The MMR Driverless team was founded in 2017 and is committed to building a autonomous driving car to challenge university teams from all over Europe in Formula SAE, an international university competition of engineering design.
Into the competition, we are part of the Driverless category, which features the autonomous driving single-seater, born in Germany in 2017 and landed in Italy only the following year.
An autonomous driving vehicle must have the same capabilities as a human driver but enhanced: what does it do? Perceives and interprets the internal and external environment, processes received information and plans a driving strategy, implements the previously planned strategy using the engine, steering and brakes. Our story is written step by step, as we work to put these goals of autonomous driving into practice.
Our first prototype: DL21
CHASSIS: Carbon fiber monocoque
WEIGHT: 296 kg
ENGINE: 600 cc, 4 cylinders in line, longitudinal, natural aspirated
POWER: 85 CV
WIRING: + 1,5 km of cables
AUTONOMOUS DRIVING: 5 actuation modules
BUSINESS & MARKETING
It focuses on the relationship with sponsors and suppliers, public relations and the Team’s image.
It is also responsible of the Business Plan, the focal point of the competitions that ultimately reflects the performance of the division.
VEHICLE DYNAMICS
This division works on the vehicle mechanics. Attention is paid to the chassis and on-board volumes management, aspects for all divisions, respecting the limits offered by the regulations. In addition, attention is paid to vehicle dynamics by working closely with the IT division on modelling the autonomous driving software.
PERCEPTION
The Perception division’s goal is to perceive, as accurate as possible, the surrounding environment using all the sensors mounted in the car like cameras, LiDAR, phonic wheels, IMU, GPS.
The focus here is to detect the cones around the track and calculate their distance w.r.t. vehicle.
POWERTRAIN
Bosch ECU calibration, test bench set up, design and optimization of accessory components such as the tank, management and maintenance of the engine and transmission system. They work on the optimization and brake test and EBS, redesign optimization and test of the clutch, gearbox and steering, system integration with driving in dual mode.
AUTONOMUS DRIVING
The Autonomous Driving division takes care of the part of the autonomous driving software that deals with mapping the surrounding space, memorizing the track and calculating the optimal trajectories for each event.
It also deals with the control algorithms that allow the vehicle to stay on the calculated optimal trajectory.
Within this division, there is a sub-division dedicated to the implementation and maintenance of a simulator, which is responsible for simulating the sensors and the behaviour of the car to test the various parts of the autonomous driving software. This division is in charge of simulating sensors and car behavior in order to fine-tuning the ‘brain’ of autonomous driving.
CONTROLS & PROGRAMMING
The focus is on CAD design, choice of components, professional wiring, documentation and compliance with the regulation, make the circuits and boards waterproof in collaboration with the Vehicle division. Matlab and Simulink modeling, dynamic vehicle models in collaboration with Vehicle, signal noise management, models for the control of electric actuators. Work on STM32.
The programming division takes care of developing and controlling the actuations via software–actuations such as brake, clutch and steering wheel. From this year onwards, it will also manage the car’s telemetry.
We achieved second place in Autonomous Design class, in the Formula SAE Italy Varano.
We achieved fourth place overall in Autonomous Driving class, in the Formula SAE Italy Varano.
We achieved victory in Autonomous Design and second place overall in the ADS class, in the Formula Student Imeche at Silverstone.