Regenerative Braking for a Hydraulic Bicycle

The Environmental Protections Agency (EPA) has been working with the University of Michigan to create a hydraulic regenerative braking system for a bicycle. The goal of the regenerative hydraulic braking project is to reduce the amount of energy required from the rider to accelerate the bike. When the rider engages the regeneration cycle for deceleration, a hydraulic motor stores energy from braking in the form of pressurized hydraulic fluid in an accumulating tank. When the rider wants to accelerate again, he/she runs the launch cycle, which uses the same motor to release the pressure in the tank and convert the stored energy into torque on the front wheel of the bicycle. Ideally, the pressure stored in the tank will provide enough energy to return the bike to its original speed prior to the regeneration cycle. This semester, our goal was to improve upon this system with the assistance of David Swain from the EPA. Previous ME450 teams have worked to build a working prototype; our task was to optimize the design by maintaining efficiency, by reducing the weight of the system, and by having it fit inside a standard bicycle front fork. We also improved the overall safety of the system to make it more user-friendly. We hope the product of our work demonstrated the benefits of hydraulic regenerative braking and the possibility of implementing this technology o