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This investigation utilizes a DFSS analysis approach to determine automatic transmission gear content required to minimize fuel consumption for various powertrain - vehicle systems. L18 and L27 inner arrays with automatic transmission design and shift pattern constraint parameters were varied to determine their relative influence on fuel consumption. An outer noise array consisting of two vehicles with various engines, final drive ratios and legislated emissions test cycles was used to make a robust transmission selection based on minimizing fuel consumption. The full details of the DFSS analysis method and assumptions are presented along with a detailed examination of the results. With respect to transmission design parameters, parasitic spinloss and gear mesh efficiency were found to be most important followed by the number of gears. The DFSS analysis further revealed that unique transmission design formulations are potentially required for widely varying engines.

It is obvious at this point even to the most casual observer of the automotive industry that efforts to reduce mass throughout the vehicle are at a fervor. The industry is facing its most significant increase in fuel economy standards in its history, and light-weighting the vehicle is a major enabler. Despite the performance and quality of the brake system being intensely related to its mass, it too has not been spared scrutiny. However, like many modern automotive subsystems, it is very complex and mass reduction opportunities that do not sacrifice performance or quality are not always obvious. There are some interesting and sometimes even profound relationships between mass and other vehicle attributes built into brake system design, and making these more visible can enable a better balancing of brake system with the rest of the vehicle design objectives. Examples include - what is the cost, in terms of brake system mass, of added engine power? Of tire and wheel size?

This paper presents a methodology to represent automatic transmission clutch-to-clutch shift dynamics with a two degree of freedom, lumped inertia model. The method of reducing the automatic transmission to a lumped, two inertia model as a function of shift and input shaft acceleration is detailed using a full kinematic representation of the automatic transmission. For a given clutch-to-clutch shift maneuver there are two dependent equations that utilize the two lumped inertias and represent the response of the transmission system from input to output shaft. Applicability of the method is shown for planetary automatic and layshaft dual clutch transmissions. Typical clutch-to-clutch shift maneuvers are illustrated with the two inertia model for power on upshifts and downshifts.

This paper presents the most recent advancement in the vehicle development process using the one-step or auto Transfer Path Analysis (TPA) in conjunction with the superelement, component mode synthesis, and automated multi-level substructuring techniques. The goal is to identify the possible ways of energy transfer from the various sources of excitation through numerous interfaces to given target locations. The full vehicle model, consists of superelements, has been validated with the detailed system model for all loadcases. The forces/loads can be from rotating components, powertrain, transfer case, chain drives, pumps, prop-shaft, differential, tire-wheel unbalance, road input, etc., and the receiver can be at driver/passenger ears, steering column/wheel, seats, etc. The traditional TPA involves two solver runs, and can be fairly complex to setup in order to ensure that the results from the two runs are consistent with subcases properly labeled as input to the TPA utility.

A dog clutch, if successfully implemented in an automatic transmission, provides better packaging and the potential for improved fuel economy. The technical requirements for this concept are examined through modeling and simulation. As a first step, a physics-based component level model is developed that provides an understanding of the basic contact and impact dynamics. The model is compared to a built-in AMESim block to establish confidence. This component level model is then integrated into a powertrain system model within the AMESim environment. As a test bed, the powertrain model is exercised to simulate a friction plate to dog clutch shift in a 6-speed automatic transmission. The analysis helps to define the slip speed target at the onset of the dog clutch engagement while ensuring shift requirements are met. Finally, the model is validated by comparing the simulated results with measured dynamometer data.

Vehicle steering wheel pull is a condition experienced by customers where a constant torque at the steering wheel is required to maintain a straight path. Steering wheel pull may be accompanied by the secondary effects of steering wheel angle misalignment and vehicle thrust angle “dog-tracking.” EPS pull compensation is a feature that can automatically compensate vehicle steering wheel pull. This paper examines customer benefits, operating principles, effectiveness, and robustness of EPS pull compensation in vehicles. Vehicle road test data indicate EPS can correct a severe vehicle steering wheel pull. Using fundamental physics equations, an analysis tool is derived to support further investigation of steering wheel angle misalignment and vehicle thrust angle. The final section presents a designed experiment revealing parameters most influencing vehicle robustness to chassis and road characteristics.

This investigation utilizes energy analysis and statistical methods to optimize step gear automatic transmissions gear selection for fuel consumption. A full factorial matrix of simulations using energy analysis was performed to determine the optimal number of gears and gear ratios that provide the best fuel consumption performance for a particular vehicle - engine application. The full factorial matrix setup as a design of experiment (DOE) was applied to five vehicle applications, each with two engines to examine the potential differences that variations in road load and engine characteristics might have on optimal transmission gearing selection. The transmission gearing options considered in the DOE were number of gears, launch gear ratio and top gear ratio. Final drive ratio was also included due to its global influence on vehicle performance and powertrain operating speeds and torque.

