Baolong air suspension controller officially passed the assessment of ASPICE CL2 on Jan. 3rd, 2024. This was the second time it passed this assessment, as its TPMS had passed the assessment before. Mr. Charles Zhang, Chairman and President of the company, attended the awarding ceremony. Mr. Yawen Hou, INTACS Certified Principal Assessor, awarded the certificate to Baolong.
Develop air suspension controller in line with international engineering standard
Baolong’s air suspension system segment has been growing rapidly these years and it has got nominations from several automakers at home and abroad. The air suspension controller that passed this assessment is a key component of the air suspension system of a high-end EV by a local brand. As a supplier of integrated systems of this EV, Baolong provides products including air spring assembly, controllers, air reservoirs, air supply units, etc., as well as integrated systems. This is the first integrated air suspension system project of the company and also its first controller project that passed ASPICE CL2. The project was started in September, 2022 and lasted for 16 months. During that period, the development team worked hard, overcame numerous difficulties, implemented the ASPICE specification in the whole process of engineering development, and eventually achieved ASPICE CL2, which marks a new step in the systematization of development of air suspension products.
Collaboration between three Business Units in three cities
The project was led by Dr. Leon Zhang, GM of Integrated System, ECAS BU, and jointly completed by the Integrated System Team of ECAS BU, Baolong IDS (Intelligent driving solutions) factory and Technology Center. Altogether nearly forty engineers from Shanghai, Wuhan and Hefei took part in this.
“We’ve made three major achievements through this project. First, a cross-BU and cross-center product development process and system of air suspension controllers is established; second, our suspension controllers are successfully developed and mass produced according to the requirements of functional safety ISO 26262 system and ASPICE standard; third, we have built a team capable of high-quality software development, and established a development architecture based on a complete V-model. This certification marks that the company's overall capability of system requirement analysis, software development, layered verification, project management and quality control of air suspension controllers is in line with the ASPICE process model, and meets the requirements of major OEMs and Tier-1 partners on technical and product cooperation.” said Dr. Leon Zhang.
The high-performance controller and intelligent production line
The air suspension controller that has achieved ASPICE CL2 is equipped with a 32-bit high-performance Infineon processor, three-axis IMU, and multiple sensor signal interfaces, which are compatible with a wide range of sensor combinations. It allows synchronous control of air spring and electronically controlled damper, and supports control of 4-channel electronically controlled damper, which can be expanded to 8-channel dual-valve electronically controlled damper. It also supports control of 7-channel open air spring system, and can be expanded to control of dual or triple-chamber air spring. The technically-leading product is based on complete AUTOSAR, and has achieved ISO26262 ASIL-B. It supports cyber security (R155/R156), OTA remote software upgrading, and A/B backup. The product has got four nominations and the company has built an automated and intelligent production line which are leading domestically for the production of air suspension controllers in Hefei factory.
In future, the company aims to upgrade the development system of each business unit to meet more international standards, so as to provide technology and products of much higher quality.
