OPEN ACCESS
The three wheeled auto rickshaws are most extensively used in India for transporting people and cargo. Even though the existing vehicle design is robust in the operating environment, but the emission control is minimal owing to the use of inefficient internal combustion engines. The best way to revamp the existing auto rickshaw is to develop a solar assisted auto rickshaw with efficient electric drive train to minimize the emissions at the tail pipe. This paper presents the development of solar assisted three wheeler auto rickshaw and also to implement an energy management strategy suitable for Indian city-driving pattern and driving requirements setup. The proposed auto rickshaw is modeled in Simulink software, fabricated and tested at different traffic conditions. From the test results it is concluded that the fabricated solar assisted auto rickshaw mimic the existing conventional auto rickshaw.
electric auto rickshaw, batteries, BLDC motor, photo voltaic panels
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