From "Pikes Peak" show car to start of Audi Q7 production in less than three years More intensive use of simulation technologies than ever before "Soft factors" such as sound, feel or odour played an important part Design Development of the concept Virtual worlds: simulation and computing The "Strake" Design Check Wind tunnel Electronics Test-driving Suspension and driving dynamics A car for the senses Quality assurance Coordination by model line management Vom Showcar "Pikes Peak" bis zum Serienstart des Audi Q7 vergehen keine drei Jahre Einsatz virtueller Simulationstechnologien war noch nie so intensiv Auch "weiche Faktoren" wie Sound, Haptik oder Geruch spielen wichtige Rolle

Developing the Audi Q7 In the words of Prof. Dr. Martin Winterkorn, Chairman of the AUDI AG Board of Management: "The Audi Q7 represented uncharted territory for Audi – both in its own product range and on the competitive scene. The market had no similarly sporty and dynamic, but also spacious, multifunctional vehicle with off-road capability to offer. To achieve this position was the special challenge our development teams had to face." Almost 5,000 people work in Technical Development at AUDI AG. Since 2002, many of them will have been engaged to a greater or lesser degree on the project bearing the internal Audi number AU 716: the development of the Audi Q7. But in addition to the many technical departments, experts from Production, Toolmaking, Quality Assurance and Marketing were brought in from the first concept and design sketches onwards. There can be no doubt that creating a vehicle such as the Audi Q7 is one of the most complex tasks encountered anywhere in industry. So many of the tasks it involves can only be hinted at or described in brief here. At Audi, the engineers, designers, mathematicians, physicists, industrial chemists, mechanics, shop-floor personnel, electronics and IT experts work in virtual computer worlds, on crash circuits, test rigs and other test equipment, in wind tunnels - or in worlds of the senses. But they have all contributed to a fine result: a third-generation sports utility vehicle (SUV). Design One of the most important reasons for buying a car has always been its appearance – in other words, its design. The designers are the first people to concern themselves with a new vehicle project: they give the idea its actual shape. Even for the Audi Q7, the process starts in a ‘classic’ way, with pencil and sketch pad. Audi Q7 design project manager is Canadian Dany Garand, who recalls: "The Audi Q7 design process was a special challenge for our team. We had to create a product that was totally new for Audi, and bring the normally rather crude design of an SUV into harmony with Audi’s formal idiom. The kind of SUV on the market today would not have suited us." The varied demands that this vehicle segment has to satisfy in the European, American and Asian markets also had to be taken into account. Garand comments: "Consumer profiles in Europe and overseas are distinctly different, and during the design process we had to bear these regional patterns of life in mind. This included the Audi Q7’s overall size, its maximum capacity of seven seats, specific storage facilities and even new colour concepts both inside and out." Audi’s large SUV project acquired concrete form midway through 2002. Garand explains: "After the concept had been largely finalised, we succeeded in developing and building the fully functional Audi Pikes Peak quattro show car in only six months, so that it could be shown to an international public at the Detroit Motor Show. We wanted to establish how the public would react to our vision for this vehicle segment." The response was overwhelmingly positive – an ideal brief for the designers, who were then able to base their styling work on the "Pikes Peak" rather than having to start again from scratch. Garand: "We saved a considerable amount of time when it became clear that many of the show car’s basic features could be adopted on the production model." Some 150 members of Audi Design at the Group’s head offices in Ingolstadt, led by Gerhard Pfefferle, then began intensive creative work on the Audi Q7’s interior, exterior, colour schemes, equipment and trim. The aim, in Garand’s words, was to "unite the best of four worlds" in the new SUV: the dynamic, sporty lines and road behaviour of a sports coupe, the comfort of a luxury saloon, the technology and strength of an off-roader and the space and versatility of a van. The designers produced three different concepts, one of which was chosen for further work. Body designer Satoshi Wada explains the exterior features of the chosen concept in the following terms: "The Audi Q7 is homogeneous in the ratio of overall height, length and width, with a short front overhang and a rather longer one at the rear. Like the A6, the body tapers considerably in plan view, and divides visually into volumes above and below the dynamic boundary line. The Audi Q7 therefore looks sporty and elegant above this line, but sporty and robust below it." For its Japanese designer, the Audi Q7’s outward values are emphasised by its coupe-style roof line, the close-to-vertical angle of the Audi single-frame grille, the innovative rear-end styling with single-unit rear lights and the boldly flared wheel arches and large wheels. Inside this SUV, the creative minds have adopted an "island design" principle. Interior designer Uli Beierlein and his Dutch colleague Mattijs van Tuijl describe this as "closed, single-colour surfaces, entirely made from one material, interrupted by islands containing the functional units." Beierlein: "The three easily identifiable islands are the door island (the inside door trim), the seat island (the seat locations) and the driving-area island (the cockpit and centre console unit). These islands are distinguished by their functions and differ both visually and in terms of touch from all the other surfaces." Van Tuijl adds: "The interior makes a lasting impression because of its clear architecture, perfect ergonomics and top-quality materials and craftsmanship." This is the point at which colour and