Battery-Line Communication for X-by-Wire Systems in Automobiles

Our objective in this paper is to show the feasibility of battery-line communication in an automobile in order to lighten the weight of wire harnesses. We experimentally measured the attenuation characteristic of some battery-lines. We showed a throughput of 10.2 Mbps from a cigarette lighter socket to a rear light was obtained via the battery-line by using our prototype modem with an OFDM (Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing) modulation for the battery-line communication. But throughput from the cigarette lighter socket to the battery was 297 kbps because of noises generated from such apparatuses as the engine, air-conditioner and windshield wipers. We expect that it is possible to improve the throughput of battery-line communication by using some error-correcting technique.