Design of the experimental setup for a plug-in hybrid electric vehicle

This paper identifies the procedure utilized to determine the required ratings of components for the experimental setup of a 2 by 2 power-split connected plug-in hybrid electric vehicle. The test vehicle considered for this project has been selected from the available small scale conventionally driven vehicles in Western Australia. The main criteria for vehicle selection required that an existing electrical network was available, with alternator and battery and that the chassis has significant space and supportable structure for the coupling of an electric motor to the driveshaft. Following the selection of the vehicle the appropriate sizing of electrical components was undertaken considering a scaled standardized drive cycle selected to be utilized for testing. This involves the estimation and selection of the electric motor size, energy storage requirement and associated ratings of power electronics for control. The ADVISOR software package has been utilized to support the calculated sizes of electrical components for this experimental setup

A Novel Model of Internal Combustion Engine for High Efficiency Operation of Hybrid Electric Vehicles and Power Systems

This article realizes a novel model of an internal combustion engine (ICE) based on its operating torque and speed for the purpose of designing new control strategies to optimize engine efficiency and performance in hybrid electric vehicles and power systems. The proposed model is developed such that it utilizes only a limited number of experimentally measured operating conditions of the internal combustion engine. Therefore it helps in minimizing the expensive and time consuming testing of the vehicle under a large number of operating conditions in comparison to other models. On the other hand, it is possible to utilise the model to determine a novel control strategy for fuel consumption reduction in plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEV) and hybrid electric vehicles (HEV). This fuel consumption reduction is achieved through the use of the proposed model to predict the efficiency of operation of the ICE instead of the fuel utilization predicted by conventional models. In order to prove the accuracy of the proposed model, efficiency of operation of six known ICEs have been modelled and compared with three existing models utilizing larger numbers of experimental data. The errors in efficiency in comparison to known data are found to be within a reasonable range. The paper finally demonstrates the possible applications of the proposed model in high efficiency control of ICE in a model of the 2010 Toyota Prius developed using experimental data. The demonstration for the proposed model is in the form of a vehicular system however it is envisaged that this model has applications in hybrid power systems also

Field oriented control for an induction-machine-based electrical variable transmission

An electrical variable transmission (EVT) is an electromagnetic device with dual mechanical and electrical ports. In hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs), it is used to split the power to the wheels in a part coming from the combustion engine and a part exchanged with the battery. The most important feature is that the power splitting is done in an electromagnetic way. This has the advantage over mechanical power splitting devices of reduced maintenance, high efficiency, and inherent overload protection. This paper gives a conceptual framework on how the torque on both rotors of the EVT can be simultaneously controlled by using a field-oriented control (FOC) scheme. It describes an induction-machine-based EVT model in which no permanent magnets are required, based on classical machine theory. By use of a predictive current controller to track the calculated current reference values, a fast and accurate torque control can be achieved. By selecting an appropriate value for the flux coupled with the squirrel-cage interrotor, the torque can be controlled in various operating points of power split, generation, and pure electric mode. The conclusions are supported by simulations and transient finite-element calculations

Power Flows and Efficiency of Output Compound e-CVT

Hybridization is the most promising vehicular technology to get significant improvements of the vehicle efficiency and performance in the short-term. Mechanical transmissions for hybrid vehicles are very often multiple modes transmission, which permit improving the performance in different working conditions. In this context, optimal design and control of these transmissions are a key point to improve the performance of the vehicles, and mathematical models which supports the design can play an important role in this field. In this work, an approach for evaluating the performance of Output Compound Split e-CVT (electric Continuously Variable Transmission) in steady-state is proposed. This approach, in addition to a kinematic analysis of the device, leads to the calculation of the internal power circulation modes and the efficiency of the device in different working conditions

Design and control of the energy management system of a smart vehicle

This thesis demonstrates the design of two high efficiency controllers, one non-predictive and the other predictive, that can be used in both parallel and power-split connected plug-in hybrid electric vehicles. Simulation models of three different commercially available vehicles are developed from measured data for necessary testing and comparisons of developed controllers. Results prove that developed controllers perform better than the existing controllers in terms of efficiency, fuel consumption, and emissions