15
Low Cost, High Temperature, High Ripple Current DC Bus
Capacitors For Hybrid Vehicles--SBE Inc,
Mr. Terry Hosking, Principal Investigator, edsawyer@sbelectronics.com
Mr. Edward Sawyer, Business Official, edsawyer@sbelectronics.com
DOE Grant No. DE‑FG02‑07ER84870
Amount: $747,477
Currently, no low-cost capacitors
provide an elevated temperature, high reliability solution to the DC Bus
Inverter need in hybrid electric vehicles.
In previous work, an annular film capacitor design, which showed
potential for use in the DC Bus application, was developed. The unique shape of the capacitor enables the
potential use of polypropylene film at 105°C, a requirement for this
application. However, the
characteristics of the device in this application over transportation lifetimes
need to be understood, and the overall design must be optimized. In Phase I, the characteristics of all of the
materials that make up the capacitor were profiled as a function of temperature
and fed into a sophisticated modeling program.
The results, which were compared with actual tests of an annular film
capacitor, confirmed the reliable 105°C operation of the device as a DC Bus
Capacitor. In Phase II, the final
material selections will be optimized for reliability, a low cost but reliable
interconnect scheme will be developed, and a test package (which will allow
power-train transportation designers to confidently specify the device) will be
produced. In addition, modeling
simulations to predict failure modes and lifetimes will be compared with actual
test results of manufactured capacitors.
Commercial Applications and Other Benefits as described by
the awardee: A low-cost, polypropylene film used as a DC Bus Capacitor,
which requires nothing more than available 105°C engine coolant, would enable
the potential elimination of a separate coolant loop and reduce the cost and
weight of hybrid electric vehicles.