Title: Early electric vehicle charging: a survey

Authors: Vadim F. Yakovlev

Addresses: Department of Electrical Engineering, Samara State Technical University, Samara 443100, Russia

Abstract: This survey considers charging of electric vehicles at the turn of 19th and 20th centuries. Inspection of the characteristics of some typical models of electric cars and trucks revealed that they were equipped with lead-acid or nickel-iron batteries. These batteries had nominal voltage between 40 V and 88 V, ampere-hour capacity between 96 Ah and 450 Ah. Construction and charging methods of vehicle batteries did not change principally during the last 130 years. Instruction manuals for storage batteries helped to determine recommended parameters of ordinary and fast charge in 1900s. Motor-generator sets and mercury arc rectifiers were used as home charges. They supported unattended charge at night hours. Infrastructure including road network, service and charging stations expanded gradually in developed countries in 1900s. Some of these stations might charge sufficient number of electric vehicles at once; they were equipped with rotary converters, motor-generator sets, and mercury arc rectifiers.

Keywords: electric vehicle; EV; road transport history; electric vehicle batteries; charging methods; motor-generator sets; mercury arc rectifiers.

DOI: 10.1504/IJEHV.2022.125582

International Journal of Electric and Hybrid Vehicles, 2022 Vol.14 No.3, pp.219 - 230

Received: 20 Nov 2020
Accepted: 02 Mar 2021
Published online: 16 Sep 2022 *

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