A vehicle powertrain component includes a thermal transfer surface that transfers thermal energy out of a powertrain component and a thermally active material disposed over the thermal transfer surface. The thermally active material includes a variable thermal conductivity and an actuator coupled to the thermally active material induces changes in the thermal conductivity of the thermally active material. A controller governs operation of the actuator to adjust the thermal conductivity of the thermally active material responsive to a vehicle operating condition to maintain the powertrain component within a predefined temperature range.

A method for controlling a start of a mild hybrid vehicle that includes an engine, a starter-generator starting the engine or generating electricity by an output of the engine, a starter starting the engine, and a battery supplying electric power to the starter-generator may include: determining, by a controller configured for controlling an operation of the vehicle, whether a start of the vehicle is requested; checking, by the controller, current limit data of the battery when the start of the vehicle is requested; checking, by the controller, start torque current data of the starter-generator according to state data of the vehicle; comparing, by the controller, the current limit data with the start torque current data; and starting, by the controller, the engine using the starter-generator or the starter according to a result of the comparing, by the controller, the current limit data with the start torque current data.

A method for operating a vehicle that includes a DC/DC converter is described. In one example, the method includes adjusting an output voltage of the DC/DC converter after the DC/DC converter is used to crank an engine. The output voltage of the DC/DC converter may be adjusted responsive to a state of charge of an ultra-capacitor.

A vehicle includes a battery pack including a secondary battery and a first control device, a second control device provided separately from the battery pack, and a converter. The converter is configured to select a conversion formula from options depending on a situation and use the selected conversion formula to convert at least one of a first current upper limit value and a second current upper limit value into at least one of a first power upper limit value and a second power upper limit value.

A method for controlling a hybrid vehicle including a battery charged with electric power generated by an engine, including a motor as a drive source, and having multiple running modes that can be selected through a mode operation, the running modes including a normal mode configured to perform charging of the battery according to a running state, and a charge mode configured to perform electric power generation by the engine according to a mode operation, the method comprising: setting a range of charge amount that allows for charging of the battery based on the electric power generated; and setting an upper limit of the range of charge amount in the charge mode to be lower than an upper limit of the range of charge amount in the normal mode.

A heat management control device for a vehicle that includes an electric motor and a power supply section that includes a storage battery and that supplies electrical power to the electric motor. The heat management control device includes a charging device that charges the storage battery through a connection to an external power source, a heat exchanger that performs heat exchange of heat generated by the charging device during charging with fluid flowing in a specific transport path. The heat management control device includes a heat storage section that uses a chemical reaction partway along the specific transport path in order to recover heat from the fluid and that stores the recovered heat, and a fluid supply controller that, from immediately after a vehicle is started, releases heat stored by the heat storage section to the fluid, and selectively supplies the fluid to a predetermined plurality of warm-up targets.

Electrically powered vehicles may be equipped with both mechanical braking systems and regenerative braking systems. Regenerative braking systems improve vehicle efficiency by returning a portion of the energy lost in deceleration to the battery of the electrically powered vehicle. An electrically powered vehicle controller that provides collision avoidance functionality can maximize the energy returned to the battery of the electrically powered vehicle by maximizing the use of regenerative braking for collision avoidance. A first braking mode can include only regenerative braking for objects greater than the minimum regenerative stopping distance. A second braking mode can include composite braking using both mechanical and regenerative braking. The electrically powered vehicle controller determines the maximum regenerative braking level at least based on data provided battery charge level or battery state sensors.

A method for producing an overtaking probability collection, having the following steps: recording a respective driving characteristic in a multiplicity of motor vehicles passing through at least one route section at a geographical position; assigning the respective motor vehicles to overtaking vehicles or to non-overtaking vehicles on the basis of the respective driving characteristic; determining a ratio between the overtaking vehicles and the non-overtaking vehicles; and entering the ratio into the overtaking probability collection as an overtaking probability for the route section at the geographical position.

An HCU (37) includes a battery low temperature reducing output calculating section (71A) that determines, when it is determined that an electricity storage device (31) is in a low temperature state by a battery temperature Tb, a battery low temperature reducing output PbL that is made to a larger value as the battery temperature Tb is lower, a hydraulic oil low temperature reducing output calculating section (71B) that determines, when it is determined that hydraulic oil is in a low temperature state by a hydraulic oil temperature To, a hydraulic oil low temperature reducing output PoL that is made to a larger value as the hydraulic oil temperature To is lower, and an output command calculating section (80) that controls a vehicle body operation based upon a sum of the battery low temperature reducing output PbL and the hydraulic oil low temperature reducing output PoL.

A controller for a hybrid vehicle predicts whether necessary discharging electric power from a power storage device which is required to perform downshift in a transmission exceeds upper-limit discharging electric power of the power storage device when downshift in the transmission is performed in a hybrid vehicle travel mode and controls a compressor rotation speed such that a rate of increase of the compressor rotation speed of a supercharger at the time of performing downshift in the transmission increases as the upper-limit discharging electric power decreases when it is predicted that the necessary discharging electric power exceeds the upper-limit discharging electric power.