Toyota Jidosha Kabushiki Kaisha

Aisin Seiki Kabushiki Kaisha

Masayuki Ito

Tomohiko Kaneko

Yasushi Araki

Masaaki Matsusue

Hideyuki Kumei

Takahiro Umehara

Nobuyuki Kitamura

Norishige Konno

Nobuaki Nonoyama

Hitoshi Hamada

Takashi Kajiwara

Naohiro Takeshita

Shigeki Hasegawa

Hiroaki Takeuchi

Tomohiro Ogawa

Hideo Nagaosa

Kazunori Shibata

Naoki Takehiro

Takumi Taniguchi

Makoto Adachi

Keisuke Fujita

Takahiro Kato

Atsushi Ida

Shinji Jomori

Haruyuki Aono

Tomoaki Uchiyama

Koichiro Ikeda

Naohiro Hoshikawa

Ryouichi Nanba

Tomoyuki Takamura

Satoshi Andoh

Yuuki Kasahara

Wataru Otsu

Reddy Yella Paidi

To provide a fuel cell system configured to appropriately measure the AC impedance of a fuel cell. A fuel cell system wherein a controller controls ON and OFF of switches of n phases; wherein the controller monitors current values of coils; the controller operates the switches of the n phases at different phases; wherein the controller operates duty ratios of the switches of the n phases with periodically increasing and decreasing them, and the controller measures an AC impedance of a fuel cell from a current waveform of and a voltage waveform of the fuel cell; and wherein, when the controller determines that a predetermined condition 1 is met, the controller makes amplitudes which increase and decrease the duty ratios large compared to other operating conditions.

Fuel cell system

A power supply unit includes a power supply and a converter. The converter performs operation selected from the group consisting of boosting and stepping down of an output voltage of the power supply; and includes a reactor in which n-phase coils are magnetically coupled to each other, n-phase switches, and a control unit. The control unit controls duty cycles of the n-phase switches; monitors a current value flowing through the n-phase coils; and performs phase switching control when the control unit determines that an operation condition described below is satisfied, the phase switching control being control in which the control unit performs phase switching from in phase to out of phase in the case where the n-phase switches are being driven in phase and performs phase switching from out of phase to in phase in the case where the n-phase switches are being driven out of phase.

Power supply unit capable of reducing possibility of overcurrent and current shortage

A fuel cell is provided with: a membrane electrode assembly (MEA); and a cathode-side separator assembled to the MEA, the cathode-side separator including first passages on a first surface of the cathode-side separator on a side closer to the MEA, and second passages on a second surface of the cathode-side separator on an opposite side, the first and second passages allowing oxidant gas to flow through the first and second passages, respectively. The first passages include first recessed portions on the first surface so as to extend from one end of the cathode-side separator to the other end, the second passages include second recessed portions on the second surface so as to extend from the one end to the other end and to be arranged alternately with the first recessed portions, and a penetration hole on a bottom face of the second recessed portion penetrating through the cathode-side separator.

Fuel cell and fuel cell separator

To provide a power supply unit configured to determine the boundary between the operation modes (continuous mode and discontinuous mode) of a converter with high accuracy. The power supply unit is a power supply unit wherein the controller controls a value of output current of the power supply by controlling a duty ratio by switching the second switch; wherein the controller detects the current value of the reactor acquired by the current sensor, at a frequency of at least n (n is an integer of 2 or more) times in a cycle of the switching.

Power supply unit with current control

A ventilation system including a building having a space inside, a subterranean facility arranged in a basement of the building and having a subterranean space inside, a communication passage establishing communication between the space and the subterranean space, and a ventilation hole establishing communication between an earth outside the building and the subterranean space is provided. A fuel cell unit having an exhaust port is arranged in the subterranean space. The communication passage has a lateral wall protruding downward from a ceiling of the subterranean space. The lateral wall is arranged on the exhaust port side when the communication passage is arranged on a straight line linking the exhaust port and a second opening portion of the ventilation hole on the subterranean space side. The lateral wall is arranged on the straight line side when the communication passage is arranged at a position spaced apart from the straight line.

Ventilation system

To provide a fuel cell system configured to appropriately measure the AC impedance of a fuel cell. A fuel cell system wherein the controller controls ON and OFF of the switches of n phases; wherein the controller operates the switches of the n phases at different phases, and the controller operates the switches of the n phases at the same duty ratio; wherein the controller operates the switches of the n phases at different duty ratios, when the controller determines that a specific condition is met; and wherein the controller measures the AC impedance of the fuel cell from the current waveform and voltage waveform of the fuel cell.

