SAE TECHNICAL

PAPER SERIES 2004-01-0425

Evolution and Design of the 2003

Cornell University Engine Control
Module for an FSAE Racecar
Santi Udomkesmalee, Dominik Utama and Michael Nicolls
Cornell University

2004 SAE World Congress

Detroit, Michigan
March 8-11, 2004

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Printed in USA

Evolution and Design of the 2003 Cornell University Engine
Control Module for an FSAE Racecar
Santi Udomkesmalee, Dominik Utama and Michael Nicolls
Copyright © 2004 SAE international
ABSTRACT
The Formula SAE (FSAE) racing event is an annual
collegiate competition in which student-designed and
built, open-cockpit racecars are examined and evaluated
via a variety of static and dynamic events. Cornell
University has been involved in the competition since
1987, and was the first team to run its own custom-built
engine control module (ECM) in 1993. This paper
presents the evolution of the Cornell ECM and offers a
systems-level overview of the design of the third-
generation Cornell ECM 2003 (ECM03) system. The
ECM03 was used in the 2003 Cornell FSAE racecar, the
ARG03.
INTRODUCTION
The Society of Automotive Engineers hosts the annual
Formula SAE event, which is an open arena in which
schools can design creative solutions to the formula
racing format. The events in which the performance of
cars is judged are:
Static Events:
• Design Review
• Cost
• Business-Presentation
Dynamic events:
• Acceleration
• Skidpad
• Autocross
• Endurance/fuel-economy
Cornell University has been involved with the Formula
SAE event since 1987 and has claimed the title of World
Champion seven times in these past sixteen years. The
2004-01-0425
Cornell University
team began designing custom engine control modules
(ECM's) in 1993. The first generation of Cornell ECMs
controlled only the most fundamental engine control
functions─fuel and ignition─for a four-cycle, four-cylinder
motorcycle engine running on gasoline.
Since then, the Cornell ECM has evolved from a simple
spark and fuel-injection controller, to a complex and
advanced control system that manages all aspects of
the car’s electronics. The ECM03 has enhanced
features, including traction control, to accommodate the
increasingly sophisticated approach to both design and
functional optimization that has come to characterize the
Cornell Formula SAE racing team’s work.
The ECM03 used in the 2003 competition is arguably
the most complex and functional ECM design to emerge
from within any student-design environment. The
features of the Cornell ECM03, such as traction control,
turbo-wastegate control, radiator fan control, and DC
motor control (for electronic coolant pump), rival those of
the most expensive aftermarket electronics packages.
Additionally, the Cornell ECM03 manages to incorporate
these sophisticated features, while maintaining a cost
structure that is significantly below comparable
commercially-produced ECM’s.
This paper discusses the evolution and design process
of the ECM03, and offers a systems-level overview of its
general functionality.
MAIN SECTION
HISTORY:
Since the time of the first Cornell Engine Control
Module, developed during the 1992-1993 season, there
have been four versions of Cornell ECM’s. Design
changes to date have been driven by substantial
changes in vehicular design (such as migration to a new
engine), or new demands for additional functionality. In
this section, we review the history and development of
Cornell ECMs.
1992-1996: Cornell Fuel Injection (CFI)
During the 1992-1993 season, the Cornell Fuel Injection
(CFI) system was developed. At this point, Cornell was
running a 600cc Honda CBR motorcycle engine.
Previously, Cornell used the stock Honda spark
controller and carbureted injection. The limitation of the
stock spark controller and the benefits of fuel injection
over a carbureted design were the impetus for the
development of the first ECM.
The stock spark controller was based on a fixed map of
spark advance versus RPM, with no compensation for
air-to-fuel ratio, manifold pressure, or other dynamic
inputs. Demand for a more flexible spark controller
increased as interest grew in moving from gasoline to an
alternative fuel like M-85 (85% methanol, 15% gasoline),
coupled with the necessity of increased spark
retardation with a turbocharger. It was also recognized
that fuel injection would provide significant advantages
over a carbureted design. The air-to-fuel ratio could be
tuned for peak power, and deficiencies of carbureted
systems – including decreased performance in high-
acceleration situations – could be ameliorated.
