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Due to technological evolutions and social demands, motor vehicles are requested to be enhanced in terms of occupant safety and comfort. As a result, many countries are reinforcing crash regulations and new car assessment programs. Automotive seats are essential parts for providing passenger safety and comfort and have become most important. Many automotive companies concentrate on optimization of the seat structure. This paper presents an overview of the recent evolution of the seat structures and gives a development procedure covering seat frame design, optimization and validation. Through the study, a competitive frame design is drawn as a case result and a design guideline and a standard development procedure is established

This paper reflects an efficient and comprehensive approach for vehicle sound optimization integrated into the entire development process. It shows the benefits of early consideration of typical vehicle NVH features and of intensive interaction of P/T and vehicle responsibilities. The process presented here considers the typical restriction that acoustically representative prototypes of engines and vehicles are not available simultaneously at the early development phase. For process optimization at this stage, a method for vehicle interior noise estimation is developed, which bases on measurements from the P/T test bench only, while the vehicle transfer behavior for airborne and structure-borne noise is assumed to be similar to a favorable existing vehicle. This method enables to start with the pre- optimization of the pure P/T and its components by focusing on such approaches which are mainly relevant for the vehicle interior noise.

This paper presents an in-vehicle information system, AVICS in development. With AVICS, the driver could get the various information on traffic, news, weather, restaurants, and so on, which the AVICS information center provides via mobile telecommunication network. The driver requests the information to operator in center by voice with hands-free system or by handling the menu offered in the form of web-page. The in-vehicle unit for AVICS is designed to interface with wireless network with a built-in RF MODEM, to control NAVI system, and to display the information on the LCD monitor of AV system. The Internet browser is customized to parse specific HTML tags, application software is realized on 32-bit RISC processor. In this paper, we will overview the concept of AVICS and focus on development of in-vehicle unit of AVICS.

Recently weight reduction is increasingly needed in automotive industry to improve fuel efficiency and to meet a CO2 emission requirement. In this paper, we prepared composite body panels for the lightweight vehicle based on a small passenger car. Fender, roof, door, side outer panel, and tailgate are made from hand layup using a glass/carbon hybrid reinforcement. Hood is made from low pressure sheet molding compound (SMC) to investigate feasibility of mass production. Both hand layup and low pressure SMC materials are newly developed and their physical properties are examined. CAE simulation was done for strength analysis and optimization of thickness for the body panels.

Generally, the widely used hydraulic control system in automatic transmissions is pulse width modulation (PWM) type. It consists in a PWM solenoid valve and a reducing type second stage valve, so called pressure control valve (PCV), to amplify pressure or flow rate. In this study, the mathematical models of the PWM solenoid valve and the PCV with moderate complexity are proposed. Then, their behavior is analyzed from the steady state characteristics. Finally, we find that there are good matches between the dynamic simulation results and the experimental data.

Currently, diesel engine-out exhaust NOx emission level prediction is a major challenge for complying with the stricter emission legislation and for control purpose of the after-treatment system. Most of the NOx prediction research is based on the Zeldovich thermal mechanism, which is reasonable from the physical point of view and for its simplicity. Nevertheless, there are some predictable range limitations, such as low temperature with high EGR rate operating conditions or high temperature with low EGR rates. In the present paper, 3 additional considerations, pilot burned gas mixing before the main injection; major NO formation area; concentration correction, were applied to the previously developed real-time NO estimation model based on in-cylinder pressure and data available from ECU. The model improvement was verified on a 1.6 liter EURO5 diesel engine in both steady and transient operation.

A comprehensive investigation was carried out in order to develop the idle sound quality for diesel V6 engine when the engine development process is applied to power-train system, which included new 8-speed automatic transmission for breaking down the noise contribution between the mechanical excitation and the combustion excitation. First of all, the improvement of dynamic characteristic can be achieved during the early stages of the engine development process using experimental modal analysis (EMA) & the robust design of each engine functional system. In addition, the engine structural attenuation (SA) is enhanced such that the radiated combustion noise of the engine can be maintained at a target level even with an increased combustion excitation. It was found that the engine system has better parts and worse parts in frequency range throughout the SA analysis. It is important that weak points in the system should be optimized.

