Ather Energy Develops Electric Two-Wheeled Scooter and Charging Stations Using Model-Based Design

The Ather team wanted to make it easy for owners of petrol-powered scooters to switch to the 450. That meant producing a scooter with comparable power and acceleration that could be recharged quickly at home or at locations throughout the city. Because the 450 would be one of the first of its kind in the market, the engineering team faced numerous unknowns, including rider usage patterns.

该团队需要进行模拟，以评估各种骑行和使用场景的设计概念，并在优化设计参数时做出明智的权衡决策。例如，尽管电池容量的增加将提供更好的范围，但它也会增加成本和尺寸，并改变踏板车的重心。

In addition to designing the scooter itself, the engineers needed to develop and implement embedded control algorithms for battery charging, temperature management, and other key functions. As a startup, Ather needed to deliver a viable product quickly with a small team while regularly demonstrating progress to investors.

Ather Energy使用MATLAB和SIMULINK使用基于模型的设计，以模拟和模拟450，并为控制金宝app软件生成生产代码。

他们首先建立了踏板车及其主要组件的植物模型。使用第一原理直接在Simulink中直接在Simulink中对车辆动力学和机械组件进行建模。金宝app使用SIMSCAPE™和SIMSCAPE Electrical™对功率转换器和电路进行建模。

在没有详细组件数据的情况下，团队采用了一种经验方法来对电池电池进行建模。他们在各种温度和充电水平上测试了电池，并使用了System Sidefilesiondiaction Toolbox™的测量输入数据来创建电池电气和热特性的黑盒模型。

该团队对工厂模型进行了广泛的模拟，以评估设计权衡。他们完善了设计，直到确定了一个电动机和电池配置，该电动机和电池配置满足目标加速度和范围要求，同时满足成本，尺寸和温度限制。

Next, they developed algorithms for battery charging, power control, and temperature control in Simulink. They modeled the control logic in Stateflow^®and used Control System Toolbox™ to tune controller gains. They ran closed-loop simulations with the plant model to validate their control design. They generated code from the controller model with Embedded Coder^®并将其部署到手臂上^®Cortex^®踏板车或充电站中的Ti C2000™微控制器上的处理器。

Using an agile and iterative development process, they rapidly debugged and refined the algorithms, sometimes generating and testing new code up to five times a day.

Because this was their first experience with code generation, Shivaram first attended a two-day public training session on code generation with Embedded Coder conducted by MathWorks engineers, and then engaged MathWorks Consulting Services for further training on production code generation, model review, and process review.

The Ather 450 is now in production, with an initial release in Bengaluru as well as 31 charging stations and 7 stations in Chennai. Ather’s founders, who learned MATLAB at IIT Madras, where they launched the company, will soon be opening pre-orders in their next market.

• 在数周而不是数月内评估的设计替代方案。“Simulations in Simulink helped us compare multiple design alternatives and select the best one,” says Shivaram. “Instead of taking two months to build and test a physical prototype, using our Simscape models we finished in two weeks.”
• Testing time reduced by 50%.Shivaram说：“基于模型的设计使我们能够加速控制算法的测试。”“通过对Simulink中的整个踏板车和充电系统进行建模和模拟，我们将一个月的测试工作减少到了两个星期。”金宝app
• 现场问题迅速解决。“Once any new product is in the field, issues are to be expected,” says Shivaram. “We reduced turnaround time on these issues by half. Because our Simulink production model is self-documenting, we can easily make algorithm improvements and then send them out to the scooters via an over-the-air update.”