Research News, January 03, 2017 – Bringing mobility into Germany’s transition to a new energy economy is a complex undertaking. While carmakers are developing more economical combustion engines and alternative drive systems, research establishments and companies are working on making more efficient use of vehicles. A new data logger developed by Fraunhofer researchers simultaneously collects data from vehicles with combustion engines, electric drives, external sensors, and location data, and permits the development of new hybrid and electric vehicles.

The data logger designed by the project group for New Drive Systems NAS in Karlsruhe is useful when developing new hybrid and electric vehicles, and also increases the efficiency of vehicle fleets.

Our mobility is currently undergoing rapid change. Trends such as electromobility, autonomous driving, and car sharing are changing how we drive and opening up new markets for the future. Researchers from the New Drive Systems NAS project group at the Fraunhofer Institute for Chemical Technology ICT have designed a data logger that will make possible a new generation of cars that are tailored to individual drivers’ requirements and driving behavior. The data logger provides insights into how vehicles are used. Once installed in a car, it records all the relevant operational data from the journeys the car makes over a period of several weeks or months. This helps researchers evaluate in a usage-specific way how a car is used, including characteristics such as route profiles or driving style: when does the driver drive more cautiously, when more aggressively?

Analysis allows the researchers to draw a variety of conclusions about how drivers handle their vehicles – for instance whether they are using a car that is tailored to their needs. “Collecting many such profiles allows us to bracket a large number of users into user groups, and to analyze driving data on a group-by-group basis,” says Tobias Burgert, a scientist at Fraunhofer ICT. “These profiles can produce typical driving cycles that can be used in the development of new cars, for instance as part of a virtual test drive during vehicle simulations.”