trim designer Ute Grönheim took over. Together with her colleagues, she selected suitable fabrics, materials and paint finishes for the Audi Q7. She comments: "Colour and the nature of the materials tell us a lot about a car and its owner. The colour of a car is the first thing you notice about it, and is therefore an excellent way of stimulating the emotions." To create this initial emotive response, eleven standard paint finishes are available, some in metallic and others in pearl effect, from Calla White to Garnet Red and from Condor Grey to Phantom Black. Customers can also have the sill areas of the Audi Q7 finished in Silver or Grey as a contrasting colour. New colours with a specific SUV affinity are Sycamore Green and Bahia Beige, metallic. Ute Grönheim explains that each colour is applied to an actual vehicle before being approved: "They simply can’t be shown realistically enough as a virtual display." The forceful but at the same time luxurious feeling that prevails inside the Audi SUV is emphasised by various high-grade materials and fabrics. The designers created fine ("Verano") and coarser-grained ("Cricket") leather upholstery and trim, and developed a new type of carpet known as "Fresco" and the "Cosmo" seat upholstery fabric. Three kinds of wood inlays from three different continents are available: American burr walnut, European burr olive ash and Tamo, from a tree that grows in Japan. Ute Grönheim illustrates the difficult task that the designer has to perform when identifying trends: "Our own tastes have to take second place when choosing materials and colours. On the contrary, we have to work out what will appeal as strongly as possible to customers in various markets in a few years’ time." A car is a long-lasting product, but can be confronted with fashionable preferences and trends in taste that prove to be relatively short-lived." Development of the concept Not everything that seems ideal from a design standpoint can be implemented as a practical technical concept. When the designers start their work, therefore, their colleagues in Concept Development begin to realise the vehicle project at the same time. As Ralf-Gerhard Willner, Head of Vehicle Concepts at Audi, puts it: "We are to some extent the mediators between the various worlds." He defines his task as tracking down the best possible compromise between emotive styling, customer-relevant and legally permissible demands and the concept’s technical feasibility. One of the main tasks of Concept Development is to lay down the vehicle’s principal dimensions and its architecture. The engineer Felix Biffar undertook this work for the Audi Q7 project: "From the very outset, the emphasis when the package was drafted out for the Audi Q7 was on typical Audi qualities: design, driving dynamics, safety, the operating concept, comfort and convenience." One of the first assumptions for the AU 716 project, he goes on to explain, was for a third row of seats to be an option. "Market surveys have confirmed that customers want this kind of flexible, purpose-orientated seat arrangement in a vehicle of this size," explained Biffar. A wheelbase of three metres was therefore chosen. The high seat position characteristic of an SUV was also included in the requirement specification from the very start, as were sporty handling, an above-average level of comfort on long journeys, off-road capability, ample room for the occupants and the largest load area in its class. Another requirement was that despite its imposing dimensions, with an overall length of more than five metres and a width of almost two metres, the Audi Q7 should have a sporty visual character. Also finalised by Concept Development at a very early stage: the size of the wheels, the range of engines and transmissions to be offered, the use of air suspension, the MMI operating concept and the capacity of the fuel tank. Biffar comments: "We wanted to create a "performance SUV" from the outset, with a combination of emotive design, comfort, agile handling, luxury, flexibility and space – something that no model in the SUV segment had so far succeeded in achieving." By the end of 2003, the technical aspects of the Audi Q7’s specification had been largely finalised. As far as the main dimensions were concerned, the concept development team was able to make rapid progress by using the show car as a basis. Biffar and Willner describe the procedure as "lean", and even as "relaxed" in comparison to other projects. Willner explains why: "Our advantage was that the Audi Q7 was an entirely new product for us. There were no preconceived opinions, and we didn’t have to base our work on a previous model." When development work began, the core team consisted of just 20 people, but the total number went up steadily as the project continued, until in the end about 500 men and women were working exclusively on Audi Q7 development. Virtual worlds: simulation and computing Among these employees were many who were closely involved in the car’s progress, its appearance and its design long before they were able to handle a single component "in the flesh". Never before had such intensive use been made of computer-aided simulation tools from the virtual world. Never before had so many of the Audi Q7’s characteristics been portrayed with the aid of bits and bytes, and never before had so few actual prototypes been built and, at the same time, such a high level of production maturity attained. The advantages are obvious: everything than can be designed, destroyed, tested, modified and displayed on a screen in the virtual world of the computer only needs to be confirmed when actual hardware – culminating in the "real car" – becomes available. This not only cuts development time and cost but also boosts quality, since any conflicts of objective affecting the car can be eliminated even more accurately and efficiently. This is the world in which terms such as Computer Aided Design (CAD), Computer Aided Engineering (CAE), Digital Mock-Up (DMU), Finite Element Method (FEM) or Virtual Reality (VR) are bandied about all the time in conversation among the technical specialists. They