Hail CESAR

Siemens VDO Automotive Corp. says aspects of its modular cockpit structure likely will appear in production vehicles in Europe as early as next year.

The supplier displayed a BMW 5-Series sedan equipped with its fully operational CESAR at the Ward's Auto Interiors show.

The Cockpit Electromechanical System Architecture represents a revolutionary change in the way instrument panels are designed and manufactured for vehicles around the world.

Today, each electronic device installed in an instrument panel — namely instrument clusters, climate control, audio, navigation and the body control module — requires a separate controller with unique software allowing the devices to communicate with each other.

With CESAR, Siemens VDO applies a system approach that optimizes vehicle communication by replacing all five controllers with two central servers, says James Bayley, business development manager-cockpit modules and systems for Siemens VDO.

The first is a “real-time” server that supports the functions of the instrument clusters, body control and climate control, while a second “multimedia” server controls the radio and navigation system, Bayley says.

“It means the brains of the electronic devices are consolidated into central servers, rather than duplicated in redundant software programming and hardware boxes,” he says. The two servers can be located wherever convenient: behind the instrument panel, in the trunk or under the seat.

The design implications are enormous: Massive amounts of wiring harnesses are eliminated, generating overall weight reductions of about 24 lbs. (11 kg) and freeing up about 0.7 cu. ft. (20 L) of valuable packaging real estate within the cockpit.

Overall, weight savings are estimated at 15%, and design costs drop by about 30%, Siemens VDO says.

The CESAR concept also introduces a level of modularity.

Modularity allows auto makers to easily alter the appearance of the cockpit for special-edition vehicles, while maintaining the identical substructure.