Mark is from the south coast of England. Growing up on the Isle of Wight, he went from a tranquil coastal island to a bustling city at the University of Brighton. Mark did his MEng in Automotive Engineering there, having been fascinated with automotive propulsion systems throughout his college education and doing bits on his own car. The natural progression of the course was to look into green technologies and sustainable propulsion, which handed itself perfectly to applying for the AAPS CDT to continue his journey after a few years in different industries.
The opportunity to take a year in the MRes to learn from the disciplines within the cohort and develop his research and presentation skills was a big part of his decision and he is excited to get a broader perspective on the transport industry than simply from a technical standpoint. Eventually, however, he will expand on his mechanical base knowledge to discover how superconductive wires with cryogenic cooling channels can reform a traditional electric motor to be more powerful and compact. This has implications in electrifying Heavy Duty transport where a standard motor cannot conform with the power and weight requirements.
It will be a big learning curve in a field he is quite unfamiliar with but he is enthusiastic to approach the topic and bring forward his knowledge of mechanical systems alongside this!
​Electric motors are limited by the current they can carry and experience heat loss. Superconductive material can replace normal copper windings in motors to produce the strong magnetic fields required with high current density and make them more efficient and far more powerful, to be used in heavy vehicles and dynomometers. This PhD focuses on dynomometers for AVL to replace their current setups with just one combined dyno - one that can spin very fast to test EV motors and produce the torque required to act as a brake to test engines. Currently, two different dynomometers are used for these two different use cases. A superconducting motor might be the solution, but a feasibility study using simulations will be required for this to be conclusive.
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