AVL CONCERTO - Efficient Data Management in the Sports Car and Racing Engine DevelopmentThe Challenges:How can you minimise the time required for searching relevant data and thus optimise the effective time for the analysis of those data?
How do you cope with the challenge of having to analyse growing amounts of data in shorter periods of time?
Do you have to make a comparison to reference values in order to optimise your engine and vehicle components?
Do you also have to compare and verify a growing amount of data from automation, simulation and measurement systems?
The support provided by the AVL software CONCERTO regarding the solution of these challenges is explained shortly in the following article.
Handling Constantly Growing Amounts of Data:The amount of data collected in the different measurement systems and thus the size of the recorded files continuously increases even stronger particularly in the racing area, compared to the other application areas. Finding relevant data segments that are important for further analyses with individual files and tests becomes more and more difficult for the user and a purely manual search is nearly impossible.
Thus, the use of corresponding programmes supporting the user in finding these areas is essential. Due to its options for a targeted search and navigation within data environments, AVL CONCERTO is a software tool supporting the user regarding these increasing challenges in his daily routine in an ideal manner.
Data filter and navigation:The CONCERTO Data Explorer offers comprehensive filter and search functions for systematic data navigation. These features enable the quick filtering of extensive test lists in order to display a reduced list of the tests which are relevant for the further evaluation (see figure 1). Then it is possible to search for specific tests according to freely defined attributes or according to the measuring values contained in a file (see figure 2). The CONCERTO Data Explorer displays all data that is relevant for a test in a clear and hierarchically structured form.
Long measurement times as well as higher sampling rates lead to a significantly increased number of measuring points which are available for further evaluation in the end. In order to be able to reduce the amount of data to the relevant ranges, CONCERTO provides the option to simply link data sets or diagrams with each other. Thus, one channel can be used as a kind of navigation channel (or overview channel, to provide e.g. a trend overview with reduced resolution) while another channel is reduced to the area selected in the navigation channel (see figure 3).
If the data is read directly from an ASAM ODS database, the performance can be significantly increased due to these segmental loading of channels.
ASAM ODS Database Systems:One crucial advantage CONCERTO is offering with regard to data from ASAM ODS databases is the possibility to load them in a segmented form. Afterwards this data can also be displayed and processed further according to the segments. This provides highest performance when areas within large measuring files are processed and thus less working memory capacity is tied up. In order to display the overview channels of the entire measuring file mentioned in the section above without performance losses, the corresponding preview channels can be used (e.g. an AVL PUMA system can generate them automatically during a test run). Although preview channels are only available with reduced measuring resolution, they still provide the entire relevant information about minima and maxima of the entire measuring file and are thus perfectly suitable for the use as navigation channels.
One Window to the Whole World of Data:The connection and verification of data from different systems (such as automation, measurement or simulation systems) in a central software tool is a clear requirement of the market.
This also holds true for data in different application areas (such as test stand data, vehicle data, indicating data, emission data, etc.).
As shown in figure 4, CONCERTO allows the central processing of data nearly independent of their origin and thus also complies completely with these requirements of the market.
 | | Figure 4: CONCERTO, the Central Window to the Whole World of Automotive Data |
The CONCERTO DataExplorer provides the necessary clear overview and serves as central interface for easy access to all available data sources and formats.
Flexible Data Access:CONCERTO is not limited to the post-processing of AVL data formats but also features open interfaces which ensure an easy integration of customer-specific formats as well as the access to standardized formats and database systems such as ASAM ODS. The main focus here is also on guaranteeing highest performance with regard to data handling and navigation. The number of available formats is growing with each new release of the software making CONCERTO a safe investment into future. As shown in figure 5 the data from simulation systems (e.g. from AVL InMotion systems) and measuring systems (e.g. from test bed recorders) is correlated simply in a joint application window.
 | | Figure 5: Concurrent Display of Simulation and Recorder Data |
Global Standards for Increased Comparability:CONCERTO allows the company of the automobile industry acting increasingly on a global scale to exchange both data and analysis routines (such as graph templates, formulas, algorithms, etc.). This is the foundation for a worldwide cooperating development team, creates comparable results and also helps increasing the data safety and thus the efficiency of the data analysis within a company. Integrated functions and intelligent comparison logics support the user regarding the optimisation of his systems on the basis of existing reference measurements in the simplest way.
Templates which can be used globally just have to be created once centrally in CONCERTO and are then available for all users. If the group of users (due to internal agreements) is to be limited, CONCERTO also provides the option to define user levels. This enables a company to clearly define who, for example, is authorized to create or modify templates and who is only authorized to use them for evaluations. The exchange of data sets which are actually visualized in a template or the use of the implemented file comparison logic which is available in CONCERTO can be executed directly by the user (see figure 6).
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