by cidaut | Nov 7, 2017 | Sin categoría
ReFreeDrive is our most recently approved H2020 project. With the title “Rare earth free e-Drives featuring low cost manufacturing”, ReFreeDrive is focused on developing rare earth‐free traction technologies beyond their current state-of‐art, with a strong focus on industrial feasibility for mass production, targeting lower costs with higher specific torque and power density. The project was kicked off last 17th and 18th of October.
ReFreeDrive joins 13 partners, 9 of them industrial partners, from 6 different European Countries. Coordinated by CIDAUT, the Consortium includes an OEM (Jaguar Land Rover), an applied research center focused on materials research (CSM), a Tier1 system integrator (Privé), motor designers for both the electric machines and the power electronics (Motor Design Limited, Univesity of L’Aquila, IFP Energies Nouvelles), manufacturers (Breuckmann, Aurubis, Tecnomatic, Mavel Powertrain, R13 Technology) and an association (European Copper Institute).
The project will study and develop simultaneously two solutions for the power traction system of electrical vehicles. Both solutions are brushless AC electrical machines: induction machine with fabricated and copper die-cast rotor (IM) and synchronous reluctance (SynRel) machine. Through their configurations these machines not only are rare-earth magnet free, but also share common features that can be exploited during the design step, as well in the manufacturing process. These common features lead to a complex synergy between the two technologies, which justify the development of different topologies of electric machines in just one project.
The design of the ReFreeDrive motors will take as a premise the reduction of use of materials, as more than half of the final price is formed by raw materials cost. Also, a minimization of manufacturing costs will be ensured by an early involvement of manufacturers, from the design stage. ReFreeDrive motor topologies have good room for cost reduction by off-setting permanent magnet use.
Beyond the motor design, ReFreeDrive also consider an integrated design of the power train that allows the optimization of the electric connections, the cooling systems and the housing.
Power electronics development will be mainly focused on the introduction of innovative Wide Bandgap power switch to allow high frequency operation and reduce cost associated with passive components. That advance allow achieving a 50% increase in the power density of motor power electronics and a 50% reduction in losses
ReFreeDrive proposes a scalable design that will be tested for two power range applications (75kW and 200kW). In this case, the market that this project addresses covers all the possible option of fully electric vehicles and hybrids.
by cidaut | Feb 10, 2017 | Sin categoría
On December 1st, El Norte de Castilla organized a conference to bring the electric vehicle closer to the public.
Electromobility experts from the three companies exposed their point of view on the difficulties, opportunities and challenges for the electric vehicles promotion. The vehicle manufacturers presented their new innovations in the market and focused on the need of a continued support from the administration. The public needs a better understanding of the electromobility advantages and also a stable scenario of economic support to effectively promote the sale of this kind of vehicles. The strategy followed by different European countries was discussed, paying special attention to Norway and China. The first country has established many positive discrimination measures to promote the electric vehicle purchase and use and some provinces of China are working to facilitate the manufacturing and use of lightweight electric vehicles.
Regarding the development of electric vehicles, Cidaut presented some of the developments and innovations achieved in the last projects. Improvements on efficiency, the importance of energy harvesting to reduce the carbon footprint, the main technologies for weight optimization and the need to ensure the passive of electric vehicles were some of the targets presented.
Special attention was paid to the difficult compromise between lightweight and crashworthiness for small urban electric vehicles. The European Commission and also the users are asking for reduced size mobility solutions propelled by electricity but without renouncing to the passive safety. Cidaut is really concerned about this issue and showed the last crash simulations and real tests carried out in its facilities.
by cidaut | Feb 10, 2017 | Sin categoría
Both European projects have run parallel for three years to balance the vehicle and infrastructure development.
Both projects are aimed to take advantage of the solar energy for electromobility. They work on the same vehicle, but Free-Moby is focused on the infrastructure while Plus-Moby’s target is the vehicle itself, which is an L7 type vehicle.
The vehicle has the possibility to be charged trough a connector but also by battery swapping. Then the batteries can be charged both in the vehicle and at home. Free-Moby has developed an innovative charging system based on photovoltaic energy. The photovoltaic installation is connected to a battery rack where there are several modules equal to the ones installed in the vehicle. The battery rack has been developed to allow the control of the energy flux attending to the user’s needs.
