Racer X

Just because an electric motor can produce a rated power under ideal circumstances, doesn’t mean that as it is installed with controller and programming it will produce that power. They could easily sell the car at a certain power and a year later, offer an OTA update for $5000 that will increase power by 50 HP. Welcome to the new world.

St!ngray

The 3 Ultium motors were announce by GM together with the other components, it was not a leak document.
As far as the plaid it wins even against the above 1000 hp cars. A test was done where the Porche went by a 30 mph instead of a stand still and the Plaid finish 1st.

msm859

Well that is a non sequitur. I am pretty sure if the RWD is advertised as having 340 hp and GM makes an AWD version and advertises it has 500 hp, that it in fact has 500 hp. Now down the road if they want to offer you an OTA update to add more hp that is a different question. My "point" was GM apparently has a 160 hp electric motor that fits in the front of a car - different from the other previously announced options.

Racer X

The point is that 160 HP additional with going to a AWD may be coming from the 180kW announced motor that puts out 160 HP in this configuration because that is what the controller allows it to put out. Next year they could give you a 50 HP upgrade for $5k just by changing the software with no change in hardware. That is not inconsistent with any GM announcement.

St!ngray

Sorry race X but the 180kW motor produces 235 hp not the 160 hp you claim has been dial back from it. That motor is not design as an AWD, only the 62kW motor is.

RedLS6

Racer X's point is that, just because a motor is rated at 180KW, doesn't mean it absolutely has to put out 180KW in all platforms. If an EV application only needs 150KW for example, maybe due to torque limits or costs or the desire not to place too much power into the target market, it may be more cost effective to just voltage-limit the hypothetical example 180KW motor to 150KW. This comes with tradeoffs too, and as a result they do have different motor sizes to try to target different ranges.

Racer X

You misinterpret the 62kW motor. Note that it is not a permanent magnet motor. The FWD and RWD systems can be used in tandem for AWD. The motors can be pared at one end for more power. How do you think they got 1000 HP in the Hummer?

Racer X

Couldn't they just step up the voltage to 400V? I realize this adds another energy wasting step, but could they do that?

RedLS6

They could do that on the high-voltage side DC Link (battery/inverter/motor). Most of the time, this is done on the charge side; if they were to do it here, they could possibly even use a a thing called a dynamic dc-dc converter, between the battery and the inverter. A dynamic DC-DC modulates the voltage going into the inverter as a function of the motor load, while the inverter modulates the effective motor voltage by modulating the current pulse widths / phases going into the motor. Sometimes you can help system efficiency a little by placing the inverter/motor into a better spot efficiency wise, by modulating the inverter input this way, even though taking a hit on the dc-dc efficiency. At high motor loads, higher voltage into the inverter, and at low loads, lower the voltage into the inverter.

Most DC Links are designed to be a continuous voltage following the kiss rule. An inverter/motor combo is complex and requires a lot of simulation work in the design phase. Add a dynamic DC-DC to the front of this chain, and the sim effort probably quadruples. Then there's the efficiency of the DC-DC. If you counted on a DC-DC to step up from 100V to 400V, you'd also increase the battery current draw by 4X so you have to count those losses as well. Then you also have multiple power domains, Low Voltage, HV High Voltage, and really High Voltage, each requiring separate isolation from the microprocessor sitting in the LV domain.

msm859

How about cutting both the battery length and width in half. That way you could fit 4 batteries in the same size and have your 400 volts?

RedLS6

That's what I was thinking of. A volume reduction like that gets the capacity down by a factor of ~4, so now the 3.7V cells deliver 400V at 10KWh instead of at 40KWh. I think the Ultium cells released in the GM videos are slotted for battery packs with a minimum capacity of 40 or 50 KW.

RedLS6

A pancake motor would have the best shot of slotting in between the engine and the DCT, but not sure how they could fit it in, both space and cost-wise.

Corvettemac

It is clear your electrical engineering or physics classes missed a lecture or two on Hybrids . Because as smart as you think you are . You are comparing EV’s to HYBRIDS ! They are not the same .

Single phase vs dual phase motors also can influence overall power input .

And lastly whether you believe it or not the Eray will make roughly 600 HP .
I wouldn't be surprised if its rated for more ( despite your best objections )

Corvettemac

I think they are going to stack a battery in the tunnel or underneath the floor . This will lower and depolarize the center of mass in the car . FRUNK will prob exist but be smaller as those are where the motors will go .

Racer X

I haven't said anything about how much power the car will or will not put out.

I have talked about how GM can use electric motors rated to a specific publicized output, and how they can put out different power when in a specific car, based on their specific control systems and programming. I am sorry if you cannot understand that.

So you are telling me that hybrids with an independent electric drive motor and axle, puts power down and functions differently than an independent electric drive motor and axle in an all electric car? You will have to explain the physics of that.

St!ngray

Racerx and MSM859 are speculating about a 160 hp motor just because the New Cadilac Lyric with a single rear motor is advertise by GM (Cadilac) as 340 hp, which comes from the single 255kW Ultium motor.
The same Lyric with AWD and 2 motors puts out 500hp which prompted MSM859 to speculate there might be a newer Ultium motor.
However, the more possibly explanation rather than take the 180-kW motor rated at 245 and re tuned it to a lower output (per RACERX), Cadilac could just be putting 2 180kW motors for a total of 500 hp