Electric Car Motors:

What makes them an essential part of the Electric Car?

The best would have to be the AC three phase electric motor. They can handle hills a lot more effectively than DC motors and keep going at a respectable speed whereas the DC motors just give great acceleration. They are also brushless motors so there’s no worry about anything wearing.


It's also much simpler to add regenerative braking - and regenerative means more energy saved - and so more range. Another advantage is if you're thinking of a conversion then it would be much easier on your transmission compared to the DC (but of course - that is offset by the fact that they are difficult to install!)


How do Electric Car Motors Work?



For the DC motor system - when you put your foot down on the accelerator a potentiometer tells the DC controller how much voltage to give to the DC motor and that controls the power going to the motor.







The AC system works pretty much the same but requires more supporting components such six times the amount of transistors to change the DC voltage from the battery to AC, and it gets kind of hard to explain simply!

Electric motors are a pretty hard concept to understand for someone who comes across them for the first time. In high school I remember spending many classes just learning how the basic AC and DC motors work!

But there's no real need for you to know why electric car motors work, you just need to know some of the advantages and disadvantages.


This definitely isn't the most technical information you could get. There's plenty more advice out there, especially on the internet.
I have to warn you though if you're not careful you could spend days going through the technical aspects and end up not learning anything useful, so watch out!

Have a Look at my Other "How Electric Vehicles Work" Articles

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