Seat control
Seat control module
The seat and its functions are an essential part of cabin comfort and safety and as one of the direct interfaces to the driver and passengers, it is an important contributor to the user experience and a differentiator for the car-makers. Today, high-end seats combine applications for:
- Seat adjustment or seat movement, e.g., the setting of position, height, length, width, angle, back angle, and also headrest position and angle
- Seat comfort, e.g. dynamic bolsters, lumbar support, massage, heating, cooling and/or ventilation, “air-scarf”, entry aid, and individualized adjustment memory
- Seat safety functions such as seatbelt pretensioner, which are part of the vehicle safety system
- Seat passenger detection, several sensors are the built-in seat and feedback to the system for more safety and reliability
As modern seat modules take on additional functions, they have a comparable complexity to body control modules with similar challenges in meeting requirements for supply, communication, sense, actuation and control, and quiescent current targets. To manage seat control modules in the smallest space and with the lowest power dissipation and low quiescent current, integration of functions is one of the key factors for design.
The Infineon product portfolio here is best prepared and offers many product families with high integration:
- OPTIREG™ SBC (System Basis Chip) gathers in one product a system supply, communication interface, diagnosis, switching functions, and failsafe output with the best-in-class quiescent current.
- MOTIX™ DC Motor System IC combines supply, communication, diagnosis, switching functions, and failsafe output along with half-bridge gate drives
- MOTIX™ Multi MOSFET Driver IC to control up to eight Half-Bridges (with external MOSFETs) with best-in-class quiescent current
- MOTIX™ Single half-bridge IC, low ohmic protected single Half-Bridge Switch (with integrated MOSFETs)
As with many power motor control designs, one of the critical aspects is controlling EMC emissions during PWM operation. The Infineon MOTIX™ products here (Single half-bridge IC, Multi MOSFET Driver IC, and DC Motor System IC) include features (e.g. Adaptive MOSFET Control) that avoid the compromise between EMC performance and power dissipation.
An additional challenge for the seat module designer is the increasing number of configurable variants driven by a car manufacturer’s platform strategy. To easily support the diverse variants with a single PCB design, scalability within product families has become necessary. Infineon’s TRAVEO™ T2G MCU family has a range of memory and I/O capabilities to support a flexible platform design, and the PROFET™ family of smart high side power switches, for example, has the most scalable portfolio of high side switches in the market.
The monitoring functions of the seat control are found off-board, outside of the main ECU, such as XENSIV™ Hall sensors for tracking seat position, or XENSIV™ absolute pressure sensors which indicate the state of air bladders used in lumbar adjustment, massage, or active bolster control.
All of these applications can be managed either electro-mechanically or fully electronically, but the latter approach has significant advantages:
- Avoids driver irritation over relay clicking, necessary as cars become quieter (e.g., hybrids, EVs and cars with start/stop function)
- Brings the comfort of soft start motion through PWM motor regulation, improving the user experience
- Creates more cabin space, as smaller footprints and lower profiles of semiconductors enable thinner ECUs and thus thinner seats
- Preserves the user experience and avoids service calls, as solid-state solutions bring additional intelligence, robustness, and safety via sense, diagnosis and protection elements
Regarding the ECU design, seat control module systems require:
- A set of scalable Multi MOSFET Drivers to configure any kind of Half-Bridges with external MOSFETs
- A set of robust, scalable MOSFETs for creating half-bridges and H-bridges
- A supply and communication interface which can be built discretely (voltage regulator + LIN/ CAN transceiver) or integrated (SBC)
- A set of scalable single- and multi-channel High-Side Switches with sense, diagnostic and protection functions
- A set of scalable Single Half-Bridge Switches with sense, diagnose and protection functions
- A µC capability fitting to the system requirements from low cost up to high-end modules with local decision-making options
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- Summarize the control scheme of the adaptive MOSFET control over a complete PWM cycle
- Estimate the decrease of the MOSFETs’ power dissipation
- Recognize the precise output duty cycle for accurate motor control, and
- Explain the MOSFET independent switching times
- Understand the MOSFET turn-on process after watching the overview on MOSFET driver optimization
- Have a closer look at adaptive MOSFET control
- Learn more about Infineon‘s TLE956x MOTIX™ motor system ICs, which are the first devices in the world that combine half-bridge gate drivers, power supply and a communication interface in a single device
- Get an overview of TLE956x’s main features and benefits
- Learn about Infineon’s TLE9210x, which is a family of Multi MOSFET Driver ICs, designed to control up to eight half-bridges (up to 16 n-channel MOSFETs) with one packaged device
- Get an overview of TLE9210x’s main features and applications
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- Understand why and how Infineon is strengthening its position in the 40 V MOSFET market, and be familiar with Infineon’s newest 60 V MOSFETs
- Learn to Identify the specific components used in a MOSFET-based application
- Become aware of what to consider when you replace relays with MOSFETs
- Do you know Infineon’s OPTIREG™ power supply solutions?
- Do you know why OPTIREG™ products stand out from other solutions in the market?
- Understand how MOTIX™ BTN99xy devices work.
- Get to know their main features, applications and portfolio, and identify the specific characteristics of the latest MOTIX™ BTN99xy devices.
- Become familiar with the main Seat Control functions
- Recognize customers’ top system-level needs and how Infineon’s chipset offering can meet them
