Regenerative Braking Applied to a Student Team’s Electric Racing Motorcycle Prototype: A Theoretical Study

Abstract

One crucial aspect in the design phase of an electric racing prototype is reducing the weight and size of the battery energy storage system without compromising performance. Using battery energy storage also presents range limitations. A promising solution is to implement regenerative braking as a way to divert energy from the wheel to the accumulator, thus recuperating some of it rather than losing it entirely as heat when only using mechanical brakes. MATLAB/Simulink software (Matlab R2022a version) was developed to simulate in 25 different tracks the regenerative capacity of an electric racing motorcycle developed by students for a student worldwide competition. Results point to an average increase in available energy of 11.11% for a depth of discharge of 80%, when applying 30% of the braking force on the rear wheel as regenerative braking. This translates to an average increase in traveled distance of 8.8%. Sensitivity analyses on the Circuit of Barcelona–Catalunya on the percentage of rear braking and mass allow concluding that (1) for a reduction of 5% in weight, the percentage of recuperated energy decreases from 12.21% to 12.03% and traveled distance increases from 39.635 km to 40.527 km. For a 5% weight increase, the recuperated energy increases to 12.45%, and the traveled distance decreases to 38.886 km; (2) if the percentage of rear braking were to increase or decrease by 5%, the traveled distance would increase or decrease about 1.5%, respectively.