All of these factors led to the design and fabrication of
the CFI system. The 8-bit Motorola 68HC11
microcontroller was used, featuring an 8-MHz system
clock, 256 bytes of internal RAM, and 2 kilobytes of
internal non-volatile electrically erasable programmable
ROM (EEPROM). Two variable-reluctance magnetic
sensors sensed the crankshaft position and speed by
detecting teeth on a gear connected directly to the
crankshaft. An open-collector Schmitt trigger
comparator circuit was used to condition this input into a
square wave that was fed into the microcontroller. The
coils and injector were driven by field-effect transistors
(FETs), which were isolated from the microcontroller.
The CFI system featured central-port injection. A mass
air-flow (MAF) sensor with a custom conditioning circuit
was used to sense air flow into the engine, and a lookup
table was used to compute the injection pulse width,
which is proportional to air flow. Although an alternative
method of determining the injection pulse width exists
(based on the intake manifold pressure and temperature
along with the volumetric efficiency of the engine), the
MAF method was selected for simplicity and testing time
limitations.
Other features of the CFI system included a
temperature-compensated air-to-fuel ratio using a
thermistor in the coolant system, simple data-acquisition
to log intake-manifold pressure and engine torque, and
an RS-232 (serial) user interface that allowed on-the-fly
adjustment of the spark map and other engine
parameters. Comparisons to the carbureted engine
showed marked increases in performance. For
example, peak power increased by nearly 20
horsepower. The CFI system was later successfully
adapted for M-85. This ECM was the ancestor and root
of all future Cornell ECMs, and many features of this
robust design are still present in the 2003 ECM.
1997-1999: SMACK FI
In 1994-1995, Cornell switched from the CBR engine to
a Yamaha 600cc FZR motor. The CFI system was
adapted successfully for fuel injection (again, using
central-port injection), however the crank-position sensor
on the new engine was significantly different than on the
CBR engine. Initially, attempts were made to adapt the
CFI circuitry, however this effort was unsuccessful, and
for two years the team utilized the stock spark controller
for the FZR.
In the 1996-1997 year, development of a new ECM
began, utilizing a 68HC11 controller along with a slave
processor, an Atmel chip similar to the Intel 8051. This
ECM was nearly complete by the end of the year,
however timing and inter-controller communication
issues led to a rethinking of the design for the following
year.
The 1997-1998 season ushered in a new design, based
around the 68HC11. A flywheel-conditioning circuit (still
in use in the 2003 ECM) was developed based on the
stock FZR circuit. An external 256-kilobyte removable
EPROM was added to store lookup tables and firmware,
and an 8-kilobyte SRAM was added as well. A
programmable logic device (PLD) was used for address
decoding. In addition, an oxygen-sensor conditioning
circuit was added, although an O2 sensor was never
integrated, and the team moved to batch injection from
central-port injection. This new design was very robust,
easily manufactured, inexpensive (costing approximately
$40 for all components including the enclosure when
manufactured in quantities of 1000), small, and user-
friendly.
In the 1998-1999 season, the first realistic attempts were
made to implement traction control. A system had been
designed a few years prior to this, but was never
successfully built. A system based on the 16-bit
Motorola 68HC16Z1 controller was developed that
communicated serially (via a Motorola serial-peripheral
interface) to the SMACK FI system. This traction-control
system was successfully implemented and was on the
car for the 1999 competition. As the traction-control
system had not been fully tested or developed, and track
times never showed consistent improvements.
2000-2002: ECM01 and ECM02
The 2000-2001 year marked a significant redesign
phase for Cornell ECMs. The primary driving force
behind the redesign was scalability, with the thinking that
the fuel-injection and spark-control system should
ultimately be the electronic “heart” of the car. This
thinking led to a design that allowed for sequential fuel
injection, pre-injection, spark control, electronic gear
shifting, electronic turbo-wastegate control, electronic
throttle control, traction control, and many other
expandable non-reserved capabilities.
