Investigation of the energy recuperation potential of the damper system for a compact class passenger car

In this paper an investigation of the potential of harvesting the energy dissipated by shock absorbers is presented, with a special focus on compact-class passenger cars, representative of electric vehicles (EVs). The calculations include the pitch movement due to the acceleration of the vehicle. The road roughnesses are modelled according to DIN ISO 8608. The vehicle model considered is a half car model. The tyre model considers the damping and the absorption behaviour via an integrative filter. A large number of driving cycles are studied by using their predefined velocity profiles, including the NEDC the FTP75, and different city cycles like the NYC-cycle, and the Tokyo City cycle. The road roughnesses are projected onto the driving cycle profiles. The simulation results show the potential for energy harvesting systems for different road roughnesses and driving cycles. Parameter studies are conducted to study the influence of different factors on the harvestable energy.