The ever-increasing regulatory requirement on CO2 emissions drives efficiency improvement of vehicle powertrain systems. In this context, three mega trends have been happening in the automotive transmission industry. First, future automatic transmissions will have more gear steps to offer a broader ratio spread and finer ratio steps, which may enable the engine to operate at its efficient regions more often. Second, engine downsizing with boosted power and flexible cylinder deactivation have been become the technology trend to achieve better thermal efficiency. These engine technologies demand improved transmission dampers with greater isolation capabilities to drive future transmission dampers to be equipped with softer springs. Third, future transmissions will be more efficient due to new architectures and incremental subsystem improvements.

The automotive industry is one of the most competitive enterprises in the world. Customers face an ever-expanding number of entries in each market segment vying for their business. Sales price, brand image, marketing, etc. all play a role in purchase decisions, but the factor distinguishing products that consistently perform in the market place is the ability to satisfy the customer. Steering character plays a critical role in the customer driving experience and can be one of the most heavily debated topics during a new vehicle program. The proliferation of EPS steering systems now allows engineers to calibrate steering feel to almost any desired specification. This raises a key question: What subjective & objective characteristics satisfy customers in a particular market segment?

Previously published research [1] covering the role of piston material properties in brake torque variation sensitivity and roughness concluded that phenolic pistons have significantly higher low-pressure range compliance than steel pistons, which promotes lower roughness propensity. It also determined that this property could be successfully characterized using a modern generation of direct-acting servo hydraulically actuated brake component compression test stands. This paper covers a subsequent block of research into the role of the caliper piston in brake torque variation sensitivity (BTV sensitivity) and thermal roughness of a brake corner. It includes measurements of hydraulic stiffness of pistons in a “wet” fixture, both with and without a brake pad and multi-layer bonded noise shim.

General Motors has introduced a new front wheel drive seven speed dry dual clutch automatic transmission in 2014. The 250 Nm input torque rated gear box was designed and engineered for a global market in both front wheel drive and all-wheel drive configurations. The transmission has integrated start/stop capability enabled by the use of an electric motor driven pump and a pressurized accumulator. The architecture selected was chosen for optimization of packaging, fuel economy, mass, shift pleasability, and NVH. High mileage durability and world class drivability were the cornerstone deliverables during the engineering and design process Fuel efficiency is estimated to be 3% - 10% improvement over a conventional six speed automatic transmission. FWD variant wet mass of 78.1 kg was achieved through the rigorous engineering processes used to optimize the transmission system.

General Motors shall introduce a new rear wheel drive eight speed automatic transmission, known as the 8L90, in the 2015 Chevrolet Corvette. The rated turbine torque capacity is 1000 Nm. This transmission replaces the venerable 6L80 six speed automatic. The objectives behind creation of this transmission are improved fuel economy, performance, and NVH. Packaging in the existing vehicle architecture and high mileage dependability are the givens. The architecture is required to offer low cost for a rear drive eight speed transmission while meeting the givens and objectives. An eight speed powerflow, invented by General Motors, was selected. This powerflow yields a 7.0 overall ratio spread, enabling improved launch capability because of a deeper first gear ratio and better fuel economy due to lower top gear N/V capability, relative to the 6L80. The eight speed ratios are generated using four simple planetary gearsets, two brake clutches, and three rotating clutches.

Today's sophisticated state-of-the-art powertrains with various intelligent control units (xCU) need to be calibrated and tested stand-alone as well as in interaction. Today the majority of this work is still carried out with prototype vehicles on test tracks. Moving prototype vehicle tests from the road into the lab is key in achieving shorter development times and saving development cost. This kind of frontloading requires a modular and powerful simulation of all vehicle components, test track, and driver in steady state and dynamic operation. The described HIL (Hardware In the Loop) high performance driveline dyno test bed uses driveline components and models from the engine all the way to the wheel ends. The test cell was built to do real time vehicle maneuvers and NVH testing. This test setup can emulate any road surface and grade and vehicle inertia including wheels and engine as close to reality as possible.

