International Scientific Journals
of Scientific Technical Union of Mechanical Engineering "Industry 4.0"

The issues related to road safety and the complexity of the driving task present a continuously increasing burden for the driver. In order to support this task, the existing on-board systems in vehicles primarily display visual messages, forcing drivers to move their eyes from the road. This paper presents a survey of studies related to perception and cognitive attention of drivers when this information is presented on the windshield (Head-Up Displays). Past research has suggested that this technology is considered as a possible solution for reducing the time and frequency of drivers moving their eyes of traffic. However, this technology brings its own challenges that are discussed in this paper. Augmented Reality concept is also presented because this solution adds new challenges to the technology as the risk of occlusion of real objects that are relevant to the traffic as well as phenomena like perception tunneling and cognitive capture.

The advanced technologies find their application in many areas of todays’ human life. This provides the engineers with a new ability in the area of technical visualization in different formal or informal engineering processes. Augmented and virtual reality are visualization technologies in which the virtual objects are combined with the real ones and coexist in the same space, or completely substitute the reality with computer modelled environment. In their nature, these technologies open up opportunities for their application in various processes in the area of automotive engineering. In this stage of development of these visualization technologies, initial steps have to be made for their use in engineering tasks in the area of automotive engineering. Real expectations exist that these technologies can serve as additional tools in the processes like vehicle approval or vehicle maintenance, or as an additional tool in the hands of the experts that make the crash forensics. This paper presents the results of conducted research in the direction of use of technical solutions for visualization of vehicles in different areas of the automotive engineering, presenting their positive characteristics along with their limitations.

The concept of virtual testing is generally used method for understanding the structures behavior during loading. It can be used as accurate replacement of real tests only if they are correctly modeled and verified. The regulation UNECE R66 is uniform technical prescription concerning the approval of large passenger vehicles with regard to the strength of their super structure. The rollover test is the basic approval test, but virtual tests can be the adequate testing methods of the physical test. The verified computer simulation according to the regulation can be equivalent approval method. There is a need that snow groomer vehicle sometimes accommodates larger number of people (for sport, work or rescue missions). Because of the terrain those vehicles have to pass, there is significant danger of rollover. So far, there are no regulations for testing of such a superstructure. This paper describes the effort and results in the use of virtual testing according to ECE R66 as a tool for estimating the safety of passengers inside such a vehicle. A computer simulation of a rollover test of the snow groomer vehicle was made. The virtual test was conducted according to the ECE R66 which allows this kind of testing. By following the standard guidelines for computer simulation of a rollover test the vehicle superstructure was analyzed. Series of virtual test were carried for meeting the standard requirements and the customer needs. The final snow groomer superstructure had to undertake serious reinforcement considering the passengers surviving area.

A cylinder bundle is a portable assembly which consists of a frame and two or more cylinders, each of a capacity up to 150 l and with a combined capacity of not more than 3000 l, or 1000 l in the case of toxic gases, connected to a manifold by cylinder valves or fittings such that the cylinders are filled, transported and emptied without disassembly. The type approval of the cylinder bundle covers series of tests regarding its structure and its behavior during and after the tests. The research, presented in this paper, is focused on virtual testing, i.e. modeling and simulation of a cylinder bundle drop tests. First, a CAD model of a cylinder bundle which contains five cylinders is built, and then a vertical and rotational drop tests are simulated in virtual environment. The obtained results are analyzed in line with the demands defined in the international standard ISO 10961:2010(E).They could serve as a base for further improvement of the model and point out the possibility for validation of the virtual testing.

The development of high power electronics, improvement of existing and emerging of new battery technologies and optimization of electric motors over the last decade are some of the issues that have raised the interest in electric vehicles. Based solely on tank to wheel analyses, electric vehicles are regarded as zero emission vehicles. Regarding these facts, the research presented in this paper is focused on mixed traffic with different percentage rates of electric vehicles and its environmental influence in urban areas. A model of a mixed traffic stream comprised of conventional and electric vehicles was built upon a microscopic single lane urban traffic simulator.

Through number of parallel simulations of solely conventional and mixed traffic stream and analysis of the results, we have evaluated the influence that certain presence rates of electric vehicles in the mixed traffic stream have on the exhaust emission. The results that we have obtained are constrained by the assumption that the electric energy used by the electric vehicles originates from renewable energy sources.

In this paper we have presented a methodology used to determine actual acceleration, velocity and traveled distance profiles of vehicles of different categories in urban environment, as dominant microscopic traffic flow parameters. The tests have been done on representative arterial road in the city of Skopje. Within a period of one month, we have been observing the traffic on the subject arterial road and have determined the average traffic flow during different day periods. The structure of the traffic flow has also been analyzed. In the experiment we have used a probe vehicle equipped with adequate measuring system to follow more than 130 vehicles of different categories on the observed arterial road, imitating i.e. reproducing their behavior as much as possible. The final goal to determine the domains of these microscopic traffic flow parameters in specific velocity intervals, regarding different vehicle categories was reached. These results have shown to be very useful as input parameters in the single lane urban traffic flow simulator that we have developed.