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An automobile seat’s thermal performance can be challenging to quantify since it requires comprehensive human subject testing. Seat manufacturers must rely on subjective ratings to understand how the construction of a seat and its underlying heating and cooling technology may compare to other seats. Other factors may influence seat ratings published by global marketing information services companies (e.g., JD Power and Associates). In particular, occupants may be biased by the vehicle class in which a seat is installed and by how much the contribution of a specific vehicle’s HVAC system performance affects the perception of seat thermal comfort. Therefore, there is a need for an objective testing methodology that does not rely on human participants but is still capable of producing a thermal performance rating in terms of established thermal comfort scales.

Hybrid Electric Vehicles (HEV) utilize a High Voltage (HV) battery pack to improve fuel economy by maximizing the capture of vehicle kinetic energy for reuse. Consequently, these HV battery packs experience frequent and rapid charge-discharge cycles. The heat generated during these cycles must be managed effectively to maintain battery cell performance and cell life. The HV battery pack cooling system must keep the HV battery pack temperature below a design target value and maintain a uniform temperature across all of the cells in the HV battery pack. Herein, the authors discuss some of the design points of the air cooled HV battery packs in Ford Motor Company’s current model C-Max and Fusion HEVs. In these vehicles, the flow of battery cooling air was required to not only provide effective cooling of the battery cells, but to simultaneously cool a direct current high voltage to low voltage (DC-DC) converter module.

CO2 is an alternative to replace the conventional refrigerant (R134a) for the air-conditioning system, due to the high Global Warming Potential (GWP) of R134a. There are concerns with the use of CO2 as a refrigerant due to health risks associated with exposure to CO2, if the concentration of CO2 is over the acceptable threshold. For applications with CO2 as the refrigerant, the risk of CO2 exposure is increased due to the possibility of CO2 leakage into the cabin through the duct system; this CO2 is in addition to the CO2 generated from the respiration of the occupants. The initiation of the leak could be due to a crash event or a malfunction of the refrigerant system. In an automobile, where the interior cabin is a closed volume (with minimal venting), the increase in concentration can be detrimental to the customer but is hard to detect.