work with super-computers, microprocessors, power walls, gigantic volumes of data and the very latest software technologies. This is where the classic skills of mechanical engineering and vehicle design come together with advanced mathematics, lattice structures suitable for input to the computer and complex differential equations. There is very little that the computer cannot calculate and simulate. The list of areas in which simulation technology is used in motor-vehicle manufacturing is a long one: body rigidity, strength and operating life, avoidance of unpleasant vibration, doors, lids, occupant protection, interior components, joining techniques and crash performance can all be displayed by these methods, as can driving dynamics, ride comfort, fuel consumption, sensor operation, aerodynamics and aero-acoustics, heating, ventilation and air conditioning, headlights, suspension characteristics or the actual combustion process in the engine. Many others could be mentioned too: Audi Technical Development currently uses some 250 simulation methods in production areas. Even in the early vehicle development phase, colleagues from the Toolmaking, Production or Test Construction departments participate actively: as elements in the "digital factory", they can simulate how certain sheet-metal parts can best be made (or if they are suitable for production in their initial form). In an imaginary production shop, the spot welds to be produced by the robots are decided upon, and the robots’ own positions determined so that they keep clear of each other while performing the necessary movements. In the "Cave", as it is called, an engineer from Test Construction wearing 3D goggles extends a fully movable "virtual hand" into the Audi Q7’s body. He is using this authentic three-dimensional environment to check whether an employee on the assembly line will later be able to install, for example, a seat designed on the computer or the vehicle’s roof lining easily without any collisions with other components occurring. Nor should we forget that all this happens at a time when neither the car itself nor any of its components have been built. At the power wall, a back-projection screen about 6 metres wide and 2.5 metres high, everyone involved in the development process, from technicians to members of the Board of Management, can view a virtual picture of the Audi Q7. Almost every detail can be displayed, even the surface texture of materials used inside the car. With a single mouse-click, the car can be turned for viewing from every possible perspective, or the observer can make a circular flight all around it or through the interior. Various paint finishes and equipment specifications, as well as left- or right-hand-drive versions, can all be conjured up within a matter of seconds. The development engineers can even blend the real and virtual worlds together on the power wall, for example by displaying the virtual Audi Q7 in a real setting to see what effect is created when it is seen on the road. Dr. Ulrich Widmann is Head of Functional Design at Audi. He knows the reasons why simulation technologies have now become indispensable: "A model such as the Audi Q7 is a highly complex combination of many different components and assemblies, with any number of different characteristics. To develop it and determine its performance by means of genuine tests would be totally impracticable. Such a mammoth task can only be tackled successfully by means of a vast number of virtual-world simulations." Even in the Audi Q7 concept phase, computing and optimising the design ratings of the vehicle package is a particularly important task. There are tools that permit the modular vehicle concept to be described by just a few different parameters – about 1,000 in all, each of which can be changed interactively. Adjacent design areas that are influenced by these changes are then modified automatically. For example, the complete B-post can be moved rearwards by five centimetres within a matter of minutes. The volume of data necessitated by such a change is immense: for a crash analysis on a modern car, up to a million elements are now involved when calculating the results within a period of 150 milliseconds. To calculate the effects of a frontal collision, the super-computer with its eight processors needs about 22 hours. When Audi Q7 development is complete, some 2,000 virtual frontal crash tests will have been carried out, compared with just over 40 on actual vehicles. Dr. Widmann: "Our forecast accuracy from these simulations is already 90 % or higher!" An important aspect of such processes is for all the departments taking part to be networked together at an early stage, so that all of them have access to the latest design data. Widmann: "For the Audi Q7, we used an "Engineering Portal" for the first time that our suppliers were able to access directly as well." The experts’ term for this kind of closely interlocked development work that takes place in parallel is "Simultaneous Engineering" (SE). "We never worked as intensively as this before in the virtual world. Together with an actual concept car to act as a basis for package decisions and convey a sense of space, we were able to reach the series-production development phase more rapidly", says Dr. Widmann. The "Strake" On the Audi Q7, virtual reality also played a decisive part in an area that can be regarded as a link between the design and construction departments: the "Strake". This term, which came originally from shipbuilding, now refers to the geometrical representation of all the vehicle’s interior and exterior surfaces that are visible to the customer – taking all technical and formal aesthetic requirements into account. The "Strake" therefore embodies the core competence for the finest surface finishes and the associated quality. "We act as a bridge between design, that is to say the aesthetic statement made by the design model, and construction, representing the technical activities of the Vehicle Development departments", says Horst Schneider, who is in charge of "Strake" visualisation. According to his records, between 600 and 800 