Parametric Modelling of the Exterior Design of Autonomous Shuttles
Year: 2023
Editor: Kevin Otto, Boris Eisenbart, Claudia Eckert, Benoit Eynard, Dieter Krause, Josef Oehmen, Nad
Author: Hafemann, Philipp; Daumoser, Manuel; Lienkamp, Markus
Series: ICED
Institution: Technical University of Munich
Section: Design Methods
Page(s): 2875-2884
DOI number: https://doi.org/10.1017/pds.2023.288
ISBN: -
ISSN: -
Abstract
Autonomous vehicles for the last mile are a promising use case for advancing autonomous driving in real-world traffic. For this purpose, traditional car manufacturers and newcomer companies develop a new vehicle concept: the autonomous shuttle. During the development, components from the automation domain, such as the sensors, must be placed and integrated into the vehicle body. The trade-offs between the functional performance of the perception and the exterior design must be evaluated early in the design process. For this purpose, a model of the vehicle exterior is needed. In this contribution, we present a method for parametric modeling of the vehicle exterior of autonomous shuttles. We define 17 input parameters and use computer-aided design to create a virtual model of the body and the wheelhouses. In the results, we validate our method by ensuring that existing shuttles can be modeled with our approach and also analyze the limitations. The model supports decision-making in the early design phase by enabling quick iterations between sensor placement and exterior design.
Keywords: Computer Aided Design (CAD), Early design phases, Virtual Engineering (VE), Exterior Design, Sensor Integration