ABSTRACT
There is an ongoing project at the National Mining University (Dnipropetrovs’k, Ukraine) dedicated to development of low-cost solution to retrofit conventional vehicle into hybrid one. Similar ideas were investigated by several researchers and engineers, like Bharat Forge and KPIT Cummins Infosystems LTD alliance which even announced that a special retrofit kit would be available on the market by 2011. The solution we pursue is to equip a front-wheel drive vehicle with additional electric drive installed onto the rear axle. The rear wheels can be equipped with hub motors, which requires less mechanical transformations and saves space but is more expensive, or the axle can be transformed to be driven from single electric motor. The latter solution despite its complexity is obviously cheaper and thus our target.
