Abstract

World Solar Challenge (WSC) is a race held for solar powered vehicles from all around the world in every two years and multiple contestants from Turkey attend to this competition. The aim of this paper is to find a way of increasing the performance of vehicle during the qualifying lap of the race via modelling and dynamically simulating the solar vehicle. For this study, IPG/Carmaker software is used and a solar vehicle formed by two front and 1 rear wheel is modelled. Performance enhancer parameters including the vehicle design is selected and implemented to the model. Additional to vehicle model, race track is also modelled according to its physical features. According to gathered simulation results vehicle velocity and race duration is optimized. Vehicle is also tested on additional test cycles from literature and test outcomes are compared. Moreover, discussion between studies from literature is held.

References

[1] Z. Taha, R. Passarella, J. M. Sah, N. Bin ve N. A. Rahim, «A Review on Energy Management system of Solar Car» Proceedings of the 9th Asia Pasific Industrial Engineering & Management System Conference (APIEMS 2008), Bali, Indonesi, 2008.
[2] A. Mills ve E. Stumpges, «The American Solar Challenge 2012» IEEE Potentials, vol. 32, no. 2, pp. 10-16, 2013.
[3] A. O. Onol, O. Atabay, A. Icke ve O. Serin, «Longitudinal Dynamics of a Solar Electric Vehicle» International Journal of Vehicle Design» vol. 73, no. 1-3, pp. 136-156, 2017.
[4] N. Alnunu, S. Said, S. Al-Sharman, A. Al-Ibrahimi, A. AbdulAziz, M. Al Hellabi, F. Touati, S. Ghani, E. S. Mahdi ve M. Benammar, «Design of Qatar University's First Solar Car for Shell Eco-Marathon Competition» First International Conference on Renewable Energies and Vehicular Technology (REVET 2012), Hammamet - Tunisia, 2012.
[5] J. Zhao, F. Yun, G. Zhang, D. M. Roche, S. R. Wenham ve M. A. Green, «20000 PERL Silicon Cells for the '1996 World Solar Challenge' Solar Car Race» Progress in Photovoltaics: Research and Applications» vol. 5, pp. 269-276, 1997.
[6] S. Tamura, «Teijin's Advanced Carbon Fiber Technology Used to Build a Car for the World Solar Challenge» Reinforced Plastics» vol. 60, no. 3, pp. 160-163, 2016.
[7] M. Elshafei, A. Al-Qutub ve A. W. Saif, «Solar car optimization for the World Solar Challenge» 13th International Multi-Conference on Systems, Signals & Devices (SSD), Leipzig, Germany, 2016.
[8] G. S. Wright, «Optimal Energy Management for Solar Car Race» 39th Midwest Symposium on Circuits and Systems, Ames, IA, USA, USA, 1997.
[9] World Solar Challenge Committee, «Regulations».