Energy Harvesting Shock Absorbers

[edinlexusV8]

Not sure whether this is a repost ... Think this is an interesting idea ... that shock absorbers can help power your car by converting the up-and-down motion to electricity rather than heat.

 

Shock absorber generates electricity when it hits a bump

• By Bill Howard on July 15, 2011 at 10:55 am
  

Researchers from Stony Brook University on Long Island have found that shock absorbers can help power your car by converting the up-and-down motion to electricity rather than heat. They’d generate 100-400 watts at highway speeds, up to 1,600 watts on bumpy roads, and have the potential to increase fuel economy by 1-4% in regular cars and up to 8% in hybrids. As a bonus, the shocks might provide a smoother ride if and when they become commercially available.

 

Traditional mechanical shock absorbers are tubes with oil inside and a plate in the middle with little holes. Your car hits a bump, the oil is forced through orifices (holes in the plate) to the other side of the tube, then back when the car rebounds from the bump. That smooths out the ride. All the energy is dissipated as heat, so much that if you touched the shocks after a fast ride on a bumpy road, you’d burn your hand. The Stony Brook shocks, created by Professor Lei Zuo and graduate students Xiudong Tang and Zachary Brindak, with funding from the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA), convert the energy to electricity instead. Zuo and team also have patents on two kinds of shock absorbers: linear shocks and rotational shocks.

 

The linear shock comprises a small magnetic tube with high flux intensity (paging Captain Kirk?) that slides inside a larger hollow tube. The rotational shock turns and uses what the developers call a motion magnification mechanism. The motion is converted to electricity. In either case, on a mid-size passenger car the shock absorbers would generate 100-400 watts on good to average roads (what’s called Class B and Class C roads) and up to four times as much on rough roads (Class D). Used on trucks, off-road vehicles, and railroad cars, you’d get a return of 1-10 kilowatts, or 1,000-10,000 watts. Zuo, an assistant professor of mechanical engineering at SUNY Stony Brook, says the nature of the shocks means the car or the driver could change suspension damping (sporty ride, limo ride) and reduce vibration from the road.

 

The harvested energy recharges the car’s battery and powers the car’s electronics, which the researchers say draws 250-350 watts “with optional electronic systems turned off.” A car alternator typically provides 500-600 watts, although that figure is creeping up as cars use more power, especially the ones with electric power steering and electric, not belt-driven, air conditioning. A car engine rated at 200 hp would be rated at about 150 kilowatts. The higher mpg gain for hybrids is because they have bigger batteries and electric motors as well as combustion engines. Hybrids would get better mpg improvements at highway speeds because they could use their electric motors to take some of the load off the combustions engines.

 

The shocks can be installed on new cars or retrofitted. Zuo estimates that if 5% of the nation’s 256 million vehicles adopted them, it would be a $6 billion market. Doing the math, that pegs the shocks at $475 a car — a lot more than normal shocks. Zuo says, “We expect 1-2 years of recoup time for the implementation in trucks and service vehicles, and 3-4 years of recoup time for typical passenger vehicles.” The shocks are patented and awaiting a commercial developer. One downside to the shocks could be weight, especially since they contribute to what’s called unsprung weight along with the wheels and tires.

 

The energy harvesting shocks recently received the R&D 100 Award from R&D Magazine, which in the past recognized the ATM machine in 1973, the ATM machine that eats your card when you’re desperate for cash in 1974 (if not, they should have), the LCD in 1980, the anti-smoking patch in 1992, and

HDTV

in 1998.

 

[ManwithSupra]

No Joke i was thinking about this like 3 or 4 months ago.

Was just a passing thought "i wonder if they could use suspension to generate energy in hybrids"

 

Never thought about it again... Dam it i could have been a billionair - would have bought every paid member a big single conversion

[edinlexusV8]

No Joke i was thinking about this like 3 or 4 months ago.

Was just a passing thought "i wonder if they could use suspension to generate energy in hybrids"

 

Never thought about it again... Dam it i could have been a billionair - would have bought every paid member a big single conversion

 

Now I am feeling bad ... I missed out on my big single

 

May be we should ask the guy in the pic above to join our forum ...

[Gaz6002]

May be we should ask the guy in the pic above to join our forum ...

 

Erm... there are several more effective ways to improve the efficiency of the Supra before you start looking at this. Brake energy regeneration and aerodynamic tweaks coupled with lower rolling-resistance tyres would make a significantly bigger difference.

 

This tech isn't very effective on older, more crude cars like the Supra.