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Energy 189 (2019) 116274

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Energy
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/energy

Recovering waste vibration energy of an automobile using shock


absorbers included magnet moving-coil mechanism and adding to
overall efficiency using wind turbine
Hassan Fathabadi
School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, National Technical University of Athens (NTUA), Athens, Greece

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: The vibration energy of an automobile caused by driving on bumpy roads and the automobile acceler-
Received 6 December 2018 ation as well as its deceleration is dissipated by the shock absorbers of the automobile, so the vibration
Received in revised form energy is wasted in the suspension system of the automobile. This paper deals with increasing the en-
14 September 2019
ergy efficiency of an automobile by applying two modifications to the automobile. First, to recover the
Accepted 2 October 2019
mentioned waste vibration energy, magnet moving-coil mechanism is added to the four shock absorbers
Available online 4 October 2019
of the automobile by embedding four proposed electric coils inside the four shock absorbers. The total
electric voltage of the four electric coils is converted into a constant dc voltage technically named “dc-
Keywords:
Vehicle
link voltage” using a converter. Second, to recover a part of the kinetic energy of wind hitting the
Automobile vibration energy automobile when the automobile is moving or stopping, a wind turbine is attached to the back of the
Magnet moving-coil mechanism automobile’s condenser. Correspondingly, the output voltage of the wind turbine is converted into the
Wind turbine dc-link voltage using another converter. By constructing a novel system including the two mentioned
converters, the power productions of the four electric coils and wind turbine are converted into
appropriate levels of voltage and current to be used to charge the battery of the automobile as well as to
drive the other parts of the automobile. The two modifications can be applied to both internal com-
bustion engine vehicles and electric vehicles (EVs). Experimental measurements obtained from applying
the two mentioned modifications and the constructed system to an EV with the weight of 1855 kg are
presented that demonstrate the four electric coils and wind turbine have added respectively 0.36 kWh
and 2.64 kWh to the energy production in the EV during two days, and as a result, the traveling range of
the EV has increased by 7.27 km. This point proves the advantage of utilizing the proposed electric coils
and wind turbine as well as the novelty and contribution of this study in recapturing the waste vibration
energy of an automobile and the energy of wind hitting the automobile.
© 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction performed using a simple electromagnetic device which was sen-


sitive to movement. Two regenerative shock absorbers that one
The vibration energy of an automobile originating from driving works as linear unit and the other works a rotary unit were
on an uneven road and the automobile acceleration/deceleration is designed in 2003 [4]. It was shown that the two shock absorbers
dissipated by the shock absorbers of the automobile, so the vibra- can recover only a small portion of vibration energy wasted in a car.
tion energy is wasted in the automobile [1]. Basically, utilizing Nowadays, different types of renewable energy are widely used
shock absorbers in which electromagnetic law was used to convert due to their benefits [5,6]. In this regard, it is observed that popular
vibration energy into electric energy was proposed by Goldner in attention has mainly focused on utilization of solar and wind en-
2001 [2]. Literature survey demonstrates that a regenerative shock ergy [7,8]. To utilize wind energy, a wind turbine is the fundamental
absorber was designed to recover vibration energy wasted in a car element that converts wind power into mechanical power [9].
[3]. In that design, recovering the waste vibration energy was Estimation the physical parameters of a wind turbine and per-
forming sensitive analysis are two important issues reported in
some research works [10,11]. Fluctuation of wind speed and
maximum power extraction are two topics that should be
E-mail address: h4477@hotmail.com.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.energy.2019.116274
0360-5442/© 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
2 H. Fathabadi / Energy 189 (2019) 116274

