Monitoring of electricity generation from exhaust waste heat and wireless data recording from a mobile phone in real driving conditions of a vehicle.

Abstract

In this study, a system is designed to generate electrical energy from the exhaust waste heat of vehicles using a thermoelectric generator. Electronic hardware that can communicate wirelessly, firmware, and mobile software specific to the system have been developed to control and monitor this system. The system comprises hexagonal aluminum components, thermoelectric generators, a cooler, sensors, software, and electronic hardware. The easily removable hexagonal modular aluminum component is designed to transmit heat from the exhaust pipe to thermoelectric generators. It used a thermoelectric generator (TEG-SP1848) on each edge of this hexagonal component and a heatsink to cool the generator. The voltage and current values of the electrical energy produced in the observations made under real driving conditions are recorded on the SD card on the system. In addition, system-specific mobile software has been developed by the work team. With this software, the system can be controlled, as well as visualizing the instantaneous parameters of the system. According to the results obtained from the test drives, electrical energy was obtained at a maximum voltage of 9.8 V and a current of 0.32 A. This electrical energy from the exhaust waste heat can be stored in the vehicle's existing battery. In this way, since the alternator used for the vehicle's electricity generation will be activated less, fuel savings will be achieved in the engine, and harmful exhaust emissions will be reduced. In addition, the electrical energy obtained by this method can be stored in an external battery independent of the vehicle battery and used for various purposes. In contrast, the vehicle is stationary or has a portable battery.