components with relevant surfaces are "straked" for every project. As the product range continues to grow and become more varied, but the time available for development work becomes shorter, systematic use of virtual techniques is essential as an error filter and an aid to decision-making in the process. Horst Schneider explains: "If we wish to make decisions possible at early stages in the development process, we shall have to integrate virtual reality even more strongly into our day-to-day "straking" activity in the future." Whereas previously only one digital data control model was processed in virtual form, today construction and visualisation data are networked during the very first discussions (design, "straking", project, simultaneous engineering, technical team) and can thus be prepared photo-realistically and used for decision-making. Schneider: "There are various degrees of preparation for visualising the "straking" process. For a discussion on the overall impression made by the vehicle’s interior or the body, the quality is naturally many times higher that during a normal working meeting where a rapid general view of an individual part is all that’s needed." The general impression, lighting simulation, surface diagnosis, colour variants, view through to the rear or the production of pictorial material for Marketing colleagues are just some of the activities undertaken with VR in the straking process. Design Check The Design Check is a kind of "barometer of maturity" during Audi Q7 development as a whole. It is a visualisation and decision-making process aimed at avoiding incorrect development steps and enabling clearly defined work instructions to be issued. The Design Check begins in the concept phase and continues until production starts. During this lengthy process, concepts and the current development-work position are visualised and verified at an early stage. The engineers operate both in visual worlds and with models, but also with "genuine" fully-functional vehicles. The purpose of the Design Check is to render the complete Audi Q7 project transparent for everyone who is concerned with the vehicle’s development. Ergonomics and package dimensions, for example the door sills, legroom and headroom, loading through the tailgate, the view to the rear, the driving position and even the practicability of the cup holders can all be examined at an early stage during the Design Check. This is also where all the necessary product optimisation measures are agreed with the specialist departments, with the aim of enhancing series-production development quality and, as a result, the quality of the finished product. Wind tunnel A great many specialist areas were – and are – directly involved in development of the Audi Q7 to series production readiness. The project acquired much of its dynamic character from the engineers concerned with aerodynamics and aero-acoustics. Audi Q7 prototypes and pre-production vehicles spent more than a thousand hours in the Audi wind tunnel centre in Ingolstadt, which is one of the most modern anywhere in the world. The results are a drag coefficient of 0.34, the best value in the large SUV segment, and extremely low wind noise levels. For Dr. Michael Jaroch, who with his team was responsible for Audi Q7 aerodynamic, aero-acoustic and water management development work, achieving such good results was far from easy. As he says: "Optimum design of a vehicle of this size, without any adverse effects on its styling, is a difficult balancing act for us." The Audi development engineers studied the airflow acting on the Audi Q7 in a vehicle wind tunnel that is both quieter and faster than those currently in use anywhere in the world. A turbine approximately four metres in diameter, with a drive rating of 2.6 Megawatts, delivers air to the wind tunnel at up to 300 kph. The thermal wind tunnel is used to optimise the flow of air to the Audi Q7’s cooling systems. On this hi-tech test rig, the temperature can be varied anywhere between 20 and 50 degrees Celsius, and the airflow accelerated up to 275 kph. Even the floor of the measurement zone can be heated, to simulate hot road surfaces. Set into the floor is an additional roller for Audi models with quattro four-wheel drive. A further development priority is water management. The aim here is to minimise interference with the driver’s view of the road as a result of dirt and water on the windows. Dr. Jaroch illustrates this as follows: "Critical situations can for example arise if the car is following a truck along a wet road, and water spray from its wheels obscures the driver’s view. This can typically occur at speeds of between 70 and 90 kilometres per hour. Our aim in the case of the Audi Q7 was to optimise the airflow round the A-posts and exterior mirrors so that the side windows and mirror glass remain clean." How is this achieved? The vehicle is sprayed with a fluorescent liquid in a special wind tunnel devoted to surface contamination. Under black light, the paths taken by rain and spray and the areas where the water collects can be clearly seen. Electronics Audi naturally keeps pace with the rapidly increasing importance of automotive electronics – in the Audi Q7 as in all other Audi models. For this purpose, an ultra-modern Electronics Centre has been specially built on the Technical Development site in Ingolstadt. All Audi’s competence in electronics is concentrated in this seven-storey building, which includes space for future extensions. Some 750 employees from the Development, Purchasing, Quality Assurance, Production Planning, After Sales and Controlling departments work there. Peter Dlab, in charge of Electrics/Electronics Project Steering for the Audi Q7, sees the significance of electronics in this way: "Automotive electronics are a key technology, and have therefore been made into a core competence area at Audi." In the cars of tomorrow, up to 90 % of all innovations will be based on electronics. The volume of electronics is increasing all the time: navigation systems, on-board computers, infotainment, electronic engine and transmission management, airbags, ABS, ESP, electric