Diesel Particulate Filter Testing on Vehicles with GPS Logging

Dyzelino-daleliu-filtras The company Twin-Tec develops and manufactures a wide range of diesel particulate filters and catalysers for automotive applications. Many elderly vehicles have no diesel particulate filters. Many car owner are interested in adding the particulate filter to the exhaust system in order to protect the environment and to benefit from reduced vehicle emission taxes.

The filter installation will substantially reduce the taxation. The German government encourages all owners to retrofit filters through financial incentives. Twin-Tec is therefore developing many different retrofit filters for many different brands and each filter requires a testing on the road under driving conditions to determine the filter efficiency.

Application / Problem:

The problem is that virtually every new filter requires a new design because of the variety of exhaust systems and their varying temperature and pressure operating levels. During test drive filter temperature, pressure, engine speed, idle times, vehicle position and speed need to be measured accurately and reliably to ascertain that the filter meets the required standards. In order to record the test data Twin-Tec decided to use a TopMessage data logger in combination with a GPS sensor to record measurement data from the filter in combination of vehicle position information.

Proposal / Solution / Hardware:

For this logging application the Twin-Tec is using TopMessage data logger with ADVT and DIOT modules. The whole system is installed in a weather proof enclosure and the sensors are interfaced to the enclosure through special connectors. The following photos show the test system.

testavimo-sistema-foto

During the test drive all test data is recorded to the internal memory of the TopMessage data logger. The speed of the engine (rpm) is recorded through a separate speed meter (DAB 500 from AVL) which is providing TTL pulse output. The pulses are then recorded by the counter and inputs of the DIOT module. The live data is visualised through a mimic interface of the ProfiSignal Basic software.

Duomenu-vizualizacija

In order to record the vehicle speed and direction a special NEMA driver for a GPS sensor was developed. This driver is interface to the TopMessage through serial RS232 port. The GPS information like speed, direction, altitude a separate COM channel is created and all the data is stored directly in the 1 GB TopMessage data logger memory.

Duomenu-issaugojimas

After the test drive is finished, all the data is analysed with the ProfiSignal software. It is also possible to convert the GPS data into a KLM file which can be loaded by Google Earth to plot various measurement channels like vehicle speed, filter temperature or pressure of position or engine speed.

Google-Earth

Summary of Benefits:

Twin-Tec is using now 5 Data Acquisition systems to run the diesel particulate filter testing. The main advantages for them are:

  • The 1 GB internal memory provides storage capacity for several thousand test drive kilometres.
  • Easy to configure ProfiSignal software to show live reading during the test drive.
  • The interface of the GPS sensor also gave Twin-Tec valuable additional information about vehicle speed in combination with engine RPM and particle emission.
  • The universal analog inputs made it very easy to connect the temperature and pressure sensors.
  • The small and compact size of the data logger of (200x73x118 mm) made it very practical for the installation in a small enclosure.
  • In internal calculation and logic channels where used to trigger data logging when test conditions are reached.

For more information please see: TopMessage >>

 

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