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Intensive R&D is currently performed worldwide on hybrid and electric vehicles. For full electric vehicles the driving range is limited by the capacity of currently available batteries. If such a vehicle shall increase its driving range some range extending backup system should be available. Such a Range Extender is a small system of combustion engine and electric generator which produces the required electricity for charging the batteries in time. Since the acoustic response of an electric motor driving the vehicle and of a combustion engine as part of a Range Extender is very different by nature an extensive acoustic tuning of the Range Extender is necessary to meet the requirements of exterior vehicle noise and passenger comfort. This paper describes the NVH (noise, vibration & harshness) development work of a range extender within the AVL approach of an electrically driven passenger car with range extender.

When employing in-car active sound generation (ASG) and active noise cancellation (ANC), the accurate knowledge of the vehicle interior sound pressure distribution in magnitude as well as phase is paramount. Revisiting the ANC concept, relevant boundary conditions in spatial sound fields will be addressed. Moreover, within this study the controllability and observability requirements in case of ASG and ANC were examined in detail. This investigation focuses on sound pressure measurements using a 24 channel microphone array at different heights near the head of the driver. A shaker at the firewall and four loudspeakers of an ordinary in-car sound system have been investigated in order to compare their sound fields. Measurements have been done for different numbers of passengers, with and without a dummy head and real person on the driver seat. Transfer functions have been determined with a log-swept sine technique.

Today’s automotive industry is changing rapidly towards environmentally friendly vehicle propulsion systems. All over the globe, legislative CO2 consumption targets are under discussion and partly already in force. Hybrid powertrain configurations are capable to lower fuel consumption and limit pollutant emissions compared to pure IC-Engine driven powertrains. Depending on boundary conditions a numerous of different hybrid topologies- and its control strategies are thinkable. Typical approach is to find the optimum hybrid layout and strategy, by performing certain technical design tasks in office simulation directly followed by vehicle prototype tests on the chassis dyno and road. This leads to a high number of prototype vehicles, overload on chassis dynos, time consuming road test and finally to tremendous costs. Our developed approach is using the engine testbed with simulation capabilities as bridging element between office and vehicle development environment.

This study deals with the experimental investigation of the mechanical properties of a lithium-ion pouch cell and its modelling in an explicit finite element simulation code. One can distinguish between ‘macroscopic’ and ‘microscopic’ modelling approaches. In the ‘macroscopic’ approach, one material model approximates the behaviour of multiple inner cell layers. In the ‘microscopic’ approach, which is used in the present study, all layers and their interactions are modelled separately. The cell under study is a pouch-type lithium-ion cell with a liquid electrolyte. With its cell chemistry, design, size and capacity it is usable for automotive applications and can be assembled into traction batteries. One cell sample was fully discharged and disassembled, and its components (anode, cathode, separator and pouch) were examined and measured by electron microscopy. Components were also tensile tested.

For a broad acceptance of electric vehicles, the trade-off between all electric range and battery cost respectively weight represents the most important challenge. The all electric range obtained under real world conditions most often deviates significantly from the nominal value which is measured under idealized conditions. Under extreme conditions - slow traffic and demanding requirements for cabin heating or cooling - the electrical range might become less a question of spatial distance but even more of total operation time. Whereas with conventional powertrain, high flexibility of the total driving range can be obtained without sacrificing cost, with a pure battery vehicle this results in extreme high cost and weight of the energy storage. Therefore the difference between the typical daily driving range (e.g. in Germany 80-90% is below 50 km) and the minimum total range requested by most customers for acceptance of battery vehicles (200- 250 km), becomes essential.

The paper focuses on an optimization methodology, which uses Design of Experiments (DoE) methods to define component parameters of parallel hybrid powertrains such as number of gears, transmission spread, gear ratios, progression factor, electric motor power, electric motor nominal speed, battery voltage and cell capacity. Target is to find the optimal configuration based on specific customer targets (e.g. fuel consumption, performance targets). In the method developed here, the hybrid drive train configuration and the combustion engine are considered as fixed components. The introduced methodology is able to reduce development time and to increase output quality of the early system definition phase. The output parameters are used as a first hint for subsequently performed detailed component development. The methodology integrates existing software tools like AVL CRUISE [5] and AVL CAMEO [1].

Currently lithium-batteries are the most promising electrical-energy storage technology in fully-electric and hybrid vehicles. A crashworthy battery-design is among the numerous challenges development of electric-vehicles has to face. Besides of safe normal operation, the battery-design shall provide marginal threat to human health and environment in case of mechanical damage. Numerous mechanical abuse-tests were performed to identify load limits and the battery's response to damage. Cost-efficient testing is provided by taking into account that the battery-system's response to abuse might already be observed at a lower integration-level, not requiring testing of the entire pack. The most feasible tests and configurations were compiled and discussed. Adaptions of and additions to existing requirements and test-procedures as defined in standards are pointed out. Critical conditions that can occur during and after testing set new requirements to labs and test-rigs.

