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Boosting the fuel efficiency of motor vehicles by "harvesting" the energy generated by their shock absorbers and feeding it back into batteries or electrical systems such as air conditioning has become a major goal in automotive engineering. Now, a University of Huddersfield researcher has made a breakthrough by designing a new system and constructing a prototype that is ready for real-world testing.
Ruichen Wang carried out the project to obtain his doctorate at the University and has published his findings. The article, in the journal Energies, is titled Modelling, Testing and Analysis of a Regenerative Hydraulic Shock System. It provides a summary of current progress in the field of vehicle energy harvesting and a detailed account of the theory and the practical development of his device, designed for installation in a heavy good vehicle.
An abstract is available: DOI: 10.3390/en9050386
Why not also a stirling engine to make use of solar gain in parked cars on sunny days?
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Francis on Sunday October 30 2016, @04:21PM
The point of this is as a replacement for the dampeners that shocks usually have.
I wouldn't expect to see much improvement in efficiency from this, but every little bit you can scavenge from things like braking and the shocks does make a difference over a large enough number of cars. The relevant question is like the GP asked, is this going to be good enough to justify installing.
It's definitely not good enough for a gas burning car, it might eventually be worthwhile for a hybrid or electric though.