windows and central locking – without electronics, none of these would function as they do in the modern car. A large number of electronic control units in the vehicle communicate with each other; Audi models have long since taken to the "data highway". An example will serve to show the unstoppable progress of in-car software integration: an Audi Q7 with top-level specification contains as many as 50 electronic control units and has a memory capacity of up to 90 Megabytes. Peter Dlab: "That’s precisely where the major challenge lies. We have to make these increasingly complex in-car electronic networks easy for the customer to operate, and also ensure that they process data reliably." Another important aspect involves bringing the remarkable development progress that is being made in electronics into harmony with the comparatively lengthy life-cycle of the average car. The Electronics Centre plays a decisive part in this strategy, by grouping all Audi’s competence in the electronics area under one roof. The terraced building complex provides workplaces for 400 electronics development experts, 80 employees from a variety of Purchasing departments and 50 specialists from Quality Assurance and Production Preparation. Each of the project teams includes members from various company work areas, with efficient "cross-desk" communication between them. Innovative electronics development naturally includes organisational changes, a minimum number of hierarchy levels, efficient processes and a young, highly motivated team. Project teams can be brought together at one point for various activities in a number of different areas, without major modifications to the room layout. This is particularly important in the electronics field, since experts in widely varying disciplines often have to work together for limited periods on specific projects. The Electronics Centre is not only impressive in its architecture: it is also equipped with the very latest measuring and testing apparatus, for instance a climatic roller test rig that is used to test operation and reliability of electronic components for the Audi Q7 at the most extreme temperatures and over a variety of road surfaces. This combined test rig can simulate arctic temperatures just as effectively as humid, tropical weather or the extreme heat of the desert. The complete electronics for the Audi Q7 are tested on a board assembly, and the reliability and fault-free interaction of the components – up to 4,000 in all – checked in detail. The MMI laboratory is entirely devoted to checking and developing all the functions to be performed by Audi’s innovative Multi Media Interface (MMI) concept in authentic operating conditions. MMI is standard equipment in the Audi Q7. There is also an ultra-modern acoustic laboratory in which the engineers perfect the sound system for the new SUV. Yet another impressive facility is the lighting test area, 50 metres long and 10 metres wide, which is used to develop new vehicle lighting systems. Audi is already one of the leading car manufacturers in the electronics area, in which it has achieved a high standard of reliability. The Audi Q7 also sets new standards in "chips, bits and bytes". Not one but several innovative driver assistance systems have reached series production for the first time on this model. For example the "Audi side assist" radar-supported lane-change assistant and "parking system advanced" with its visual and audible signals and rear-view camera. The ESP includes several new functions, such as the hill descent assistant. A special off-road mode optimises brake-system performance and traction on loose surfaces. A trailer stabilisation system uses controlled brake applications to reduce the risk of snaking when a trailer is being towed. None of these features would be practicable without electronics. The Electronics Centre will enable Audi to consolidate and extend the leading position it already occupies in this area. As electronics are used to an ever-greater extent in modern cars, electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) is becoming an increasingly important topic. This term refers to a vehicle’s ability to operate correctly in an environment in which electromagnetic interference signals may occur, and also to avoid transmitting such signals if they could prevent other equipment from operating safely. Audi operates an extremely modern EMC centre in which the Audi Q7 too was exposed to a torrent of external radio signals. The central element in this EMC testing centre is the big absorber room. It has metal screening and is lined with pyramid-shaped absorbers to reduce reflection of radio waves. In this futuristic setting, large aerials bombard the Audi Q7 with electromagnetic fields in the frequency range from one Megahertz to three Gigahertz. Test-driving To make sure that the Audi Q7’s features remain fully operational, even in extreme conditions, when the vehicle is in the hands of the customer, a test driving programme is carried out. Never before has a model been exposed to tests representing such an extensive range of potential tasks and applications as those to which the Audi Q7 was subjected. Before the first production vehicles are delivered to customers next spring, Audi Q7 prototypes and pre-production vehicles will have covered several million test kilometres. Testing takes place at a variety of locations: on various test rigs, at the Volkswagen Group’s proving ground, on the Arctic Circle at minus 35 degrees Celsius, in the scorching heat of South African desert, sand and loose stones, on highways in Florida, on dusty tracks surfaced with gravel chippings in Europe, Asia, Brazil and Central America, and on the North Loop of the Nürburgring motor racing circuit. Every other kind of road is featured in the programme too: isolated, twisting country roads, German motorways and dense city-centre traffic. Although still disguised, the Audi Q7 is on the road constantly, often in the farthest corners of the earth and in the most severe dynamic, climatic and topographical conditions. Suspension and driving dynamics The Audi Q7 is designed to master a