Technical Paper
A Seamless Implementation of Model-Based Design Applied to a New Fuel Control Feature for an Existing Engine ECU
2006-04-03
2006-01-0612
Bringing a new automotive electronic control unit (ECU) to market is a multi-phase process. Generally speaking, the phases are engineering analysis, rapid prototyping, software implementation, test and calibration. A variety of engineering staff and tools are used as the ECU progresses through the development process. However, the use of different tools may require non-value-added steps to translate data and results from one process phase to another. This lack of integration introduces the potential for errors, adds delay and costs to projects, and makes it difficult to trace the behavior of the final product back to the original requirements. Model-Based Design addresses many of the integration problems through use of executable specification models and automatic code generation. However, connecting the design effectively to the prototype vehicle provides additional integration challenges since it requires specialized hardware interfaces and target-specific software device drivers.