Vehicular Power-Line Communication Constraints

Abstract

The increase of sensors and actuators in today’s vehicles has led to a growing number of electronic control units (ECU). This increases the wiring harness of the vehicle, resulting not only in increased weight but also high installation and maintenance costs. This is mainly because the ECUs use protocols such as controller area network(CAN), local interconnect network (LIN), Flexray etc to communicate with each other. In this project, we conduct a feasibility study of power-line communication (PLC) using fixed point digital signal processors (DSP) in modern vehicles. The study focuses upon issues related to the transmission channel as well as the hardware. The issues related to the channel are addressed by proposing a model which includes the wiring harness and noise source. The hardware issues are addressed by implementing a signal chain consisting of a modulator and a demodulator using a fixed point DSP. Finally, the study shows that the processing hardware and the background noise does not prevent PLC from being a workable solution, instead it is the variation of the loads connected to the wiring harness that inhibits transmission over the power grid.