For further illustration of hybrid bus access methods and corresponding data transmission, a FlexRay cluster is defined that consists of five FlexRay nodes (FlexRay nodes A through E). As can be seen in the figure “Demo Cluster”, all FlexRay nodes are physically connected by a line. To minimize the risk of failure, the communication channel is designed to be redundant. Therefore, two channels are available for data transmission, Channel A and Channel B.

The communication schedule that serves as the foundation for data transmission is subdivided into a static segment and a dynamic segment. Both of these segments consist of five slots. The schedule lists the static messages for the static segment and the dynamic messages for the dynamic segment.

During communicative operations all static messages defined in the static segment are always transmitted according to the communication schedule. However, the dynamic messages defined in the dynamic segment are only transmitted if a respective event occurs.

An interactive figure and an animation are provided so that you can become familiar with data communication in the FlexRay cluster. The interactive figure clarifies the communication technology in the dynamic segment. The animation lets you work on the communication in both, the static and dynamic, segments. Please read the instructions for the media objects so that you can fully utilize their entire functionality.