Investigation on the energy management strategy for hydraulic hybrid wheel loaders

Energy management strategies for a hydraulic hybrid wheel loader are studied in this paper. The architecture of the hydraulic hybrid wheel loader is first presented and the differences of the powertrain and the energy management system between on-road vehicles and wheel loaders are identified. Unlike the on-road vehicles where the engine only powers the drivetrain, the engine in a wheel loader powers both the drivetrain and the working hydraulic system. In a non-hybrid wheel loader, the two sub-systems interfere with each other since they share the same engine shaft. By using a power split drivetrain, it not only allows for optimal engine operation and regenerative braking, but also eliminates interferences between driving and working functions, which improve the productivity, fuel efficiency and operability of the wheel loader. An energy management strategy (EMS) based on dynamic programming (DP) is designed to optimize the operation of both the power split drivetrain and the working hydraulic system. A short loading cycle is selected as the duty cycle. The EMS based on DP is compared with a rule-based strategy through simulation.