Ford Has a Better Idea a Hydraulic Hybrid

Anti-Ford, not anti-American. Being the first to do something doesn't mean you do it the best.

 

Green Car Congress: Artemis Intelligent Power Unveils New Hydraulic Hybrid Powertrain

Hydraulic hybrids might one day prove an appealing choice. If Ford is checking out that branch on the technology tree, then good for them.

Harry

 

Hey, hydraulic hybrids have some distinct advantages over HEVs. For one, a properly designed high-pressure system is nearly bullet proof and won't degrade over time the way current battery tech does. For another, fewer conversion steps from the wheels to the storage medium and back mean that it could...if properly executed...recover energy a great deal better that our cars can. So more power to them if they can bring it to market. Any step forward is a step in the right direction.

 

Hi All,

The energy recovery on a Prius with optimum braking is like 80 %. Using that energy for accelleration from a stop is very inefficient however. And the total effiency of reuse is like only 40 %.

The hydraulic system uses constant volume pump/motors, which have good efficiency across a broad RPM range, and have high torque capacity. This is why they are good for heavily loaded package trucks going down the street from neighbor to neighbor. So, they would be good for a work truck, but nothing special for Joe office worker commuting around in a F150.

Overnight storage of energy is better with batteries though, as the heat will leak out of the hydraulic resovoir, and reduce pressure. Overnight NiMH batteries loose very little energy. Again, this shows the great advantage for the drive-all-day stop and go duty cycle for hydraulic system.

And as this was published in 2006, and nothing else seems to have come of it, it appears that Ford has abandoned the project. Probably due to the extra expense of plumbing up all the hydraulics. Which is not going to be a problem for UPS and FedEx, if it pays off over the life of the vehicle. But quite negative for a consumer commuter F150. Standard F150's are already a very high entry price vehicle for commuting.

 

C'mon. Cars have problems with the low pressure hydraulics -- the brakes. I'll admit reliability has improved over the years and cars aren't crashing into each other, but still I wouldn't buy a 1st gen version. I'll also admit that my EE background makes me more comfortable around HVPS than high pressure hydraulics. I find the buzzing more calming than the hissing!

 

Toyota is the market leader in hybrid technology. The Prius is the most advanced production car in the world right now. It makes a Ferarri look outdated.

 

Lets look at the JD Power press release for the real scoop:
2007 version:
2007 Initial Quality Study (IQS) | J.D. Power and Associates
On the bar graph, Toyota is rank 7th, Lexus 2nd, Ford 10th, and Lincoln 3rd.
http://www.jdpower.com/corporate/news/releases/charts/2007088a.GIF

2008 version:
2008 Initial Quality Study | J.D. Power and Associates
Look at the bar graph, Toyota jumps to rank 5, Lexus to 3rd, ford to 8th, Lincoln to 15th O.O!
http://www.jdpower.com/corporate/news/releases/charts/2008063a.gif

J.D. Power: Vehicle quality improves industrywide: Financial News - Yahoo! Finance
Porsche was the top brand in J.D. Power's annual ranking of initial vehicle quality, which measures both mechanical and design problems in the first 90 days of ownership. Others in the top five were Nissan Motor Co.'s Infiniti, Mercedes-Benz, and Toyota Motor Corp.'s Lexus and Toyota brands.

 

Can you give us an inkling into how this is a step toward a zero emission vehicle? Or a vehicle which uses no fossil fuel at all. This is how I see an electric hybrid, a step toward zero emission vehicles.
The way I see a hydraulic hybrid right now is a step down a dead end road unless there are plans afoot to somehow expand the storage and charge it at home from electricity or other non fossil fuel sources.

 

Yes I see your point, Ford have it all over Toyota and I see the Toyota execs committing hari cari all over the place from the second report you link

I currently own 3 road going Toyotas. I replaces a wheel bearing on my RAV4 which cost about $200 and a water-pump on the Camry I later replaced with my Prius. That is the only non scheduled repairs I have done on my Toyotas in 15 years. Oh on closer inspection what I thought was a coolant stain near the bearing vent hole of the water pump was actually gasket sealant from the factory. I changed the pump while doing the timing belt to avoid going back in later.

I also have never been left stranded in a Toyota, that is in 20+ years of Toyota ownership.
Enough of the pissing contest, where is Fords hydraulic hybrid, I looked in the Ford showroom and there was nothing, not even a brochure.

 

I agree. So next time there is an article about Ford lets not have all of the negative responses about Fords quality and how crappy they are. Ford is the only car maker besides Toyota making a full hybrid that gets over 30mpg that they designed themselves.

Ford has an excellent hybrid platform, I wish they would do more with it.

1) Make a midsized car (the Fusion) with it. Nearly the exact system they have could go in it.

2) Make a hybrid minivan.

3) Make MORE hybrids. Lots more. They are supply limited not demand limited. The demand is there.

4) Make that hydraulic hybrid option for large pickups and delivery vans. It is a niche market, not good for the highway at all but mostly for stop and start delivery drivers.

Hydraulic is the only system I know of that there is no real limit on manufacture. The US could pump out as many systems as needed, there are no rare parts, everything in it decreases in price with production.

 

I never said it was, but now that you mention it there may be something to this. Somebody up the thread mentioned that batteries are better at overnight storage than a pressure vessel, which I think is accurate. However batteries don't really like to be charged and discharged constantly the way a HEV uses them. So how about this: get rid of the gas engine and create a hydraulic/electric hybrid. By adding a small-ish parallel hydraulic system to your EV, the big battery becomes more like a gas tank that is only charged and discharged once in a while. You also get the improved energy recycling efficiency. It would be worth little for a vehicle that spends most of its time on the highway, but it could be just the ticket for mail and UPS trucks in a petro-depleted future. So it's hardly such a dead end that it's not worth developing IMO.

 

Apart from heat losses during compression who knows. I'm not holding my breath.

I always wondered why no one ever made a giant version of the pull-back cars we had as kids (admit it you still play with them like I do) which can recapture braking energy in a spring. Wind the spring overnight with a geared down low power motor ready for commuting. I remember you pulled that sucker back maybe a foot and a half and it went the length of my grandmother's hallway past 6 bedroom doors and slammed into the door at the end, that's efficient!!

 

How important is regen braking to the Prius's total efficiency though? For efficiency, read MPG if you like.

I thought the main gain came from the Atkinson cycle engine being off a lot of the time....

 

Also, early self winding wrist watches. I vaguely remember (but google has lots of refs) a hybrid design using a flywheel for energy storage. No extra conversion losses. I think a large scale spring energy storage system would make me real nervous. I remember a design for a system with a high peak load but low duty cycle. You use relatively cheap, low power sources to spin it up over a time, then dump that kinetic energy in a flash. Similar to ultracap applications.

 

I saw one of the hydraulic hybrid UPS trucks in Toronto this summer. UPS says the system improves fuel economy by 45-50%. Of course, we're talking about repetitive stop-and-go urban use, but the technology definitely has its niche in these delivery trucks.

Here's a simplified cartoon about the system. I take it when the engine is off there has to be some extra battery power for AC stuff.