OP6000V2 System Description

Automotive controller development is a complex process requiring several phases of verification and integration. Computer-assisted development and automated testing accelerate the development and decrease the time to market of new engine control units (ECU). The OP6000 solution includes hardware, software and user interfaces specifically designed for Powertrain ECUs development and vehicle simulation for ECU-in-the-loop testing.

The OP6200V2 chassis is a versatile fully programmable simulator that comes with a series of I/O cards. Each I/O card implements specific electronic circuitry for ECU stimulation or signal acquisition and is powered with an FPGA chip which implements custom logic for I/O management, and communication with the real-time simulation. The chassis accepts typical ECU and battery operating voltage ranges (5V, 12V, 24V), and provides industrial connectors (ELCO-56) for robust ECU harness connection.

The simulation model, which runs on the real-time computer enclosed in the chassis, sends control and acquisition commands to the I/O cards via a PCIe communication backplane. The model is based on a library of Simulink blocks that can be assembled according to the I/O configuration in the chassis and runs on the RT-LAB simulation platform. 

Third-party I/O interface cards can also be included in the simulation, as long as the cards can fit in the chassis and are supported in RT-LAB. Typical interfaces include CAN communication and break-out box management.

A versatile version of the model, which can accommodate various configurations of the different I/O cards is provided with the system. This model comes with configuration and run-time LabView panels for each I/O card, allowing the operators to easily configure the different modules composing their system. For easy deployment on several systems, the model and panels are bundled in a workspace that can be imported in RT-LAB. The ease of use is reinforced by the availability of a light version of the RT-LAB interface, the OP6000 perspective, which is adapted to display only the RT-LAB components relevant for operators' use.

Automated testing is made possible with the use of Python scripts that can be launched via the RT-LAB interface or from a remote application using OPAL-RT python API.

Furthermore, the fact that the RT-LAB instance, used to control the simulator and to launch the scripts, accesses the simulator via standard Ethernet communication makes it possible to interact with the simulator even if it is located remotely, for operators' training or debugging purpose for example.

For more details on the hardware and software architecture, refer to the System Overview section.