Speculating the FluidGU

[Zynerji]

Kinda as the title says. With the drive towards even more efficiency, I was considering how the energy of the fluid pressure spikes moving through a FRIC system might be harnessed.

Considerations:

1. Must be directional. GU, not MGU.
2 Must be between damper valving and reservoir. Possibly on damper.
3. Must be compact and lightweight.

My first thought was something as simple as running a micro turbine on a small, 3 phase RC brushless motor, one for each corner of the car, as well as the front and rear 3rd units. If the micro turbines could have variable vanes, I think it could be tuned to operate under both fast/slow conditions.

Could such a setup of 6 FluidGU's, coupled with a small supercapacitor bank be worth investigating? Is the energy dissipated through modern systems large enough to harness? Would this have road car relevance?

Thanks.

[Tim.Wright]

I've done the maths on damper energy in the past and you are looking at RMS power of less than 1kW if I remember correctly.

For F1 it's probably even lower given how smooth the tracks are.

So not worth it in my opinion.

[Zynerji]

I've done the maths on damper energy in the past and you are looking at RMS power of less than 1kW if I remember correctly.

For F1 it's probably even lower given how smooth the tracks are.

So not worth it in my opinion.

I sincerely appreciate your post! A question if you dont mind.

Do you believe the math may change with the shift to 18in wheels, and the increased damper work that will require? Kerbing and direction change, especially late, sharp maneuvers should push more fluid around with this change.

Even adding a recovery coil to the inerter could be helpful. I guess it really comes down to ePower/weight.

Thank you!

[Tim.Wright]

If we speak about the F1 case I think the wheel travels are simply too small to build up any appreciable energy. I ran the calculations on a GTE car years ago and saw peaks of a several hundred Watts only and average values of only a few hundred.

I've heard of similar systems for off-road vehicles which claim to be able to run auxiliaries from recovered energy which is still a very small amount of energy coming from very large wheel travels. I can't find the company or product anymore which says a lot.

Then there is the problem of balancing energy recovery with adequate damping. Or in other words, if your energy recovery system replaces your dampers - it needs to be able to damp the suspension movements as good as the original dampers.

Regarding the 18in wheels - this will cause slightly more higher frequency vibrations (probs 20-30 Hz) which is too low in terms of energy content. What you need are low frequency high amplitude movements to generate energy.

[Zynerji]

Thank you for your feedback!