Discussion about Altering Automotive Electricity Management

[Vincent Tree]

I'd like to start a thread of thoughts and opinions of a topic that I am considering spending time and money on. Unfortunately, I do not have a very broad knowledge of the engineering intricacies of the topic. I'm really curious if there has been a proposal or workings of a vehicle that uses an electromagnetic field to transfer a power supply to common automotive loads. A car that functions normally without physical copper wire transmission of power. I'd like to spark some debates about how this would come to life if there already isn't a similar proposal. I am affluent in automotive technology, but nowhere near the level of engineer type of understanding it would take to tackle an idea like this. My inspiration sparked from wireless phone charging. What I've read is that the voltage travels through the electromagnetic field that the pad in the charger creates to the phone battery. Would this even be practical? Or would it be a novelty achievement. Here is a brief list of what came to mind of how this might work, if even possible:

Would there be any possible way of using the principals of the tesla coil (Transmission of high voltage/low current via electromagnetic field), but inverted (Car battery 12.6V/high amperage potential- average 600Amps) via electromagnetic field?

Would a BUS CAN system be implemented in such a way where each individual load can receive its own power supply through a unique path for the load? A similar example I thought of would be a radio translating frequencies into the noise that travels through the unique frequency value, but instead of noise being translated from the head unit-voltage and amperage.

I am very open to suggestions of any nature; whether introducing similar theories, other websites or people to look toward for advice. Thank you very much for reading.

 

[berkeman]

Welcome to the PF. Here are a few quick thoughts:

• Please do a forum search for Wireless Transmission of Electrical Power. There have been a number of threads that discussed the isses involved, and the basic problem is that you need contact or near-contact to get efficient coupling of power. Any distance over a large fraction of meter or farther is very inefficient in general.
• You could think about doing a WiFi network (or similar wireless network) for the control portion of the comm traffic in a car (instead of via wired connections), but that is a reliability issue because of RF interference (either unintentional or intentional / hacking), which can have bad consequences in a vehicle.
• The biggest improvement in "wiring harness" designs came with shared wired control bus technology like CAN. That allowed you to have fewer wires in the wiring harness, and having more intelligent nodes at the control points in the car let's you figure out problems like burned out bulbs, etc. more quickly.

 

[anorlunda]

I'm really curious if there has been a proposal or workings of a vehicle that uses an electromagnetic field to transfer a power supply to common automotive loads. A car that functions normally without physical copper wire transmission of power.

As @berkeman said, there are sound engineering reasons why that won't work well But I am more interested in why you think that would be a big advantage. Wires contribute only a small fraction of the cost of a vehicle. In addition to delivering power and data, wires are far more immune to external hacking than any wireless scheme could ever be.

If it was practical, what are the big advantages you see?

 

[Borek]

My inspiration sparked from wireless phone charging.

Hint: an application that doesn't call for high currents nor high efficiency and can easily sacrifice them for the ease of use.

 

[Vincent Tree]

As @berkeman said, there are sound engineering reasons why that won't work well But I am more interested in why you think that would be a big advantage. Wires contribute only a small fraction of the cost of a vehicle. In addition to delivering power and data, wires are far more immune to external hacking than any wireless scheme could ever be.

If it was practical, what are the big advantages you see?

The main advantage I see in moving toward this idea would be solving the countless hours it may take to repair circuitry in vehicles. I also see a ton of communication issues with the current CAN system. Besides the whole communication system, have you seen anything about EM coupling working at longer distances?

@berkeman Thanks for letting me know about other threads, I had no idea how much this topic has been discussed. This is my first experience with the technology.

 

[berkeman]

The main advantage I see in moving toward this idea would be solving the countless hours it may take to repair circuitry in vehicles. I also see a ton of communication issues with the current CAN system.

Can you give some specific examples of the repair issues, and the communication issues with CAN that you mention? And what are you proposing to address these issues? Thanks.

 

[Borek]

The main advantage I see in moving toward this idea would be solving the countless hours it may take to repair circuitry in vehicles.

Wireless means even more circuitry.

 

[Vincent Tree]

Wireless means even more circuitry.

Such as the windings per electronic? Like I said I do not have a ton of engineering experience being at the technician level of the industry.​

Can you give some specific examples of the repair issues, and the communication issues with CAN that you mention? And what are you proposing to address these issues? Thanks.

There are a lot to go wrong with wires, whether chewed up by mice because of the insulation's sweet taste it has to them, pinched during installation in a dashboard for example, the many connectors that seem impossible to get to. Not to mention the fact that techs get paid very minimally for the work it may take as well. And as for the CAN issues, my experience may be biased about it, I think they do a good job on writing TSBs to fix the issues but they're 60+ pages of material to read through most of the time. Which again, don't pay very well. I like your idea of somehow implementing a wifi or even Bluetooth system. I do understand the effects of that, and how that can go into computer science topics like firewalls or security measures. Which, I think, can be attainable. Routers implemented into vehicles now are absolutely terrible in security measures. Regardless of security measures, what would the biggest interference of the EM field be. Radio frequencies?

 

[anorlunda]

The main advantage I see in moving toward this idea would be solving the countless hours it may take to repair circuitry in vehicles. I also see a ton of communication issues with the current CAN system. Besides the whole communication system, have you seen anything about EM coupling working at longer distances?

You are confusing the issue. Wireless communication has nothing to do with wireless power transmission. Is it data communication that you are really interested in?

 

[Vincent Tree]

You are confusing the issue. Wireless communication has nothing to do with wireless power transmission. Is it data communication that you are really interested in?

Okay, do they influence each other though? Like said above, the CAN system is as ideal as it can get. So my focus is more on wireless power transmission.

 

[Borek]

So my focus is more on wireless power transmission.

As I already wrote earlier - wireless power transmission is highly inefficient. No way it could beat a copper wire.

Plus, you will need additional circuitry to both transmit and receive the power. Again, no circuit will be ever as simple and as reliable as a piece of copper.

 

[anorlunda]

So my focus is more on wireless power transmission.

OK, so let's make the thread clearer by not mentioning CAN or data transmission.

Twice in this thread you heard that wireless power transmission is very hard to make efficient, and your reasons why wireless would be an advantage are pretty weak. Is there more to discuss?