The ECM01 utilized two microcontrollers, on separate
PCBs, one of which was dedicated to fuel injection,
spark control, and related tasks (i.e. interrupt-driven
processes), while the other was dedicated to traction
control and related tasks. The former utilized the
Motorola 68HC16Y3 (16-MHz system clock), and the
latter utilized the Motorola 68HC16Z1 (25-MHz system
clock), both 16-bit controllers with much improved
processing capabilities. External flash memory, SRAM,
and EEPROM were added to the boards, which
communicated via the Motorola SPI interface. The
Bosch Control Area Network (CAN) was also added to
communicate with a data acquisition system under
development. The ECM01 ran, and won, at the 2001
competition. Once again however traction control was
not fully operational due primarily to a lack of
development time. This did not preclude the additional
implementation of other new features, including
electronic wastegate control.
In 2002, the original ECM01 design was maintained for
the most part and a large effort was put into developing
a working traction-control and electronic throttle-control
(ETC) system, as well as the integration of electronic
components into this new system. ETC and traction
control ultimately did not run at the 2002 competition due
to reliability/safety concerns and testing/development
issues. However, there were other significant additions,
such as sequential injection, fan control, dash control,
and a new data-acquisition system.
THE ARGO3 ECM03 DESIGN PROCESS
The ECM02 was the predecessor of the ECM03, the
ECM developed in the 2002-2003 season to which the
remainder of this paper is devoted. It was decided early
in the design phase of the ECM03 that the best way to
minimize the complexity that hindered successful
implementation of traction control in 2002 was to
combine the processing into one powerful chip. The
design of the ECM03 was driven by similar objectives as
the design of the ECM01 and ECM02; however, a much
stronger emphasis was put on modularity. Specifically,
the design team set about to increase the number of
mechanisms that could be controlled electronically,
doing so with a centralized, cohesive design, and in a
modular fashion, such that components could be added
or removed as necessary.
To realize the objective of active suspension
components and the long-running pursuit of functional
traction control, a significantly more powerful system
was envisioned that could accommodate the multivariate
needs of the car's systems. Successful implementation
of a traction-control system presented the most
immediate set of design issues. Previous designs called
for the traction control to be reliant on communication
with the central controller, however, this design proved
cumbersome, problematic in implementation, never
delivering sufficient performance to warrant using
traction control at actual competitions.
The approach taken was to create a system that was
able to use just one microcontroller for all electronic
controls. Preliminary calculations indicated that the
current Motorola 68HC16Y3 could probably handle the
necessary computations. However, upon closer
inspection and further testing, it was decided that the
safety margin was too small and would limit modularity,
requiring that a new microcontroller be located.
Three Critical Design Themes
Past experience had demonstrated that entering the
design phase for a new ECM with a list of objectives that
was too carefully delineated could have a limiting impact
on the ultimate ECM’s development. The 2002-2003
Cornell Formula SAE team elected instead to identify the
three most critical objectives, and then to hold closely to
these guiding beacons throughout the design process.
The three specific overarching themes that were
established, and which became the mission-critical
criteria for the 2003 ECM/TCS system were:
• Scalability
• Modularity
• Innovation
Using these themes, we set out to find a microcontroller
which was both powerful and contained as many I/O
ports as possible. The Motorola MPC555 32-bit
microcontroller emerged as a potentially ideal candidate.
The MPC555 was both computationally powerful, and
contained a myriad of I/O capabilities. It had also shown
its automotive prowess during use in many aftermarket
systems as well as in the OEM environment for engine
controls. Selection of this new microcontroller presented
two challenges that led to our next design decision.
The first challenge was that the MPC555 was only
available in a PBGA package which presented a
manufacturing challenge, as no means for soldering
such a package to the printed circuit board was available
to the team. The second challenge involved memory
and storage.
Throughout the Cornell Formula SAE team’s history,
memory/storage system integration with the
microcontroller, always proved to be among the most
troubling and time consuming tasks for the team.
Consequently the decision was made to use a single-
board computer (SBC) from Phytec that contained both
the microcontroller and memory/storage in one unit.
Operationalizing Scalability, Modularity and Innovation
With the system’s heart in place, the balance of the
design process continued. At this point, our modularity
theme came into play, as there was a great deal of
uncertainty surrounding the ultimate capabilities
requirements of the ECM needed for the 2003
competition. We began to focus heavily on a very
modular design to optimize flexibility.
