I'd noticed that with the upcoming GM products, which lead to this post. What hardware allows for the 800 volts? Is it wiring or the battery itself?
Battery itself. But GM uses a 400 volt battery. They spilt it in half and run them in parallel to enable 800 volt charging. Something I was hoping Ford would adopt after launch on newer models of both Lightning and Mach-E.
GM must be patent blocking on this, or maybe Ford is afraid they are? It's such a simple solution to the problem, and practically just a switch. It couldn't cost any significant amount to include this feature. Far less than switching to a heat pump I would think.
That would be nice! Maybe even 95%; at least for road trips.
Maybe I'm oversimplifying things, but I guess that could mean that we could hypothetically have a 800v aftermarket battery design installed in the future?
You can't patent Ohm's Law. Ford probably either didn't think of doing it, or didn't want to have the added expense needed to split the voltage.
Of course, but I would think you could patent, or at least try to patent the "switching architecture of a high voltage battery for automotive applications" or some other fancy speak for what they're doing.
There are many ways to skin a cat. It would most likely only entail a new High Voltage Junction Box, some added bus bars and some software. I can't see how you could patent block it unless you blatantly copied the hardware down to the exact measurements.
The “trick” is to divide the battery pack into two equal-sized 400v modules; connect them in parallel for driving (400v operating) and connect them in series for charging (800v charging). This gives the benefit of faster charging (higher kW due to lower amps) and retains the (present) economy of 400v architecture. This is the method GM Is using, but I believe Porsche introduced it in their Taycan.
Series for charging (400v + 400v = 800v) and parallel for driving (400v).
No, you had the concept, don’t be embarrassed. We live in a world where most people don’t know a kW from a kWh.
