Professor Toshio Ito of the Department of Mechanical Control Systems, Shibaura Institute of Technology, in collaboration with Calsonic Kansei Co., Ltd., is a next-generation air conditioner that improves the fuel efficiency of automobiles while keeping the inside of the vehicle at a comfortable temperature for each person with minimal air conditioning. Started research for system development.
In recent years, in addition to the fuel efficiency and design of automobiles, comfort such as vibration, noise, and thermal environment has also been emphasized.It is the in-vehicle air conditioning system that uses the power of the engine most when not driving, and the current system operates to maintain the set temperature regardless of the human sensible temperature, so the current situation is that there is waste.
In addition, the heating and cooling of automobiles uses the waste heat of the engine, but as the engine performance improves, the waste heat decreases, and there is a problem that fuel is consumed to supply heating energy.In particular, in electric vehicles that do not use waste heat from the engine, the problem of energy consumption due to heating and cooling is more pronounced than in gasoline-powered vehicles, which is a major obstacle to extending the actual mileage.In fact, in winter electric cars, 50% of the energy can be consumed by heating.
Based on this situation, through research, "Development of a mechanism that automatically measures comfort or discomfort from the driver's heart rate data and automates the optimum temperature environment", "Waste by overcooling and overheating until now" We will proceed with "improvement of energy loss" and "development of products that require only the heart rate monitor to be installed in the handle or seat without the driver wearing the device".
