Self-Organizing Maps for Automatic Fault Detection in a Vehicle Cooling System

A telematic based system for enabling automatic fault detection of a population of vehicles is proposed. To avoid sending huge amounts of data over the telematics gateway, the idea is to use low-dimensional representations of sensor values in sub-systems in a vehicle. These low-dimensional representations are then compared between similar systems in a fleet If a representation in a vehicle is found to deviate from the group of systems in the fleet, then the vehicle is labeled for diagnostics for that subsystem. The idea is demonstrated on the engine coolant system and it is shown how this self-organizing approach can detect varying levels of clogged radiator.