OVER8™ – Affordable Thermal Management Innovations to Achieve the 2020 Fuel Consumption Limits in China

Authors

Dr. F. Will, Ino8 Pty Ltd, Jan Juc, Australia; Dr. H. Wang, Guangxi Liuzhou Jinhui International Technology Co., Ltd., Liuzhou, China; L. Gaojian MSc, L. Guohua BSc, SAIC - GM Wuling Automobile Co., Ltd., Liuzhou, China

Year

2018

Print Info

Fortschritt-Berichte VDI, Series 12, No 807

Summary

The 2020 China phase IV fuel consumption standard is expected to require a fleet-average fuel consumption of 5 L/100km. This is forecasted to increase the cost per car by over EUR 1348 (Li, 2013). One of the world’s bestselling cars is the Wuling Hong Guang S1 MPV; for its entry model the price would increase by over 17%. Thermal management technologies are some of the most cost effective measures to reduce fuel consumption, but the reduction potential is considered to be limited because modern engines warm up quickly so that the cold hot factor can be less than 6%. This raises the question about the potential for novel thermal management innovations to further reduce fuel consumption, not only during cold start, but at least as importantly, also during warm engine operation.
OVER8™ is a systems approach that generates new synergies by combining existing thermal management components in novel ways. NEDC tests were run in an ISO17025 accredited emission lab with a 2016 model year car to evaluate a new combination of affordable technologies such as a high temperature coolant, evacuation of coolant during cold start, heat storage tank, etc. Fuel consumption was reduced by 9% for part 1, and 6% for the combined cycle, and surprisingly even 3% for part 2. Challenges were the measurement of the coolant temperature at an appropriate position, the interface of a more dynamic coolant temperature sensor to the engine control unit (ECU) and that the standard engine calibration was not optimised for higher coolant temperatures of 130°C and above.
Further tests are planned with an improved sensor to ECU interface and to evaluate optimised system configurations to determine the most cost effective solution for production implementation. The research was supported by the Liudong Government, Woco Industrietechnik GmbH, Evans Cooling Systems Australasia, China and USA,Dana Canada, Mackay Rubber, Davies Craig, Wingmate, and Mahle Behr.