Testing of networked ECU in a HIL Virtual Car environment

Modern vehicles use electronic control units (ECUs) to perform their functions. The ECUs are becoming more powerful and more complex in terms of their functionality. Moreover, many functions are distributed across several interconnected ECUs. It is this interconnection via data bus (CAN) that enables sensors, calculated information and actuators to be shared. ECU manufacturers eliminate many errors during the project and testing phases of a single ECU, but many others are very difficult to detect without performing testing at integration and system level.

This paper describes a concept and a powerful tool, VirtualCar, which allows a wide range of automatic tests to be performed on networked ECUs.

The VirtualCar tool presented is based on hardware-inthe- loop (HIL) technology from dSPACE. It was designed and realized in a joint project by ELASIS, a FIAT-owned engineering company; dSPACE GmbH, Germany; and TESIS GmbH, Germany. More precisely, it represents a complex system for connecting and testing all the networked ECUs in a modern car of the compact class. This involves more than twenty ECUs divided into two separate CAN networks.