Wanna save some energy?
In the high-speed rollercoaster of automotive engineering today, one thing is about as certain as taxes: energy efficiency will remain a top priority for all OEMs venturing to stay in the race. No matter whether they develop fuel-based cars, electrically powered ones, or some kind of combination of both. The math is simple in this respect: fuel is scarce and batteries need to be charged.
The first and second laws of thermodynamics simply aren’t going anywhere anytime soon.
Bummer – we know!
Fortunately, many players have meanwhile embraced and organized for this reality, establishing completely dedicated departments to investigate all the complex intricacies of energy management. Hutchinson, global leader in vibration control, fluid management and sealing technologies for the automotive and aerospace industries, is not lagging behind.
During our latest Vehicle Energy Management and Vehicle Thermal Management masterclass, organized by our Simcenter Engineering and Consulting Services, my dear colleague Julie Ercolani-Peck and I had a very much-appreciated opportunity to talk to mr. Abdou Bacar, thermal-fluid simulation specialist at the Thermal Management Lab of Hutchinson. Inspired by two days of interactive sessions, completely committed to the topic at hand, we sat ourselves down for a quiet face-to-face(-to-camera…) in two cozy chairs of the Best Western hotel lobby.
While acknowledging the trickiness of energy management for automotive purposes, especially in combination with other performance attributes such as cabin comfort, mr. Bacar is convinced that there still is room for improvement. Or at least: when using the right tools.
Simcenter Amesim allows Hutchinson to calculate energy flows of different kinds of subsystem and vehicle configurations up front. On top of this, using system simulation allows for a significant amount of subsystems to be replaced by numerical models – that’s where the digital twin enters the game. This not only saves Hutchinson considerable time and costs. It also enables them to assess the relevancy and feasibility of many different architectures and system configurations, and numerically isolate the ones that fit the initial performance requirements, thus eliminating tens of physical prototypes that would have otherwise been built in vain.
“Simcenter Amesim helps us to get quick answers, as well as proof that the solution we are going to propose our clients is relevant. We can show results and curves up front, in order to convince the customer that our solution is going to work in terms of the physics. ” mr. Bacar testifies.
No proof is as strong as the one you can see on your own screen, with your own eyes, right?
So why not see the conversation we had with mr. Bacar for yourself here below…
