Fuel cell vehicle and method for controlling fuel cell vehicle

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10358050-B2
Application number	US-201715796943-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Oct 30, 2017
Priority date	Nov 4, 2016
Publication date	Jul 23, 2019
Grant date	Jul 23, 2019

Abstract

A fuel cell vehicle includes a fuel cell stack, which is connected to an in-vehicle electric load, a power storage device, which is connected to the fuel cell stack so as to be connected in parallel to the in-vehicle electric load, a state-of-charge sensor, which detects a state of charge of the power storage device, and circuitry that controls the power generated by the fuel cell stack based on the detected state of charge of the power storage device. The in-vehicle electric load includes a driving motor, which is driven based on operation of an operating member. When the state of charge of the power storage device detected by the state-of-charge sensor falls to or below a threshold value, the circuitry executes a restriction process to apply restriction on driving of the driving motor.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. A fuel cell vehicle comprising:
an in-vehicle electric load;
a fuel cell stack, which is electrically connected to the in-vehicle electric load;
a power storage device, which is electrically connected to the fuel cell stack so as to be electrically connected in parallel to the in-vehicle electric load;
a state-of-charge sensor, which is configured to detect a state of charge of the power storage device; and
circuitry that is configured to control a power generated by the fuel cell stack based on the state of charge of the power storage device detected by the state-of-charge sensor, wherein
the in-vehicle electric load includes a driving motor that is configured to be driven based on operation of an operating member,
the circuitry is configured such that, when the state of charge of the power storage device detected by the state-of-charge sensor falls to or below a threshold value, the circuitry executes a restriction process to apply restriction on driving of the driving motor,
the driving motor includes a traveling motor, which is used for traveling of the fuel cell vehicle, and a cargo handling motor, which is used for a cargo handling operation, and
the circuitry is configured such that, when the restriction process is executed, the circuitry makes restriction applied to driving of the traveling motor less than restriction applied to driving of the cargo handling motor.

2. The fuel cell vehicle according to claim 1 , further comprising a fuel cell system, wherein
the fuel cell system includes the fuel cell stack and is configured to output power generated by the fuel cell stack, and
the circuitry is configured to execute the restriction process such that an output power of the fuel cell system becomes greater than or equal to a required power of the driving motor.

3. The fuel cell vehicle according to claim 1 , wherein the circuitry is configured to execute the restriction process by adjusting a speed of the driving motor.

4. The fuel cell vehicle according to claim 1 , wherein
the threshold value is a first threshold value,
the circuitry is configured such that, after starting the restriction process, the circuitry ends the restriction process when the state of charge of the power storage device detected by the state-of-charge sensor recovers to a value greater than or equal to a second threshold value, which is greater than the first threshold value.

5. A method for controlling a fuel cell vehicle, the fuel cell vehicle including
a driving motor that is configured to be driven based on operation of an operating member, the driving motor including a traveling motor, which is used for traveling of the fuel cell vehicle, and a cargo handling motor, which is used for a cargo handling operation,
a fuel cell stack, which is electrically connected to the driving motor, and
a power storage device, which is electrically connected to the fuel cell stack so as to be electrically connected in parallel to the driving motor,
the method comprising:
detecting a state of charge of the power storage device;
controlling a power generated by the fuel cell stack based on the detected state of charge of the power storage device;
executing a restriction process to apply restriction on driving of the driving motor when the detected state of charge of the power storage device falls to or below a threshold value; and
making restriction applied to driving of the traveling motor less than restriction applied to driving of the cargo handling motor when the restriction process is executed.

Assignees

• Toyota Jidoshokki Kk
• Toyota Motor Co Ltd

Inventors

• Tomimoto Naoya

Classifications

• H01M16/003

  of fuel cells with other electrochemical devices, e.g. capacitors, electrolysers · CPC title

• H01M8/0494

  of fuel cell stacks · CPC title

• B60L58/13

  Maintaining the SoC within a determined range · CPC title

• Y02T90/32

  Cross-Sectional Technologies · mapped topic

• B60L58/40

  for controlling a combination of batteries and fuel cells · CPC title