Investigation of a Planetary Differential for Use as a Continuously Variable Transmission

Abstract

With gas prices and pollution on the rise, the production of electric and hybrid-electric vehicles has been a focus of all major automobile manufacturers. The further advancement of this technology must not only continue to focus on fuel-efficient, low-emission vehicles, but also decrease their cost to make them more available and enticing to the general public. Results from this research include one potential solution to reduce the cost of electric and hybrid-electric vehicles. An exploration of the functionality of a Planetary Differential (PD) has shown that it can simplify expensive and complex electronic control systems for electric and hybrid-electric vehicles. This research is a furtherance of work performed previously and its main purpose is to discover a more efficient solution than what was already tested under similar circumstances. Recommendations for future work and implementation of the PD in electric and hybrid-electric vehicles are presented herein.