The ambition to lower fuel consumption has been a goal for the vehicle industry since many years. During the first oil crisis in the seventies this first came into light and it has become more relevant during the last years climate change debate.
Fuel costs are also an issue. Reducing lifetime costs, in which fuel is 30 %, gives a competitive advantage to the vehicle producer. Over the years the drive train has been made efficient to the point where a reduction in fuel consumption due to improvements in the drive train is highly expensive to develop. The fact that the driver behavior is a big factor in the vehicle’s fuel consumption has recently come into attention.
This study has been performed at Scania in Södertälje and presents a way to give the driver advice in advance of difficult road segments. The advice will help the driver drive in a fuel efficient manner. Focus is put on a specific case where the vehicle approaches a downhill and advice is given for the driver to let the vehicle coast up to the start of the downhill so that the vehicle can regain its speed in the downhill.
The detection of the downhill is made with look-ahead technology where a GPS and a digital 3D road map makes the topography of the road segment ahead available.
Source: Linköping University
Author: Stribeck, Robert
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