Vehicle Emission and Fuel Economy Simulation Study Using a Powertrain Dynamometer

In recent years, many automotive companies have been striving to reduce costs and shorten new vehicle development cycle time. To develop a new vehicle costs a tremendous amount especially at the prototype phase. So currently vehicle simulation on the powertrain bench is an attractive alternative at the development phase to reduce the quantity of proto vehicles. This test method moves the test site from the road to the bench without the need for real chassis parts.

This paper deals with the method and strategy for moving testing from road to bench, specifically emission and fuel economy test for vehicles equipped with manual transmission. To execute vehicle type tests on the bench requires correlation and simulation of many parameters - for example gear shifting, throttle position, clutch travel and related driver characteristics, temperature and driving road load resistance, etc. For the correlation, analysis of all of the measured data was conducted on the real vehicle on the chassis dynamometer and then these parameters were applied to the powertrain bench. Via this study it became apparent that it is possible to replace the test site from rolling road to bench and define the method of correlation between vehicle and bench.