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Department of Automotive Engineering  

The Department of Automative Engineering at South China University of Technology is recognized as having research strengths in both vehicle design and experimental and manufacturing techniques in the disciplines of vehicle body, chassis system, and vehicle vibration, noise and fault diagnosis. We are one of the earliest universities who have the undergraduate speciality of Vehicle Design and Manufacturing in China. We have the Guangdong Key Laboratory for Automotive Engineering and a Laboratory Center. There are 2 majors for undergraduate students in the school. Besides, the school offers 2 PhD programs and 3 master programs. The goal of our academic programs is to provide students with practical vehicle design and manufacturing experiences that enable them to address a variety of societal needs.
Our favorable teaching and researching conditions and good academic atmosphere attract many excellent talents. At present the department has 2 academicians, 23 faculty and staff, in which 6 full professors,9 associate professors and 8 lecturers. 60 percent of them are young people, and 73.9 percent owns the doctoral degree. The activities of the research group make a contribution in a number of fundamental and applied areas in the vehicle design and manufacturing field which include:
Vehicle Body Construction and Safety
(1) Lightweight design and manufacturing techniques of vehicle body and vital chassis components. The major research fields are as follows: the lightweight design and manufacturing system for the vehicle body and important chassis components, such as steering arm and suspension etc; lightweight design simulation of body outer panel and manufacturability theory and method; experimental investigation of new materials and techniques for vehicle body and key chassis components; modern design theory and method for vehicle lightweight design etc.

(2) Safety design of vehicle body and vital chassis components. In this field, modern mathematics and mechanics methods are applied to the safety design. Besides, CAE software such as LS-DYNA3D and MADYMO, are used to conduct virtual safety regulations experiments in the computer. In this manner, the development costs and time can be reduced significantly, and the inner deformation of the vehicle body and components can be checked which can not be obtained in the practical collision test.
Vehicle Vibration, Noise and Fault Diagnosis
(1) A series of correction methods for discrete spectrum analysis are presented systematically, which increase significantly the discrete spectrum analysis accuracy. This includes investigations of energy centrobaric correction method, proportion correction method and synthesized correction method of phase difference etc.
(2) Investigation of demodulation analysis and optimization algorithms, and fault diagnosis techniques of transmission and gearbox. Gear engagement frequency modulation and resonance frequency modulation of gear and box are presented. Synthesized automatic diagnosis methods are presented based on time-domain characteristics, spectrum signature and demodulation characteristics, which lay solid foundation for automatic diagnosis of gearbox.
Vehicle System Matching Technology
(1) Vehicle vibration and noise control which includes the following research directions: isolation vibration analysis of powertrain mounting system and its matching design with the whole vehicle; design and development of hydraulic mounts of powertrain mounting system; vibration control of torsion shock absorber of engine crankshaft; vibration control of exhaust system; vibration control and vibration isolation design of vehicle chassis system (sub-frame system and suspension system etc).
(2) Design and analysis of suspension and steering system which includes: kinematic and dynamic analysis of suspension and steering system and its matching with the whole vehicle; structural and strength optimization of vehicle suspension control arm.
Chassis System Dynamics and Integrated Control
(1) Advanced chassis system and its control technology which includes: structural innovation research and development of suspension, steering and braking systems; advanced chassis system control technology based on electronic and hydraulic pressure control system.
(2) Main research results: advance angle tester of engine intelligent ignition; computer integrated control technology development of vehicle ABS/TCS based on active safety; emission and dynamic control system development of modern LPG bus; control method for semi-active suspension via magneto-rheological fluid damper; embedded in-car navigation system; EPS closed-loop system; lamp intelligent control based on CAN communication system; anti-collision system based on millimeter-wave radar and vision system etc.
Contributed Facilities
Vehicle chassis dynamometer machine
Volvo powertrain
Two BMWs
Five engines, including one Hyundai motor and one Nissan motor
Two vehicle body-in-white
1500 suits of UG Software
Disassembly and assembly labs of chassis and engine