The design was inspired by the PC/104 stacking form
factor. We created our own form factor (fig. 1) in which
there would be several stacking printed circuit boards
(PCB) each with dedicated functions connected by two
64-pin busses. This design would accommodate nearly
any increased capability need, with the ease of simply
designing another board and stacking it on top.
Figure 1: Stacking Form Factor
The first design called for a total of four boards:
• Processor board
• Conditioning board
• Interface board
• High-current board
The processor board would contain the Phytec SBC as
well as all needed power circuitry. It would then serve
as the connection from the Microcontroller to the two
busses for all I/O and communication lines.
The conditioning board would contain all needed
circuitry to clean and condition the incoming inputs from
various on-car sensors. It would then place the “clean”
signals onto the bus.
The interface board would contain all needed circuitry to
provide a user interface on the car. This included things
like serial connections, an LCD controller and
conditioning circuits for any on-car switches and buttons.
Finally, the high-current board would contain those
circuits which due to their high current nature would be
beneficial to isolate from the rest of the system. This
mainly consisted of MOSFET transistors that drove the
injectors, spark coils, and other inductor/solenoid type
loads.
The proper circuits were designed, and the first version
of the ECM03 came to life in this stackable format in
December, 2002. While functional and extremely
modular, the ECM turned out to be too large. With 4-
separate boards, the ECM was large and had a large
number of wires inside the casing. The high volume of
wires were related to the requirement for each board to
maintain its own set of connectors to obtain inputs and
send outputs that were not available on the bus (i.e. raw
sensor inputs, high-current outputs, etc.). This created
packaging issues as well as noise problems. To
address these unforeseen size and noise issues, the
circuit design was maintained, but the board layout and
form factor underwent a redesign.
Figure 2: Final Form Factor
The redesign produced results that effectively addressed
both the size and noise issues. A two-board design was
created, which allowed us to keep high current elements
away from more delicate circuits, while simultaneously
minimizing the mess of wires created in the first design.
Inputs to the high current board resting above the main
board would be provided via a 24-pin bus. The outputs
of the high-current board would then be returned to the
main board near the connectors via a cable. This
allowed the new ECM to utilize 2 weatherproof header
style connectors, as its sole means for input and output
allowing for a cleaner, more robust and weatherproof
solution. This did limit some of our intended scalability
since the addition of new boards became impossible.
Even with the scalability limitations now introduced, the
ECM03 represented significant progress, manifested in
the other two critical design themes of innovation and machined aluminum housing, designed to minimize
modularity. With so many new capabilities—details of weight and provide a waterproof enclosure.
which are outlined in the next sections—the tradeoff in
scalability was well-balanced. FUEL AND SPARK CONTROL

HARDWARE AND CAPABILITY OVERVIEW The four pistons of the inline four-cylinder YZF engine
are arranged in two pairs, where pistons 1 and 4 make
The ECM03 is centered around a Phytec MPC555 single up one pair and pistons 2 and 3 make up the other pair.
board computer. This module contains a myriad of The pistons of each pair are physically in phase and half
features including: (i.e. two strokes) of the combustion cycle out of phase.
The pairs are physically 180 degrees out of phase. This
• Motorola 32-bit MPC555 microcontroller running at configuration sets the firing order for the cylinders at 1-2-
a 40Mhz clock speed 4-3.
• 256KB flow-through synchronous external BURST-
SRAM Fuel and spark control are based on the Motorola’s Time
• 4MB external Flash-ROM Processing Unit (TPU). The TPU is an interrupt driven
• Dual Full 2.0B CAN with PCA82C250 transceiver system that allows for input and output. Flywheel (and
support camshaft sensor if available) inputs generate interrupts
• SPI and dual UART with RS-232 level-converters in the system, and the internal counter of the TPU is
• Dual 10-bit 16-channel A/D-converters used to calculate relevant time intervals. The spark and
injector control are sequenced by scheduling output
• Dual 16-channel TPU
interrupts. Given a time and duration, the
• 16-bit 8-channel PWM system
microcontroller generates the desired digital output.
