Case Study: VE Commercial Vehicles Ltd. achieves ~90% simulation-to-test correlation in tractor‑semitrailer ride‑comfort analysis with MathWorks (Simulink and Simulink Design Optimization)

VE Commercial Vehicles Establishes Ride Comfort Characteristics of Tractor-Semitrailers

VE Commercial Vehicles Ltd., a Volvo group and Eicher Motors joint venture, needed to assess and improve tractor‑semitrailer ride comfort to meet ISO 2631‑1 standards and reduce driver fatigue during long shifts. Because many components come from suppliers and some parameters are not available from testing, VE Commercial Vehicles Ltd. turned to MathWorks tools (MATLAB, Simulink, and Simulink Design Optimization) to build a virtual testing approach that would save prototype time and cost.

Using MathWorks' Simulink and Simulink Design Optimization with MATLAB, engineers developed a parameterized 7‑degrees‑of‑freedom mathematical model, collected acceleration data from accelerometers on A and B class road profiles, and fed identical road inputs into the simulation to correlate time‑ and frequency‑domain results. The MathWorks solution produced a versatile virtual test model with close to 90% correlation between simulated and experimental ride‑comfort data and offered a fast, cost‑effective way to optimize ride‑comfort elements.

VE Commercial Vehicles Ltd.

Sarnab Debnath

VE Commercial Vehicles Ltd.