Integrated Onboard Battery Charger for Four‐Wheel Drive Electric Vehicle Featuring Interleaved Control and Sensor Optimization

ABSTRACT The four‐wheel drive electric vehicle (4WDEV) consists of four electric motor drives, each employed at a wheel, operating without a transmission system. This drive system functions in both propulsion and charging modes. In this paper, the drive system is analyzed in charging mode, where the front‐wheel‐drive systems are configured as a three‐phase PWM rectifier. This converter operates with a single‐phase power source to deliver a constant and ripple‐free DC voltage while maintaining unity power factor correction (PFC). The rear‐wheel‐drive systems are configured as a multiphase DC‐DC converter to charge the EV battery. An interleaved control technique is utilized to minimize ripple in the supply and battery currents, reducing the number of current sensors required to control the individual inductor currents of the DC‐DC converter. This work provides a comprehensive study of the proposed 4WDEV system, including its circuit description, control scheme, simulation results, and experimental validation in a laboratory environment. Integrated onboard battery chargers (IOBCs) leverage the electric motor windings, voltage source converters (VSCs), and other hardware components of the 4WDEV system to establish the power topologies of the charging system. This approach reduces the size, weight, and cost of the charging system, making it a more efficient and cost‐effective solution.