5 4 simulation
By providing simulation and testing
software, AVL supports its customers
throughout the entire development
process. In particular,
simulation solutions provide highdefinition
models and insights into
the behavior and interactions
of components, systems and entire
vehicles. Additionally, virtualization
enables system validation tests
in early development stages, significantly
reducing customers’ needs for
vehicle prototypes, while ensuring
highly repeatable test conditions.
One of the most crucial data sources
for modeling are those from vehicles
in motion. The high volume of data
generated and exchanged by increasingly
complex systems can be a valuable
treasure if properly evaluated.
Engineers are therefore taking a systemic
approach to development and
no longer just looking at the individual
components in isolation. This requires
them to have both the knowledge
and the tool landscape to work
across disciplines.
The best case is to connect the real
and virtual worlds, which is supported
by AVL’s global Integrated
and Open Development Platform
(IODP) business unit. For example,
not all components of a powertrain
need to be connected to the
engine in order to be tested. “You
can put a real engine on the testbed
and then simulate different models
of batteries, e-motors and vehicles
to test their behavior,” says Wolfgang
Puntigam, Global Business
Unit Manager, IODP.
The heart of IODP is so-called
“connected software”. Simulation
supports the connection of single
components of a vehicle to real conditions.
“Open” means that not everything
is necessarily developed by
AVL. “We analyze the status quo,
define development tasks and virtualize
them together with our customers”,
explains Puntigam. In this
hybrid world, his credo is crystal
clear: As the industry is moving
to a software-defined eco-system,
“we continue combining our existing
global software forces with our
automotive domain applications
know-how to serve our customers
within this transformation.”
THE TWIN THAT BEATS THE ORIGINAL
The enforcement of simulation to avoid high testing effort and cost is a
general trend in the industry. With e-mobility
on the rise, there are new car
makers on the market who aim to have their models ready for the market
in less than 18 months. Historically, this requirement would have been an
illusion. The key to accelerating complex vehicle development is therefore
virtualization. With the high quality of the Virtual Twin, more and more
engineers are realizing the potential to replace time-consuming and costly
testing of physical prototypes in development. It is the digital replication
of a single cell, a component, the entire system and/or of a vehicle which
enables
it to interact with all other objects in the system, with the software
and control functions, and above all with its environment.
AVL offers a centralized methodology with a fully integrated and automated
workflow. This is where Roland Wanker
and his 500 employees in AVL’s
Advanced Simulation Technologies come in. “We used to be the nerds whose
job was to support the development process,” Wanker says with some pride.
“Now we’re on the front lines.”