New energy vehicles (NEVs) refer to automobiles that utilize non-traditional fuels, combined with advanced technologies in power control and driving systems. These vehicles feature cutting-edge technical principles, innovative technologies, and novel structures, inevitably leading to upgrades and adjustments in their components. As a result, advanced ceramic structural parts are increasingly being adopted in the NEV sector.
1. Engine Ceramic Bearings
Compared to traditional bearings, motor bearings operate at higher rotational speeds, requiring materials with lower density and superior wear resistance. Additionally, the alternating current in electric motors generates fluctuating electromagnetic fields, necessitating enhanced insulation to mitigate electrical corrosion caused by bearing discharge. Furthermore, the bearing balls must exhibit ultra-smooth surfaces to minimize wear.
Engine ceramic bearings are bearings that use ceramic materials as the main components, which have significant advantages in high-temperature, high-speed, and high-load working conditions. The following is a detailed introduction:
Main Materials
Silicon Nitride (Si₃N₄): It is a commonly used material for engine ceramic bearings. It has high strength, good wear-resistance, and excellent high-temperature resistance, and can work stably at temperatures up to 1200℃. At the same time, it has a relatively low density, which helps to reduce the weight of the bearing.
Silicon Carbide (SiC): Silicon carbide also has high hardness, high-temperature resistance, and good thermal conductivity. It can maintain good mechanical properties and wear-resistance in harsh working environments, and is often used in occasions where higher performance requirements are put forward for bearings.
2. Ceramic Copper-Clad Substrate
High thermal conductivity, low coefficient of thermal expansion, excellent solderability, high-temperature resistance, superior electrical insulation, and outstanding thermal shock resistance.
① Aluminum nitride (AlN) ceramic copper-clad substrates for new energy vehicle headlights.
② Silicon nitride (Si₃N₄) substrates for IGBT modules.
③ Alumina (Al₂O₃) ceramic substrates for automotive sensors and shock absorbers.
3. Ceramic Brake Pads for Braking Systems
Carbon Ceramic Brakes feature low density, high strength, stable friction performance, minimal wear, high braking ratio, exceptional heat resistance, and extended service life.
The material is a reinforced composite ceramic synthesized from carbon fiber and silicon carbide (SiC) at 1700°C. This advanced composition not only delivers outstanding high-temperature endurance but also reduces weight by over 50% compared to traditional brake discs of the same size.
Advantages
Excellent braking performance: With a high and stable friction coefficient, even when the brake disc temperature reaches 650 °C, the friction coefficient of ceramic brake pads can still be maintained at about 0.45 - 0.55, ensuring good braking performance and shortening the braking distance.
Long service life: The service life of ordinary brake pads is less than 60,000 kilometers, while that of ceramic brake pads can reach more than 100,000 kilometers. Moreover, ceramic brake pads will not leave scratches on the brake disc, which can extend the service life of the original brake disc by 20%.
Low-noise and comfortable: Since they do not contain metal components, they avoid the abnormal noise generated by the friction between traditional metal brake pads and the mating parts, providing a quiet driving environment.
Less brake dust: Ceramic brake pads generate less brake dust than traditional semi-metallic pads, which helps keep the wheels clean and reduces maintenance time and costs.
Good heat resistance and heat dissipation: They have excellent heat-resistance and thermal stability, and can also quickly dissipate the heat generated by braking, ensuring the stability of braking performance and improving vehicle safety.
4. Ceramic Coating
① Ceramic Car Paint Coating
Key Properties & Benefits:
Exceptional Protection: Acts as a sacrificial barrier against environmental contaminants:
UV Radiation: Significantly reduces oxidation and paint fading.
Chemical Stains: Resists damage from acidic bird droppings, bug splatter, tree sap, and road salts.
Minor Scratches & Swirl Marks: Provides enhanced hardness (9H+) compared to clear coat or wax, offering better resistance to light marring (though not scratch-proof).
Water Spotting: Reduces the risk of mineral deposits etching into the paint.
Superior Hydrophobicity & Self-Cleaning Effect:
Creates an extremely water-repellent surface. Water beads up tightly and rolls off effortlessly, carrying loose dirt and dust with it.
Makes the vehicle significantly easier to clean and reduces the frequency of washes needed.
Enhanced Gloss & Depth:
Creates an unparalleled, deep, reflective "wet look" shine that surpasses traditional waxes or sealants.
The coating enhances the clarity and color depth of the underlying paint.
Long-Term Durability:
Unlike traditional waxes (lasting weeks) or synthetic sealants (lasting months), ceramic coatings offer protection typically lasting 1 to 5 years (or more), depending on the product quality, application, maintenance, and environmental exposure.
② Exhaust System Ceramic Coating
③ Ceramic Thermal Insulation Coating
5. High-Voltage Ceramic Relay
① In traditional internal combustion engine vehicles, relays are widely used in control systems, starting, air conditioning, lighting, wipers, fuel injection systems, oil pumps, power windows, power seats, electronic dashboards, and diagnostic systems. These conventional automotive relays are low-voltage products, typically operating within a 12-48V range.