variety of different driving tasks equally well: long-distance road travel, leisure activities and off-road driving. This calls for a combination of widely differing chassis and suspension characteristics. Audi’s development engineers have tuned the Audi Q7’s suspension systematically to achieve a standard of road dynamics previously considered impossible. Front-to-rear axle load distribution of 52:48 when unladen (V8 FSI) and quattro permanent four-wheel drive with dynamic load-dependent torque distribution are the keys to optimal road behaviour right up to the handling limits. In the words of Thomas Kriegel, Head of Driving Characteristics Simulation at Audi: "We used DOE (Design of Experiments) methods to determine details of the suspension components at a very early stage in our development work. We chose the settings for the springs, shock absorbers, anti-roll bars and tyres to ensure harmonious, easily controlled handling in all operating situations." For example, to achieve the ideal combination of firmness values in various directions for the rubber-to-metal bushings, the Suspension Computing staff investigated several thousand versions in various load situations and for each axle. To make it easier to filter out the most suitable combinations of values, they established target ranges for all the main suspension performance areas. These were subsequently investigated in more detail. It was found for example that the firmness of the steering box mountings, together with the front wishbone pivot bushings, determines the lower levels of acceptable agility and dynamic stability. By means of thorough road testing, the engineers arrived at a typical Audi combination of sportiness and ride comfort, whether the vehicle was fitted with steel springs and conventional shock absorbers or air suspension with controlled damping. Thomas Kriegel sums up: "Air suspension offered us additional scope for optimising high-speed dynamics. Firmer shock-absorber settings and step-by-step lowering of the body for aerodynamic reasons have the effect of stabilising the Audi Q7’s handling still further. Compared with competitors, it has the best dynamic driving characteristics." To achieve this, the development team had to take a number of different aspects into consideration: a premium-class SUV, for instance, is a popular choice for long journeys on account of its high seat position and its attractive interior trim. The occupants naturally expect ride comfort to reach an equally high standard. Thomas Kriegel explains how this was achieved: "An initial aid to determining the ride-comfort settings was an operating-point analysis, using details of the forces measured in the rubber bushings." For this purpose, the computing engineers simulated excitation from the road surface (for example rough asphalt, cobblestones and lateral joint lines) using a high-resolution multi-body model of the Audi Q7. In this way, the bushings could be ideally matched to the forces that occur when the vehicle performs movements relevant to occupant comfort. Kriegel concludes: "Finally, these and other changes to suspension components were assessed repeatedly for acceleration values at the "comfort points" such as the steering wheel and seat, using a complete-vehicle model, so that we obtained an excellent starting situation for fine tuning on the road." A car for the senses When a new Audi model is being developed, what are known as the "soft factors" are also becoming increasingly important. Apart from the visual satisfaction of a well-styled vehicle, the senses of hearing, smell and feel also played a signficant role in Audi Q7 development. Audi was one of the first car manufacturers to recognise the importance of these factors and set up special teams to work on them. One of these teams deals with haptics. Gerhard Mauter, Head of the Control Haptics team, is an engineer "with feeling", so to speak, though this scarcely hints at the full extent of his work. Haptics are the science of touch, but here again the task is not limited to making an Audi feel pleasant wherever the occupant comes into contact with one of its surfaces. Ergonomics, control logic, smooth movement and attractive appearance also play their part whenever controls and switches are pulled, pushed, pressed, slid, turned or simply touched inside the car. How does one find oneself working in such an esoteric area? Gerhard Mauter explains: "It’s important for haptics to be taken seriously, and also for one to approach the subject with a certain degree of sensitivity. This of course starts quite literally at the fingertips, but it goes beyond such physical characteristics and largely takes place in the mind." Mauter has been in charge of the haptics team for more than five years now; it was first formed back in 1995 – a sign that Audi has always taken this topic very seriously indeed. There are good reasons for this: haptics are of considerable importance in the car. The impressions gained by touching and handling the controls and surfaces exert a strong influence on the potential customer’s purchase decision. Whoever sits in an Audi should feel good from the start. To make sure that this applies to all Audi models, the haptics team was set up. Then there is the Audi "Nose Team": its job is to "poke its nose" into every possible part of the car, to track down objectionable smells and to ensure that the inside of an Audi, is always consistently agreeable. Plasticisers exuded by synthetic materials, leather with an odour of fish oil, floor mats that smell as if they had been in contact with onions – none of these have a chance to spoil the quality of an Audi car. Nor, of course, have materials that could produce emissions that represent a health risk. As many as 500 parts used inside each model are analysed by the "artificial nose". Audi sets benchmark standards for the industry in odour avoidance. The aim is not so much the avoidance of all odours as the production of an "odour-neutral" car in which the customer always encounters a pleasant atmosphere. Heinz Stahl, who heads Audi’s team of odour detectives, says: "Eliminating all smells would be