Design, Analysis and Development of Solar-Powered Electric Bi-Cycle for domestic use

Nowadays a greater number of people use cars or other automobiles as a means of transportation between places and the number of such vehicles is increasing day by day on the roads. Moreover, people are driving their cars for every need even if the location he/she is heading to is really near and can be taken by a walk. On the other hand, with respect to different researches that driving cars is having an impact on the environment and it is affecting the ozone layer due to the emission of greenhouse gases from the vehicles so providing a transport that supports the environment such as solar-powered e-bike is an affordable solution for our society particularly for the near distances. This paper presents the design and development aspects of solar powered bi-cycle. The key phases of this work include designing a solar energy cell converting solar energy into useable electric energy and designing a power transmission system suitable for driving a conventional bi-cycle. These phases involve calculation of power requirements to drive the bi-cycle and redesign of transmission elements of bi-cycles suitable to the solar energy power source and suitably select PV cell components to meet these requirements. The electrical motor type and capacity are decided on the basis of the above calculations and the motor is connected to the bi-cycle through suitable chain drive system. Solar PV cell capacity of 40 W with area dimensions of 54 x 51 cm is used to generate electrical energy and the same is used to charge the batteries as well. The maximum voltage recorded is 24 volts and the maximum current generated is 12 Amperes. Various parts of the assembly are integrated into the bi-cycle and the working model was completed. Finally, the testing of the bi-cycle was performed to obtain the results based on which an engineering analysis and cost details were carried out. The fabricated model and the results obtained thus prove that there is a potential scope to introduce the solar-integrated electric bikes into the market for domestic use.