Multiple, inline electric motors?

i've noticed with my honda hybrid civic that i seldom reach the low battery mark. this may mean that ~ for the driving i do ~ i have more battery then really needed? or the electric is used less then what i can get away with?

this may tie in with your comment for a second motor - or simply bigger motor. it might be achieved with no extra battery needs.

i've only reached the low bettery mark when driving to las vegas where thru the desert we can get LONG stretches of slow up hill rides. some 15 to 20 miles long steady uphill on 5% grades.

for me that's a rare drive.

maybe they can create a switch to swap between city style driving to desert driving, to other significant driving styles.

the concept of piggie backing motors might be useful in design. they can use one standard motor and add one for each larger size vehicle. and is there something sacred about even number cyclinders in a car? we're used to even numbers, but some mechanical systems work better with odd numbers like windmill blades (three blades).

maybe there's a motor style that today lends itself to hybrids nicely? recall the old mazda wankle rotary engine?

any motor heads out there reading these posts?

see ya

I read up a bit a while back on the technology, and I might be a little misguided, but to me the definition of an electric motor is a part that receives an electric current, and a magnetic part that reacts to the electric current.

And I think that all the hybrid-power engines I've seen in current production cars use (in addition to the standard ICE) a single stage stator that receives the current from the batteries, and a single, permanent-magnet rotor that reacts with the stator to produce motion. I'm not too sure on the internal specifics of Honda's IMA system, but if I'm not mistaken, it's still a singile-stator, single-rotor electric motor. How interesting would it be to put more than one electric motor inline with the rest of the drivetrain?

Am I mistaken on the number of stages in the electric portion of Honda's engine?

AND!! to answer the question about even numbers of cylinders!!! I think I know this one...

There is a certain geometry and trigonometry to the crankshaft, camshaft, and valvetrain of an ICE which is designed to make sure (among many other things) that the time between piston firings is the same for all cylinders. I believe (and I can't prove this because I dont' have the numbers, but an ICE engineer might be able to conform this) that the geometry of using an even number of cylinders is MUCH easier than that of using an odd number of cylinders. Aside from that tidbit that I can't really prove, the vibration aspect always comes into play as well. Even-numerated engines always have a cylinder to counter the vibration created by another piston's detonation. This is what led to the parallel bank arrangement of today's modern engines.

All that crap said, I know for certain that one of Volvo's sportier type cars actually has a 5-cylinder engine (turbo, I think, too) but I don't know which model, I'm sure you could find that out on volvo's website. And if Volvo did it, I'm sure one of the German manufacturers have at least tried it. I've heard of ultra-fuel efficient ultra-low-power cars having 3-cyl engines, but never actually investigated it (Geo Metro maybe, possibly some of the older VW Beetles)

well, a basic flywheel spinning thru most of the cars' drive would be handy i suppose. years back (82?) they were part of the technology used then. using a clutch to engage or disengage was a way of getting some extra acceleration power from dead stop - without a motor.

i wonder why they dropped that aspect aside from extra parts being used?

and is there some extra inherent stability from having a flywheel spinning? i would think so?

see ya

Oooh, wow, so maybe I invented a new system...hehehe!

Apparently, I have been corrected on the operation of the Prius and the Escape engines. I think one of the advantages of the Honda IMA system (and again, there may be room for me to be mistaken) is that there is no planetary-sun-ring gear system to transfer power, so that reduces the weight of the car. Instead, where a flywheel might be located, there is a big "stator" portion of an electric motor. Of course, there will be a "rotor" portion as well, but keep in mind that the stator is not really stationary; since it's mounted directly to the crank of the ICE, its moving at the same rpm as the ICE. However, when electric power is applied to the stator, the rotor is pushed through electromagnetic power (basic operation of an electric motor). It sort of works like the hydraulic part of a torque converter, only instead of the LOSING a little bit of the RPM's in the torque conversion, the engine is actually ADDING torque.

OK, enough with the hybrid engine lesson.

In the case of the prius and the escape hev (since they use separate, self-contained electric motors) what do you think the effect would be of adding more electric motors to the planetary-sun-ring gearing system (effectively putting 2 or more electric motors in the system with the ICE instead of just one)?

In the case of the Honda IMA system, since the elec. motor is inline with the ICE, this is what I mean when I say more than one inline electric motor. Would the torque multiply? Would acceleration increase? Would we be able to keep up with a 'vette or a 'stang? Or would we get 1000 foot-tons of torque, getting us to 30 mph in half a second, and then still depending on the ICE and its pathetic torque to get us the rest of the way to 60?

I would think that if you added another electric motor to the prius/escape, it would add torque, so you'd see a LOT of low-end accel., but in the mid-range and high-end, you'd still be depending on the ICE. In the case of the Honda IMA system, that's where I'd be interested to see "just what happens" because the RPM's, and therefore the torque, would be MULTIPLIED. Am I wrong?

