Thermal Modelling of a Single-Oil Cooled and Lubricated Electrical Drivetrain with Advanced Cooling Methods

The increasing need for high power density electrical drivetrains necessitates advanced cooling approaches to avoid overheating of components. Unfortunately, the use of multiple coolants requires different cooling circuits with according equipment which hampers the way towards high power densities. Therefore, in this work, we present a full thermal-hydraulic model of an electrical drivetrain which is cooled by a single oil cooling circuit using the Simscape Matlab environment. The thermal-hydraulic model is verified using more advanced computational tools, and is aimed to investigate the thermal response of the electrical drivetrain under varying load conditions and using different cooling approaches.