Working together on future mobility: Electric Refuelling

Accelerating the energy transition in the automotive industry

Charging an electrical car as fast and conveniently as refuelling a petrol car, known as Electric Refuelling, is what drives the Dutch student team InMotion. The team from the Eindhoven University of Technology aims to create the world’s fastest charging battery packs, to make electric driving the standard. 

Technologically, Electric Refuelling is very challenging. InMotion already achieved a charging time less than 12 minutes, all fully implemented in endurance race car; The Revolution. With their next generation battery pack, they take the technological challenge even further. The students believe the charging time can be reduced further, with a state-of-the-art cooling solution on a cell-level. InMotion partners with AMADA WELD TECH to use cutting-edge welding technologies to create low resistance, dissimilar metal joints, between cells, to complement its efficient cell-level cooling technology. 

Cell-level cooling

The next step towards Electric Refuelling: to engineer a revolutionary battery pack with an even more effective cooling system. InMotion improves its previous achievement by transitioning from module-level cooling to cell-level cooling. This pivotal step could be compared to changing from the veins of a human body to the intricate capillaries, ensuring more surface area and therefore improved cooling rates. Next to cell-level cooling InMotion was also looking to optimise the connections of their pouch cells tabs. In close collaboration with AMADA WELD TECH, multiple techniques were evaluated to connect the aluminium and nickel plated copper cell tabs. The connections were tested on repeatability, electrical resistance, and strength. The joint conclusion: laser welding emerged as the ideal solution.

Creating one of the world’s fastest charging battery packs

AMADA WELD TECH and InMotion joined forces to optimize both the welding process and product design, with welding ease and reproducibility in mind. An effective collaboration since the early design stages of the battery pack resulted in a module design optimised for the laser welding process. Thanks to InMotion’s design capacity and capability and AMADA WELD TECH’s laser welding expertise, a high quality stable weld connection was created using a challenging material combination. This achievement propelled InMotion towards their ultimate goal of creating one of the world's fastest charging battery packs.

Partners in cutting-edge technology

The partnership between AMADA WELD TECH and InMotion set the next step towards Electric Refuelling. With this breakthrough, InMotion places itself into the forefront of cutting-edge technology, offering a glimpse into a future where charging will be as easy as conventional refuelling. As the world moves towards electrification, InMotion's advancements in battery cooling will shape the landscape of sustainable transportation.

Accelerate the energy transition

InMotion will showcase the potential of Electric Refuelling in endurance racing, the best platform for new developments to be tested. Their ambition is to participate in the Garage 56 class during the 24 Hours of Le Mans, with a fully electric endurance race car. In the meantime, both AMADA WELD TECH and InMotion continue to improve on battery welding solutions, inspiring academics and businesses to accelerate the energy transition within the automotive sector.