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Electric helper motor

 Motor adds HP to gasoline engine when needed
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Let's just say you want to add some horsepower to your car's naturally aspirated engine but hooking up a supercharger or turbocharger or nitrous oxide feed would surely blow it up. How about an electric motor hooked to your battery through a switch and mounted to the side of the crankshaft pulley and connected to the pulley by a belt?

Somehow the motor would not engage until you needed it, and then, when you flipped a switch on your dash or completed a circuit when you mashed your accelerator to the floor, it would hum to life and spin out another 10 horsepower or so for a few seconds or a minute while you passed a slower vehicle. You would drain your battery a bit but then your alternator would charge it back up again when you disengaged the helper motor.

Note: the purpose here isn't to get better mileage. You're going to get slightly worse mileage. The purpose is to get a little more power out of your engine instead of upgrading to a bigger engine.

—eprobe, May 17 2015

http://www.autocar....ve-prototype-review [pocmloc, May 17 2015]

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       Hybrid petrol-electric motors are being done.
—pocmloc, May 17 2015
   

       Yes, but are they being done as a retrofit to give short-duration power boosts to regular cars?   

       Also, congrats to [eprobe] on his/her first post.
—MaxwellBuchanan, May 17 2015
   

       Surely rather than retrofitting the electric booster to the engine, it could be retrofitted to the wheels? A replacement hub could even be self-contained, like the Copenhagen Wheel; charging by regenreative braking.
—pocmloc, May 17 2015
   

       But then you need at least two. Simpler, shirley, to take section out of the propshaft and fit it there?
—MaxwellBuchanan, May 17 2015
   

       ^ and you get some rear wheel regen as well,   

       but, why not use it as the main pulley ? save a bit of bother. or drop it in as a flywheel replacement.   

       Either way. add some supercaps: I imagine that kind of usage would kill a regular car battery fast.
—FlyingToaster, May 17 2015
   

       You already have one in most cars. It is called the starter motor. You - Just need to attach your gizmo to the other end of it and mess with the wiring a bit.   

       Warning: Starter motors melt down if over used.   

       Welcome eprobe!
—popbottle, May 17 2015
   

       // It is called the starter motor.//   

       That's less than 1 horsepower, they draw a lot of current too, you'd need a pretty beefy battery to supply 600-1000 Amps necessary for 10 horsepower. Moreover, the starter motor isn't really adapted for a wide range of speeds.   

       Honda's IMA is closer to this idea.
—bs0u0155, May 18 2015
   

       Thanks for feedback! Letsee...on a vehicle with a long enough driveshaft you could install a pulley or teeth and run a chain or belt to it from an electric motor, which would be on the side, underneath the car. But the motor would be more exposed to the elements and this seems more complicated to me...It's not the same as a starter but you could run the electric motor against the flywheel, though that also sounds a little more complicated than what I'm suggesting...Yes, you might have to install another battery or use a lithium ion pack or supercapacitors to provide enough power to the electric motor...
—eprobe, May 21 2015
   

       The electric motor would drive the crankshaft via a belt, sort of like a roots-type supercharger, except that it would be adding power at the crank pulley / harmonic balancer instead of drawing it. The motor would be mounted on a bracket to the side of the crank. The problem is, you wouldn't want the electric motor to be engaged all the time, so the motor would have to have a clutch, like an a/c compressor, and then it would have to supply additive power while it was already spinning.   

       This is only one of the fruit-loopy ideas that has been gnawing at my mind.
—eprobe, May 21 2015
   

       As long as they are viable and you don't mind them being implemented without any credit to you whatsoever, then... keep'm'comin.   

       Welcome eh.   

       Yank the starter, slap a whatever-kW motor on the main belt (closest to the crank, and pulling - and probably not belt but chain), add some supercaps and a micro-controller and away you go!   

       Back in 1990 when I was but a wee lad, I purchased a Turbo Sprint. I really, really wanted something like this. I used to wonder if I could replace the alternator with a motor/generator and a Mad Max on-switch on my shifter, and use the stock battery for power.
—TIB, May 21 2015
   

       Welcome eprobe!
—normzone, May 21 2015
   


 

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