Integrated design of an hydraulic servo-system fed by vehicle regenerative braking

Many industrial vehicles are equipped with hydraulic servo systems devoted to load manipulation and other operations that are mainly performed when the vehicle is stopped. In conventional applications hydraulic servo-system are fed by a pump directly connected to the vehicle internal engine. As a consequence the internal combustion engine cannot be switched off when the vehicle is stopped causing relevant losses and additional costs in terms of pollution, noise, fuel consumption. In this work authors propose a solution in which on board hydraulic servo system are fed using electrical energy stored in accumulators that have been previously recharged using electric regenerative braking. The proposed solution has been applied to the design of a system for a truck devoted to the collection of garbage. In the paper design criteria, simulation results and preliminary experimental data are shown in order to justify feasibility of the proposed system.