[turbospooler]

I recently came across few videos about "Massless Batteries" or Structural Batteries, and to my surprise, couldn't find a single reference here on our beloved Team-BHP.

Hence, my attempt to pen the findings of the scientists, who have had a breakthrough in this field.

What is a Structural Battery?
Structural battery (or as many people like to call it Massless battery) concept is simple: The structure of the vehicle (be it a car, a plane, a bike etc.) is the battery instead of a separate battery pack which is encased in the structure of the vehicle.

Simply put, the monocoque chassis or the skin panels ARE the battery instead of HOUSING the battery.

The advantages are weight saving, which leads to increased range.
In Aviation, this weight saving is critical to make the future electric.

If we take the battery weight to total gross weight of a Tesla 3, the battery weighs around 480 kg out of the total weight of 1730 kg (~28%).
Imagine all this weight being redistributed in the car's body, delivering an even outrageous performance and phenomenal range.

Who has achieved this breakthrough and How?
The researchers at Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden developed a prototype cell consisting of a carbon fibre electrode and a lithium iron phosphate electrode separated by a fibreglass fabric, all impregnated with a structural battery electrolyte for combined mechanical and electrical function.

You can read the research here or see their video below

here

Few other interesting videos about the same
Subject Matter Zero:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWezv80lLJE

Undecided with Matt Ferrel:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7rJf_n3bc0I

Few questions about the future?
1) What happens in the event of a crash? (more relevant for cars than airplanes)
2) What happens in the event of a lightning strike?
3) What happens when the battery runs out of juice? Do we stop using the car?
4) Following onto the 3rd question, how will recyclability of the car be affected?


I am too keen to see this technology being adopted and developed, especially in aviation as the small range electric planes can replace the fossil fuel planes very quickly.

[GTO]

Thanks for sharing! Thread moved to the Electric Car forum.

[kosjam]

Having a structural battery is like expecting a military tank do the fighting as well as perform duties of a people carrier. There have been multiple examples but they tend to not do either role to the best abilities of a specialist tank or an armoured personnel carrier.

Rather than that, it is better to have specialist items do what they do very well, integrated with each other. an extremely efficient battery pack, power as well as energy dense, and an extremely lightweight and strong chassis to mount the extremely efficient battery.


In addition, the points you raise are valid as well, as to the utility of the vehicle once the battery condition has depleted.
Regarding a lightening strike, the outer shell will probably be metal, so it would behave roughly the same way a regular car does now (assuming the computer components are properly shielded of course)

In any case, this technology is too theoretical for practical application right now.
It produces an energy density of 26-35 W/kg, compared to a tesla battery with an energy density of 260 W/kg , a 10th order of magnitude variation...