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Reading About Electric Vehicle Design

April 6, 2023

A quick review of Sam Davis’ book “Managing Electric Vehicle Power.”

Sam Davis was editor-in-chief of Power Electronics Technology magazine. Its website was eventually merged with Electronic Design and you can still find articles that Sam wrote for us. Sam achieved his BSEE from Case-Western Reserve University and did graduate work at the same school and UCLA. He’s also a prolific technical writer and I was able to get my hands on his latest tome: Managing Electric Vehicle Power.

The book focuses on power management of electric vehicles (EVs) and the challenges of ensuring proper EV operation. This includes the role of power management in automotive design and delivery. Everything from motors and motor control to circuit protection of ECUs is covered in the book.

The chapter list provides an overview of the contents:

EV Power Management
EV Batteries
EV Fuel Cells
ECU Power Management
Future AEC-Qualified Power Management Technology
EV Power Semiconductors
EV Lighting
EV Traction Motors
ECU Circuit Protection
EV Thermal Management
Power Management of ADAS
Power Management of Autonomous EVs
CAN Bus
AEC Standards

Sam offers technical insights that start with a discussion of the high- and low-voltage aspects of EVs. Battery management is up next, including a discussion about on-board battery chargers.

The chapter on fuel cells discusses the most common type used in EVs, the polymer-electrolyte-membrane (PEMFC) fuel cell. ECU power management is critical to proper operation as EVs have become more sophisticated.

The book covers all aspects of power from switching power supplies to power semiconductor technologies, including the latest silicon power MOSFETs, insulated-gate bipolar transistors (IGBTs) and the use of silicon carbide (SiC) and gallium nitride (GaN).

Chapter 9 delves into circuit protection of ECUs that are vulnerable to electrical hazards. This includes electromagnetic interference (EMI), transients, electrostatic discharge (ESD), and power malfunctions.

Overall, the book provides useful and detailed insights into all aspects of an EV. Definitely worth a detailed read.

About the Author

William G. Wong | Senior Content Director - Electronic Design and Microwaves & RF

I am Editor of Electronic Design focusing on embedded, software, and systems. As Senior Content Director, I also manage Microwaves & RF and I work with a great team of editors to provide engineers, programmers, developers and technical managers with interesting and useful articles and videos on a regular basis. Check out our free newsletters to see the latest content.

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I earned a Bachelor of Electrical Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology and a Masters in Computer Science from Rutgers University. I still do a bit of programming using everything from C and C++ to Rust and Ada/SPARK. I do a bit of PHP programming for Drupal websites. I have posted a few Drupal modules.

I still get a hand on software and electronic hardware. Some of this can be found on our Kit Close-Up video series. You can also see me on many of our TechXchange Talk videos. I am interested in a range of projects from robotics to artificial intelligence.