considered to design a wind power plant [12,13]. The main goal in four electric coils and wind turbine with that of the automobile’s
implementing a wind farm is to maximize its conversion efficiency, battery should be designed and built. Fig. 1 shows the detailed
but it is necessary to take into account the parameters of the wind configuration of the required system which has been designed and
turbine used such as turbine wake effect, rated power, rated wind constructed in this study to be used in an EV. As depicted in Fig. 1,
speed, cut-in wind speed, cut out wind speed and start-up wind the wind turbine drives a permanent magnet synchronous gener-
speed [14,15]. ator (PMSG) the three-phase output voltage of which is rectified
Regarding utilizing renewable energy in an automobile, an using six diodes. This three components form a wind energy con-
entire review of current literature demonstrates that several version system (WECS) as enclosed by a rectangle in Fig. 1. The four
research works reporting utilization of solar energy in automobiles electric coils positioned inside the four shock absorbers have been
are available. Five automobiles only supplied with solar energy connected to four diode bridges connected in series to provide the
have been designed within the last decay [16]. They were operated sum of the output voltages of the four electric coils, i.e.:
under realistic conditions, and experimental measurements
demonstrated that they have two essential limitations. First, they Vcoils ¼ Vco1 þ Vco2 þ Vco3 þ Vco4 (1)
should be light, and second, they are practically useless during
night. Utilizing photovoltaic (PV) module in a car to satisfy the where Vco1 , Vco2 , Vco3 and Vco4 are the output voltages of the four
power demand of an EV was evaluated in detail in a recent research electric coils positioned inside the four shock absorbers, and Vcoils is
[17]. A simulation work modeling a fuel cell/PV hybrid power the sum of the output voltages of the four coils. The WECS, four
source applicable to an EV was presented in another research work coils and the automobile’s battery are connected to the dc bus
[18]. A model representing a small scale EV supplied with a fuel providing dc-link voltage (Vdc ) by means of three converters named
cell/PV/battery hybrid power source was reported [19]. The model WECS converter, coil converter and battery converter, so voltage at
showed that it is necessary to apply an energy management the output ports of the three converters is the dc-link voltage (Vdc )
scheme to provide an appropriate power flow required in the EV as depicted in Fig. 1. The traction motor of the EV is driven by a
[19]. Similar model simulating application of PV power in EVs was three-phase dc/ac inverter that is fed by dc-link voltage and pro-
reported that showed in addition to PV power source, other power duces three-phase voltage. There is also a vehicle-to-grid (V2G)
source such as battery or fuel cell is also needed [20]. connection realized by a dc/ac inverter that provides grid connec-
In this study, two novel ideas are proposed and realized. First, to tion for the EV. The WECS and coil converters are flyback with
recover vibration energy wasted in the suspension system of an similar structure depicted in Fig. 2 [21]. As reported in Table 1, the
automobile, magnet moving-coil mechanism is added to the four only difference between the two converters is difference between
shock absorbers of the automobile by embedding four proposed the turns ratios of their transformers. Relationship between the
electric coils inside the four shock absorbers. Second, to recover a input voltage (Vcoils ) and output voltage (Vdc ) of the coil converter is
part of the kinetic energy of wind hitting the automobile when the expressed as [21]:
automobile is moving or stopping, a wind turbine is attached to the
Vdc n1
back of the automobile’s condenser. To combine the power pro- ¼ (2)
ductions of the four electric coils and wind turbine with that of the Vcoils 1  Dco
automobile’s battery, a novel system has been built, and experi-
where n1 is the transformer’s turns ratio and Dco is the duty cycle of
mental measurements are presented that shows an increase of
pulse train fed to the gate of the converter’s switch. Eq. (2) can be
7.27 km in the traveling range of the EV used to conduct road tests.
rewritten as:
This point clearly proves the novelty and contribution of this study
in recapturing the waste vibration energy of an automobile and the n1 Vcoils
energy of wind hitting the automobile. The theoretical concepts of Vdc ¼ (3)
1  Dco
the proposed ideas are presented in Section 2. Constructed system
implementing the two proposed ideas, details of the electric coils Eq. (3) outlines the theoretical basis on which the dc-link
and wind turbine added to an EV along with experimental results voltage of the system depicted in Fig. 1 is adjusted to a constant
are presented in Section 3, and the study is concluded in Section 4. value by changing Dco . As depicted in Fig. 1, Vcoils is measured by the
control unit, and change in Dco is performed by the control unit to
2. Theoretical concepts of the proposed idea adjust Vdc to allotted constant voltage which is þ400 V for the
system built in this study. Correspondingly, relationship between
On the one hand, the vibration energy of an automobile caused the input voltage (Vwe ) and output voltage (Vdc ) of the WECS con-
by the automobile acceleration and deceleration as well as driving verter is formulated as [21]:
on rough roads is dissipated by the shock absorbers of the sus-
pension system of the automobile; as a result, this vibration energy Vdc n2
¼ (4)
is wasted in the automobile. On the other hand, there is another Vwe 1  Dwe
waste energy in the automobile; when the automobile is moving or
stopping, wind passing across the automobile’s radiator and where n2 is the turns ratio of the WECS converter’s transformer and
condenser hits the automobile’s chassis and loses its kinetic energy. Dwe is the duty cycle of pulse train fed to the gate of the converter’s
Considering the above explanation, this study applies two modifi- switch. Similarly, Eq. (4) is rewritten as:
cations to an automobile to increase its efficiency. First, to recover
n2 Vwe
the mentioned waste vibration energy, magnet moving-coil Vdc ¼ (5)
1  Dwe
mechanism is added to the four shock absorbers of the automo-
bile by embedding four proposed electric coils inside the four shock Based on Eq. (5), Dwe is changed by the control unit to adjust Vdc
absorbers. Second, to recover a part of the kinetic energy of wind to the allotted constant voltage (þ400 V). As shown in Fig. 3, the
hitting the automobile when the automobile is moving or stopping, battery converter is a bidirectional boost-buck converter. In the first
a wind turbine is attached to the back of the automobile’s direction, it works as a boost converter with the voltage gain of
condenser. To realize the two aforementioned modifications in an 1
1Ddisc that discharges the battery into the dc bus, while in the
automobile, a system which combines the output powers of the second direction, it works as a buck converter with the voltage gain
H. Fathabadi / Energy 189 (2019) 116274 3