② In new energy vehicles (NEVs), relays are primarily used in high-voltage DC environments, controlling high-current DC circuits. They feature diverse specifications with small production batches, often requiring flexible manufacturing techniques.
6. Ceramic Capacitor
In new energy vehicles, low-loss ceramic capacitors are primarily used in power electronics systems such as electric drive systems, charging piles, and battery management systems (BMS). Key applications include:
① DC-DC Converters and Inverters
Function: Serve as filter capacitors to reduce power loss in circuits and improve energy conversion efficiency.
② Charging Piles
Function: Act as noise-suppression capacitors to mitigate current interference and enhance charging efficiency.
③ Battery Management Systems (BMS)
Function: Stabilize battery output voltage, extending battery cycle life and ensuring safety.
④ Key Advantages of Low-Loss Ceramic Capacitors
High-temperature resistance
High-voltage endurance
High-frequency performance
Critical role in NEV electronic control systems
7. Ceramic Fuse
① Circuit protection function
② Load-bearing capability and pulse resistance
③ Safety function
A ceramic fuse is a type of fuse that uses a ceramic material as the housing and has the function of protecting electrical circuits. Here is a detailed introduction:
Structure and Principle
Basic Structure: It is mainly composed of a ceramic tube, metal end caps, a fusing element, and quartz sand. The ceramic tube provides high-temperature resistance and insulation. The metal end caps are used for electrical connection. The fusing element is the core part that melts when overcurrent occurs. The quartz sand inside the tube can absorb arc energy and extinguish the arc.
Working Principle: When the circuit has an overcurrent or short-circuit fault, the fusing element generates heat due to the increase in current and melts. At this time, the quartz sand in the tube quickly absorbs the arc energy, extinguishes the arc, and wraps the metal slag to prevent splashing, thus realizing safe circuit breaking and protecting the safety of equipment and circuits.
8. Ceramic Sealed Connector
The sealing ring is located just under the battery cover, and is used to form a sealed and conductive connection between the power battery cover and the pole. It ensures that the battery has good sealing performance, prevents the leakage of electrolyte, and provides a good airtight environment for the internal reaction of the battery. At the same time, it can also play a role in decompression and buffering when the battery cover is pressed down, ensuring the normal operation of the internal components of the battery and providing an important guarantee for the service life and safety of the battery.
A ceramic sealed connector is a kind of connector that uses ceramic materials as the main body to achieve a sealed connection, which can ensure electrical insulation and prevent the intrusion of external media. Here is a detailed introduction:
Structure and Principle
Basic Structure: It is usually composed of a ceramic body, metal electrodes, and sealing components. The ceramic body provides high-temperature resistance, insulation, and mechanical strength. The metal electrodes are used for electrical connection, and they are firmly bonded to the ceramic body through processes such as metalization and brazing. The sealing components, such as gaskets or sealants, are used to further enhance the sealing performance to ensure that the connector can maintain a good sealing state in different environments.
Working Principle: The high-density and low-porosity characteristics of ceramics itself can effectively block the passage of gases and liquids. At the same time, through the precise design and processing of the interface between the ceramic body and the metal electrodes, as well as the use of appropriate sealing materials, a reliable seal is formed to prevent external moisture, dust, and other substances from entering the interior of the connector, thereby ensuring the normal operation of the electrical connection and the safety and stability of the electrical circuit.
Characteristics
High-temperature Resistance and Insulation: Ceramics have excellent high-temperature resistance and can work stably in high-temperature environments. At the same time, they have high-voltage insulation performance, which can effectively prevent electrical breakdown.
Good Sealing Performance: It can provide a high-quality sealing effect, effectively preventing the intrusion of gases, liquids, and dust, and is suitable for harsh environments such as vacuum, high-pressure, and corrosive environments.
High Mechanical Strength: Ceramics have high hardness and mechanical strength, which can withstand certain mechanical stress and vibration, ensuring the reliability of the connector during use.
9. Ceramic Heater PTC
PTC heaters have the advantages of low thermal resistance and high heat exchange efficiency, and are automatic constant-temperature and energy-saving electric heaters. One of their prominent features lies in safety performance: in any application scenario, they will not produce the surface "reddening" phenomenon like electric heating tube heaters, which can cause potential safety hazards such as scalds and fires.
A PTC ceramic heater is an electric heater that uses a positive temperature coefficient ceramic heating element and generates heat through the principle of resistive heating. Here is a detailed introduction:
Working Principle
PTC ceramic heaters are made of special ceramic materials. When voltage is applied, their resistance increases as the temperature rises. When the temperature is below the Curie point, the resistivity is very low, and the heating speed is very fast. Once the Curie point temperature is exceeded, the resistivity suddenly increases, causing the current to drop to a stable value, thus achieving the purpose of automatically controlling the temperature and maintaining a constant temperature.
10. Ceramic Package Housing
The new ceramic housing for IGBT packaging can realize the gate connection and extraction of all chip units of the IGBT.
"Ceramic Package Housing" refers to a high-performance material enclosure used for the packaging of electronic devices. Here is the relevant introduction:
Characteristics
Excellent physical properties: It has high strength, outstanding heat resistance, corrosion resistance, insulation, and thermal conductivity.