• Extensive Multi-Purpose I/O signal system
The ECM03 computes the position of the pistons from
The hardware provisions of the EMC03 enable the the crankshaft position angle with respect to the top-
following inputs: dead-center (TDC) of piston 1. The unit anticipates the
instance just before a piston pair reaches TDC, and sets
• 4 wheel speed up the appropriate ignition coil to fire for this cylinder
• Mass air flow pair: ignition coil 1 discharges simultaneously to the
• Flywheel/Crankshaft spark plugs of cylinders 1 and 4, ignition coil 2
• Camshaft discharges simultaneously to the spark plugs of
• Intake manifold pressure cylinders 2 and 3. A MOSFET transistor driver for each
• Gear indicator coil is driven by the microcontroller signal to deliver
• Brake position spark.
• Throttle position
• Coolant temperature Each coil fires once every revolution and supplies the
• 2 Auxiliary Analog inputs charge for two concurrent sparks. Just before a piston
• 7 Auxiliary Digital inputs pair reaches the TDC, only one cylinder is at the end of
the compression stroke, while the other cylinder is at the
Output capabilities include: end of the exhaust stroke. This allows the ignition
configuration to create an effective spark and an
• 5 fuel injector drivers ineffective spark when a coil fires. The ECM03 does not
differentiate between the compression and exhaust
• 2 spark coil drivers
strokes; as a result, the ignition sparks occur in pairs.
• Electric coolant pump/DC motor control
• Electric/pneumatic shifter control The ECM03 uses the YZF flywheel, which is attached to
• Stepper motor control the crankshaft, to calculate the crankshaft position angle
• 4 PWM outputs and the engine speed. This flywheel has three teeth on
• 5 driven Auxiliary Outputs its outside surface that pass before a magnetic pick-up
sensor inside the flywheel cover. Two long teeth are 180
Interface capabilities include: degrees out of phase, and a short tooth leads one of the
long teeth. The falling edge of this long tooth following
• DB9 serial connection; the short tooth marks the TDC of piston 1. The flywheel
• Auxiliary serial input/output sensor picks up a positive voltage spike from a rising
• Dashboard Control tooth edge and a negative voltage spike from a falling
• BDM connector tooth edge. The signal is conditioned to produce a
transition from high to low on a rising tooth edge and a
These I/O and interface abilities are delivered to the car transition from low to high on a falling tooth edge. The
via a DB9 serial connector, a 23-pin Amp AMPSEAL ECM03 is set to interrupt on the transitions of the
weatherproof connector, and a 35-pin Amp AMPSEAL resulting square wave. A free-running counter is used to
weatherproof connector. The boards reside in a CNC- calculate the time between transitions.
The ECM03 assigns numbers to the three teeth to
anticipate the instance to fire each coil: the small tooth is
tooth 1, the long one after that is tooth 2, and the other
long one is tooth 3. The falling tooth edges mark teeth 2
and 3 after finding teeth 1 and 2, respectively. The
ECM03 anticipates the instance to fire coil 2 by
scheduling the output interrupt exactly one-half of a
revolution minus the spark advance at the current
engine speed after the falling edge of tooth 2. Similarly,
the instance to fire coil 1 is anticipated exactly one-half
of a revolution minus the spark advance at the current
engine speed after the falling edge of tooth 3. The spark
advance is stored in a look-up map for fast processing.
The fuel injectors are fired as a bank. This scheme
delivers the total amount of fuel, which is required by all
four cylinders for the entire engine cycle in two
revolutions. All four injectors shoot the same amount of
fuel at the same rate and time once every revolution.
Therefore, each injector delivers one-half of the fuel that
is required by one cylinder in one revolution. The fuel
accumulates in the intake port before the appropriate
amount of fuel is sucked into the cylinder during the
intake stroke. The ECM fires the first bank when cylinder
1 is at the TDC of the compression stroke and the
second bank, when cylinder 1 is at the TDC of the
exhaust stroke. Even though the injectors are currently
fired as a bank, the ECM03 has the potential to deliver
sequential multi-port injection with the introduction of a
camshaft position sensor, as each injector is actuated by
its own transistor driver.
