Research and development of high performance Continuously Variable Transmission for heavy vehicles
Background
Vehicle and transmission manufacturers put a lot of efforts in developing as competitive vehicles as possible. One component with great impact on the overall vehicle performance is the gearbox. For many years, stepped transmission gearbox concepts have dominated the market. However recently the vehicle industry is giving continuously variable transmissions, so called CVT’s a lot of interest. Such gear boxes has many advantages compared to former traditional solutions, such as decreased fuel consumption, less green house gas emissions as well as simplified and improved driving comfort. Such advantages have made them popular and attractive by the end customer. The major disadvantage is that they are not able to handle high torque. This has made them unsuitable for heavy vehicles like trucks and busses.
Goals
To develop a gearbox prototype based on the Infinigear CVT concept and perform tests in order to show conformity and compliance towards specific transmission requirements and towards general requirements given by a selected application domain.
To enable accurate and reliable simulations in order to minimize high costs related to prototype development.
To enable simulations of critical transmission requirements like efficiency, maximum transmission speed, maximum load, durability, reliability and noise.
To enable simulations of aspects like production costs and unit costs.
A new CVT concept
The company Infinigear AB has developed a brand new mechanical CVT concept. The infinigear CVT is developed to handle high torque and significantly decrease fuel consumption compared to existing CVT concepts. Due to a simple construction the Infinigear CVT will require less maintenance, improved durability and an advantageous production economy. The concept has been demonstrated by a functional prototype and its theoretical efficiency has been proven by calculations and simulations performed by the Royal Institute of Technology.
Possible applications for the concept
Within the following market segments Infinigear CVT is judged to have its most competitive advantages:
Distribution vehicles and city busses: are both vehicle types where the benefits using a CVT are high. Running the engine at a constant and optimal speed is very propitious in such vehicles since the traffic situations often are very jerky. Since those vehicles often run in crowded areas, the pressure from public, authorities and politicians are high and the need for reduced emissions is very high.
Construction equipments, tractors and wheel loaders: Until recently such kind of vehicles did not have the opportunity to gain from the inherent advantages of a CVT gearbox. The existing solutions on the market have problems to combine high torque capability with high reliability. Within this market segment the current CVT gearboxes have the poorest efficiency. The Infinigear CVT offers better vehicle performance, improves customer satisfaction and significantly reduces fuel consumption and green house gases.
Another interesting market segment for the Infinigear CVT is wind- and water power plants, where the need for using a high torque CVT is high. It is a market with high future potential complementing the more traditional vehicle market.