Development of a flexible test bench for a Hybrid Electric Propulsion System

This paper deals with an upgrade of an existing test bench for medium size (about 100 kW) Internal Combustion Engine (ICE). The redevelopment was needed to adapt the system to new challenges and scopes. Hybrid Electric Propulsion Systems (HEPS) are widely spread in the automotive field. Moreover, the interest in other fields (e.g., aeronautical) is increasing. The enhanced test bench is flexible enough to be adapted to the main different HEPS configurations (series and parallel). Both the hardware and software parts are open and re-configurable for future development. The current upgraded bench can acquire all the physical quantities needed for a full characterization of both the ICE and the Electric Motor (EM).