- Father or mother firm of Dodge, Ram, Jeep envisions an exhaust system for EVs
- Would determine battery thermal runaway, may assist forestall ensuing fireplace by treating gases
- Dodge Charger Daytona EV already makes the sound of an ICE exhaust system
Exhaust methods take away the byproducts of inner combustion, so they may appear superfluous in electrical automobiles. However Stellantis would possibly disagree with that.
On Jan. 16, america Patent and Trademark Workplace (USPTO) printed a patent submitting from the automaker (initially filed in 2023) for an electrical automobile exhaust system that, Stellantis claims, may assist forestall EV battery fires—or management the extent of their injury.
When batteries overheat—or expertise thermal runaway, in engineering parlance—they will launch flammable gases that then ignite within the presence of the excessive temperatures generated by the overheating batteries, Stellantis explains within the doc. These gases can embody hydrogen, in addition to hydrocarbons like methane, ethane, ethylene, acetylene, propane, cyclopropane, and butane, in line with the automaker.
Stellantis EV exhaust system patent picture
Eradicating these gases may forestall thermal runaway from escalating into fires, the automaker causes, in addition to vent stress from the battery pack. With Stellantis’ 4 new modular STLA platforms designed to accommodate combustion engines and their exhaust methods, in addition to all-electric powertrains, there is definitely room for the mandatory plumbing.
Stellantis even designed an exhaust system of types for the Dodge Charger Daytona EV, to reproduce the V-8 rumble of previous Chargers—though that system is solely supposed for sound and vibration.
Within the battery exhaust system, gases and they’d go via “a plurality of therapy zones for chemically treating the stream of gases to remove or not less than scale back the variety of numerous chemical species from the stream,” Stellantis says within the submitting—bringing to thoughts some similarities to the catalytic converters utilized in combustion automobiles.
Stellantis EV exhaust system patent picture
Fashionable batteries in most EVs are rigidly managed through battery administration system parameters. They’re additionally tightly sealed, with liquid cooling methods, and monitored on the module or cell stage in a means that may isolate a faulty portion of the pack. So whereas it is shocking to see an automaker specializing in an consequence that its engineers have seemingly gone to nice lengths to keep away from, this is not the one uncommon resolution proposed for lessening the danger of EV battery fires. In 2019 the automotive provider Bosch proposed utilizing pyrotechnics to rapidly sever electrical connections between battery pack and the remainder of the automobile if thermal runaway happens. Both resolution can be extra about containing injury, and doubtlessly making automobiles safer for first responders to strategy, than forestall runaways within the first place.
Hearth danger has led to a number of massive EV recollects, however in 2023 the Insurance coverage Institute for Freeway Security (IIHS) stated that, as a security concern, it is outweighed (no pun supposed) by the bulk of many present EVs and the injury they will inflict on different highway customers.