more or less impossible, and not particularly desirable either. It would be comparable to travelling in an acoustically dead vehicle." Every car is now a sensory pleasure. How should this be understood? Stahl explains: "We spend quite a lot of time in our cars, so that our sensory perceptions are becoming more and more important." A new car should always have a typical odour, but of course not an objectionable one. This is the task tackled by the "olfactory experts" (olfactology is the scientific study of odours). What may seem only of secondary importance compared with other aspects of the car can subconsciously play a fundamental role for the customer. The leader of the "Nose team" explains this by reference to the comfort hierarchy, which has been confirmed by scientific investigations: "Imagine this in the form of a pyramid. The customer’s well-being is right at the top, the car’s odour is down at the bottom. If an unpleasant smell comes to the customer’s attention, he or she no longer senses all the car’s other comfort and convenience aspects in a positive way, but is totally irritated by the objectionable smell." In the sound design area, the important thing is to strike the right note – something that Audi achieves with particular success in its cars. Acoustic development work has become an important element in car development at the Ingolstadt-based manufacturer, and one of the calling cards of the brand with the four-ring badge. How should an Audi sound? That depends on the type of vehicle, and also on what the customer expects. For the Audi Q7, the sonic image can be described as "powerful and sporty". Dr. Ralf Kunkel, Head of Audi Acoustics, is the conductor of the "Audi orchestra". As an engineer, his choice of words is perhaps unusual: as well as using this term, he speaks of "composing" and "directing", of "good musicians", of "out-of-tune players" and of the "Symphony of the Four Rings". His guiding principle: "The sound must be what the listener expects to hear. Sound stimulates emotion." He has a very convincing example to illustrate this: a photo of a glass of lager appears on the screen, but the sound track is of tap water being poured into the glass. The listener automatically registers the fact the picture and the sound don’t fit together. In other words, "we expect something and are then disappointed." One can apply the same logic to a car. Dr. Kunkel explains that the sound it makes must tie up with the expectations that the model positioning arouses in the customer. To put this another way: anyone who buys a Audi Q7, sits behind the wheel and presses the accelerator expects to hear a strong, sporty sound. Too much acoustic restraint would disappoint the customer in this case. Yet at the same time, the sound must not be too obtrusive or begin to cause irritation as the journey continues. The Audi Q7’s acoustic image has therefore been slanted towards comfort in a way that also emphasises the vehicle’s supreme character in a fairly restrained manner. Dr. Kunkel: "For a model like the Audi Q7, everything has to blend together perfectly: design, performance, objective size – and sound!" The "Squeak and Rattle" team is on the track of quite different sounds. Eckhard Peithmann, the leader of this group of "good listeners", and his colleagues have located and suppressed just about every form of minor noise – from rattling to far more subtle sources of aural irritation – in the latest model families. During Audi Q7 development too, they conducted innumerable tests both on the road and on the company’s test rigs with the aim of driving any squeaks and rattles out into the open and eliminating the causes. Some people at Audi call him simply "The Ear". Peithmann himself smiles when he hears this nickname: "This is certainly a job that calls for good hearing – but also for plenty of patience! There are some sounds you simply can’t hear until you’ve run the test over and over again." Those who not only hear them but somehow sense them too – these are Eckhard Peithmann’s most sought-after colleagues. The listening team is made up of development engineers, and staff from Quality Assurance, Production and Customer Care. Peithmann’s verdict: "You don’t learn our job at school or in training sessions. And not everyone has the patience it needs." Peithmann, a blues fan, has a strong dislike of rattling, unmusical glove box lids, squeaking seat frames or creaking plastic trim. But as he readily admits, suppressing obvious noise is not the real problem: his remedies have to work on a variety of road surfaces, at specific temperatures, speeds or after the car has covered a certain distance. Otherwise they may reappear to plague an otherwise contented customer. Locating the origins of all these noise sources is an extremely complex, time-consuming task. Audi Q7 noise analysis took at least a year to complete. Every four to six weeks, the noise detectives take a test run, sometimes in icy-cold Scandinavia, sometimes on desert trails in North Africa. Between these excursions, noise elimination continues intensively on the roller and vibration test rigs, climatic chambers, dummy-head microphones and hydropulsers in the Ingolstadt plant’s Technical Development and Quality Assurance departments. Peithmann: "Over the years, the number of trial runs and noise analyses has steadily increased, the reason being that the Audi model range has grown all the time and so new product launches naturally occur at more frequent intervals." But why do Audi’s acoustics experts have to go as far as the Arctic Circle in their hunt for noise sources? This is explained by Franz Lang from the Design Check and Test Run department, who is also a member of the "Squeak and Rattle Management Circle": "We can find winter temperatures there down to minus 40 degrees Celsius. In a climate such as that, plastics lose their flexibility, their friction coefficients change and they are more likely to generate noise." Exposure to extreme heat can have different but equally serious consequences, so that here too certain types of plastics in the car begin to creak or chatter. At first glance, there’s