MOTOR VEHICLE AND METHOD FOR ADAPTING AN AVAILABLE HEATING POWER IN A MOTOR VEHICLE

Abstract

A motor vehicle, especially an electrically operated motor vehicle, having a heating fluid circuit by which a heating fluid, especially water, can be taken to at least one component of the motor vehicle which is to be heated, and a heating device to heat the heating fluid, wherein the heating device comprises a basic component mounted in the motor vehicle, comprising a heating duct, which is part of the heating fluid circuit, and electrical connectors, which are connected to an onboard network of the motor vehicle, wherein the basic component comprises multiple interfaces for heating modules configured separately from the basic component, each of them comprising a current connection to the power supply of the respective heating module and being adapted to hold the respective heating module, while at least one of the interfaces is occupied by a heating module the operation of which provides heat for heating the heating fluid carried through the heating duct.

Claims

1. A motor vehicle, comprising: a heating fluid circuit by which a heating fluid can be taken to at least one component of the motor vehicle which is to be heated; and a heating device to heat the heating fluid, wherein the heating device includes a basic component mounted in the motor vehicle, the basic component including a heating duct, which is part of the heating fluid circuit, and electrical connectors, which are connected to an onboard network of the motor vehicle; wherein the basic component includes multiple interfaces for heating modules configured separately from the basic component, each of the interfaces including a current connection to a power supply of the respective heating module and adapted to hold the respective heating module, and wherein at least one of the interfaces is occupied by a heating module the operation of which provides heat for heating the heating fluid carried through the heating duct.

2. The motor vehicle according to claim 1, wherein the respective heating module encompasses at least one heating element and a local control device, wherein the local control device is adapted to receive communication signals via at least one data connection implemented by the interface and to control the energization of the heating element in dependence on these communication signals.

3. The motor vehicle according to claim 2, wherein the motor vehicle encompasses a vehicle-installed control device, which is adapted to control the heating power of the respective heating module by a communication with the local control device or one of those devices, which is part of the respective heating module, and/or by setting the power provided via the current connection to the respective heating module.

4. The motor vehicle according to claim 3, wherein the vehicle-installed control device is adapted to acquire on the one hand an occupancy information, which indicates whether a respective interface is occupied by a heating module and/or describes the at least one parameter of the heating module occupying the interface, and on the other hand to control the current heating power of the at least one heating module present in the heating device in dependence on the occupancy information.

5. The motor vehicle according to claim 1, wherein the heating duct is closed fluid-tight, except for a fluid inflow connected to the heating fluid circuit and a fluid outflow connected to the heating fluid circuit.

6. The motor vehicle according to claim 5, wherein a heating element of the respective heating module contacts the heating duct directly or across a heat pipe.

7. The motor vehicle according to claim 1, wherein the respective interface comprises fluid ports for the respective heating module, wherein the at least one heating module comprises a module duct, which is connected via the fluid ports of the respective interface occupied by the respective module to the heating duct.

8. The motor vehicle according to claim 3, wherein the vehicle-installed control device or a processing device of the motor vehicle is adapted to predict a presumably required heating power of the heating device based on the current position and/or a planned travel destination and/or a planned travel route of the motor vehicle, to select in dependence on this a suitable occupancy of the interfaces by heating modules and to actuate an output device of the motor vehicle to put out an occupancy information regarding the suitable occupancy to a user and/or to relay this to an external device.

9. The motor vehicle according to claim 1, wherein the respective interface and the respective heating module are adapted so that a connecting of the respective heating module to and/or a disconnecting of the respective heating module from the interface is possible without a tool.

10. The motor vehicle according to claim 1, wherein the heating fluid circuit is adapted so that the heating fluid can be carried to a heat exchanger for air being supplied to an interior of the motor vehicle and/or to a battery and/or to a power electronics and/or to an electric machine as the component being heated.

