Introduction
Page 5DTI307_002-727e-03.15
2. Introduction
The number of sensors in crash test dummies increases
more and more so that the conventional instrumentation
with analogue lines from the dummy to an external data
acquisition system gets problems with the volume of the
cabling. This problem can be solved with very small data
acquisition electronics within or nearby the sensors which
give out the digitized sensor signals via bus lines. Bus li-
nes for data transmission reduce weight and volume of
the cabling so that the additional weight for the in-dummy
electronics will be more than compensated.
Sensor ID modules with TEDS (Transducer Electro-
nic Data Sheets) are state of the art in the conventional
equipment. These modules can be replaced with so called
DiMods (Digitizing Modules), which do not need more
mounting space. DiMods are microelectronic components
with a suited signal acquisition for the enclosed sensor, a
nonvolatile TEDS memory and a bus interface. The bus
technology with DiMods at the sensors and a recorder,
which takes up the bus lines and handles data is called
the DTI concept (Digital Transducer Interface) using the
DTI bus lines.
DTI uses the today available most integrated microelec-
tronic components and is optimized for lowest weight and
volume so that the DTI dummies do not have to be special
prepared and validated.
The main part of the DTI in-dummy measurement system
is a recorder with a large memory and a UPS power
supply for an autonomous operation of the dummy for
more than 10 minutes with all sensors active. These units
are described in a special paper. They are mounted at the
spine box in the center of the dummy.
The DTI bus line is a 4 wire bus with two lines for exci-
tation and two lines for a half duplex data transfer in the
noise-free differential RS-485 format with 6 MHz trans-
mission rate. One DTI bus line has the capacity for the
signals of 12 sensors which are sampled with 20 kHz with
a resolution of 16 bits. Data is stored in the recorder and
the sensor data is transferred online from the DiMods to
the recorder in small packages. The simultaneous data
sampling is controlled by the recorder so that the DiMods
do not need to use a precise clock generator. This offers
a very low volume and power consumption of the whole
system.
DiMods in several designs are available for uniaxial sen-
sors (DiMod Type DTI307.1) and triaxial sensors (DiMod
Type DTI307.3).