A nano-sized PM and THC emission characteristics were investigated according to the fuel injection strategy such as a pressure and timing in the GDI engine. On the part-load condition, the particulate emissions exhibited a strong sensitivity to the injection timing. The fuel injection pressure also had a great association with the nano-particles and THC. A size of PM exhausted from the GDI engine located near 10nm on the part-load. In contrast, accumulation mode particles within 60 - 80nm mainly exhausted during the cold transient start phase. Increment of fuel injection pressure positively affected on the nano-particle and THC emissions during the start of the engine, as well.

In order to achieve the proper automobile interior sound, the tailpipe noise of the exhaust system must be considered as a main contributor. This paper describes a study of the achievement of dynamic sound quality through exhaust system design. Firstly, we determined the vehicle's interior sound quality and established a target sound using a subjective assessment of 10 benchmark vehicles. The exhaust noise target is determined by means of transfer path analysis focusing on the noise source and how it's impacted by the muffler design. The exhaust system is commonly modeled as a combination of source strength and impedance. We obtained the source character by the wave decomposition method using two microphones and six loads ultimately leading to an optimized design of the inner muffler structure. Based on this study, we achieved dynamic interior sound and improved exhaust system performance.

This paper describes a systematic approach to the development of a luxurious driving sound. In the first step, the luxurious sound is conceptualized through jury test, factor analysis and regression analysis. From the results, the main factors and the correlation equation for the luxurious sound are extracted. Also, customer's preference for the luxurious sound is investigated from the customer clinic. In the second step, three core axes and the detailed indices for luxurious sound are defined and quantified. These core axes are a dynamic sound character, a sound balance and a sound harmony. These core axes are also composed of detailed indices and quantified by guide lines. In the third step, each contribution of the sub-systems for sound quality is identified and the target values and methods for implementing the luxurious sound are suggested. In this process, noise path analysis and the customer's preference in each region are considered.

The paper describes an engineering project carried out to optimize the crashworthiness of an existing passenger car for frontal crash using a procedure relying on numerical simulation. An optimization target is defined in terms of an ideal acceleration pulse at the seats anchors. The acceleration time history and structural members are scanned in parallel to correlate the local acceleration peaks to specific structural members. Members details are iteratively modified in order to alter the accelerations and get closer to the target.

It is necessary for vehicle horns not only to satisfy regulations on the sound level but also to fulfill various demands related with sound quality. For example, a disk type horn which is attached on most of small size vehicles has been required to improve its sharp feeling sound. However, the improvement of horn sound has been deterred mainly due to the deficiency of the understanding on how design factors are related with emotional judgments on horn sound. In addition, a proper CAE tool is not available in the process of horn design since it is difficult to describe multi-physical phenomena engaged with horns. The purpose of this study is to improve the sound quality of a disk type horn. In order to achieve this goal, firstly, acoustic characteristics of horns were obtained through a series of experiments. In addition, various sound quality metrics were examined in order to derive design factors affecting sound quality enhancement.

A model based control algorithm for the pressure control type CVT has been developed. First, a P-line is proposed from the steady state relationship between the primary and secondary pressure for the given speed ratio to predict the shift performance. The P-line shows the pressure difference from the steady state primary pressure to the maximum(or minimum) pressure available for the given secondary pressure. It is found from the P-line that the bigger the pressure difference, the faster the shift speed. Based on the steady state characteristics of the pressure control type ratio control valve(RCV), the model based control algorithm is proposed. In the model based control, ratio control solenoid valve(RCSV) control duty is supplied in the feedforward loop.

As CO2 legislation tightens, the next generation of turbocharged gasoline engines must meet stricter emissions targets combined with increased fuel efficiency standards. Recent studies have shown that the following technologies offer significant improvements to the efficiency of turbocharged GDI engines: Miller Cycle via late intake valve closing (LIVC), low pressure loop cooled EGR (LPL EGR), port water injection (PWI), and cylinder deactivation (CDA). While these efficiency-improving technologies are individually well-understood, in this study we directly compare these technologies to each other on the same engine at a range of operating conditions and over a range of compression ratios (CR). The technologies tested are applied to a boosted and direct injected (DI) gasoline engine and evaluated both individually and combined.

