Fraunhofer Institute for Experimental Software Engineering IESEVirtual validation of ECU networks
Together with Robert Bosch GmbH, Fraunhofer IESE realized the virtual integration and validation of electronic control units (ECUs) using the Fraunhofer technology FERAL.
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Reference Project: Robert Bosch GmbH
What it is all about: Fraunhofer IESE and Robert Bosch show the potential of virtual validation of electronic control units
FERAL (FramEwork for Simulator Coupling on Requirements and Architecture Level) is a co-simulation platform for the virtual testing of electronic control units (ECUs). In addition to the functions of the ECU, the influences of the bus communication and the target platform can also be tested. Various buses, processors, and gateways are supported for this purpose. Robert Bosch GmbH has commissioned an interface to FERAL from Fraunhofer IESE in order to use this platform in future tests during ECU development.
The challenges here mainly concerned the integration of the individual system components into a single simulation model. In addition to simulation models for vehicle dynamics and communication buses, real ECU code with an adapted AUTOSAR driver as well as mock-ups of additional ECUs were used. Together, the project team created a simulation model that can provide valuable information on quality aspects, such as vehicle bus utilization and response times.
This is what Dr. Roland Samlaus, Subproject Manager Platform Development Simulation Framework at Robert Bosch GmbH, has to say:
“The simulation framework FERAL of Fraunhofer IESE is characterized by its high flexibility. This enables us to cope with numerous tasks. Moreover, FERAL is not inferior to other solutions in terms of functional scope and accuracy.”
Dr. Roland Samlaus, Subproject Manager Platform Development Simulation Framework at Robert Bosch GmbH
The result: Bosch secures electronic control units with Fraunhofer FERAL
To integrate the system shown in the figure into the overall model, the project team first equipped the virtual ECUs with an interface. For the AUTOSAR components, these were implemented in the MCAL layer, so that the application code did not have to be changed. Simulators for vehicle dynamics were loaded by means of existing Simulink and FMI interfaces. Simulation models for vehicle buses (here, CAN and Flexray were used) are already included in FERAL and could be used directly.
The resulting simulation system can be executed accordingly and is stimulated with input data from the simulation runtime environment. The integrated simulation system, in turn, realizes a co-simulation that simulates the vehicle dynamics, while the driving functions are executed in the simulated environment.
Such a setup has the advantage that the system behavior can be observed at any point by means of “virtual terminals”. This data can be exported and analyzed.
Due to the virtual setup, even critical system states or those that are hard to generate in the real environment can be easily recreated and evaluated.
The results of the work were published in the conference paper “Towards virtual validation of distributed functions”: https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.5555/3374138.3374143
Robert Bosch GmbH has licensed the FERAL framework in order to implement further virtual engineering tasks with it.