Fig. 1. Configuration of the system recovering waste vibration energy and wind energy in an EV.

of Dchar that charges the battery using power fed by the dc bus, phase inverter, (Pload ) as:
where Ddisc and Dchar are, respectively, discharge and charge duty
cycles. Noting Fig. 1 demonstrates that the power control unit 8
< Pco ¼ Vdc Ico
measures Vdc , the output currents of the coil converter (Ico ), WECS
P ¼ Vdc Iwe (6)
converter (Iwe ), battery converter (Ibat ) and current supplied the 3- : we
Pload ¼ Vdc Iload
phase inverter driving the automobile’s traction motor (Iload ). The
power control unit calculates the output powers of the coil con- Depending on the values calculated in Eq. (6), two cases dis-
verter (Pco ), WECS converter (Pwe ) and power supplied to the 3- cussed below are followed by the control unit:
4 H. Fathabadi / Energy 189 (2019) 116274

Fig. 2. Coil and WECS converters.

Fig. 4. Inverter tied to the traction motor.

Table 1
Details of the components of the constructed system.

Traction motor Coil and WECS converters


Model LSRPM 200 L Cwe (m F) and CeCO1-4 (m F) 470 and 2.2
Made by Leroy-Somer Co. Switching frequency, fs (kHz) 25
Type PMSM dc-link voltage, Vdc (V) 400
Phase number 3 Cdc (m F) 680
Nominal line voltage (V) 400 Resr (mU) 109
Rated power (kW) 80 Cwe2 (m F) and Cco2 (m F) 22
Rated torque (Nm) 170 Cwe1 (n F) and Cco1 (n F) 1.2
Rated current (A) 157 Diodes: D1 -D2 15ETH06S
Speed range (rpm) 0e4500 n1 ¼ N2= and n2 ¼ N4= 75 6 =
and 20 3
=
N1 N3
Efficiency (%) 95.7 Switches Swe and Sco IRFPS40N60K
Magnet material NdFeB PMSG
Maximum current/Rated current 1.5 Model PMG-100
Maximum torque/Rated torque 1.4 Type 3-phase
Weight (kg) 145 Rated power (W) 100
Battery Maximum power 130
Type Li-ion Rated phase voltage (V) 12
Voltage (V) 48 Rated rotation (rpm) 690
Current capacity (Ah) 400 Magnet material NdFeB
Capacity (kWh) 19.2 Weight (kg) 2.8
Series-connected batteries 4 Battery converter
ESR (Rbatesr (mU)) 2.9 IGBT switches: SW, Q1-Q2 STGY40NC60VD
 40
Wind turbine RLbat (mU) 10.8
Rated power (W) & speed (m/s) 100 & 10 V2G:
(Single-phase: ~110 VAC, 60 Hz)
Diameter (cm) 76 IGBT switches: Q9-Q12 STGY40NC60VD
8
Inverter connected to the traction motor Lg (mH) & Cg (mF) 68 & 8.2
IGBT switches: Q3-Q8 STGY40NC60VD N4= 39 12=
N3
5

Fig. 3. Battery converter.


