Virtual testing supports reliability engineering of engine prototypes

Reliability, safety and quality are key issues for placing products successfully on the market. To achieve these goals Reliability Engineering has to be employed from the concept phase and throughout the lifetime of a product. During the product development phase it is important for the engineer to better understand the factors that cause components and systems to fail. This precondition should considerably lower the risk of delaying the SOP due to failure of prototypes. It is necessary to intensively use computer simulation tools and application methodologies during the design phase and the prototype development in order to make up-front investigations based on accurate digital models under real operation conditions. Targets for such calculations are to Analyse proposed design and evaluate the reliability potential, Ensure that all components, subsystems and systems in a design will behave as the designer anticipates and Prepare procedures for the later test runs on components, subsystems and systems. The prerequisites to successfully develop and employ such sophisticated simulation methodologies are application platforms which consist of Various mathematical simulation tools, Testing tools corresponding to the mathematical simulation tools, Data and workflow management. The paper describes the application platforms for durability and NVH and how they are employed to optimise crankshaft design and to evaluate the stresses considering the cylinder head - cylinder block compound based on system simulation. Comparisons of simulation and experimental results are shown and an evaluation of the method in terms of maturity and limitations to reduce the risk of failures is outlined.