Superior electrical performance: It features high dielectric constant, low dielectric loss, and high electrical insulation strength, which helps improve the signal transmission quality and performance indicators of products.
Good thermal management: Its excellent thermal conductivity and thermal diffusion performance can effectively transfer heat from the chip to the external environment, maintaining the stability of the chip.
Higher reliability: It has better tolerance in environments such as vibration and impact, ensuring that the packaged products can remain stable in harsh environments.
Common Materials
Alumina ceramics: The most commonly used ceramic material, with certain mechanical strength and insulation properties, but relatively low thermal conductivity.
Aluminum nitride ceramics: It has high thermal conductivity, excellent dielectric properties, high electrical insulation strength, stable chemical properties, and its thermal expansion coefficient matches that of silicon well, making it an ideal substrate material for semiconductor packaging.
Beryllium oxide ceramics: It has extremely high thermal conductivity but is toxic and has high preparation costs, mainly used in military and aerospace electronic devices.
11. Ceramic Pressure Sensor
It has excellent characteristics such as corrosion resistance, impact resistance and high elasticity, and can be in direct contact with most media. At the same time, the extremely high thermal stability of ceramics enables it to have an operating temperature range of -40℃~150℃, so it can be widely used in fields such as automotive and industrial process control.
A ceramic pressure sensor is a device that uses the physical properties of ceramics to measure pressure. Here is a detailed introduction:
Working Principle
It operates based on the piezoresistive effect. The pressure is directly applied to the front surface of the ceramic diaphragm, causing it to produce a tiny deformation. The thick-film resistors are printed on the back of the ceramic diaphragm and connected to form a Wheatstone bridge. Due to the piezoresistive effect of the piezoresistors, the bridge generates a voltage signal that is highly linear with the pressure and also proportional to the excitation voltage.
Basic Structure
It is mainly composed of three parts: a ceramic ring, a ceramic diaphragm, and a ceramic cover. The ceramic diaphragm, as the force-sensing elastic body, is made of 95% Al₂O₃ ceramic through fine processing. The ceramic ring is formed by hot die-casting and high-temperature sintering. The ceramic diaphragm and the ceramic ring are fired together with high-temperature glass paste through thick-film printing and heat-firing technology to form a force-sensing cup-shaped elastic body with a fixed periphery. The ceramic cover has a circular groove at the bottom to form a certain gap with the diaphragm, which can prevent the diaphragm from breaking due to excessive bending during overload.
Characteristics
High Precision and Stability: Ceramics have high elasticity, corrosion resistance, wear resistance, and impact and vibration resistance. The working temperature range can reach -40°C to 135°C, with high measurement accuracy and stability. The electrical insulation degree is >2kV, the output signal is strong, and the long-term stability is good.
Good Corrosion Resistance: The ceramic diaphragm can be directly in contact with most media without additional protection, making it have unique advantages in applications such as refrigeration, chemical, and environmental protection.
Ceramic Pressure Sensor can also be used in other industries.
It is widely used in process control, environmental control, hydraulic and pneumatic equipment, servo valves and transmissions, chemical and chemical industries, medical instruments, and many other fields.
12. Piezoelectric Ceramics Detect Tire Pressure
An electrical connection is established between the piezoelectric ceramics and the tire pressure monitoring chip, so that the piezoelectric ceramics can supply power to the tire pressure monitoring chip. In this tire pressure monitoring device, the change of air pressure in the vehicle tire during the driving of the vehicle causes the deformation of the air pressure bladder, which in turn causes the piezoelectric ceramics to deform. The current generated by the deformation of the piezoelectric ceramics is used to supply power to the tire pressure monitoring chip.
Piezoelectric ceramics can be applied in tire pressure detection systems, leveraging their unique piezoelectric effect (converting mechanical pressure into electrical signals) to monitor tire pressure. Here's a concise overview:
Working Principle
When a tire is inflated, internal air pressure exerts mechanical force on the piezoelectric ceramic element (typically embedded in the tire valve or inner liner).
The piezoelectric ceramic generates a small electrical charge proportional to the applied pressure.
This electrical signal is processed by a sensor module (amplified, converted to digital data) and transmitted wirelessly to the vehicle's on-board system, which displays real-time tire pressure.
13. Piezoelectric Acceleration Sensor
The piezoelectric acceleration sensor works based on the piezoelectric effect of piezoelectric crystals. Piezoelectric acceleration sensors are also applied in safety performance aspects such as automotive airbags, anti-lock braking systems, and traction control systems.
In the R&D and production stages of new energy vehicles, more and more new materials and new processes are being adopted, which makes it possible to meet people's requirements for new energy vehicles in terms of lightweight, low cost, intelligence, economy and reliability. Regarding the use of new materials, ceramic materials, with their various excellent and unique properties, when applied to new energy vehicles, have positive significance for reducing the vehicle's own weight, improving motor efficiency, reducing energy consumption, increasing the service life of vulnerable parts, and improving the intelligent functions of new energy vehicles.
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