H. Fathabadi / Energy 189 (2019) 116274 5

Fig. 5. Electric circuit of the built system.


6 H. Fathabadi / Energy 189 (2019) 116274

A) When Pwe þ Pco  Pload , the control unit sets the battery front shock absorber of the car equipped with the electric coil is
converter in buck mode (Dchar s0 and Ddisc ¼ 0) and establishes shown in Fig. 7.
power balance as: B) The WECS which is composed of an 100 W wind turbine
attached to the back of the car’s condenser, an 100 W PMSG
Pwe þ Pco ¼ Pload þ Pchar (7) (PMG-100) driven by to the turbine, and a 3-phase diode
rectifier. The photo of the wind turbine and PMSG driven by it
where Pchar is power available in the input port of the battery are depicted in Fig. 8.
converter (in buck mode) to charge the battery as exhibited in C) The battery and battery converter connected to the battery
Figs. 1 and 3. As mentioned, the voltage gain of the battery con- that is bidirectional boost/buck type as depicted in detail in
verter in buck mode is Dchar , so charging voltage (Vbat ) exhibited in Fig. 3.
Figs. 1 and 3 is obtained as:
The microcontroller MC68HC11E9 shown in Fig. 5 acts the role
Vbat ¼ Dchar Vdc (8) of the power control unit and adjusts the dc-link voltage to þ400 V
B) When Pwe þ Pco < Pload , the control unit sets the battery by performing change in Dco and Dwe according to Eq. (3) and Eq.
converter in boost mode (Dchar ¼ 0 and Ddisc s0) and establishes (5). The wind turbine has been attached to the back of the
power balance as: condenser, so there is not any change in the dynamic resistance of
the car. The waveforms of the dc-link voltage regulated by the
Pdischar þ Pwe þ Pco ¼ Pload (9) microcontroller, currents (phases A and B) and voltages (lines AB
and BC) supplied to the traction motor are shown in Figs. 9 and 10.
On the one hand, it is deduced from Eq. (9) that the amount of The switching frequency of the three converters (coil, WECS and
the battery power discharged to satisfy load demand is obtained as: battery converters) is 25 kHz. The waveform of the control pulse
supplied to the WECS converter (Dwe ) along with the dc-link
Pdischar ¼ Pload  Pwe  Pco (10) voltage is shown in Fig. 11. It can be seen that the dc-link voltage
On the other hand, since the battery converter is working in is accurately regulated to þ400 V by the power control unit (mi-
boost mode, power discharged by the battery is expressed as: crocontroller) providing appropriate change in Dco and Dwe based
on Eq. (3) and Eq. (5).
0 1 0  1
1 Vbat  Vdc
B 1 C B 1Ddisc C
Pdischar ¼ B
@1  D
C Vbat B
A @
C
A (11)
disc 0:001 þ Resr

where Resr is the equivalent series resistance (ESR) observed from


the two terminals of the dc-link capacitor (Cdc ). Substituting the
right side of Eq. (10) in the left side of Eq. (11) results in:
20 1 0  13
1 Vbat  Vdc
6B 1 C B 1Ddisc C7
Pload  Pwe  Pco ¼ 6 B C B
4@1  D A Vbat @
C7
A5
disc 0:001 þ Resr

(12)
As depicted in Fig. 4, a bidirectional 3-phase dc/ac inverter has
been tied to the traction motor which is a permanent magnet
synchronous motor (PMSM). In the first direction, a 3-phase voltage
is generated via the six switches Q3-Q8 of the inverter and is
supplied to the PMSM. In the second direction, the inverter acts as a
rectifier and converts ac voltage regenerated by the PMSM into the
dc-link voltage (Vdc ).

