At the beginning of 2020, the unexpected outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic broke our peaceful life, and then we could hear news about the pandemic every day. The pandemic wasn’t stably controlled until July. In this situation, AECS started a 30-day summer calibration test.
Ready to Set Out
In order to complete the mission better, AECS chose three test cites of special and typical conditions so as to realize the testing under extreme conditions for vehicle development.
Test Cite 1 Dunhuang
Dunhuang is at an average altitude of 1,200 meters, and has an average temperature of 35℃ in the day. Preliminary high-temperature and high-altitude tests on the vehicle and OBD will be conducted to ensure that the OBD system has no risk of false alarms in high-altitude circumstances and is able to diagnose and report properly; and ensure good performance of the engine and good driving performance of the vehicle in high-altitude circumstances.
On the Way to Dunhuang
Test Cite 2 Qilian
Dadongshu Mountain Pass, at an altitude of 4,120, is the cite for AECS to do the higher-altitude test on the vehicle and OBD at 0℃-10℃. In spite of altitude stress, AECS staff repeatedly did the diagnostic verification on the parts including oxygen transmission, catalytic converter, and GPF, and did the calibration test in variousoperating conditions, just to ensure the reliability and conformity of the test data.
Partial Test Vehicles on Top of Qilian Dadongshu Mountain Pass
Test Cite 3 Yongchuan
On a sunny day after days of rain in Chongqing, the last OBD and vehicle high-temperature calibration test was conducted to the vehicles that had gone through high-temperature and high-altitude tests, in order to further make sure that the OBD system and the vehicle could perform well in high-temperature circumstance.
Partial Test Vehicles in Front of Yongchuan Museum
Starting from Chongqing Research Institute, AECS staff drove the test vehicles all the way through Tianshui, Zhangye, Dunhuang, Qilian, Yongchuan, and finally back to Chongqing Research Institute. On this journey as long as nearly 8,000 km, despite the natural challenges such as high temperature and high altitude, AECS staff and the test vehicles overcame all the difficulties and successfully completed the high-temperature and high-altitude tests in this special period with the pandemic. The test results showed that all test vehicles had met the requirements specified in China 6 emission standard.