THE ELECTRIC CAR SENSORS

THE ELECTRIC CAR SENSORS

Modern cars are not just built to function better in terms of speed, they are also meant to function smarter and same is the electric cars. With the number of vehicle devices consuming energy on the rise, intelligent systems are needed to monitor and ensure efficient Battery Management. To start with, there hundreds of sensors parked in these cars which regulates every aspect of the car ensuring proper functionality and effectiveness in electrical output and balance system.  Semiconductor content in automobiles has been increasing rapidly. Its growth rate is likely to increase even more as carmakers embrace the green revolution. The sensor cluster for instance, provides all control units in the vehicle with the vehicle’s current movement status in the form of electronic signals.

Digital Chassis Accelerator Sensor measures of horizontal and vertical acceleration as part of chassis control.  Also, the chassis Position Sensor (CPS) Regulates the main beams with the CPS for greater road safety while The PAS (paddle Angle Sensor) can be used to detect the angle of the brake pedal in hybrid and electric vehicles. One major component of driving safety is monitoring the thickness of the brake pads on an on-going basis and that exactly is what the Brake Pad Wear Indicator does as well as Speed Sensors that gives information on both motor and wheel speed to enhance balance and break response.

More on the focus are battery sensors, since every aspect of an electric car is driven or reliant on the batteries, much attention is given to this power source to achieve higher efficiency. Automakers currently don’t allow their batteries to be charged all the way, which helps avoid the high voltage levels that can degrade battery materials or in some cases cause fire. They also keep some capacity in reserve in case overheating or other factors reduce the performance of the battery. They build in these safeguards because they don’t know exactly what’s going on inside each cell—the temperature, chemical composition, mechanical strain, voltages at each electrode, and so on.

Electric-vehicle battery packs could shrink 20 to 30 percent, and make electric vehicles more affordable, if new sensors were developed to monitor the cells in a pack, according to the U.S. government’s Advanced Research Projects Agency for Energy (ARPA-E). The agency says such sensors could have an even greater effect on hybrid gas-electric vehicle batteries, causing them to shrink by half.

Cell sensor: Small fiber-optic sensors  like those developed at PARC, could help makers of electric cars get the most out of the vehicles’ batteries.

Better sensors could tell what’s happening inside each of the hundreds of cells that make up an electric vehicle’s battery pack, allowing automakers to safely store more energy in them. A $30 million ARPA-E program that’s been underway for about a year is seeking to develop the necessary technology.

Developing new battery chemistries can take a decade or more, so increasing the capabilities of existing ones could be a faster way to reduce the cost of batteries, which remains one of the main things holding back the adoption of electric cars.

Other auto makes earlier on focused their attention on self-driven cars on which they demonstrated many fuel management techniques where computers calculate the distance to be covered and equate it to the amount of fuel needed to cover such distance thus, accelerating and maintaining the necessary speed in other to curb fuel consumption. Others experimented with trucks travelling along the same path, maintaining certain distances from each other in order to reduce drag which in turn reduces fuel consumption.

While looking at a future filled with AI and self-driven mobility systems, there is need to first eradicate (if possible) or at least reduce the level of emission of CO₂ to a considerably low level. Many are of the opinion that it will take a longer time for EVs to attain the needed efficiency that will boast its usability and acceptance around the globe. Presently, there are just too many places around the world where EVs are just to practical, there areas needing intense infrastructural reform as regards electricity. Except drastic steps are taken towards developing more efficient cells and cheaper alternatives to electricity, the green revolution might as well be a far-fetched. The good news is, hundreds of researchers around the globe are committed to find a lasting solution to these problems and hopefully, in no time the EV will become a perfect replacement. There is more to look forward to.