Electrified vehicle thermal management systems with combinable battery pack and electric drive component cooling circuits
AssigneeFord Global Technologies, LLC
InventorsKevin Mackenzie, Sunil Katragadda, Ronald Richard Semel
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
This disclosure details thermal management systems for thermally managing battery packs and other electric drive components of electrified vehicles. An exemplary thermal management system may include a battery cooling circuit and an e-drive cooling circuit. The e-drive cooling circuit may be fluidly connected to the battery cooling circuit by a combination of valves and coolant lines during or in anticipation of certain vehicle conditions, such as high load operating conditions, to augment cooling of electric drive components during the high load operating conditions.
Claims20
A thermal management system, comprising:
- a battery pack;
- a battery cooling circuit configured to thermally manage the battery pack;
- an electric drive component;
- an e-drive cooling circuit configured to thermally manage the electric drive component;
- and
- a first multi-position valve disposed immediately upstream from an inlet of the battery pack and being configured to control a flow of a coolant within a coolant subsystem of the battery cooling circuit,
- wherein, in a first position of the first multi-position valve, the battery cooling circuit is fluidly isolated from the e-drive cooling circuit,
- wherein, in a second position of the first multi-position valve, the battery cooling circuit is fluidly connected to the e-drive cooling circuit such that the coolant is permitted to flow from the battery cooling circuit to the e-drive cooling circuit.
A method, comprising:
- controlling a flow of a coolant between a battery cooling circuit and an e-drive cooling circuit of a thermal management system of an electrified vehicle, wherein controlling the flow includes:
- preventing the flow of the coolant from the battery cooling circuit to the e-drive cooling circuit when a current stator coil temperature of an electric drive component of the e-drive cooling circuit is less than a predefined stator coil temperature value;
- allowing the flow of the coolant from the battery cooling circuit to the e-drive cooling circuit when the current stator coil temperature of the electric drive component is greater than the predefined stator coil temperature value;
- and
- fluidly connecting the battery cooling circuit and the e-drive cooling circuit to pre-cool the electric drive component in response to receiving a signal indicating that a vehicle user has selected a heavy-duty cycle drive mode.
A thermal management system, comprising:
- a battery pack;
- a battery cooling circuit configured to thermally manage the battery pack;
- an electric motor;
- an e-drive cooling circuit configured to thermally manage the electric motor;
- a temperature sensor for monitoring a stator coil temperature of the electric motor;
- a first multi-position valve disposed immediately upstream from the battery pack and being configured to control a flow of a coolant within the battery cooling circuit;
- a second multi-position valve disposed within the e-drive cooling circuit and being configured to control a return flow of the coolant from the e-drive cooling circuit to a chiller of the battery cooling circuit;
- and
- a control unit programmed to command the first multi-position valve and the second multi-position valve to fluidly connect the battery cooling circuit and the e-drive cooling circuit when the stator coil temperature is greater than a predefined stator coil temperature value and to fluidly isolate the battery cooling circuit and the e-drive cooling circuit when the stator coil temperature is less than the predefined stator coil temperature value.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.