• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2007.11a
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• pp.137-141
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• 2007

The startup behaviour of PEM fuel cells at subfreeze zero is one of the most challenging tasks to be solved before PEM fuel cell vehicle is commercialized. Automotive companies are trying to increase cold statup capability of fuel cell. In this study, we found out the design factor of the stack to increase cold startup capability using 4kW stack and then cold startup test was performed at the various shutdown condition and the various current. In order to test the cold startup possibility and capability in vehicle, we installed 80kW stack in the vehicle and this 80kW fuel cell vehicle was housed in an environmental chamber to investigate the characteristics of cold startup and driving. We found that it is possible for fuel cell vehicle with 80kW stack to self-heated cold startup and drive at $-15^{\circ}C$.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2008.10a
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• pp.17-20
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• 2008

Cold start of a fuel cell system is a major obstacle should be overcome as to commercialize it, especially for passenger vehicle applications. However, the cold start characteristics is so complicated since it involves various phenomenon such as ice-blocking in GDL, ionic conductivity in membrane affected by water activity with phase change, heat transfer through components such as bipolarplates or endplates, electro-chemical reactions affected by circumferential temperature and humidity as well. Axiomatic design provides a systematic method to investigate the complex phenomenon although it was developed as a methodology to establish logical design procedure by Nam P. Suh in 1990s. This paper presents a framework to approach the complex cold start problem using Axiomatic Design which features simplifying a problem through hierarchical decomposition and decoupling from the view of functional requirements and design parameters.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers B
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• v.35 no.6
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• pp.585-592
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• 2011

The enhancement of the cold-start capability of polymer electrolyte fuel cells is of great importance in terms of the durability and reliability of fuel-cell vehicles. In this study, vanadium oxide films deposited onto the flat surface of metallic bipolar plates were synthesized to investigate the feasibility of their use as an efficient self-heating source to expedite the temperature rise during startup at subzero temperatures. Samples were prepared through the dip-coating technique using the hydrolytic sol-gel route, and the chemical compositions and microstructures of the films were characterized by X-ray diffraction, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, and field-emission scanning electron microscopy. In addition, the electrical resistance hysteresis loop of the films was measured over a temperature range from -20 to $80^{\circ}C$ using a four-terminal technique. Experimentally, it was found that the thermal energy (Joule heating) resulting from self-heating of the films was sufficient to provide the substantial amount of energy required for thawing at subzero temperatures.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2005.06a
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• pp.357-360
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• 2005

Hyundai Motor Company developed the second generation of fuel cell hybrid electric vehicle based on Tucson SUV in 2004. This vehicle has cold start capability below -10C and its driving performances including maximum speed and accelerating time are almost similar to conventional Tucson SUV's performances without any sacrifice in terms of cabin space. Especially. the cold start capability was realized by utilizing only internal power sources such as fuel cell power and high voltage lithium ion polymer battery. In this paper, we will briefly introduce specifications of Tucson FCEV and its driving performances based on field test and simulations.

• Journal of Hydrogen and New Energy
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• v.23 no.5
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• pp.484-492
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• 2012

The TMS(Thermal Management System) heater in a fuel cell vehicle has been developed to prevent a decline of fuel cell durability and cold start durability. Main functions of the COD(Cathode Oxygen Depletion) heater are depletion of oxygen in a cathode as heat energy and consumption of electric power for rapid warming up of a fuel cell stack. This paper covers subjects including the design specification of a heater, heater controller for detection of overheat and reliability assessment including coolant pressure cycle test of a heater. To verify the design concept, burst pressure and deformation analysis of plastic housing were carried out. Also, temperature distribution analysis of heater surface and coolant inside of housing were carried out to verify the design concept. By designing the plastic housing instead of a steel housing, the 30% weight lightening and 50% cost reduction were attained. A module-based design of a TMS system including a heater or reducing the watt density of a heater is a problem to be solved in the near future work.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2008.10a
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• pp.33-36
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• 2008

Cell degradation when anode channels are blocked during cold start up was tested and measured. Proton exchange membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) stacks with several configurations of channel blockages were operated and decay in performance was analyzed. When only channels near hydrogen inlet were blocked, performance was rarely changed. In contrast, significant cell reversal occurred and considerable amount of $CO_2$ was produced when all channels near inlet and outlet were blocked. In the case, it was also observed that performance was severely decreased in the area where hydrogen was not supplied sufficiently.

