Toyota Motor Corporation Selects CarSim for Use in World's Largest Driving Simulator

ANN ARBOR, Mich. - Considered the largest of its kind in the world, Toyota Motor Corporation's new world-class driving simulator uses an actual vehicle inside a 23-foot diameter dome, with a 360 degree, concave video screen simulating a realistic driving environment. In addition to testing suspension, braking and other vehicle systems, it will measure driver behavior under a range of circumstances.

CarSim(R) Real Time (RT) from Ann Arbor, Mich.-based Mechanical Simulation Corporation is used to provide all the critical vehicle dynamics simulation for the system. "An installation of this magnitude can allow auto manufacturers to conduct precise tests of their designs, without the time, expense and hazards of road testing," said Terence Rhoades, Mechanical Simulation president. "Driver-behavior tests can be created in a repeatable, simulated environment. Without the danger of traffic exposure and unpredictable weather and road conditions, Toyota can simulate driver and vehicle responses to a wide range of environments, as well driver response to safety technology such as Intelligent Traffic Systems (ITS)."

In fact, the Toyota simulator, located in Tokyo, is designed to measure vehicle performance impact from a wide range of driver characteristics, including reduced awareness of one's surroundings, inattentiveness to danger and impaired driving. The data are used to evaluate the effectiveness of safety technology such as driver-warning and vehicle-control systems in the vehicle and ITS outside the vehicle.

CarSim uses information derived from driver control inputs (steering angle, throttle, brake) and from the external environment, computes how the vehicle will move, and then provides motion instructions to the simulator and to the scenario generator creating the visual environment. The Toyota simulator features a vehicle inside the 23-foot diameter dome.