something exotic about the way the noise eliminating team goes about its work. An acoustics engineer is quite likely to be found huddled up in the boot of the car during the test run, "just to hear what’s going on" – no manner how bumpy the road or how low the outside temperature. The tester occupying the passenger seat may have his head down in the footwell and his feet on the head restraint during the test run, and be listening hard for a noise that’s difficult to locate. Eckhard Peithmann sums up: "It’s true, we crawl into every nook and cranny on the car!" But since road safety risks have to be allowed for, these test runs take place on cordoned-off test tracks rather than on the public highway. Quality assurance All these efforts culminate in the high quality that has been achieved on the Audi Q7. Quality assurance personnel take part in development meetings from a very early stage. Marcus Hoffmann, who is responsible for Audi Q7 Quality Planning and Steering, says: "At the start, we were less concerned with detailed quality matters than with the task of determining what demands the customer makes of a vehicle such as the Audi Q7." In the next phase, the experts monitor the quality by means of design and data control models or prototypes. Hoffmann: "Quality has to be part of development work from the very start. It can’t be applied to the vehicle at a later stage." The quality assurance teams have borne the needs of American customers in mind throughout their work. As a model in the SUV segment, the Audi Q7 is closely geared to North American market requirements. During development, the new model was therefore driven regularly from an early stage by staff from Audi of America and assessed in accordance with US customers’ preferences. Hoffmann: "In most cases, those who drove the car have day-to-day contact with customers and are extremely familiar with their wishes." In addition, experts from the American market research company J.D. Power and Associates were invited to Ingolstadt and their suggestions incorporated into the Audi Q7 development process. In the USA, J.D. Power is one of the most respected arbiters of consumer satisfaction: it issues a regular bulletin on this topic and assesses the quality of cars from the customers’ standpoint. Hoffmann: "In this way we able to gain a picture at an early stage of how the US customer would react to the Audi Q7 and what he would expect of it." Some of the results of this exchange of views are the large cup holders in the centre console, the bottle holders in all four doors, the way the air conditioning operates, which is somewhat different from European practice, and the folding mechanism for the third row of seats, which is child’s play to operate. But Hoffmann is nonetheless confident: "We have by no means neglected the wishes of other customers from around the world. We have simply combined these often very different requirements in the most effective possible way." Fine-tuning of technical, visible and haptic quality takes place at the pre-production stage. At Audi, one of the measuring instruments used for this is referred to as the "master gauge". Versions for both inside and outside the car are used. Even for Josef Junker, the Measuring Technology and Master Gauge Manager in the Quality Assurance department, the name is something of a mystery. But as he explains, "The master gauge is far more than just a measuring instrument; at Audi it’s an integral element in quality assurance policy." The master gauge is a ladder-type frame made of aluminium, on which the vehicle, including all the currently available parts, is built up, measured and assessed. These assessments take place once a week. A large group including suppliers’ representatives gathers round the master gauge and presents its components in the latest optimised versions to members of the Quality Assurance, Development and Production departments. Are the joint gaps ok? Is the "feel" of the surface acceptable? What impression does the part make when seen in or on the complete vehicle? Can the pushbuttons and switches be easily reached and operated without difficulty? Will it be possible to install the part later without problems arising on the assembly line? Many questions of this kind are discussed and the solutions arrived at during the master gauge meetings. In this way, some three hundred parts relevant to the Audi Q7 are subjected to close examination. At two- to four-week intervals, the Board of Management visits the master gauge department to obtain a picture of the quality level that has so far been achieved. Junker: "The procedure is repeated until we know that we can maintain the high build quality that Audi is famous for." Coordination by model line management But who controls the entire process? Audi has organised it according to model lines. Gerhard Hametner, the Audi Q7 and A8 Model Line Manager, explains: "The demand for an ever-greater variety of models increases pressure on the production process. This is a situation that applies to all car manufacturers. One of the most crucial challenges for AUDI AG is to keep control of this constantly expanding multi-project scene. Despite increasing complexity, new models such as the Audi Q7 must be developed successfully, launched punctually and be in accordance with customers’ wishes." Model line management is responsible for every aspect of the vehicle project: it controls project-related activities, monitors progress and, if there are signs of significant deviations from the targets, steps in and takes remedial action. Hametner sums up: "Model line management controls the Audi Q7 product process at cross-department level, almost as if it were a business within a business, from the decision to go ahead with the project to the market launch of the vehicle and its entire subsequent life-cycle." AUDI AG, Kommunikation Produkt AUDI AG, Communication Product AUDI AG, Communication Produit Ingolstadt, February 2006 Back to Top HOME | CARS AND VEHICLES | AUDI-MODELS | MOTORSPORTS | | HOME | MODELLE | AUDI-MODELLE | MOTORSPORT | MOBILER ALLTAG | © Copyright 2006, motormove online. All rights reserved.