IIT MADRAS READIES FIRST INDIGENOUS MOTORS FOR E-RICKSHAWS

India’s thrust for electric vehicles got a leg up with an unit inside IIT Madras developing motors and sub assemblies indigenously and signing agreements with manufacturers for commercial usage. The first of the motors with design details will be delivered on August 15.

Centre for Battery Engineering and Electric Vehicles Research (C BEEV) has developed a range of motors and sub assemblies for commercial deployment. “All e-vehicle makers now import motors and assemble them. We now have motors and sub assemblies fully designed and developed here,” said Prof Ashok Jhunjhunwala of C BEEV.

Contracts have been signed with two manufacturers Amber and Alpha Sine for supply of motor designs and sub assemblies, which will be used in e-rickshaws, e-autos and e-2wheelers.

The EV eco system needs five broad ranges of products that are made indigenously. Motors and sub assemblies, batteries, chargers, converters and monitoring and tracking devices. “As a nation we are getting ready on all the parameters with motors fully ready. The missing part is cell manufacturing. Even that should gain further momentum as the government has included cell manufacturing as part of the PLI Scheme (Production linked incentive scheme is an incentive package where a manufacturer gets fiscal incentives upon achieving targets),” Jhunjhunwala said.

In India for a product to be successful, it has to be cheaper and also better in performance over imported ones. “The first set of motors are for e-rickshaw. They are superior to imported motors in terms of efficiency and smoothness in drive,” he said. “We hope they get commercialised and scale.”