11. A method for adapting an available heating power in a motor vehicle, wherein the motor vehicle comprises a heating fluid circuit by which a heating fluid can be taken to at least one component of the motor vehicle which is to be heated, and a heating device to heat the heating fluid, wherein the heating device includes a basic component mounted in the motor vehicle, the basic component including a heating duct, which is part of the heating fluid circuit, and electrical connectors, which are connected to an onboard network of the motor vehicle, wherein the basic component includes multiple interfaces for heating modules configured separately from the basic component, each of the interfaces including a current connection to a power supply of the respective heating module and adapted to hold the respective heating module, and wherein at least one of the respective interfaces is occupied by a heating module the operation of which provides heat for heating the heating fluid carried through the heating duct, the method comprising: adapting the available heating power by installing a heating module within at least one not yet occupied interface and/or removing at least one heating module occupying an interface.

12. The method according to claim 11, wherein a current position and/or a planned travel destination and/or a planned travel route of the motor vehicle is ascertained and a processing device predicts the presumably required heating power of the heating device based on the current position and/or the planned travel destination and/or the planned travel route of the motor vehicle and a suitable occupancy of the interfaces by heating modules is selected in dependence on this and an occupancy information regarding the suitable occupancy is put out to a user.

13. The method according to claim 11, wherein adapting the available hearing power includes replacing at least one heating module occupying an interface with another heating module.

14. The method according to claim 11, wherein the motor vehicle is an electrically-operator motor vehicle.

15. The method according to claim 11, wherein the heating fluid is water.

Description

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SEVERAL VIEWS OF THE DRAWINGS

[0040] Further advantages and details are illustrated in the corresponding drawings.

[0041] FIG. 1 shows an embodiment of a motor vehicle used in the context of a method described herein.

[0042] FIGS. 2 and 3 show detail views of a heating device of the motor vehicle shown in FIG. 1.

[0043] FIG. 4 shows a detail view of a heating device of another embodiment of a motor vehicle.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

[0044] FIG. 1 shows a motor vehicle having multiple components 3 to 8 being heated, which can be heated by a heating fluid carried in a heating fluid circuit 2. A heating device 9 is used here to electrically heat the heating fluid.

[0045] For an adequate heating in different regions, different heating powers may be required on account of the different outdoor temperatures occurring there, in order to achieve an adequate comfort of use. At the same time, one should avoid carrying along a needlessly large dimensioned and thus needlessly heavy heating device. Therefore, a heating device 9 will be used which comprises a basic component 10 permanently installed in the motor vehicle 1 and carries, in the situation represented in FIG. 1, three separately configured removable heating modules 11, 12, 13, which together provide the heating power of the heating device 9. The heating device 9 here is situated in the front of the vehicle beneath the front hood 44, in order to be more easily accessible to the user 43, so that the user can remove, add, or replace the heating modules 11, 12, 13 as needed.

[0046] One possible configuration of the heating device 9 which makes this possible will be explained below with additional reference to FIGS. 2 and 3, where FIG. 2 is a top view of the heating device 9 in a condition in which it is occupied by only one heating module 12, and FIG. 3 is a cross sectional view along line III-III of FIG. 2.

[0047] The condition represented in FIG. 2 can be produced, for example, if the user 43 removes the heating modules 11 and 13 from the basic component 10. The heating device 9 is still operable here, but it has a lesser heating power, for example, only a third of the heating power when a heating occurs exclusively through the heating modules 11, 12, 13 and these have the same heating power.

[0048] The basic component 10 comprises a heating duct 14, which is connected by a fluid inflow 45 and a fluid outflow 46 to the heating fluid circuit 2 and is otherwise closed fluid-tight. Furthermore, the basic component 10 is connected by electrical leads 15, 16 to the onboard network 17 of the motor vehicle. The electrical lead 15 is connected to a low-voltage network, such as a 12 V network, which is powered by the battery 18. The low-voltage network also powers the central control device 30 of the motor vehicle, which communicates by the data connection 29 with the vehicle-installed control device 28 of the basic component 10 in order to control and monitor the operation of the overall heating device 9 as needed. For example, a control command of the control device 30 sent to the control device 28 can dictate the desired overall heating power.

