Starter-alternator propel the vehicle through a hybrid supply: Battery and supercapacitors

In this article the use of Matlab-Simulink software to simulate the replacement of the car battery by a hybrid supply will be presented. The specific power of the supercapacitor makes it very attractive for the high power/low energy applications. This component has very high lifetime (1 million of cycles) what can improve the lifetime of the supply. The use of a hybrid sources composed with battery and supercapacitors allows to decrease the weight of the supplying system. After the identification of the ICE torque developed at the startup and the identification of the starter-alternator parameters, the validation of the hybrid supply interest is proved by the simulation of the system using Matlab-Simulink software. Finally, a test bench is developed in the laboratory to validate the simulation results.