PowerPad [wireless charge pad]

Studies have shown a high demand for wireless charging of low scale and large scale devices, however there is a market gap between these two solutions. On one hand, mobile devices can be wirelessly charged at low power levels through qi charging pads. On the other hand, Plugless Power, an American manufacturer, developed a modular product to charge electric vehicles wirelessly in 2014. From here, our team, Disconnect Electronics, has drawn a conclusion that wireless charging solutions have a large demand in the market, and although there are existing solutions for low scale and large scale products, we will target a medium scale solution for our capstone project.Our product, the PowerPad, will be a modular solution for wireless power transfer of a primary transmitter to a secondary receiver mounted to a single middle scale electronic device such as a golf-cart or other low speed vehicle. To do this we will implement a primary transmitter which will draw power from an AC outlet and charge our secondary receiver which will be mounted to the on-board charger on an electric golf-cart vehicle. We will also develop a feedback system for users to determine primary and secondary device alignment, charge efficiency, and foreign object detection. As a result, we will need several sensors to measure power transfer and charge efficiency. For funding, our group will receive funds from the SFU ESSS and Delta-Q Technologies, while any outstanding budgets will be covered internally by Disconnect Electronics. Ultimately, the goal is to prove that a medium scale inductive charging solution can be developed to fill a known market gap.