Design and Implementation of Flex Ray Communication Protocol in Automotives

Today for a security critical and safety application in automotives, a protocol is required which can transfer the data with a higher speed than existing protocol. As concepts like x-by-wire(x used for drive, steer, brake, etc.,)where steering arms and brake pipes are replaced by electric wire and integrated circuits, a robust and fail-safe communication is needed, and Flex Ray is fulfilling these needs. Failure of these critical systems will cause accident and personal injuries, so a robust and fail-safe communication is needed to avoid these conditions. CAN is a existing protocol in automotives, which is a multi-master broadcast serial bus communication protocol for connecting electronic control units(ECUs).Flex Ray is a newly introduced, communication protocol for automotive control system which is developed to fulfil the increasing demand in automotives for higher safety and comfort. Fault-tolerant property of Flex Ray is mainly highlighted in this protocol so that it can be robust enough to apply for safety critical applications. Flex Ray can overcome the disadvantage of existing CAN protocol. It can be used in automotive industries as well as other industries, where safety and reliability is must, because of its deterministic approach to communication of the message. This is done by the help of two channel topology, where each channel can work independently and can also be used to communicate same information and as such has built in redundancy. In this protocol if one channel fails then other will be available for work, so one channel is always available for backup in safety critical applications. This paper will demonstrate the Flex Ray protocol in automobile and will also explain the design and implementation of electric window to show the communication in Flex Ray protocol.