Textbook of Automotive Electrical and Electronic Systems: Principles, Diagnostics, Networks, and Electrified Vehicle Technology

A dashboard warning light flickers on, then disappears before a scan tool can even be connected. A customer describes a problem that never seems to happen on the drive into the shop. In moments like these, the gap between a confident diagnosis and an expensive guess comes down to one thing: whether the technician has a structured way to find the fault's objective, measurable signature, or is reduced to swapping the most likely-looking part and hoping it fixes the problem.

Vehicle electrical systems have changed faster than a great deal of training material has kept pace with. A technician who learned on simple, point-to-point wiring can no longer reason through a modern vehicle the same way, because the vehicle itself is no longer built that way. Circuits still matter, but they now sit inside a layered architecture of sensors, control modules, shared communication networks, software-driven diagnostic protocols, and, on a growing share of vehicles, high-voltage propulsion systems.

This textbook was written to meet that vehicle as it actually is today. It opens with the electrical fundamentals every technician still needs, then treats vehicle networks, service-oriented diagnostics, and electrified propulsion as core material rather than optional extensions. Every chapter pairs theory with the specific measurement, waveform, or diagnostic decision that theory makes possible, developed through complete, step-by-step worked examples and verified practice problems, so a fact never sits as trivia. It becomes a tool for deciding what test to run next.

Inside, this book helps the reader:

• Build a structured, evidence-based diagnostic workflow that replaces guesswork and unnecessary parts replacement with repeatable measurement and reasoning.
• Learn correct multimeter, oscilloscope, and current clamp technique, with worked examples showing a healthy reading next to a faulty one.
• Read wiring diagrams and connector layouts with confidence, and follow correct terminal, splice, and harness repair procedures.
• Trace faults across CAN, LIN, FlexRay, and automotive Ethernet networks, and work through the OBD, UDS, and DoIP protocols that have replaced simple trouble-code reading.
• Apply the same discipline to engine electrical, ignition, fuel, and emissions diagnostics as a case study of everything covered earlier.
• Extend that discipline into high-voltage hybrid and electric vehicle systems, including isolation procedures, traction battery management, inverters, motors, regenerative braking, and charging.
• Use key equations, safety and warning boxes, and chapter summaries built for fast classroom or shop-floor reference.

Eighteen chapters move in deliberate order from electrical safety and diagnostic thinking, through test equipment, wiring and connector systems, batteries and charging, power distribution and switching, sensors and control units, vehicle communication networks, and service-oriented diagnostics, to engine electrical systems and, in the final third, complete hybrid and electric vehicle architecture, high-voltage safety, traction battery management, inverters and motors, charging standards, and vehicle programming, cybersecurity, and telematics.

This book is written for automotive technology students beginning without a prior electrical background, apprentice and working technicians who want to close the gap between older training and current vehicle architecture, and instructors seeking a single, coherent course text that carries a class from first principles through electrified propulsion.

Begin building the diagnostic discipline that separates a confident technician from a guess wearing a work order. Add this textbook to your shelf and start developing the evidence-based reasoning it is built around, from the first circuit measurement to the last high-voltage system.