In the case of sequential injection the ECM03 uses an
algorithm similar to that of the spark control. With the
added input of a camshaft sensor to determine when the
intake valve of each cylinder will close, the ECM02
calculates the appropriate time to begin injecting, such
that the fuel needed for a single cylinder’s entire engine
cycle will be injected by the time the intake valve closes.
The ECM03 uses a mass-airflow sensor (MAF) to
determine the amount of air intake. The MAF, air-to-fuel
ratio (AFR), engine speed, as measured by rotations per
minute (RPM), and injector flow rate (FR) is used to
calculate the overall pulse-width per revolution:
Pulse-width = (60/RRM)*(MAF/AFR)*(1/FR) [sec/rev]
The RPM is used as an index in a look-up table for the
above equation. In addition, the air/fuel mixture can be
leaned/enriched by a partial/fuel throttle function as well
as a multiplicative correction factor determined by a
table based on RPM.
Once the necessary pulse-width is known, the injector
turn on time is added to the pulse-width before the ECM
schedules the injection interrupt.
FUEL AND SPARK TUNING
ECM03 allows fuel and spark parameters to be tuned in
order to achieve optimum performance. The fuel can be
tuned by changing the overall air/fuel ratio as well as a
table based on RPM. The spark map is based solely on
RPM. The fuel and spark maps were created using a
MATLAB script, and then uploaded into the external
Flash-ROM using the Background Diagnostic Mode
(BDM) of the microcontroller. While a more user-friendly
approach was in development, this method proved to be
adequate to fine tune the ARG03 engine package and
allowed us to achieve the highest horsepower at the
2003 FSAE competition.
ADDITIONAL FEATURES AND COST BENEFIT
In addition to fuel and spark control, the ECM03 was
used to control the following ARGO3 components:
dashboard display; the turbo-wastegate; pre-injection;
and radiator fan.
The dashboard display consists of an LED tachometer,
gear indicator, and several LED warning lights. All of
these LEDs are driven by a LED driver whose input
comes serially. Given current inputs and calculations of
current engine conditions, the ECM03 sends the serial
signal to the dashboard allowing a simple and accurate
means to deliver engine information to the driver.
The turbo-wastegate can be controlled by the ECM03 by
two means. The first uses an electronic servo motor
attached directly to the turbocharger wastegate. By
closing the wastegate via the servo, boost pressure
goes up, while opening the wastegate allows boost
pressure to decline. The input for this closed loop
control comes from a manifold absolute pressure sensor
(MAP sensor) and the engine RPM. Given a map of the
desired boost pressure versus RPM, the ECM03 can run
a simple closed loop control over the wastegate. The
servo motor receives a pulse-width modulated signal
which the microcontroller is able to produce.
The second method to control the wastegate uses a
more traditional vacuum solenoid, inline with the input to
a vacuum diaphragm that is the connected to the
wastegate. Actuation of the wastegate is done by
allowing the appropriate pressure to reach the vacuum
diaphragm. The ECM03 in turn runs a simple closed
loop control over the solenoid, rapidly opening and
closing it in order to deliver the appropriate pressure to
the diaphragm, which delivers the desired operation of
the wastegate.
Preinjection consists of an extra fuel injector located
upstream of the other main injectors. Using the
calculated fuel for the entire engine needs, it uses a map
based on RPM to determine a percentage of fuel to
inject at that location and subsequently removes this fuel
from the amount injected at the other four injectors. By
including control of the engine’s preinjector function,
ECM03 enabled the cooling of the intake charge, which
boosted low end torque resulted in a flatter torque curve
of the engine.
The radiator fan is also controlled by the ECM03. Using
input from a coolant temperature sensor, the unit
determines if the radiator fan should be on or off. Since
significant power is used in the starting of the fan, the
ECM03 uses a hysteresis loop to control the turning on
and off of the radiator fan, thus minimizing the amount of
fan starting and preserving power.
In keeping with the scalability theme of the design, the
ECM03 has many inputs (digital and analog) and
outputs that are user configurable as listed previously.
This design element ensures that future functionality
needs, can be resolved using software solutions versus
a full hardware redesign.
