« Bye Bye - Schön war’s… • Startseite | Driving with Bosch »
Updates
Constantino • 13.April, 2010 @ 02:13 • Abgelegt unter: Forschung und Entwicklung
Well, it’s been rather long, all too long, since last updating you all on my adventures within the wide world of Bosch. In my last entry, I left you with the knowledge that my task was that of a planner: we have to test a product, how to we plan that? That is, at its core, the main theme I was tasked with and the main question which I have answered in my first 5 months within this station.
The biggest task was to find a “Rollenprüfstand” that had all the characteristics necessary for our tests. Although I’m not allowed to fill you in on all these characteristics, one example is that the test bench be all-wheel drive, not just the rear two wheels. So after making contact with several people both inside and outside of Bosch, it was decided that we would use the dynamometer of the BEG (Bosch Engineering Group).
For those of you who don’t know, the BEG is a subsidiary of Bosch GmbH. They offer services including specification, functional development, calibration and software integration, all in the areas of powertrain, safety and comfort, electronic integration, and (most famously) motorsports. While walking around the Abstatt location, you may be lucky enough to see driving around the likes of Ferrari, Maserati and Bentley !
Once the location for the test was decided, much planning was put into which tests we would initiate and how we would do it. Many balls had to be juggled at the same time as I was balancing the demands of several teams, as well as the time restrictions of the people and the vehicle. Just before the scheduled testing of the vehicle, the car was in Sweden for winter testing, so we had to schedule around that. So, for the two weeks leading up to the tests, every single day was planned with what we would do, how we would do it, and who would do what. Obviously, all sorts of little details had to be organized such as equipment needed as well as space and time.
So, the whole month of April will go down as a month full of testing and running around the general Stuttgart area. If nothing mechanically goes wrong (and trust me, we all have our fingers crossed), then everything should run smoothly. However, if something does go wrong, and the schedule is thrown off, then it will be my task to make sure that everything is adjusted, and that the schedule stays, as much as possible, on track.
My station here, with GS-EH, has been extended for about a month. If you become a fellow JMPler, you will see that the whole setup is not as rigid as you might think. It makes sense, in my case, that I spend another month on the project so that we can take all the test data, and document it all in order to prepare for the next steps. It would not make sense that I quickly leave for the next step, without passing on the work which I’ve completed. Thus, I’ll be here, with the project and GS-EH until the end of May; then I should be starting my Planstelle, that means, I’ll be starting my first permanent position within Bosch because this is my last station.
So, some sort of official news should be coming regarding that decision, stay tuned!
