Developing advanced plant models for better powertrain controls

The association of an increasing number of technologies implemented in the engine and in the powertrain with growing interactions between sub-systems leads to new challenges for the development of controls. Moreover car manufacturers have to continuously reduce the development time in order to meet customers’ expectations. The handling of a continuously increasing complexity combined with time reduction requires the deployment of tools, and physical plant modeling in particular, at every stage of the control development process, from design to validation and calibration. This paper presents the outcomes of an initiative involving a car manufacturer, a software vendor and a research lab joining forces to develop advanced modeling capabilities toward the systematic application of physical-based models for architecture choices, control design and Model-in-the-Loop, Hardware-in-Loop and pre-calibration. Combining experimental means and modeling skills leads to the development and implementation of advanced control-oriented models directly usable in an upgraded software development process.
Several project topics will be described to illustrate the value of the collaboration toward a massive deployment of physical plant models. In particular, the paper introduces how the approach permits to address the functional and dysfunctional validation at the early stage of the development cycle and the set-up of virtual chassis dynos running in HIL facilities for controls validation.