Lastly, the entire redesign was completed for a total
materials cost of under $1000. With most aftermarket
systems costing upwards of $1500, the in-house
designed ECM03 provided a definite cost benefit to the
Cornell Formula SAE team.
TRACTION CONTROL
The ARG03 features a traction control system (TCS)
that serves as a driver aid to control tire slip with the
purpose of enhancing straight-line acceleration. The
high power-to-weight ratio of the traction-limited ARG03
justifies the control of tire slip, as the engine can apply
more torque to the rear wheels than the tires can
transfer to the track. Excessive wheel spin impedes
straight-line acceleration and can result in lost control of
the skidding racecar. The TCS is centered on the control
of the speed of the driven rear wheels relative to the
speed of the undriven front wheels by continuously
monitoring the speed of all four wheels. When the TCS
detects excessive wheel spin, the applied torque at the
rear wheels is limited by reducing the power of the
engine through deliberate ignition cuts. The final tuning
allows an adequate amount of rear wheel spin to
effectively launch the racecar off a standing start.
Wheel speed data showed that quickly reducing
excessive wheel spin was beneficial to launching off a
standing start. The TCS limited excessive wheel spin by
restricting the engine power until the desired slip goal
was measured. A 50% slip goal allowed an adequate
amount of rear wheel spin to effectively accelerate the
racecar; any lower slip goal would hinder acceleration.
The TCS is designed to enhance the performance and
drivability of the ARG03. This design approach requires
a tradeoff between high power and excellent handling
characteristics.
The ARG03 turbocharged, 600cc Yamaha YZF
motorcycle engine can easily overpower the available
traction at the driven rear wheels. This situation can
cause diminished acceleration and even lost control of
the skidding racecar. Due to properties of the tire, a
certain level of slip between the tire and the track is
desirable to achieve the maximum tractive force and
therefore the maximum acceleration. Maintaining this
optimum level of slip for maximum traction is difficult as
the tractive force is dependent on tire load and amount
of slip.
These factors are very dynamic due to weight transfer,
varying engine output, and changing surface conditions.
The goal of slip control is to limit the amount of slip by
reducing the power of the engine until the desired level
of slip is measured. The challenge of this design
problem is to restrict the power of the engine to achieve
the optimum level of traction without unnecessarily
reducing the power, and/or hindering acceleration.
The tractive force, and applied torque through the
differential vary considerably at each rear wheel when
the racecar is in operation. These variations make the
theoretical control of traction difficult. Therefore, the
TCS is designed to control tire slip with the purpose of
controlling traction.
When the driven rear wheels spin excessively, the goal
of tire slip control is to limit the amount of slip by
reducing the power of the engine until the desired level
of slip is measured. Slip is the controlled variable and is
defined here as the percent difference between the
maximum speed of the front wheels (i.e. the racecar
reference velocity) and the average speed of the rear
wheels, as given by:
Average Rear Wheel Speed
Slip = −1 .
Maximum Front Wheel Speed
The TCS is intended to keep the amount of slip at a
desired offset for optimum traction through monitoring
the speeds of all four wheels with specifically fitted Hall-
effect sensors at each wheel. When the engine
overpowers the available traction at the rear wheels, the
controller initiates a specific ignition cutoff cycle with
respect to the deviation of the actual level of slip from
the desired level.
Figure 3 provides an overview of the theoretical closed-
loop design approach.
Figure 3: Closed-Loop Slip Control
Evaluation of several wheel spin control techniques were
completed, and cutting spark was chosen as a fast-
acting and precise way to restrict engine power. This
served to restrict the applied torque at the rear wheels.
Cutting spark is more compatible with the YZF engine
than cutting fuel. The TCS can limit the engine power
through spark cuts of individual cylinders; however, the
current batch-fire fuel delivery scheme does not allow
the control of individual cylinders through fuel cuts.
Cutting spark can waste fuel, which is dumped into the
exhaust system, where the fuel can potentially ignite.
Dynometer and road tests proved that cutting every third
spark was safe to the exhaust system. However, cutting
every spark or even every other spark over several
engine cycles would cause severe backfires that were
powerful enough to blow off the tailpipe and possibly
damage the turbocharger. For this reason, cutting every
third spark was identified as the most aggressive ignition
cutoff cycle that could be safely implemented. Less
aggressive cycles were able to gradually bring down the
slip variable without overshooting the desired slip goal
and hindering acceleration.