As CO2 legislation tightens, the next generation of turbocharged gasoline engines must meet stricter emissions targets combined with increased fuel efficiency standards. Promising technologies under consideration are: Miller Cycle via late intake valve closing (LIVC), low pressure loop cooled exhaust gas recirculation (LPL EGR), port water injection (PWI), and cylinder deactivation (CDA). While these efficiency improving options are well-understood individually, in this study we directly compare them to each other on the same engine at a range of operating conditions and over a range of compression ratios (CR). For this purpose we undertake a comprehensive simulation of the above technology options using a GT-Power model of the engine with a kinetics based knock combustion sub-model to optimize the fuel efficiency, taking into account the total in-cylinder dilution effects, due to internal and external EGR, on the combustion.

The shape of unit cell of catalytic converter has great influence on the conversion efficiency and pressure drop characteristics. Therefore, the properties of design parameters of catalyst monolith were analyzed and the parameters of various cell shapes of catalyst were compared. Also, the numerical study of a three dimensional compressible flow in a Close-coupled Catalyst Converter (CCC) system was performed to investigate the flow characteristics and the flow distribution of exhaust gases. Unsteady flow analysis shows that severe interferences of each pulsating exhaust gas flow as well as geometric factors (junction, mixing pipe, cell shape etc.) influence greatly on the flow uniformity and flow characteristic in substrate. The results can be applied for the catalytic converter design.

Due to improvements in vehicle powertrain performance, friction material fade performance is becoming an important topic. For this reason, needs for studies to improve thermal characteristics of the brake system is increasing. Methods for improving the fade characteristics have several ways to improve the thermal characteristic of friction materials and increase disc capacity. However, increasing disc capacity(size) have some risk of weight and cost rise, and friction factor improvements in friction material tend to cause other problems, such as increasing squeal wire brush noise and increasing metal pick up on disc surface. Therefore, a slot disc study is needed to overcome the problems discussed previously. Currently, there is few research history for slot disc related to fade and metal pickup improvements.

In recent years, emission regulations have been getting increasingly strict. In the development of engines that comply with these regulations, in-cylinder pressure plays a fundamental role, as it is necessary to analyze combustion characteristics and control combustion-related parameters. The analysis of in-cylinder pressure data enables the modelling of exhaust emissions in which characteristic temperature can be derived from the in-cylinder pressure, and the pressure can be used for other investigations, such as optimizing efficiency and emissions through controlling combustion. Therefore, a piezoelectric pressure sensor to measure in-cylinder pressure is an essential element in the engine research field. However, it is difficult to practice the installation of this pressure sensor on all engines and on-road vehicles owing to cost issues.

Squeak and rattle (S&R) noises are undesirable noises caused by friction-induced vibration or impact between surfaces. While several computer programs have been developed to automatically detect and rate S&R events over the years, no reported work has been found that can detect squeak and rattle noises and distinguish them. Because the causes of squeak noises and rattle noises are different, knowing if it is a squeak noise or rattle noise will be very helpful for automotive engineers to choose an appropriate measure to solve the problem. The authors have developed a new algorithm to differentiate squeak noises and rattle noises, and added it to the S&R detection algorithm they had developed previously. The new algorithm utilizes a combination of sound quality metrics, specifically sharpness, roughness, and fluctuation strength.

In order to improve the fuel consumption ratio of the vehicle, a great deal of research is being carried out to improve air-conditioning efficiency. Increasing the efficiency of the condenser is directly connected to the power consumption of the compressor. This paper describes an experimental method of using an additional water-cooled condenser to reduce power consumption and decrease discharge pressure of the air-conditioning system. First, the principle of a combined cooling (water + air) method was evaluated theoretically. Next, experimental proof was conducted with the additional water-cooled condenser. The shape and structure is similar to the plate type of the transmission oil cooler used in a radiator. Through a number of tests, it was found that it is possible is to reduce power consumption of compressor by decreasing discharge pressure.