Topology Generation for Hybrid Electric Vehicle Architecture Design

Abstract

Existing hybrid powertrain architectures, i.e., the connections from engine and motors to the vehicle output shaft, are designed for particular vehicle applications, e.g., passenger cars or city buses, to achieve good fuel economy. For effective electrification of new applications (e.g., heavy-duty trucks or racing cars), new architectures may need to be identified to accommodate the particular vehicle specifications and drive cycles. The exploration of feasible architectures is combinatorial in nature and is conventionally based on human intuition. We propose a mathematically rigorous algorithm to enumerate all feasible powertrain architectures, therefore enabling automated optimal powertrain design. The proposed method is general enough to account for single and multimode architectures as well as different number of planetary gears (PGs) and powertrain components. We demonstrate through case studies that our method can generate the complete sets of feasible designs, including the ones available in the market and in patents.