Predicting Automotive Electronics Performance with Digital Twins

Digital twins — fully functional 3D virtual replicas of vehicles — have revolutionized auto design and manufacturing. Now a team of Molex engineers is developing product digital twins at the electronic component level to design, optimize and validate electrical products in the virtual world to predetermine their capabilities and lifespan. Virtually validating connectors, which will become critical to modern vehicle design, arms automotive OEMs and Tier 1 suppliers with information to help save money, reduce recall risk and minimize time-consuming physical testing and revisions.

Designing cars with product digital twins offers automakers several advantages. A product digital twin is a virtual representation of a physical product that enables functional performance prediction on a product after manufacturing — from production to failure in the field, or end of life.

At each step of the design process, automakers can use digital twins to simulate a vehicle’s operation to identify and fix problems before spending money on production. Engineers can receive data from simulation models to allow performance validation on a range of factors, including structural integrity, weight, package size optimization, current rating, thermal management, signal integrity, EMI/EMC, high voltage considerations, ergonomic assembly and serviceability requirements. New ideas can also be tested using fewer physical prototypes.  

A shareable 3D model also enhances collaboration. Different teams can work together simultaneously, using a single source of constantly updated information to create and modify related systems and keep them in sync. Though digital predictive modeling is never meant to replace physical testing fully, it can reduce the amount of physical testing that needs to be done for product validation.

As megatrends like autonomous driving come closer to reality, having these capabilities in place has become critical. Molex is investing in product digital twin capabilities to enable these cutting-edge technologies and agile processes. Because in the ever-changing automotive industry, those prepared to adapt and innovate will thrive. Those who don’t are bound to fade.

The success of virtual car models stood out as a major opportunity for Molex engineers, and they saw the potential for its application in electrical connector design. 

The idea is compelling at a time when consumers demand capabilities that require more software-embedded controls, which are running everything from driving assistance and safety automation to personalized entertainment and cabin settings. Since all these capabilities require new electronic control units (ECU) and cabling, automakers are starting to run out of space, and their vehicles are gaining drag-inducing weight. A design revamp is in order, and what could be a better way to innovate and move products into production than a realistic virtual model? 

Last year, a Molex engineering team set to work and created a high-fidelity digital twin that can accurately predict and validate a connector’s current rating with 95% accuracy. Traditionally, manufacturers do extensive physical product testing or use surrogate data to validate products. But physical testing takes about 14 weeks, and customers don’t want to wait that long. Moreover, surrogate data can be off by as much as 60-70%, posing huge risks for adoption.

Using a product digital twin, engineers can collaborate with manufacturers to adjust and validate specifications as required and obtain accurate results.  

In addition to validating the current rating, the model can measure the effects of temporary current spikes. Combining this with reliability science models would predict product life under different specifications — key factors in reducing warranty costs and recalls. They are also looking for ways to optimize manufacturability. 

With the knowledge from digital twins of current rating and mechanical functions, engineers can explore design space efficiency and come up with solutions to solve manufacturers’ space and weight problems. In a pilot project, MX-DaSH, the Molex team uses a space-conserving zonal architecture for the wiring harness and has designed miniaturized hybrid connectors to carry both traditional and high-speed signals more efficiently. One wire-to-device solution example combines fourteen signal connectors into one, providing extremely compact connectivity to electronic control units (ECU) and computers throughout the vehicle. 

For Molex, MX-DaSH is just the beginning. Over the next few years, engineers plan to create comprehensive product digital twin capabilities for electrical connectors by expanding and improving these capabilities in areas of mechanical, sealing, thermal and electrical functions. This can be coupled with reliability science to establish publishable length-of-life specifications for connectors. All these considerations are top automaker concerns.

Down the road, the lessons they learn today may be applied far beyond the auto industry, improving connector design and reliability in IoT products everywhere.

By collaborating with Molex, engineers in the automotive industry gain access to cutting-edge product digital twin technology that enables shortened product development times and more reliable vehicle design — helping them stay ahead of the competition.