I've been trying to get someone to take a look at these ideas for some time. In one scale or another everyone of these systems have been proven.

Like to produce a vehicle that can burn rubber on takeoff on all four wheels and get 90+ mpg?

What I would like to see the automakers working on would have:

A turbocharged, two cylinder opposed, 2-cycle, air-cooled diesel directly
driving a generator. (It would not be running most of the time.) A 111 volt Lithium-Ion Polymer battery pack. Nothing but wires going from the
controller to every wheel, except for the necessary additional friction
brakes (of course). An added advantage of this would be the ability to recharge from the electrical grid while at home, saving even more on fuel.

Each wheel, depending on the feedback to the controller from wheel speed sensors would drive with just the right power depending on the accelerator position. You would get recharging from deceleration just as you do in today's hybrids. You would also use this feedback to stop the wheel from skidding.

Each wheel would have a stationary stator and a series of fixed magnets
closely adjacent all around the inside of the wheel. In a sense it would
operate each wheel in a very similar fashion that the mag-lev trains use,
except the motion would be circular, of course. Something very different
about this type of motor is that the stators are fixed to the axles and the
magnets are driven around them. This gives a significant increase in
mechanical advantage. That's like turning an ordinary electric motor inside out.

There would be no need for ordinary electric motor brushes. In fact, many electric motors operating today are brushless.

Such motors already exist in the model airplane field and their efficiently
is amazing - approaching 90%. I've got a couple and doubt that I would ever buy any other type.

It's possible to hang the model on the prop right out in front of you and
accelerate straight up, like a rocket, with this type motor

In the vehicle the motor/generator would not turn on to recharge the
batteries until they needed it. There are already experimental Lithium-Ion
driven cars that can get in excess of 200 miles before they have to be
recharged by plugging them in.

Lithium -Ion battery technology is so new that I doubt that very many
automotive engineers have even heard of them, much less thought to use them in this manner. Their energy density exceeds that of any other form of rechargeable energy storage.

The Lithium Ion battery is the most efficient battery available right now. So is the outer rotor electric motor the most efficient motor.

Build an SUV right and it will weight less and have simpler, easier to repair/replace modules.

Lets see what we can eliminate while improving performance and efficiency.

Transmission - None

Ignition system - None

Liquid cooling - None

Valves and valve train - None

Use bio-oil/fuels for both fuel and lubrication.

Feel free to pass this along to anyone you know in the Transportation business. I suffer from no delusion that any of them have the imagination to be able to see how something like this could jump them ahead of the competition.

I bought a Honda Civic Hybrid last summer. I enjoy it more than any vehicle I've ever owned. I will Never buy another vehicle that isn't a Hybrid and doesn't get at least 50 mpg.

As far as I can tell, Detroit isn't even thinking the same way I and the vast majority of it's potential customers are.

"Multiple, inline electric motors?"

More electric motors would consume more electricity.
As we know electricity isn't free and we pay for it as we recharge our batteries in reduced MPG.

I think Honda did it right with a single motor of the correct size.

The HCH with it's one motor drops about 7MPG while the green bars are lit for recharge.

Lucas, in general your concept is dead-on. I have have had a similar vision for about a year now, but hadn't commited it to writing.

The simplicity, the mechanical parts reduction, the AWD, and the stability/traction management possibilities are intriguing.

The only thing I don't like about it is the motors being a component of the wheel. That would increase unsprung weight, which is enemy #1 to car performance. Unsprung weight ruins acceleration, slows braking and turning, and makes bumps miserable.

Secondly, you mentioned SUV's. Hopefully by the time such a system would be developed, they will have fallen out of favor. No ground-up engineering design would ever come up with an SUV, it is an illegitimate design. If really needed, a minivan with identical AWD and ground clearance could be implimented, and with either much smaller vehicle size and identical passenger/cargo room; or of equivalent size as an SUV and much roomer interior. As I'm sure you know, most of the bulk of an SUV is wasted with a ridiculous powertrain layout. With your system, 90% of the vehicle would be useable space.

Fewer moving parts, but a lot more vibration!
However, if you put 2 of these little reciprocating doo-dads next to each other, and arranged it so one would be stroking one way, and one would be stroking the other way, it might work around vibration problem.

chuck, dc electric motors typically have a very low efficency, say 50%. i dont know what efficency a motor would operate at as a generator though. so to use a motor to generate power to power itself would require the same external source as just powering the first motor. i believe ac motors are more efficent, say 70%, but now you need to convert the dc from your solar array to ac (using a device that is less than 100% efficent)

if you used extended shaft electric motors..how come you can use alternators to charge your 12 volt battery and battery pack? i think its a good idea..but i haven't seen any conversions use the alternator to charge the cars as they move. Most conversions use DC to DC coverters to charge the 12V battery, which sux and adds weight. Let me know if alternators are the way to go when it comes to charging the car as it moves!

No url