Deploying CAN Bus Dashboards & Telematics for Military UGV

HAVELSAN

About: HAVELSAN offers end-to-end technology solutions within defense, simulation, IT, homeland security and cybersecurity.

What problem did you solve?

We need to record & collect data from unmanned ground vehicles (UGV). Normal data acqusition systems are too heavy (and expensive) for UGVs and adding external sensors is not feasible. Hence a compact CAN bus data logger was required to collect all the data for analysis.

How did you solve it?

The CANedge2 WiFi CAN logger is an an easy way to measure the general vehicle health - as well as benchmark different scenarios based on data changes. We install the CANedge2 on the UGV, where it collects data during field operation to the SD card. When the UGV returns to our workplace, the CANedge2 comes in range of our stationary WiFi router and automatically offloads the log files to our server. For some tests we deploy the device with a 4G WiFi router on the vehicle. As one of our software tools we use Grafana/Influx dashboards for visualizing our CAN bus data in the browser, which is very useful. If we see abnormal data patterns, we find the relevant MF4 log files via CANcloud and analyse the log files in detail via the asammdf GUI (using our DBC file).

What benefit has this led to?

The device helps us increase test/evaluation capability and enables us to take immediate action in response to technical parameters of the vehicle.

"The CANedge2 is an autonomous way to collect, transfer & analyse data. Set it up - and watch the data from your office."

Why did you choose the CANedge?

We were using Vector tools in the previous main battle tank project. During our search for an alternative & easy solution we found the CANedge - and now everything is OK. If we have any questions, the technical support is so fast and helpful.

— Sezer Kiral, Systems Engineer, HAVELSAN

Comments by CSS Electronics

This case study is a great display of the versatility of the CANedge2 and related software tools.

In particular, HAVELSAN uses both CANcloud (for managing devices & data), the asammdf GUI (for deep-dive CAN diagnostics), the Python API + Grafana dashboards (for automated CAN bus data visualization) and MF4 converters (for loading the data in e.g. Vector tools). All our software/API tools are 100% free and open source.

For more details, see our CANedge software/API overview.