The automotive PowerNet is facing a major transformation. The three main drivers are: • Increasing power • Availability requirements • PowerNet complexity and cost reduction These driving factors result in a wide variety of possible future PowerNet topologies. The increasing power demand is among others caused by the progressive electrification of formerly mechanical components and the trend of increasing number of comfort loads. This leads to a steady increase in installed electrical power. X-by-wire systems and autonomous driving functions result in higher availability requirements. As a result, the power supply of all safety-critical loads must always be kept sufficiently stable. To reduce costs and increase reliability, the car manufacturers aim to reduce the complexity of the PowerNet System, including the wiring harness and the controller network. The wiring harness e.g., is currently one of the costliest parts of modern cars. These challenges are met with different concepts. To meet the increasing power requirements, new voltage levels can be introduced. Availability requirements can be met through redundant subnets. The complexity of the wiring harness can be reduced by employing a zonal architecture. The changes coming with the chosen topology will have a major impact on the components used in the low-voltage PowerNet and their requirements. In some cases, entirely new components will be necessary. It is indispensable to understand the different topologies and their implications to develop appropriate safe components in the future. System simulations are suitable for this purpose. Due to the high variance of the discussed topologies and the considerable effort for building the models, the implementation of a simulation toolbox including an automized model built up is needed. The description and modeling of the PowerNet is based on a modular approach. It enables a fast and efficient model built-up and simulation. With this toolbox a fast evaluation and quantitative comparison of different topologies is possible. In the presentation, all mentioned topics will be addressed.
Session:
E/E Architecture
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| 17:35 - 18:05