The TCS was successfully implemented for the ARG03,
and enabled for one acceleration run at the 2003
Formula SAE competition. The competition-tuned TCS
assisted the driver at clocking a time of 4.161 seconds
for the 75 meter acceleration event. This time was the
best overall time for the ARG03 and faster than any
previous practice or test run and allowed us to receive
third place in the acceleration event.
FUTURE DESIGN
The 2003 ECM hardware was designed to run
sequential multiport fuel injection, which is now an
objective for the 2004 season. The implementation of a
sequential scheme was sidelined because of insufficient
development time in 2003, but the 2004 team is already
experimenting with installing a camshaft position sensor
and modifying the fuel delivery algorithm to explore the
benefit of injecting fuel sequentially.
The 2003 ECM was running the same spark map for all
cylinders. Another objective in 2004 is to gain more
engine power by tuning cylinder’s individually.
In the area of diagnostics, the main objective is to
successfully operate a knock sensor, which will aid in
tuning and also prevent engine failures. The calibration
of a knock sensor is underway, and an adaptive control
algorithm of retarding the timing and re-advancing the
spark needs to be coded and tested.
For TCS, the current team is integrating an
accelerometer and a steering angle sensor to improve
the traction control for autocross.
On the software side, the interrupt-driven functions were
prioritized in 2003 but this needs to be refined in 2004.
Finally, the 2004 team is creating a real-time calibration
and tuning interface.
CONCLUSION
Cornell University’s Formula SAE race team has a
tradition of continual innovation and improvement in the
design and implementation of in-house engine control
modules (ECM’s). The team has progressed from the
original simplistic ECM that had only fuel and spark
capabilities, to the ECM03, in which a complex variety of
capabilities are electronically controlled and optimized,
using innovative and robust design features. The
systems level design of the EMC03 was driven by the
three critical design themes of scalability, modularity and
innovation. This process resulted in an array of new
features, including a two-board, weather-tight,
professional design and full integration and
implementation of traction control.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The authors would like to acknowledge the central
contributions to the Cornell University FSAE Faculty
Advisors, Professor Albert George and Professor Brad
Anton. We would also like to acknowledge Professor
Fran McLeod who served as our defacto “EE Advisor”
for several years.
The Cornell University FSAE Team has always been
based on – and has succeeded in large part due to – the
fundamental principals of collaborative creativity. As
such, there are many students over the years that have
made significant contributions to Cornell ECMs. The
1992-1993 CFI system, the original Cornell ECM, was
developed by Daniel Foody. The 1997-1998 SMACK FI
system was developed by Matthew Harlan with some
previous work by Geoffrey Hausheer. ECM01 was
developed by Jordan Eber, Michael Nicolls, and Ryan
Mcbride. ECM02 was developed by Michael Nicolls and
Elia Bertelletti. ECM03 was developed by Santi
Udomkesmalee, Dominik Utama, Christopher Rohrback,
Adnan Albraki, and Derek Brader. We would also like to
acknowledge all past and present members of the
Cornell FSAE teams.
REFERENCES
1. Bosch. Automotive Electric/Electronic Systems.
Society of Automotive Engineers, 1998
2. Peatman, John. Design With Microcontrollers.
McGraw-Hill Book Co., 1988
3. P. Horowitz, W. Hill. The Art of Electronics.
Cambridge University Press, 1989
4. K. Lyon, M. Phillip, E. Grommes. “Traction Control
for a Formula 1 Race Car: Conceptual Design,
Algorithm Development, and Calibration
Methodology.” 1994 Motor Sports Engineering
Conference Proceedings, Volume 2: Engines and
Drivetrains 1994
CONTACT
Santi Udomkesmalee holds a Bachelor’s degree in
Physics from Cornell University, where he served on the
Cornell Formula SAE Race Team for two years.He can
be reached via email at: su26@cornell.edu
Dominik Utama holds a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree
in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Cornell
University.He can be reached via email at:
dsu2@cornell.edu