What are the advantages and disadvantages of incremental electric vehicles? What’s the difference with the plug-in hybrid power?

What is a plug-in electric vehicle?

On the basis of pure electric vehicles, plug-in electric vehicles are equipped with a small auxiliary generator set to charge the battery in case the battery power is insufficient. We call this small auxiliary generator set "range extender" for short. As a result, new energy vehicle news also wants to make clear that some of the policy documents that describe "plug-in hybrids (including increase program)" are inaccurate. As is known to all, the batteries equipped with pure electric cars are high in weight and expensive at present. For petrol-powered cars, continued driving distance is not a problem at all. But for pure electric vehicles, it has become one of the biggest obstacles to influence users to buy.

Then, the car companies began to consider if can decrease the number of cells on design, thus reduce automobile manufacturing cost, both at the same time travel distance can satisfy consumers' needs. So, incremental electric vehicles were introduced. Using a lighter and cheaper range extender to solve users' "range anxiety" about pure electric vehicles, and can greatly reduce the number of batteries, which is the origin of the design concept of plug-in electric vehicles.

In the plug-in electric vehicle, there is only one set of electric drive system, including motor, control circuit and battery. The motor drives the wheels directly, and the engine is used to drive a generator to charge the battery. Since the engine does not drive the wheels directly, a transmission is not required. This is equivalent to loading a gasoline/diesel generator into an ordinary electric vehicle.

The advantage of the plug-in electric vehicle is that it has a long range, and can drive several kilometers only in pure electric mode. Because the power source is the motor, the starting acceleration power is very sufficient. The motor low speed torque is large so that the acceleration is fast. After the battery power is exhausted, it can also rely on its internal combustion engine to generate electricity and charge the power battery. In this way, even if the pure electric car has no power, it will not be embarrassed to park the car on the roadside. Electric cars that rely on internal combustion engines to generate electricity can travel the same range as conventional cars.

Analysis from the structure, increase program electric structure is relatively pure electric vehicles is only one more power modules, car body structure more simple and the cost is lower. In addition, it has the external function of plug the extended range of electric vehicles which is more suitable for urban residents. It usually travels more than 150km in pure electric mode, and can be used for daily work and daily life. If you want to go out for a self-driving tour, you can achieve the same mileage as a traditional fuel car. It will not be like an electric car at all, because the short mileage and long charging time lead to the need to plan the route.

This mode also has disadvantages. Since the engine and generator do not directly drive the wheels, this part of power is wasted, and the weight brought by the engine and generator is not reduced. Since there is only one motor driving, it can only play the effect of 1+1=1. For example, a pure plug-in electric vehicle carries a total power of 200KW engine and motor, but only 100KW motor power can drive the wheels.

In the condition of high speed road, fuel consumption of incremental electric vehicles is high. Because under high-speed road conditions, if the engine directly drives the wheels, it can always work in the best working mode, while the plug-in hybrid power has an additional conversion process, the conversion itself will consume energy, resulting in high fuel consumption.

The representative models of this category include BMW i3 extended range version, Chevrolet volt and so on.

A plug-in electric car is more pure than a plug-in hybrid because it was a pure electric car before the addition of an extender. The deployment of the extender will not affect the power system structure of the original vehicle. The predecessor of plug-in hybrid electric vehicle is hybrid electric vehicle, so it retains more traditional mechanical parts. Structurally, it is more complex and slightly more expensive than plug-in electric vehicle. To sum up, whether a car is a plug-in hybrid or a plug-in electric vehicle depends on whether the engine of the car is directly driven by the wheels. Although it seems very complicated, but after understanding the difference is actually very simple!

What is a plug-in hybrid?

The emergence of a hybrid car let the motor part involved in the engine work for fuel-efficiency. Plug-in hybrid vehicles, the main difference is the introduction of external power supply, through external charging to provide continuous electric energy, so that the motor more involved in the vehicle drive, and then meet the purpose of energy saving and emission reduction.