The shift toward electrification and limitations in battery electric vehicle technology have led to high demand for hybrid vehicles (HEVs) that utilize a battery and an internal combustion engine (ICE) for propulsion. Although HEVs enable lower fuel consumption and emissions compared to conventional vehicles, they still require combustion of fuels for ICE operation. Thus, emissions from hybrid vehicles are still a major concern. Engine starts are a major source of emissions during any driving event, especially before the three-way catalyst (TWC) reaches its light-off temperature. Since the engine is subjected to multiple starts during most driving events, it is important to mitigate and better understand the impact of these emissions. In this study, experiments were conducted to analyze engine starts in a hybrid powertrain on different experimental setup.

System lubrication in automotive powertrains is a growing topic for development engineers. Hybrid and pure combustion system complexity increases in search of improved efficiency and better control strategy, increasing the number of components with lubrication demand and the interplay between them, while fully electric systems drive for higher input speeds to increase e-motor efficiency, increasing bearing and gear feed rate demands. Added to this, many e-axle and hybrid systems are in development with a shared medium and circuit for e-motor cooling and transmission lubrication. Through all this, the lubricant forms a common thread and is a fundamental component in the system, but no standardized tests can provide a suitable methodology to investigate the adequate lubrication of components at powertrain level, to support the final planned vehicle usage.

The automotive industry is racing to introduce some degree of hybridization into their product ranges. Since the term "hybrid vehicle" can cover a wide range of differing technologies and drivetrain topologies, this has led to a plethora of vehicles that call them "hybrid." This poses an interesting challenge for marketers to differentiate these vehicles from the incumbents. However, it is not just the marketers who are faced with challenges, the developers of such hybrid drivetrains are faced with a rise in technical complexity due to the wide range of operating modes hybridization introduces. As propulsive torque is being generated in more than one place in a hybrid vehicle, the transitions from conventional drive to electrically supported drive bring with them complex aspects of multi-dimensional system control. The challenge is to be able to implement hybrid technology in an existing drivetrain, while adapting the existing components as required.

Fast charging of batteries at cold conditions faces the challenge of promoting undesired cell degradation phenomena such as lithium plating. The occurrence of lithium plating is strongly related to local surface potentials and temperatures involving the scales of the electrode surface, the unit cell and the entire module or pack. A multi-scale, multi-domain model is presented, enhancing a Newman based unit cell model with consistent models for heat generation and lithium plating and integrating this 1D+1D approach into a thermal 3D model on module level. The basic equations are presented and three different plating models from literature are discussed. The thermal model is assessed in open-loop simulations and the different plating approaches are compared in charge/discharge simulations at different operating conditions. The full multi-scale, multi-domain model is applied as a virtual sensor for model-based control of fast charging at cold conditions.

This work elaborates the transferability of electrode diffusion coefficients gained from fitting procedures in frequency domain to an electrochemical battery model run in time domain. An electrochemical battery model of an NMC622 half-cell electrode is simulated with sinusoidal current excitations at different frequencies. The current and voltage signals are analyzed in frequency domain via Nyquist and Bode plots. The frequency domain analysis of time domain simulations is applied to assess the numerical convergence of the simulation and the sensitivity on particle diameter, electrode and electrolyte diffusion coefficients. The simulated frequency spectra are used to fit the electrode diffusion coefficient by means of different electrical equivalent circuit models and the electrochemical battery model itself. The fitted diffusion coefficients from the different electrical equivalent circuit models deviate by one order of magnitude from the a priori known reference data.

The automotive industry is racing to introduce some degree of hybridization into their product ranges. Since the term “hybrid vehicle” can cover a wide range of differing technologies and drivetrain topologies, this has led to a large amount of vehicles that call themselves “hybrid”. This poses an interesting challenge for marketers to differentiate these vehicles from the incumbents. However, it is not just the marketers who are faced with challenges, the developers of such hybrid drivetrains are faced with a rise in technical complexity due to the wide range of operating modes hybridization introduces. As propulsive torque is being generated in more than one place in a hybrid vehicle, the transitions from conventional drive to electrically supported drive bring with them complex aspects of multi-dimensional system control. The challenge is to be able to implement hybrid technology in an existing drivetrain, while adapting the existing components as required.