• Korean Journal of Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration Engineering
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• v.19 no.8
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• pp.585-592
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• 2007

Good cold start characteristics are essential for satisfactory operation of fuel cell vehicles. In this study, the melting process has been numerically investigated for a water tank used in fuel cell vehicles. The 2-D model of the tank containing ice and plate heaters was assumed and the unsteady melting process of the ice was calculated. The enthalpy method was used for the description of the melting process, and a FVM code was used to solve the problem. The feasibility study compared with other experiment showed that the developed program was able to describe the melting process well. From the numerical analysis carried out for different wall temperatures of the pate heaters, some important design factors could be found such as local overheating and pressurization in the tank.

• Journal of Hydrogen and New Energy
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• v.20 no.3
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• pp.224-231
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• 2009

The improvement of cold start capability is one of the most challenging tasks to be solved for commercialization of fuel cell vehicle. In this study, cold start test and ice blocking test(IBT) of fuel cell stack were carried out under various operating conditions. This fuel cell stack can be thawed from -20$^{\circ}$C within 25s and the voltage change was found to be comprised of 4 steps; the first step is the voltage decrease by overpotential, the second step is the voltage increase by the cell temperature increase, the third step is the voltage decrease by ice blocking, and the last step is the voltage increase by thawing. Bootstrap startup was failed after shutdown at temperature under 40$^{\circ}$C because of much condensed water in the fuel cell. Quantitative estimation of cold start capability have been demonstrated by ice blocking test(IBT). In the results, it was found that cold start capability was improved double every 10$^{\circ}$C from 30$^{\circ}$C to 65$^{\circ}$C and enhanced by 30% at the condition of SR 3/4 compared to SR 1.5/2.0 and enhanced by 20% with dry purge condition compared to with RH 50% purge condition.

• Journal of Hydrogen and New Energy
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• v.19 no.5
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• pp.403-409
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• 2008

Polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cell (PEMFC) is very interesting power source due to high power density, simple construction and operation at low temperature. But it has problems such as high cost, improvement of performance, effect of temperature and initial start at low temperature. These problems can be approached to be solved by using experiment and mathematical method which are general principles for analysis and optimization of control system for heat and hydrogen detecting management. In this paper, insulation vessel and control system for stable operation of fuel cell at low temperature were developed for experiment. The constant temperature capability and the heating time at sub-zero temperatures with insulation control system were studied by using a heating bar of 60W class. PEMFC stack which was made by 4 cells with $50\;mc^2$ active area in each cell is a thermal source. Times which take to reach constant temperature by the state of insulation vacuum were measured at variable environment temperatures. The test was performed at two conditions: heating mode and cooling mode. Constant temperature capability was better at lower environment temperature and vacuum pressure. The results of this experiment could be used as basis data about stable operation of fuel cell stack in low temperature zone.

• Journal of Hydrogen and New Energy
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• v.22 no.6
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• pp.859-867
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• 2011

The cold start problem is one of major obstacles to overcome for the commercialization of fuel cell vehicles. However, the cold start characteristics of fuel cell systems are very complicated since various phenomena, i.e. ice-blocking, electro-chemical reactions, heat transfer, and defrosting of BOP components, are involved in them. This paper presents a framework to approach the problem at a full stack scale using Axiomatic Design (AD). It was characterized in terms of Functional Requirements (FRs) and Design Parameters (DPs) while their relations were established in a design matrix. Considering the design matrix, the endplates should have low thermal conductivity and capacity without increase in weight or decrease in structural stiffness. Consequently, composite sandwich endplates were proposed and examined both through finite element analyses and experiments simulating cold start conditions. From the examinations, it was found that the composite sandwich endplates significantly contributed to improving the cold start characteristics of PEMFC.