Automated Driving Systems (ADS) Test Data Interface

Many future Level 4 and 5 autonomous vehicles are expected to lack traditional driving controls, presenting a major challenge for regulatory tests that are typically conducted either by manually operating the vehicles or by driving robots physically coupled to the manual controls. Therefore, there is a need for an alternate method allowing automotive test engineers to issue driving commands to vehicles. Additionally, typical end-users may require a way to issue basic low-speed driving commands for the purposes of repositioning vehicles in driveways and parking lots. This project proposes to design and produce a market-ready prototype for a test data interface (TDI), a concept for which was previously developed by SEA in a Phase I SBIR project. The TDI consists of a port installed on a vehicle which interfaces internally with the vehicle’s driving systems and allows manual control of the vehicle via standardized electronic command signal inputs. The details of the communication protocol and the required safety and security measures will be developed in this proposed Phase II project. Additionally, this project will produce a “Vehicle Control Unit” (VCU), which will act as the middleware interface between the TDI and high-level software controllers currently used in automated vehicle testing.