The Automotive Testing Expo got underway in Novi, MI, last October with presentations on various aspects of automotive technology ranging from tires to fuel injectors. Of course, critical to any automobile is an energy source—and a way to store that energy. If your car is powered electrically, you’ll need a battery, and if it’s powered by gasoline or diesel, you’ll need a fuel tank.
Test of the latter was the topic addressed by Nick Jaksa, managing director, BIA North America. His company builds a multi-axis simulation table that mimics real road conditions so the tank can be evaluated in the lab. In addition to vibration, the 6-DoF table can tilt to simulate lateral acceleration, which otherwise would require a great deal of space in a lab setting.
Precision battery test was the topic of Alvaro Masias, a research engineer at Ford Motor Co. What’s required, he said, is an effective way to test batteries to determine how much capacity will remain after 10 or 15 years of operation. He explained that designers of computer battery systems can measure decay in units of 500 ppm. What’s required for vehicle batteries, he said, is a 200-A tester that can measure decay at 50 ppm. A research project conducted in conjunction with Sandia National Laboratories and Arbin Instruments, he said, has resulted in a tester that achieves 150 ppm—“We need to walk before we run,” he said—and more work needs to be done. Ford, he concluded, does not want to be in the business of building battery testers, and he expects companies like Arbin to build commercial battery-test products.
Optimization of electric motors and inverters in electric vehicle drivetrains requires continuous and synchronous acquisition of electrical and mechanical raw data for review, verification, and analysis, according to Mike Hoyer, applications engineer at HBM Test and Measurement. To solve the problems of traditional techniques, he said, engineers need simple system configuration; reliable acquisition and simultaneous sampling of electrical and mechanical parameters; the ability to record acquired data to disk in a single, open file format; and modern software interfaces. HBM’s eDrive, he concluded, facilitates the test of electric motors and drives by enabling the dynamic, synchronous measurement of voltage, current, torque, speed, and other parameters simultaneously and continuously at high sample rates, especially during dynamic load changes.
On the show floor, OriginLab demonstrated its new release of Origin and OriginPro 2015. Origin 2015 adds more than 100 new features and improvements to version 9.1, which was released in October 2013. Key enhancements include ease-of-use features such as collapsible menus, project file search for string, thumbnail previews of graphs and tooltips displaying folder or window comments in Project Explorer, a choice of icon- or details-listing of project contents, a redesigned graph Axis Dialog, and an improved graph legend with support for bubble scales.
Keysight Technologies demonstrated several products, including oscilloscope options that improve automotive engineers’ efficiency in debugging a controller area network with flexible data-rate (CAN FD) and single-edge nibble transmission (SENT) serial buses. The company also highlighted power supplies, power dissipaters, and battery analyzers; PXI functional test systems; source-measure units; handheld instruments with Bluetooth connectivity; and high-end oscilloscopes that can analyze BroadR-Reach and MOST bus signals.
AR RF/Microwave Instrumentation presented its line of benchtop and rack-mounted broadband power amplifiers, EMI receivers, and complete EMC test systems with a specific emphasis on automotive conducted immunity testing, including the CI00401A test system.
National Instruments showcased its rapid engine control prototyping system, or “engine in a box.” NI also touted the use of its Single Board RIO in an acoustic camera from SM Instruments. In addition, the company featured hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) test with NI VeriStand, for which NI highlighted an engine simulation toolkit. dSPACE exhibited its hardware and software tools for HIL test.
Teledyne LeCroy emphasized its test capabilities for automotive buses like CAN, LIN, FlexRay, BroadR-Reach, and MOST plus its HD4096 high-definition oscilloscope technology. Tektronix also touted instruments for automotive bus test as well as its capabilities for RF safety and security test. Rohde & Schwarz highlighted the in-vehicle serial-bus analysis and EMI troubleshooting capabilities of its RTO and RTE oscilloscopes. Yokogawa featured oscilloscopes as well as power analyzers and data-acquisition systems. And Averna highlighted its automotive infotainment test platforms.
Boeing focused on the availability of its test laboratories to the automotive industry. The company’s test services include EMI test and environmental test.
Among the exhibitors at the show were Astro-Med DEWESoft, DEWETRON, and DTS demonstrating data acquisition systems and DYTRAN, GP:50, Meggitt Sensing Systems, and PCB Piezotronics with sensors.
Exhibitors of instruments and automated test systems and components included Brüel & Kjaer, Chroma Systems Solutions, Fluke, Gantner, GE Measurement & Control, Hioki, Honeywell Sensing and Control, Pickering Interfaces, Pico Technology, Precision Filters, Seica, and Virginia Panel. AMETEK Programmable Power, Magna-Power, and TDK-Lambda Americas featured power supplies.
Exhibitors of environmental-test systems included Cincinnati Sub-Zero and its CSZ Testing Services division, Envirotronics, Espec, and SGS Environmental Testing. Finally, Photron and PCO-Tech presented machine-vision cameras.