Leading vehicle dynamics engineering consultancy, Team Rosberg Engineering (TRE), has increased its testing and validation capabilities with the acquisition of an SPMM Plus (Suspension Parameter Measurement Machine). Their test machine has been installed at TRE’s headquarters in Germany and is now operational.
The SPMM Plus is a highly accurate kinematics and compliance (K&C) machine for the automotive industry and enables OEMs and suppliers to accelerate the design and testing of a vehicle’s suspension system. It accurately measures and analyses suspension movement whilst subjecting it to a faithful replication of on-road vehicle behaviour.
"We are thrilled to collaborate with TRE, a renowned player in the vehicle dynamics domain,” said Matthew Dustan, Director of Laboratory Test Systems at AB Dynamics. “The SPMM Plus is the latest generation of an industry-recognised test rig that has been extensively developed by AB Dynamics for nearly 30 years now."
In response to the acquisition of the SPMM Plus, Boris Kirchner, Managing Director at TRE said, "We are delighted to integrate AB Dynamics' SPMM Plus into our facility and our vehicle dynamics consultancy services. It allows us to accelerate vehicle development and measure suspension performance more accurately and efficiently. Ultimately, it enables us to provide enhanced vehicle dynamics solutions to our customers."
The SPMM Plus utilises a novel moving centre table design that manipulates a vehicle's body to generate the necessary movement and forces into the vehicle’s suspension. This design means the ground plane (the road) remains fixed when simulating vehicle cornering and braking. This architecture ensures the measurement equipment connected to the vehicle’s wheels remains relatively static, reducing the travel being measured, significantly improving accuracy.
The table is precisely controlled in six degrees of freedom by precision electromechanical actuators, which enable a combination of roll, pitch, bounce and yaw motion to be applied to the vehicle body. As a closed-loop system, it requires no iteration to reach the desired drive commands, which significantly reduces testing time.
TRE’s SPMM Plus includes the optional Moment of Inertia Measurement System (MIMS) package, allowing it to measure a vehicle’s Centre of Gravity (CoG) and Moment of Inertia (MoI). Due to the unique moving body fixed-ground design, the test vehicle can be subjected to the full axis rotation required to generate the CoG and MoI significantly faster and more accurately than traditional machines.
TRE will leverage the SPMM Plus to conduct comprehensive K&C tests on various vehicle suspension systems. This will enable the consultancy to rapidly benchmark vehicles, monitor early series production vehicles and accelerate vehicle development. The machine will also be used to generate all the necessary chassis-based data required to create and correlate virtual vehicle models.
For more information on our SPMM Plus rigs, download our brochure.