To provide a fuel cell system configured to suppress the occurrence of partial fuel gas deficiency in a fuel cell. A fuel cell system wherein at least one injector selected from the group consisting of a first injector and a second injector is driven by duty ratio control to maintain a fuel gas pressure to the fuel cell within a predetermined range, in accordance with an output current value; wherein a controller determines whether or not the output current value is larger than a predetermined first threshold; and wherein, when the controller determines that the output current value is larger than the predetermined first threshold, the controller drives the first injector by duty ratio control, and the controller drives the second injector by duty ratio control to open a valve of the second injector at least while a valve of the first injector is closed.

To provide a power conversion device configured to evenly pass current through phases and to achieve high power conversion efficiency in a wide current range. A power conversion device comprising conversion parts which are coupled in parallel to each other, which are capable of voltage conversion, and each of which includes a coil, wherein the power conversion device comprises M (M is a natural number of 2 or more) sets of conversion sets including the conversion parts of N phases (N is a natural number of 2 or more), and the coils of the conversion parts are capable of magnetic coupling to each other; wherein the power conversion device includes a controller configured to change a driving phase number X of the conversion parts according to a system requirement.

Power conversion device

A fuel cell unit including: a stack case; stacked fuel cells; current collector plates; and tabs, wherein the power converter has a power converter case, and a power conversion component, wherein the bus bar is disposed in a slit provided on the stack case, wherein the bus bars each have a current collector plate connecting portion for connecting to the tabs at a first surface, a power conversion component connection portion connected to the power conversion component at a second surface, and a plurality of connecting portions for connecting the current collector plate connecting portion and the power conversion component connecting portion, and wherein the connecting portions each have a plate surface intersecting the plane belonging to the first surface and the plane belonging to the second surface.

Fuel cell unit

A control device for a converter including a one-phase or multiple-phase converter circuit includes: a magnetic coupling determination unit configured to determine whether the converter circuit is a magnetically coupled circuit in which a reactor of the converter circuit is in a magnetically coupled state; and a control unit configured to change a control method for the converter according to a determination result of the magnetic coupling determination unit.

Control device and control method

A fuel cell system includes: a fuel cell unit including first to nth fuel cells connected in series to each other to supply electric power to a load device; first to nth supply systems that independently supply cathode gas to the first to nth fuel cells, respectively; a switching device capable of switching a state between a connected state and a disconnected state; and a control unit, when required output to the fuel cell unit is equal to or smaller than a threshold value, configured to control the switching device to switch the state from the connected state to the disconnected state, and to control the first to nth supply systems to respectively control the first to nth fuel cells so as to respectively control flow rates of the cathode gas to be supplied to the first to nth fuel cells.

A fuel cell system includes: a first fuel cell; a second fuel cell having a greater maximum power output than a maximum power output of the first fuel cell; and a controller configured to cause the first fuel cell to generate greater electric power greater than the second fuel cell when the requested power is smaller than a first threshold, cause the second fuel cell to generate greater electric power than the first fuel cell when the requested power is a second threshold, which is the first threshold or greater, or greater and is smaller than a third threshold that is greater than the second threshold and is greater than 50% of a sum of the maximum power outputs of the first and second fuel cells, and cause both the first and second fuel cells to generate electric power when the requested power is the third threshold or greater.

A fuel cell system includes a first fuel cell stack having a discharge manifold, a second fuel cell stack having a discharge manifold, a first auxiliary machine used for power generation of the first fuel cell stack, a second auxiliary machine used for power generation of the second fuel cell stack, and a controller configured to control operation of the first auxiliary machine and the second auxiliary machine. The controller is configured to control operation of the first auxiliary machine and the second auxiliary machine, such that one of the first fuel cell stack and the second fuel cell stack, of which a discharge direction of reaction gas discharged from the discharge manifold forms a smaller angle with a vertical downward direction, starts generating power earlier than the other fuel cell stack, after power generation of the first fuel cell stack and the second fuel cell stack is stopped.

A separator for a fuel cell, includes a separator plate provided with a flow path groove group through which the reaction gas flows. The flow path groove group includes a single first flow path groove, a plurality of second flow path grooves, and a branch portion that connects an end portion of the first flow path groove to end portions of the second flow path grooves. The branch portion includes a narrow portion having a narrower groove width than a groove width of a remaining portion of the branch portion. A groove depth of the narrow portion is shallower than a groove depth of the remaining portion of the branch portion.

Separator for fuel cell and fuel cell

An energy consumption predicting device includes: an acquisition unit acquiring a parameter correlated with at least one of a vehicle speed when a vehicle traveled on a route from a first point to a second point on which a vehicle traveling using only a power source consuming an energy source supplied from outside of the vehicle and stored therein is able to travel, a different vehicle speed when a different vehicle traveled on the route, an output of the power source when the vehicle traveled on the route, and an output of a different power source when the different vehicle traveling using only the same type of different power source as the power source traveled on the route; and a calculation unit calculating a predicted consumption of the energy source which is predicted when the vehicle travels on the route from the first point to the second point.

Growing community of inventors

Sunto-gun, Japan

Masayuki Ito