Optimal Power Distribution of High-Voltage Coolant Heater for Electric Vehicles Through Electro-Thermofluidic Simulations

Abstract

There is a lot of focus on improving the heating performance and efficiency of high-voltage coolant heaters for electric vehicles. It has been noticed that the geometry design of the coolant flow path in a heat-exchanging unit plays a primary role in enhancing the efficiency of the high-voltage heater. However, no previous study has been carried out on power distribution to heating elements, which are usually layered thin-film structures. This paper presents multiphysics-based computational work to explore the heat-exchanging characteristic of high-voltage heater systems with varying power distribution schemes via split electrodes. For a 7 kW heater with symmetric serpentine flow channels and two-split heating layers with a dual-input terminal, two power distribution cases of 3.75 kW: 3.25 kW and 4.00 kW: 3.00 kW showed better performance than the conventional single-input port configuration equivalent to the 3.50 kW: 3.50 kW case in terms of temperature uniformity in the working fluid and solid structures. © 2023, KSAE.