Motorcycle Waste Heat Energy Harvesting Using Thermoelectric Generators

Abstract

Meeting the increasing global demand for energy coupled with the depletion of fossil fuel sources has created breakthroughs in research on waste heat energy harvesting devices. By utilizing waste heat, energy consumption does not grow and is efficiently used instead. Harvesting energy from automobiles has promising outcomes for the application of thermoelectric generators (TEGs). Heavy duty diesel engines, pick-up trucks, sport bikes and model airplanes are involved in research attempting to do away with heavy batteries or alternators. For this study, a single cylinder, 100 cc Honda EX5 Dream, which is also known as ‘Kapcai’, was used to study the viability of installing TEGs for waste heat recovery in underbone of the motorcycle chassis. The natural convection passive cooling system of fin was used to dissipate heat for cold side of the TEGs to maintain temperature difference across TEGs of the motorcycle waste heat recovery system. Two currently commercially available TEG modules were used and were connected in series and parallel in order to obtain output power. Results for a single module of each of the two TEGs testing recorded a temperature gradient of 57.5 °C and 62.7 °C with open circuit voltage of 1.677 V and 1.704 V, respectively. The highest temperature difference and output voltage were recorded at 73.2 °C and 4.2 V in series arrangement for both the TEGs. In the same arrangement, the highest power output obtained was 551.0 mW. The outcomes from this field testing shows the applicability of waste heat recovery from the underbone chassis of a typical motorcycle in charging small portable devices such as smartphones or power banks for the rider of motorbike.