This paper presents a system-level thermal model of a fluid-cooled Li-Ion battery module. The model is a reduced order model (ROM) identified by results from finite element analysis (FEA)/computational fluid dynamic (CFD) coupling simulation using the linear and time-invariant (LTI) method. The ROM consists of two LTI sub-systems: one of which describes the battery temperature response to a transient battery current, and the other of which takes into account of the battery temperature variation due to a heat flux induced by a varied inlet temperature of the battery cooling circuit. The thermal LTI model can be coupled to an electrical model to build a complete system-level battery ROM. Test examples show that the ROM is able to provide as accurate results as those from FEA/CFD coupling simulations.

At first glance RDE seems to be a road testing topic only, mistakenly. While Type approval test must be performed at the Road and Chassis Dyno, development work beforehand delivers solutions fulfilling the demanded legislation limits. Making the right development steps and decisions will lead to a technical solution within economy of scales. Much of this work done happens on engine testbeds and Real Driving Emissions (RDE) per UN-ECE legislation or the new test cycle for the chassis dyno according WLTP (Worldwide Harmonized Light-Duty Test Procedure) will not change that. The question is, are engine test beds fit for this new challenge or are changes required? One characteristic element of RDE is the randomness of operating conditions generated by a road drive. There must be found a way, to achieve RDE relevant test conditions in a most reproducible manner.

Approaching engineering limits for the thermal design of battery modules requires virtual prototyping and appropriate models with respect to physical depth and computational effort. A multi-scale and multi-domain model describes the electrochemical behavior of a single battery unit cell in 1D+1D at the level of intra-cell phenomena, and it applies a 3D thermal model at module level. Both models are connected within a common vehicle simulation platform. The models are discussed with special emphasis on battery degradation such as solid electrolyte interphase layer formation, decomposition and lithium plating. The performance of the electrochemical model is assessed by discharge cycles and repeated charge/discharge simulations. The thermal module model is compared to CFD reference data and studied with respect to its grid sensitivity.

A growing development of hybrid or fully electrical drives increases the demand for an accurate prediction of noise and vibration characteristics of electric and electronic components. This paper describes the numerical and experimental investigation of noise emissions from power electronics, as one of the new important noise sources in electric vehicles. The noise emitted from the printed circuit board (PCB) equipped with multi-layer ceramic capacitors (MLCC) is measured and used for the calibration and validation of numerical model. Material properties are tuned using results from experimental modal analysis, with special attention to the orthotropic characteristic of the PCB glass-reinforced epoxy laminate sheet (FR-4). Electroacoustic excitation is pre-calculated using an extension of schematic-based EMC simulation and applied to the structural model. Structural vibrations are calculated with a commercial FEM solver with the modal frequency response analysis.

Increasing demands for safety, security, and certifiability of embedded automotive systems require additional development effort to generate the required evidences that the developed system can be trusted for the application and environment it is intended for. Safety standards such as ISO 26262 for road vehicles have been established to provide guidance during the development of safety-critical systems. The challenge in this context is to provide evidence of consistency, correctness, and completeness of system specifications over different work-products. One of these required work-products is the hardware-software interface (HSI) definition. This work-product is especially important since it defines the interfaces between different technologies. Model-based development (MBD) is a promising approach to support the description of the system under development in a more structured way, thus improving resulting consistency.

The advancing electrification of the powertrain is giving rise to new challenges in the field of acoustics. Film capacitors used in power electronics are a potential source of high-frequency interfering noise since they are exposed to voltage harmonics. These voltage harmonics are caused by semiconductor switching operations that are necessary to convert the DC voltage of the battery into three-phase alternating current for an electrical machine. In order to predict the acoustic characteristics of the DC-link capacitor at an early stage of development, a multiphysical chain of effects has to be addressed to consider electrical and mechanical influences. In this paper, a new method to evaluate the excitation amplitude of film capacitor windings is presented. The corresponding amplitudes are calculated via an analytical strain based on electromechanical couplings of the dielectric within film capacitors.

In recent years, the use of high-power inverters has become increasingly prevalent in vehicles applications. With the increasing number of electric vehicle models comes the need for efficient and reliable testing methods to ensure the proper functioning of these inverters. One such method is the use of Hardware-in-the-Loop (HiL) environments, where the inverter is connected to a simulated environment to test its performance under various operating conditions. HiL testing allows for faster and more cost-effective testing than traditional methods and provides a safe environment to evaluate the inverter's response to different scenarios. Further, in such an environment, it is possible to specifically stimulate those system states in which conflicts between the lines arise regarding the ideal system parametrization. By combining HiL testing with design-of-experiments and modelling methods, the propulsion system can hence be optimized in a holistic manner.