While short-haul applications such as local delivery trucks, port drayage trucks and city buses are perfect candidates for electrification, long-haul trucking will likely prove more of a challenge, because of battery-electric vehicles’ limited range. Now Furrer+Frey, a Swiss firm that provides a wide range of rail transport products and services, has proposed a simple, low-tech… Read more »
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Fairchild launches new discrete and bare die IGBTs for hybrids and EVs
Semiconductor pioneer Fairchild (NASDAQ: FCS) is expanding its portfolio of automotive-grade semiconductor solutions for electrified vehicles with its new discrete and bare die IGBTs and diodes, which are designed to be well-suited for traction inverters. The new components feature Field Stop Trench IGBT technology and a soft fast recovery diode. Designers can add IGBTs in… Read more »
Momentum Dynamics promises 200 kW wireless charging for electric buses
Momentum Dynamics says it will deliver 200 kW wireless charging systems for the municipal bus market in 2016. According to CEO Andrew Daga, the company delivered 25 kW and 50 kW systems to partners in the automotive industry in 2015, and is planning to deliver two wireless systems to municipal agencies in Maryland and Washington… Read more »
Toyota to launch two new PHEVs in China
Has Toyota decided that plug-in vehicles have a future after all? Or is the company just taking advantage of Chinese policies that incentivize people to buy PHEVs, even if they never plan to plug them in? Whatever its motivation may be, Toyota has announced that it will launch plug-in hybrid versions of the Corolla and… Read more »
A closer look at wire bonding
Wire bonding technology – widely utilized in the microelectronics and power electronics industries since the 1970s – is finding its way into interesting new applications in the growing EV industry – in particular, battery connections. We’re quite certain that a few EVs are using wire-bonding technology for production battery pack connections, but Charged was unable… Read more »
SK Innovation considers China EV battery factory
SK Innovation, South Korea’s largest oil refiner and chemical supplier, says it is having talks with several companies about jointly establishing an EV battery factory in China. “An investment announcement will likely be made in the near future,” said Chief Executive Chung Chul-khil, adding that the joint venture in China may be with a battery… Read more »
BMW’s X5 xDrive40e spearheads its plan to offer PHEVs in every market segment
BMW has taken a bold approach to electrification. It began test-marketing EVs in 2012 with the Active E and Mini E, and escalated to full-scale production in 2013 with the i3 EV and i8 plug-in super-sports car, which together passed the milestone of 50,000 worldwide sales in January. BMW deserves a lot of credit for… Read more »
Electric torque vectoring: Q&A with GKN’s Advanced Engineering Director (Full Interview)
Torque vectoring technology is generally defined as a vehicle’s ability to vary the power to each wheel. Quickly controlling the torque applied to the wheels independently of one another allows the driving characteristics of a vehicle to be improved in significant ways – more stability, more responsiveness and more agility. A conventional differential distributes the… Read more »
Ford has no plans for a 200-mile EV
At a Ford conference about a year ago, Charged asked CEO Mark Fields (and every other exec we could buttonhole) if the company had any plans for an answer to the 200-mile Bolt that GM had just announced. His coy answer of “nothing we can talk about” led willing minds to believe that there was… Read more »
Electric torque vectoring: A motor for each wheel or a single-motor-clutch system?
In February, engineering firm GKN Automotive announced a new torque-vectoring option for electric drive called eTwinster. Torque vectoring technology is generally defined as a vehicle’s ability to vary the power to each wheel. To quickly control the torque applied to the wheels independent of one another – increasing stability, responsiveness and agility – GKN’s new… Read more »