[0049] The electrical lead 16 is connected to a high-voltage onboard network, which is powered by a high-voltage battery 5 and which is coupled across a component 8, especially a DC/DC converter, to the low-voltage network.

[0050] The basic component 10 in the example comprises three interfaces 19, 20, 21, each of which has current leads 22, 23, namely, a high-voltage and a low-voltage current connection, for the power supply of the heating modules 11, 12, 13 and being adapted to hold the respective heating module 11, 12, 13, as is shown schematically by the partition walls 47.

[0051] The electrical contacting of the respective heating module 11, 12, 13 occurs on the one hand by a plug connector 48, which on the one hand comprises the current connection 22 for the low-voltage power supply and on the other hand a data connection 27 for the communication between the local control device 25 of the respective heating module 11, 12, 13 shown in FIG. 3 and the control device 28 or 30. For example, by this data connection 27 the control device 28 can send instructions to the local control devices in order to set the heating powers of the heating modules 11, 12, 13 such that on the whole the overall heating power dictated by the central control device 30 is achieved.

[0052] The control device 28 may furthermore recognize, by means of the communication via the data connection 27, whether a particular interface 19, 20, 21 is occupied by a particular heating module 11, 12, 13 and also interrogate, for example, what maximum heating power can be provided by the particular heating module 11, 12, 13. In dependence on this, it can be determined in the control device 28 for example exactly how the existing heating modules 11, 12, 13 should work together in order to provide the heating power dictated by the control device 30, so that for example the most uniform possible workload of the heating modules 11, 12, 13 can be accomplished.

[0053] On the other hand, a high-voltage power supply of the respective heating module 11, 12, 13 occurs through the plug connector 49, comprising the current connection 23 to the high-voltage power supply.

[0054] The use of a local control device 25 has the benefit that a common high-voltage power supply can be used for all the heating modules 11, 12, 13. The actual heating power is dictated by the local control device 25 in dependence on the communication signals received by the data connection 27. In the example shown in FIG. 3, the local control device 25 for this purpose actuates a semiconductor switch 26, for example, in order to control a heating power supplied to the heating element 24 by pulse width modulation and optionally by a subsequent smoothing of the voltage, not shown.

[0055] In the most simple case, the heating element 24, being for example a PTC heating element, could make direct contact with an outer wall 50 of the heating duct 14. Depending on the specific configuration of the heating device 9 or the individual heating modules 11, 12, 13, however, a heat conduction means 31, such as a heat pipe, may be used to transmit heat from the heating element 24 to the heating duct 14. In order to achieve a good heat transfer, an elastic element 32 is used in the example shown in FIG. 3, being a spring in this case, in order to press the heat conduction means 31 against the outer wall 50 of the heating duct 14.

[0056] The heating fluid circuit 2 is shown schematically in FIG. 1 such that the components 3 to 7 which are being heated receive a flow in sequence. In actual motor vehicles, more complex heating fluid circuits are typically used, which also make it possible to heat only parts of the components 3 to 8 being heated and not flow through other of the components 3 to 8, or have a fluid flow through them which has been previously cooled by a device, not shown, so that the interior can continue to be heated, for example, while a battery can be cooled, or the like.

[0057] The components 3 and 6 in this case are each power electronics, component 3 being the pulse inverter for the propulsion motor, i.e., the likewise heated component 4, and component 6 being a charger electronics, which connects the high-voltage onboard network to the charging terminal 54 of the motor vehicle 1. In addition, the component 8, i.e., a DC/DC converter in particular, could be heated as power electronics. The component 5 is the high-voltage battery.

