Flywheel assisted electro-mechanical drive system
First Claim
1. An electro-mechanical drive system for vehicles comprising:
- a planetary differential gear transmission having three separate shafts coupled respectively to a sun gear, planet gears and a ring gear;
a propulsion drive shaft coupled to a first one of said shafts;
a flywheel coupled to a second one of said shafts;
a motor-generator coupled to a third one of said shafts and having the capability of operating as a motor to drive the third shaft and as a generator to develop an output current when driven by the third shaft, the motor-generator and the flywheel being the only sources of propulsion in said drive system;
electrical storage means for supplying electrical energy to the motor-generator when operated as a motor and for receiving electrical energy from the motor-generator when operated as a generator; and
electrical control means for selectively controlling the motor-generator to cause the flywheel to deliver driving power to the drive shaft.
1 Assignment
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Accused Products
Abstract
A vehicle propulsion system combines an electric motor-generator and battery with a flywheel as regenerative power sources. A planetary differential gear train couples together the shafts from the flywheel and the motor-generator. A controller connected between the battery and the motor-generator serves to maintain the current level to or from the battery with a range which develops optimum efficiency of battery energy utilization while causing the flywheel to absorb the relatively large peaks in battery power requirements.
In one embodiment, the controller is made up of a transistorized chopper, a free-wheeling diode, a regenerative diode, a current sensor, and a switch to change the controller between the motor and generator modes of operation. The motor-generator is a separately excited, DC machine.
175 Citations
20 Claims
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1. An electro-mechanical drive system for vehicles comprising:
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a planetary differential gear transmission having three separate shafts coupled respectively to a sun gear, planet gears and a ring gear; a propulsion drive shaft coupled to a first one of said shafts; a flywheel coupled to a second one of said shafts; a motor-generator coupled to a third one of said shafts and having the capability of operating as a motor to drive the third shaft and as a generator to develop an output current when driven by the third shaft, the motor-generator and the flywheel being the only sources of propulsion in said drive system; electrical storage means for supplying electrical energy to the motor-generator when operated as a motor and for receiving electrical energy from the motor-generator when operated as a generator; and electrical control means for selectively controlling the motor-generator to cause the flywheel to deliver driving power to the drive shaft. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6)
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7. An electro-mechanical drive system for vehicles comprising:
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a planetary differential gear transmission having three separate shafts coupled respectively to a sun gear, planet gears and a ring gear; a propulsion drive shaft coupled to a first one of said shafts; a flywheel coupled to a second one of said shafts; a motor-generator coupled to a third one of said shafts and having the capability of operating as a motor to drive the third shaft and as a generator to develop an output current when driven by the third shaft; electrical storage means for supplying electrical energy to the motor-generator when operated as a motor and for receiving electrical energy from the motor-generator when operated as a generator; and electrical control means for selectively controlling the motor-generator to cause the flywheel to deliver driving power to the drive shaft; wherein the motor-generator is a separately excited DC machine having means for separately controlling the polarity and direction of current to a field winding thereof, and further comprising a mode switch connected between one side of the motor-generator armature and the battery with a current interrupting means connected between the other side of the motor-generator armature and the other side of the battery. - View Dependent Claims (8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15)
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16. The method of controlling a battery powered motor-generator intercoupled with a flywheel and a vehicle drive shaft through a planetary differential gear transmission comprising the steps of:
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selecting between motor and generator modes of operation for the motor-generator; establishing a motor-generator field in accordance with a predetermined field current command signal; and controlling the armature current of the motor-generator within preselected levels to develop a torque at the planetary transmission which controls the proportion of power flow contributed by the flywheel to level out peak curent loads applied to the battery, the step of controlling the armature current including sensing the level of armature current, comparing the sensed level with a preselected command signal, and variably controlling the armature current in accordance with the difference between the sensed level and the command signal. - View Dependent Claims (17, 18)
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19. The method of controlling a battery powered motor-generator intercoupled with a flywheel and a vehicle drive shaft through a planetary differential gear transmission comprising the steps of:
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selecting between motor and generator modes of operation for the motor-generator; establishing a motor-generator field in accordance with a predetermined field current command signal; and controlling the armature current of the motor-generator within preselected levels to develop a torque at the planetary transmission which controls the proportion of power flow contributed by the flywheel to level out peak current loads applied to the battery; wherein the step of establishing the motor-generator field includes establishing a polarity of field effective to induce an armature potential polarity opposing the polarity of the battery while selecting the generator mode of operation.
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20. The method of controlling a battery powered motor-generator intercoupled with a flywheel and a vehicle drive shaft through a planetary differential gear transmission comprising the steps of:
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selecting between motor and generator modes of operation for the motor-generator; establishing a motor-generator field in accordance with a predetermined field current command signal; and controlling the armature current of the motor-generator within preselected levels to develop a torque at the planetary transmission which controls the proportion of power flow contributed by the flywheel to level out peak current loads applied to the battery; wherein the step of establishing the motor-generator field includes establishing a polarity of field effective to establish an armature potential polarity such as to draw current from the battery while operating as a motor and concurrently selecting the motor mode of operation.
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Specification