Wednesday, May 18, 2011

CrazyEngineers Forum - Mechanical & Civil Engineering

CrazyEngineers Forum - Mechanical & Civil Engineering

Final Year Project - Electric Vehicle: Electric Motor Design Improvement

Posted: 18 May 2011 07:46 AM PDT

Hi! I'm a mechanical engineering undergraduate at University of Science Malaysia and I will be entering into my final year in September. Currently doing my internship.
I was given an opportunity to propose my own final year project title, as long as it has the potential to be commerciable.

I've always wanted to have electric vehicles (EVs) plying on our road, so I've decided to develop this area for my final year project.

Besides mileage per single charge problem (associated with premature battery chemistry. I'll leave that to the chemists to go figure...), and recycling wasted braking energy (my friend is doing Regenerative Braking System for his paper), I was wondering if I could improve the efficiency or cost of electric motors.

But I'm not sure what problems electric motors have, or even if there is any space for improvement (other than trying to develop a hot superconductor for the armature coils. I'll leave that for the material guys/chemists to solve...).

So CE guys,
-I need some kind of problem statements for electric motors. What is the latest electric motor technology used in EVs and what's the usual complaints on that? (Maybe the motors on Mitsubishi iMiEV, Nissan Leaf, or Tesla Roadster)
-other ideas related to electric vehicles (such as alternative/auxiliary energy recovery systems & devices, transmission for maintaining high torque at high rpm, continuous variable transmission, etc.)

It'll be great if you could provide some ideas that can be commercialized/practical so that I can get better chances of approval from my professor, & of course get EVs on the road quickly & cheaply. We'll choke on CO2 and die if we don't. haha
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