Full Vehicle Models with Altair Driver and Events

This section describes how to add a full vehicle model with the Altair Driver and include the events. The events are simulation commands that enable the Altair Driver control to perform the vehicle maneuvers. A model with an event exports an Altair Driver File (.adf) and the MotionSolve (.xml) files to be simulated.

Building a Vehicle Model with Altair Driver

In MotionView, models are assembled from libraries of pre-defined systems using the Assembly Wizard. The Assembly Wizard dialog guides you through the assembly process to build a full vehicle with the Altair Driver.

To access the vehicle solutions the Vehicle Tools extension must be loaded. In MotionView, go to File > Extension Manager and enable the extension.


Figure 1. Vehicle Tools Extension

Vehicle Libraries and Assembly

MotionView contains three libraries of vehicles: Car/Small Truck, Heavy Truck, and Two Wheeler. With Vehicle Tools loaded in MotionView, click on Libraries to select the desired vehicle configuration.


Figure 2. Setting Vehicle Library
With the vehicle library selected, click on Assembly to invoke the Assembly Wizard and start building the full vehicle model.


Figure 3. Building a Full Vehicle Model
Note: To include the vehicle events, the Full vehicle with driver option must be selected in the Assembly Wizard.

Adding Events to the Model

The full vehicle events are available in the Entity Browser under the VehicleTools folder. The Car & Truck folders contain the events used in cars, small trucks, and heavy trucks. A general folder contains common events for all vehicle library models. The Motorcycle folder contains events specific to 2- and 3-wheeler vehicles.
Note: If the Entity Browser is not displayed in MotionView, enable it under the View tab.


Figure 4. Events Folder in Entity Browser


Figure 5. Car/Small Trucks List of Events
To add an event, double-click on the event icon in the Entity browser and click on the Create button displayed in the guide bar.


Figure 6. Adding an Event
The events parameters such as vehicle velocity, events dimension definitions, controls and signal settings, can be edited using the Entity Editor.


Figure 7. Entity Editor for the Brake in Turn Event
Note: If the Entity Editor is not displayed in MotionView, enable it under the View tab.
To simulate a full vehicle model with events, use the Run ribbon. The simulation settings can be modified in the Analysis Settings Dialog. Both quick run and offline simulations are supported for the full vehicle events.


Figure 8. Vehicle Tools Run Ribbon
Multiple events simulation can be performed by selecting the events in the Run settings under Select analysis. When more than one event is selected, MotionSolve simulates one event after the other in different simulations following the displayed order.


Figure 9. Analysis Setting Dialog
Note: Adding more than one event does not imply the vehicle will perform one event after the other in the same simulation with a continuous simulation time.