.

In the automotive embedded system domain, the measurements from vehicle and Hardware-In-Loop are currently evaluated against the testcases, either manually or via automation scripts. These evaluations are localized; they evaluate a limited number of signals for a particular measurement without considering system-level behavior. This results in defect leakage. This study aims to develop a tool that can notify anomalies at the signal level in a new measurement without referring to the testcases, considering a more significant number of system-level signals, thereby significantly reducing the defect leakage. The tool learns important features and patterns of each maneuver from many historical measurements using deep learning techniques. We tried two CNN (convolution neural network) models. The first one is a specially designed CNN that does this maneuver classification and class-specific feature extraction.

Natural gas (NG) is attractive for heavy-duty (HD) engines for reasons of cost stability, emissions, and fuel security. NG cannot be reliably compression-ignited, but conventional gasoline ignition systems are not optimized for NG and are challenged to ignite mixtures that are lean or diluted with exhaust-gas recirculation (EGR). NG ignition is particularly challenging in large-bore engines, where completing combustion in the available time is more difficult. Using two high-speed infrared (IR) cameras with borescopic access to one cylinder of an HD NG engine, the effect of ignition system on the early flame-kernel development and cycle-to-cycle variability (CCV) was investigated. Imaging in the IR yielded strong signals from water emission lines, which located the flame front and burned-gas regions and obviated image intensifiers. A 9.7-liter, six-cylinder engine was modified to enable exhaust-gas recirculation and to provide optical access.

Mainly due to environmental regulation, future Engine Control Unit (ECU) will be equipped with in-cylinder pressure sensors. The introduction of this innovative solution has increased the number of involved variables, requiring an unceasing improvement in the modeling approaches and in the computational capabilities of Engine Control Unit (ECU). Hardware in the Loop (HIL) test system therefore has to provide in-cylinder pressure in real time from an adequate model. This paper describes a synthesis of our study targeted to the development of in-cylinder crank angle combustion model excluding look up tables, dedicated to HIL test bench. The main objective of the present paper is a comprehensive analysis of a reduced combustion model, applied to a direct injection Diesel engine at varying engine operating range, including single injection and multi injection strategies.

Today, some vehicles include a regenerative-braking system such as the electrical motor-generator that converts the vehicle's kinetic energy into electrical energy to recharge one or more vehicle batteries. The idea is to use air flow to produce additional electrical energy in response to deceleration of the vehicle. With the Wind Power Generator System (WPGS) as a green system, a vehicle can produce extra energy, reduce gasoline usage, and reduce air pollution.

Reductions of hardware costs as well as implementations of new innovative functions are the main drivers of today's automotive electronics. Indeed more and more resources are spent on adapting existing solutions to different environments. At the same time, due to the increasing number of networked components, a level of complexity has been reached which is difficult to handle using traditional development processes. The automotive industry addresses this problem through a paradigm shift from a hardware-, component-driven to a requirement- and function-driven development process, and a stringent standardization of infrastructure elements. One central standardization initiative is the AUTomotive Open System ARchitecture (AUTOSAR). AUTOSAR was founded in 2003 by major OEMs and Tier1 suppliers and now includes a large number of automotive, electronics, semiconductor, hard- and software companies.