Modeling and Energy Consumption Determination of an Electric Go-kart

Abstract

An electric traction motor drive for an electric karting application was modeled for efficiency studies and simulated using the Matlab®/Simulink® software. In this thesis, the electric traction motor drive model includes models of battery, power electronic converter, and electric motor losses related to a typical 48 seconds track driving schedule. The important losses within a typical electric motor such as stator copper, rotor copper, and core losses were modeled and simulated over the entire speed range. A power electronic converter was modeled; including the switching and conduction losses for both MOSFETs and the anti parallel power diodes. The energy storage was modeled as a generic model capable of representing losses and the state of charge (SOC) of the battery over the driving cycles. The energy captured during regenerative braking was also considered in the simulation. Finally, the overall electric traction motor drive system efficiency was estimated based on the individual model based efficiency analysis. The battery and induction motor parameters, which were used in the simulation, were calculated using the measurement data obtained through laboratory tests. The complete electric traction drive system was simulated and observed using the drive cycle of the ICE karting at the race day for 48 seconds (one lap). The total average efficiency of the electric drive system is 66.7%. The average power of the electric motor was 5.4 kW and the total energy consumed by this electric traction drive system was 920 Wh for one whole race. The battery can supply the electric traction drive system for 22 minutes. The regenerative braking energy can be used to charge the battery and reduce the energy usage in the system, but has only a small effect due to the short time of the regenerative braking period.