[0058] The heating device 9 may furthermore serve for heating the interior 55 of the motor vehicle 1. For this, a heat exchanger 7 may be connected to the heating fluid circuit 2, which heats the air supplied to the interior 55 of the motor vehicle 1. The air can be taken in, for example, through the air duct 51 from the outside and be delivered to the interior 55 through an outlet 52, wherein it flows through the heat exchanger 7 before being delivered to the interior 55 and thereby takes up heat from the heating fluid in the heating fluid circuit 2.

[0059] Since the heating fluid circuit 2 has a certain inertia, it may be advantageous to provide an additional heating element 53 in the flow path of the air, for example in the region of the outlet 52, which directly heats the air flowing past it. The heating element 53 may optionally be powered from the low-voltage or the high-voltage network of the motor vehicle 1.

[0060] A user 43 often cannot easily estimate the heating power which is presumably required for a future driving operation. It is therefore advantageous for the control device 30 or alternatively also the control device 28 to predict a presumably required heating power of the heating device 9 based on a current position and/or a planned travel destination and/or a planned travel route. The position, the destination, and the travel route may be provided, for example, by a navigation device 39 of the motor vehicle.

[0061] After this, for example with the aid of map data, received weather reports, etc., it is possible to determine outdoor temperatures presumably occurring in the region of the current position or the planned destination or along the travel route and, based on this, to predict the presumably required maximum heating power with the aid of a look-up table, a method trained by machine learning, or the like.

[0062] One can then determine how many or which heating modules 11, 12, 13 are presumably needed in order to provide an adequate heating power and occupancy information in this regard can be put out to the user 43. This may be done directly through an output device 40 of the motor vehicle 1, which may be for example a display or a loudspeaker. However, it may also be advantageous to relay this information via the output device 41, for example a transmitter for mobile communication, to an external device 42, such as a smartphone of the user 43, in order to be put out there.

[0063] In an alternative embodiment it would also be possible to perform the prediction of the presumably required heating power or the selection of a suitable occupancy outside of the motor vehicle, for example on a backend server of the vehicle manufacturer or by the external device 42 itself, for example, by an app which is executed on a smartphone.

[0064] FIG. 4 shows a detail view of an alternative heating device 33, which can be used in the motor vehicle 1 in place of the heating device 9. There is shown here only a single interface 38 and a single heating module 34 arranged there. Further interfaces may be arranged outside the border of the figure, as explained for FIGS. 1 to 3, which can be occupied by further heating modules as needed.

[0065] The heating device 33 differs primarily from the above discussed heating device 9 in that the interface 38 used in FIG. 4 to receive the heating module 34 has fluid ports 35, 36, which connect a module duct 39 of the respective heating module 34 to the heating duct 14. Thus, the heating fluid is taken through the heating module 34 itself, which may make possible a better heat transfer and a quicker response time of the heating device 33. However, for this it is necessary to use relatively expensive interfaces 38 on account of the fluid ports 35, 36. The fluid ports 35, 36 may be self-sealing, for example, or valves may be arranged in the region of the fluid ports 35, 36, which are controlled for example by a control device of the basic component 37, not shown, in order to close the fluid ports 35, 36 when no heating module 34 occupies the respective interface 38.

[0066] A further difference between the heating device 33 and the heating device 9 is that the heating element 24 in the heating device 33 or in the heating module 34 is energized directly via the current connection 23. This makes possible a very simple design of the individual heating modules 34, but in order to control the heating power it is necessary to control the power supply via the current connection 23, for example via a control device of the basic component 37.

[0067] German patent application no. 10 2021 104371.9, filed Feb. 24, 2021, to which this application claims priority, is hereby incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.

[0068] Aspects of the various embodiments described above can be combined to provide further embodiments. These and other changes can be made to the embodiments in light of the above-detailed description. In general, in the following claims, the terms used should not be construed to limit the claims to the specific embodiments disclosed in the specification and the claims, but should be construed to include all possible embodiments along with the full scope of equivalents to which such claims are entitled.