3. Constructed system and experimental results

Considering Fig. 1 showing the configuration of the system


recovering the waste vibration energy and kinetic energy of wind in
an EV, a prototype of the system has been built and installed on an
EV with the weight of 1855 kg. The electric circuit of the built
system is depicted in Fig. 5, and the detailed specifications of the
components used to build the system are reported in Table 1. As
shown in Fig. 5, the electric circuit of the system is composed of
three main parts as follows:

A) The four electric coils positioned inside the four shock ab-
sorbers of the car and the coil converter connected to them. The
detailed structure of the proposed electric coil positioned inside Fig. 6. Detailed structure of the electric coil positioned inside the four shock absorbers
the four shock absorbers of the car is depicted in Fig. 6, and the of the car.
H. Fathabadi / Energy 189 (2019) 116274 7

Fig. 9. Line voltages supplied to the traction motor, and dc-link voltage.

Fig. 7. Front shock absorber of the car equipped with the electric coil.

Fig. 10. Currents of phase A and phase B supplied to the traction motor.

Fig. 11. Control pulse and dc-link voltage waveforms.

To determine the power productions of the three power sources


of the system, i.e., the four electric coils positioned inside the four
shock absorbers of the EV, WECS and battery, the EV was operated,
and the power productions of the four electric coils, WECS and
Fig. 8. (a) Wind turbine attached to the condenser. (b) PMSG tied to the wind turbine.
8 H. Fathabadi / Energy 189 (2019) 116274

battery were measured hour by hour during two days. The result of automobile and the energy of wind hitting the automobile.
the measurements representing the power flow of the constructed
system is shown in Fig. 12. The power flow demonstrates that the
4. Conclusion
four electric coils produced an average power of about 40 W
whenever the EV was moving, and in addition, the four electric coils
In this study, two modifications were applied to an automobile.
positioned inside the four shock absorbers of the EV have produced
First, to recover the waste vibration energy of the automobile, four
a total electric energy of about 0.36 kWh during two days. Corre-
proposed electric coils were constructed and positioned inside the
spondingly, the wind turbine has produced a total electric energy of
four shock absorbers of the automobile. Second, to recover a part of
about 2.64 kWh.
the kinetic energy of wind hitting the automobile, a wind turbine
To evaluate the impact of the four electric coils and WECS on the
was attached to the back of the automobile’s condenser. To include
traveling range, velocity and acceleration of the EV, the built system
the power productions of the four electric coils and wind turbine, a
was operated in “battery mode” and “battery/WECS/coils” mode.
novel system was designed and built. The two modifications and
The battery mode means that the built system was supplied with
constructed system were applied to an EV with the weight of
only battery power, and the battery/WECS/coils mode means that
1855 kg. The experimental measurements showed that the four
built system was supplied with not only battery power but also
electric coils produced an average electric power of about 40 W
electric powers produced by the WECS and four electric coils. The
whenever the EV was moving, and in addition, they have produced
results of measurements conducted during the operation of the EV
a total electric energy of about 0.36 kWh during two days. Corre-
in the two mentioned modes are outlined in Table 2. It is deduced
spondingly, the experimental data showed that the wind turbine
from the data reported in Table 2 that utilizing the four electric coils
has produced a total electric energy of about 2.64 kWh over two
and WECS has increased the traveling range by 7.27 km. This point
days, so about 3 kWh has added to the energy production in the EV
proves not only the advantage of utilizing the four electric coils and
by the four electric coils and wind turbine. The road test showed
WECS proposed in this paper but also the novelty and contribution
that utilizing the four electric coils and wind turbine has increased
of this study in recapturing the waste vibration energy of an
the traveling range of the EV by 7.27 km.

Battery power WECS power Coils power


5.5

4.5

3.5
Power (kW)

2.5

1.5

0.5

0
24 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22 24 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22
Time (h)
Fig. 12. Power productions of the battery, WECS and four coils in the EV during 48 h.

Table 2
Comparing the parameters of the EV in the two modes.

Mode Energy production (kWh) Traveling range (km) Maximum velocity (km/h) 0e100 km/h acceleration (sec)

Battery/WECS/coils 26.57 118.17 121 13.3


Battery 23.57 110.9 121 13.3
H. Fathabadi / Energy 189 (2019) 116274 9

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