The battery rack is connected to the grid and the home in such a way that allows the energy flux between photovoltaic panels, vehicle, home grid and stationary batteries. The efforts made to develop the communication of the whole system allow making the best decision on the energy flux taking into account the state of charge of the batteries, the energy necessity at home and the energy pricing or the foreseen consumption. Cidaut has developed its own rack based on a 6kW photovoltaic parking that has installed at its facilities.
Plus-Moby project has been focused on the development of the vehicle and in order to harvest solar energy, it has several panels in the roof of the vehicle and an additional panel covers the wind screen when the vehicle is closed. Other particularity of the vehicle is the two independent motors for each of the axles. In the last phase of Plus-Moby, Cidaut’s efforts have been focused on ensuring the crashworthiness of the vehicle. After the optimization of the vehicle through a iterative simulation process, three frontal crash tests and one lateral crash have been performed demonstrating that the safety level of this light vehicle is equivalent to conventional M category ones. The crashes have demonstrated the great stability of the vehicle structure, and the high protection of the passengers. After all the crashes it was possible to open the doors and the evaluation of the damage in the occupants has been positive.
by cidaut | Sep 20, 2016 | Sin categoría
H2020 Remaghic project, coordinated by CIDAUT is one of the co-organizers of the event led by the EU MSCA-ETN DEMETER initiative (European Training Network for the Design and Recycling of Rare-Earth Permanent Magnet Motors and Generators in Hybrid and Full Electric Vehicles), together with KU Leuven Arenberg Doctoral School and the RARE³ KU Leuven cluster. The aim of this Summer School is to bring 50-60 PhD students and postdocs together to learn and discuss about the “Design and Recycling of Rare-Earth Permanent Magnet Motors and Generators in Hybrid and Full Electric Vehicles“. The lecturers are world class experts.
Taking part from the 24th to the 26th of August, the topics that have been covered in this summer school include: rare earths applications, REEs in magnesium alloys, rare earths recycling and the balance problem, recovery of REEs from electronic waste to name but those most related to Remaghic.
CIDAUT’s lecture started from the Remaghic idea of recycling magnesium and alloying it to recycled rare earths to obtain a cost competitive Mg-REE alloy from secondary sources with the performance of a primary alloy. Magnesium is a challenging material in terms of manufacturing. In this regard, CIDAUT has taken part in the ALIVE project developing new manufacturing technologies based on magnesium casting that can produce high quality complex parts that comply with strict structural requirements. The Remaghic project will finalize with the construction of an industrial magnesium recycling facility which will be installed at Grupo Antolín Magnesio premises, one of the lead magnesium founders worldwide, and will demonstrate the feasibility of obtaining high performance competitive magnesium alloys from secondary raw materials, thus enforcing the circular economy within Europe and lessening our dependence from exterior sources.
by cidaut | Apr 8, 2016 | Sin categoría
Light electric vehicles are becoming a key actor in the urban sustainable mobility, but nowadays there is not a meeting point to highlight all the research activities related to this kind of vehicles. Attending to this need LEVS, the World Light Electric Vehicle Summit, is born.
The first edition will be held in Barcelona, 20th and 21st September 2016.
The initiative has four main objectives:
- Learn from each other’s experience.
- Present the actual status of work and achievements.
- Find partners to develop synergies and build new projects.
- Join forces to lobby relevant authorities to get support.
LEVS aims at providing a premier and high quality global platform to foster exchange of views between research and development actors, industry, authorities, end-users and Non- Governmental Organizations in the field.
Strategies for light electric vehicles development will also be discussed and defined for further actions. Seeing the huge congestion problems our cities are facing nowadays, it is no doubt that light electric vehicles have a key role to play in the future.
Cidaut is strongly involved in the reduction of the environmental impact due to mobility and it is actively working in the development of electrical solutions for light vehicles. Cidaut has developed his own electric tricycles, a small demonstrator for urban mobility and is involved, nowadays, in the 7th Frame Programme Projects: Free-Moby, Plus-Moby, Evolution, Alive and Urban-EV. Its activities are also oriented to establish crash-test standards and regulations suitable for the particularities of the light vehicles
For this high implication in the Light Electric Vehicle development CIDAUT has been invited to be a member of the LEVS Scientific Reviewing Committee, we expect to meet you there. Find more information at http://www.levs.mobi/ or get in touch with us directly at newsletter@cidaut.es.
Page 6 of 8« First«...45678»