Plug-in hybrid electric vehicle (PHV), in short, it is a kind of car between electric car and fuel car. It has the engine of traditional car, transmission, transmission system, oil circuit, fuel tank, but also has the battery of electric car, motor and control circuit, and the battery capacity is relatively large, there is a charging interface.

In the plug-in hybrid car, there should be two complete power systems of integrated electric vehicle and fuel vehicle. Therefore, the cost of plug-in hybrid car is relatively high and the structure is relatively complex. In addition, the body weight is larger, which has some disadvantages compared with the pure fuel car and electric car. However, before charging stations become widespread and the time to charge is greatly reduced, plug-in hybrid vehicles will continue to exist for a long time as a transitional product between fuel and electric vehicles.

The classification of plug-in hybrid electric vehicle (after each classification explanation with representative models pictures and models basic introduction)

On market at present, although there are many types of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles on the market, they are not the same in structure. Each manufacturer will produce different types of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles according to their understanding of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, which can be roughly divided into the following categories:

Parallel plug-in hybrid

This type of plug-in electric hybrid car has two sets of drive system, mostly on the basis of traditional fuel cars increased motor, battery, electrical control, vehicle in the process of driving wheels are driven by the motor and engine. In addition, there is only one motor in the car, which acts as an electric motor when driving the wheels, but can act as a generator when not driving the wheels so as to charge the battery. Parallel plug-in electric hybrid cars, the advantage of motor engine driven wheels, no waste of power, such as 50kw motor power, engine power 100kw, can bear, as long as the transmission system can withstand, the vehicle power is 150kw.

In pure electric mode, the car also has the advantages of pure electric vehicle quiet, low cost of use. In hybrid mode, has been amazing start torque, and accelerate the performance is very good. This is kind of representative models, BYD-QIN. It also could explain that why some people say that BYD-QIN start is touted as a "on the universe better than a million sports car ". And because of this type of car just increased by an electric motor in the gearbox, on the basis of traditional fuel vehicle changes is small, so the cost is relatively low.

However, parallel plug-in hybrid models also have disadvantages. In the hybrid mode, the engine cannot always work at the optimal speed, and the fuel consumption is relatively high in the driving process. The fuel consumption will be low only when the starting and stopping function of the built-in engine is started in traffic jam. And it is because the parallel plug-in hybrid models only a motor, not power and drive wheels at the same time, so the operation condition of the engine and electric motor driven wheels can't last. Continues to accelerate, the battery will soon run out of energy, and then into the engine drive mode alone.

Plug-in electric hybrid composite group type

With parallel plug-in hybrid, this model has two sets of drive system, but the difference is that mixed type with two motors. A motor is used only for direct drive wheels and a motor has a dual role: When the ultimate performance is needed, the motor can act as a motor to drive the wheels directly. The power of the vehicle is the sum of the power of the engine and the two motors. When power is low, it acts as a generator to charge the battery.

Therefore, mixed type plug-in electric hybrid systems have increased at the same time programming and parallel connection of advantages: in the pure electric mode possesses the advantages of electric cars quiet, low use cost; In the extended range mode, there is no "range anxiety", and the engine can always control on the best speed, low fuel consumption, low noise, small vibration characteristics. In parallel mode, two electric motors, the engine can work at the same time, add up the three power has the very good starting performance and acceleration performance, a more perfect.

If you want to explain the shortcomings of hybrid plug-in hybrid, it is two motor, two motors, an engine and a transmission are indispensable. At the same time supporting the control circuit, battery, transmission system, oil line is indispensable. Because there are two motors and one engine to control, and different working modes, the control system will be relatively complex. In a word, the total weight of hybrid plug-in hybrid body is large, and the total cost is higher than that of other types of plug-in hybrid. This category is represented by the PRIUS plug-in hybrid.

The page contains the contents of the machine translation.