Reducing Operation Emissions and Improving Work Efficiency Using a Pure Electric Wheel Drive Tractor

In response to the problems of excessive greenhouse-gas and particulate emissions and the low traction efficiency of conventional diesel tractors in the field,a purely electric wheel-side drive tractor was studied,including an electric motor drive system,a battery ballast system,and an electro–hydraulic suspension system.This paper develops a dynamics model of an electric tractor-ploughing unit under complex soil conditions,leading to the proposal of an active control method for drive wheel torque and a joint control method for the traction force of the suspension system and the front-and rear-axle loads of a tractor.Finally,the tractor is prototyped and assembled,and ploughing tests are carried out.The ploughing results show that the active torque-distribution control method proposed in this study reduces the tractor slip by 14.83%and increases the traction efficiency by 10.28%compared with the average torquedistribution mode.Compared with the conventional traction control mode,the joint control method for traction and ballast proposed in this paper results in a 3.7%increase in traction efficiency,a 15.05%decrease in slip,and a 4.9%reduction in total drive motor energy consumption.This study will help to improve the operation quality and traction efficiency of electric tractors in complex soil conditions.

Powertrain parameter matching and optimal design of dual-motor driven electric tractor

The rationality of powertrain parameter design has a significant influence on the traction performance and economic performance of electric tractor.At present,researches on powertrain parameter design mainly focus on electric vehicles,and electric agricultural machinery draw much less attention.Therefore,a method of powertrain parameter matching and optimization design for electric tractor was proposed in this paper,which was based on dual-motor coupling drive mode.The particle swarm optimization(PSO)algorithm based on mixed penalty function was used for parameter optimization.Parameter optimization design was programmed using MATLAB.A simulation dynamic model with optimization design variables of electric tractor powertrain was established based on MATLAB/Simulink.Compared with the simulation results before optimization,the objective functions were optimized and the traction performance of electric tractor was improved,which indicated the effectiveness of the proposed method.

Control algorithm and energy management strategy for extended range electric tractors

It is difficult to make full use of the electrical energy of the power battery for extended-range electric tractors because the battery’s state of charge may be relatively high at the end of the running mileage.To address this situation,this paper aimed to study the control parameter adjustment in relation to the power battery’s electrical consumption and the diesel engine’s fuel consumption energy management strategy.Based on the AVL-Cruise simulation platform,the vehicle model of the tractor was established,and the control module of AVL-Cruise was used to compile the energy management strategy.In order to verify the superiority of the proposed strategy,the contrast strategy was employed in terms of the diesel engine start and stop control plus fixed point energy management strategy(FPEMS).The applicability of the proposed strategy was tested through continuous transfer operation and the small area deep loosening operation.The simulation results show that the proposed strategy was of good applicability.Compared with the FPEMS,the fuel consumption reduced significantly,and the electrical consumption of the power battery increased obviously.

Slip-draft embedded control system by adaptively adjusting the battery position for electric tractor

A slip-draft embedded control system was designed and developed for an independent developed 2WD(two-wheel drive)electric tractor,to improve the traction efficiency,operation performance and ploughing depth stability of the electric tractor.In this system,the battery of electric tractor was innovatively equivalent to the original counterweight of the fuel tractor.And through dynamic analysis of electric tractor during ploughing,the mathematical model of adjusting the center of gravity about draft force and slip rate was established.Then the automatic adjustment of the center of gravity for electric tractor was realized through the adaptive adjustment of battery position.Finally,the system was carried on electric tractor for performance evaluation under different ploughing conditions,the traction efficiency,slip rate and front wheel load of electric tractor were measured and controlled synchronously to make it close to the set range.And the comparative experiments of ploughing operation were carried out under the two modes of adaptive adjustment of center of gravity and fixed center of gravity.The test results showed that,based on the developed control system,the center of gravity of electric tractor can be adjusted in real time according to the complex changes of working conditions.During ploughing operation with adjusting adaptively battery position,the average values of traction efficiency,slip rate,front wheel load and relative error of tillage depth of electric tractor were 64.5%,22.2%,2045.0 N and 2.0%respectively.Which were optimized by 15.0%,29.5%,19.6%and 80.0%respectively,compared with electric tractor with fixed battery position.The slip-draft embedded control system can not only realize the adaptive adjustment of the center of gravity position in the ploughing process of electric tractor,but also improve the traction efficiency and the stability of ploughing depth,which can provide reference for the actual production operation of electric tractor.

Calculation of the Losses of Series-Hybrid Powertrains

Regarding mobile machinery, particularly agricultural tractors, there is an ongoing competition for the most suitable technology to achieve optimum functionality with maximum efficiency. In this competition, the efficiency of electric series-hybrid powertrains （ESHPs） is often depicted as worse than the efficiency of mechanical-hydraulic power-split powertrains （MHPSPs）. On closer inspection of these statements, however, systematic errors, such as unequal balance limits, neglected size effects and nonlinearities, non-observance of recent technical developments and standards, or erroneous application of research results regarding MHPSPs on ESHPs are often evident. For verification （and under avoidance of the systematic errors mentioned above）, the losses of an ESHP of 150 kW power are for example calculated and compared with the losses of a typical MHPSP of the same power. The comparison of the losses shows that the ESHP clearly exceeds the efficiency of the comparative MHPSP in the main working range and that there is still potential for improvement.