Foreign Object Debris Detection and Automatic Elimination for Autonomous Electric Vehicles Wireless Charging Application

Abstract

Power pad designing, misalignment reduction, safety, automation, living object detection (LOD), and foreign object debris (FOD) detection are the key challenges in the commercialization of the high voltage wireless charging of Electric Vehicles (EV). The interruption from unwanted and sensitive foreign objects such as metal objects and living objects over the charging pads is an immense challenge for the static wireless charging of EV. In this manuscript, the problem of interference due to foreign objects and living objects has been analyzed, and an innovative laser- and sensor-based FOD detection method is proposed and verified by developing a prototype setup. Modeling and analysis of the effects of foreign objects have been performed using Finite Element Analysis (FEA) in Ansys Maxwell® environment. The analysis compares the consequence of the presence of foreign objects on the wireless charging power pad. The proposed method utilizes laser light and sensor for the detection and two-dimensional signal processing for the elimination of FOD. The proposed method is compatible with all types of static wireless charging systems without interrupting the power transfer and power circuit. The proposed system has been analyzed and compared with the various available FOD detection techniques. The feasibility of the proposed system has been assessed with the help of an on the bench hardware prototype implementation in the lab environment.