Development of the next generation internal combustion engines and automatic transmissions for automotive applications is a mandatory powertrain engineering activity required now and in the coming years to meet forthcoming global emissions regulations. This paper details a preliminary investigation into possible synergies for fuel consumption reduction considering emerging automotive technologies integrated into the next generation combustion engine and automatic transmission architectures. A range of hypothetical gasoline engines were created and paired with a generalized set of step gear automatic transmissions designed to meet the performance requirements of high volume longitudinal full size truck application. These designs were then run through a design of experiments orthogonal array for prediction of fuel consumption on the WLTP test schedule and stand still acceleration to 100 kph.

An area of brake system design that has remained continually resistant to objective, computer model based predictive design and has instead continued to rely on empirical methods and prior history, is that of sizing the brake pads to insure satisfactory service life of the friction material. Despite advances in CAE tools and methods, the ever-intensifying pressures of shortened vehicle development cycles, and the loss of prototype vehicle properties, there is still considerable effort devoted to vehicle-level testing on public roads using “customer-based” driving cycles to validate brake pad service life. Furthermore, there does not appear to be a firm, objective means of designing the required pad volume into the calipers early on - there is still much reliance on prior experience.

An aspect of high performance brake design that has remained strikingly empirical is that of determining the correct sizing of the brake pad - in terms of both area and volume - to match well with a high performance vehicle application. Too small of a pad risks issues with fade and wear life on the track, and too large has significant penalties in cost, mass, and packaging space of the caliper, along with difficulties in maintaining adequate caliper stiffness and its impact on pedal feel and response time. As most who have spent time around high performance brakes can attest to, there methods for determining minimum brake pad area, usually related in some form or another to the peak power the brake must absorb (functions of vehicle mass and top speed are common). However, the basis for these metrics are often lost (or closely guarded), and provide very little guidance for the effects of the final design (pad area) deviating from the recommended value.

SAE J2562 defines the background, apparatus and the directions for modifying the Scaled Base Load Sequence for a given a wheel rated load for a wheel design. This practice has been conducted on multiple wheel designs and over one hundred wheel specimens. All of the wheels were tested to fracture. Concurrently, some of the wheel designs were found to be unserviceable in prior or subsequent proving grounds on-vehicle testing. The remainder of the wheel designs have sufficient fatigue strength to sustain the intended service for the life of the vehicle. This is termed serviceable. Using the empirical data with industry accepted statistics a minimum requirement can be projected, below which a wheel design will likely have samples unserviceable in its intended service. The projections of serviceability result in a recommendation of a minimum cycle requirement for SAE J2562 Ballasted Passenger Vehicle Load Sequence.

This work analyzes the lubricant supply to critical regions of needle roller bearing of an automatic transmission. The needle roller bearing is a critical component of an automatic transmission and it has several rotating cylindrical needle rollers that are having relative motion with inner surface of the pinion. Supply of lubricant to the needle roller bearings is very essential to prevent failure of the bearings due to frictional contact between rollers and inner surface of pinion. The supply of lubricant to the needle roller bearings depends on the location of oil supply hole. Lubricant supply to the needle roller bearings of an automatic transmission is studied using commercial 3D Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) software for different oil supply positions. CFD simulation is performed for the region between the pinion supply hole and end of the needle bearings including all needles. Lubricant is supplied to the needle bearing from the pinion pin oil supply hole.

For the conventional 6 speed automatic transmission with engine stop-start powertrain, an electrically-driven auxiliary pump is implemented to maintain the transmission line pressure as required to lock-up the CB1234 clutch during engine auto-stop conditions. Upon releasing the brake pedal, the transmission engages into first gear with the objective to accelerate the vehicle in a responsive manner. In this study, a novel normally-engaged dual-piston clutch concept is designed to keep the CB1234 clutch locked-up during engine auto-stop conditions with the intention to eliminate the auxiliary pump without compromising vehicle performance. This dual piston clutch concept requires a relatively low line pressure to release the normally-engaged clutch when needed, thus, minimizing the hydraulic pumping work. To explore the functionality of this concept under a wide-open-throttle (WOT) auto-start transition, modeling and simulation of the normally-engaged dual-piston clutch is completed.

For a CAE model of the park pawl dynamic system, the engagement speed calculation is done by controlling the input rotational velocity of the vehicle. Usually, it requires multiple adjustment of the input rotational velocity to get the engagement speed and that demands time, effort and file management skill of an analyst. The current objective of this paper is to demonstrate how software Isight, working with ABAQUS Explicit as the solver, can be used to automate the engagement speed calculation procedure and thus reduce the time and effort required of a CAE analyst. The automated system is developed in a way such that the accuracy of the results can be controlled by the end user. It is observed that the automated system significantly saves an analyst's effort. The system design can be optimized easily for modifiable design features such as the torsional spring and the actuator spring stiffness values using the proposed procedure.