BMW is going to introduce an inductive charging system that can be recharged wirelessly. It will remove the hassle of cables and will let the vehicles charge from a distance. The company has already developed electric charging system in its i3 all-electric and i8 plug-in sports car.
Electric powered and hybrid vehicles are no doubt environment friendly and really smart but one hassle of recharging them is still there. To tackle the issue of recharging, BMW is going to introduce an inductive charging system that operates wirelessly. It will remove the hassle of cables and will let the vehicles charge from a distance. You just need to press a button, after parking, to charge your car. BMW is seeing the future of automotive industry in the electric cars. The company has already developed electric charging system in its i3 all-electric and i8 plug-in sports car.
Both the series were charged using BMW iWallbox. To make the vehicles more attractive for the public, the company is planning to enhance the system with wireless charging. Wireless induction system will be able to work with the BMW icar series batteries and all future batteries. A venture of BMW and Daimler is formed to develop the inductive chargers. The inductive charging system has multiple advantages over the traditional charging system such as user friendliness and no need of cables. Wireless means simple way to charge your car and less mechanical wear and requires one less thing to remember.
The system is smart enough that lets the user know the charging status on the mobile phone via app. The driver just needs to park the car at the service station and keep eyes on the smartphone to know the charging status. The system is even smart enough to help the drivers in parking the car appropriately. The working of the system is quite simple to understand. Two lightweight coils are installed; one in the floor of the garage and other in the floor of the car. Both coils are made compact and circular to keep the magnetic field limited to a small area. This is to provide the safety so that no accident could occur.
To charge the coil inside the car, the alternating magnetic field of 3.6 kW is transferred from the garage coil to the car coil. The car coil is termed to be as secondary coil whereas the coil in the garage is called the primary coil. The charging system comes with 90 percent efficiency and i8 car takes less than two hours to completely charge. The system is developed for the hybrid at the moment but company is working on expanding the system for all electric cars.
The system is quite intelligent that cuts off the power if some external object enters the field. The system is weather protected and can be installed either indoor or outdoor. The main objective of the company is to make some means of charging that is compatible for all the series of BMW. Let’s see how and when the project is completed so that users can enjoy a new way of charging the cars.