Fleetwood’s "Smart Coach" Relies on
LonWorks Networks
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Making it SimpleFleetwood’s "Smart Coach" prototype is a modified Discovery U model. "The complexity of motor homes is increasing," says Tom Jones, Product Designer at Fleetwood. "We want to make the RV lifestyle a more user-friendly experience. Developing a centralized control piece to monitor and control the motor home was determined to be the best solution to manage this complexity and improve the customers’ RV’ing experience.” |
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LonWorks Solutions–Quick and Flexible
Fleetwood needed to find an off-the-shelf control network solution that was easily configurable and would integrate with Intel architecture products. This all needed to be implemented in a very short time–one month, says Jones. "LonWorks isn’t an architecture that requires us to do extensive firmware coding to make the devices communicate with one another," says Jones. "It gives us a lot of programming flexibility." Jones stresses that LonWorks networks have several advantages over other control networks. "Other products that we looked at were fairly complex and had a proprietary type of network that did not offer the benefits of an open architecture network. We would have had to develop specific modules for each application. There was no way that could happen in such a short development cycle. There would have been a lot more initial development cost up front from a hardware standpoint."
Charles Baron, Project Engineer from Intel, also feels LonWorks technology was essential for the project. "LonWorks really enabled Fleetwood to meet their requirements. It helped take specific devices, put them on a common network and provide us with an API we could use from our computer. " The hand-held mobile user interface was developed by Intel. The Intel Web Tablet™ prototype provides wireless computing, Internet access and control of the coach devices. LonWorks technology not only delivered control, but also meshed flawlessly with the Intel solution.
RVs–LonWorks Style
As in any RV, users can control devices with basic physical switches and keypads. But these can be inconvenient and complex, especially when a user is in one part of the coach and has to walk to another part to flip a switch. The wireless web tablet not only addresses this issue, but also delivers expanded functionality.
| Custom HTML pages served to the web tablet allow users to view vehicle maintenance data, surf the Internet, retrieve e-mail, and, most importantly, control and monitor devices on the LonWorks network: thermostats, air conditioning, an electric awning, two expandable, slide-out rooms and lighting. According to Baron, "They could be roasting marshmallows over a roaring campfire and realize that they left the air-conditioning on and adjust it from outside." Furthermore, “scene control on the lighting page allows users to preset a lighting configuration of on/off, dimmed, and full power”, says Jones. Indeed, every physical switch and readout of every device on the LonWorks network is duplicated on these web tablet pages. |
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The Intel web tablet prototype communicates with an Intel Pentium® 4 processor based PC in the coach via RF through an Intel Anypoint™ network. The PC is operating on the Windows® 2000 advanced server platform. It is running LonWorks LNS™ 3.02 and LonMaker™ 3.02 with LNS APIs delivering the interface to the control network. "LNS was very easy to work with," says Baron.
The PC connects to the 78 kbps LonWorks network through a PCLTA-20/FTT-10A PCI interface and then over a thick twisted pair cable. Echelon DIO-10Modules connect the two air-conditioning units (one module each), the electric awning (one module) and the exterior wall expansion, slide-out rooms (one for the living room and one for the bedroom). Moreover, one AI-10 Module links the air-conditioning system in order to monitor room temperatures, and two AO-10 Modules connect with the Surf Networks lighting control nodes, enabling the creation of lighting control scenes. As part of the Echelon LonPoint system, the DIO, AI and AO Modules enable integration with digital and analog actuators and sensors. Seven Echelon 1D DIN Base Plates made module wiring quick, reliable and easy. “The generic function blocks in the LonPoint system allowed custom programming and were the best solution, given the short project time-frame,” says Rob Guzikowski, the Senior Network Specialist at Echelon
Looking Down the Road
With the successful Smart Coach prototype, Fleetwood has proven that home building automation can benefit an RV as well. "The long-term goal of the project is to have a more holistic control and monitoring system that will actually interact with anything and everything on the coach," says Jones. The LonWorks solution has also brought new possibilities. "LonWorks gives us the ability for remote diagnostics. You could send information back to where people could actually troubleshoot and help you get on your way; a remote repair," says Jones.
The project was a complete success, according to Jones. "The reliability of LonWorks surprised all of us. We thought there would be issues because we were developing in such a short time frame with complex devices. But, once we had it running, it stayed that way." And, that’s just what owners expect from a Fleetwood motor coach.
Key Benefits
• Enabled a very short development cycle
• Cut programming costs
• Provided a very stable, expandable control network
• Interfaced flawlessly with Intel solution
• Enabled scene settings for lighting system