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If that puppy comes with an A/C and seats 4, and is priced less than $25K, I might jump feet first into that little dude.
He does pay an extra $432 a month to purchase green energy... Details:
http://www.snopes.com/politics/business/gorehome.asp
2021 Kia Soul LX 6-speed stick
05/05/2009 12:25:30 PM
By MEERA SELVA Associated Press Writer
"Scientists unveiled on Tuesday what they hope will be one of the world's fastest biofuel vehicles, powered by waste from chocolate factories and made partly from plant fibers. Its makers hope the racer will go 145 mph and give manufacturers ideas about how to build more ecologically friendly vehicles.
The car runs on vegetable oils and chocolate waste that has been turned into biofuel. The steering wheel is made out of plant-based fibers derived from carrots and other root vegetables, and the seat is built of flax fibre and soybean oil foam. The body is also made of plant fibers.
Scientists at the University of Warwick say their car is the fastest to run on biofuels and also be made from biodegradable materials. It has been built to Formula 3 specifications about the car's size, weight, and performance.
Their claims cannot be independently verified.
They hope it can reach speeds of over 145 mph when it is tested on a racetrack in a few weeks time. They have driven it at around 60 mph and are now making final adjustments to the engine before driving it at top speed.
Warwick's project manager James Meredith said their model shows that it is possible to build a fast, efficient, environmentally friendly car.
The car, named the 'WorldFirst Formula 3 racing car,' will go on display at several races including the European Grand Prix and Britain's Goodwood Festival of Speed."
I too like the little car. I think I could survive here without AC. Though I do prefer to keep the cab at 75 degrees.
That will make it easy to choose between cars, having or not having A/C. Or are you one of those people that says "but it's a dry heat."
Right.
2021 Kia Soul LX 6-speed stick
This thing would make a fabulous commute car if they can get under $25K, the price mentioned above, but for "excitement" I am still hoping we will soon begin to see much more sporty electric cars, along the lines of the Tesla but at 1/4 the price. ;-)
I do believe that won't be TOO far off, but it might still be ten years away. :-(
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
Tesla rolls out Model S hatchback, plans late 2011 start
The Model S five-door hatchback will go into production in late 2011 at a rate of 20,000 per year. Prices will start at $49,900 for the base model, a price that assumes the $7,500 current Federal tax credit available.
.....The lithium-ion battery packs will come in three sizes. The pack in the base model will offer a range of 160 miles, but you can order larger packs that will go 230 or 300 miles. With the charger built into the car, the S can accept 110-, 220- or as much as 440-volt recharges. At maximum voltage the car can recharge in 45 minutes. At 220 volts, which most typical suburban households have, recharge time is four hours. It's overnight at 110 volts.
.......For performance, Model S designer Franz von Holzhausen said, "You'd need a spatula to flip this over." Top speed is listed at 130 mph and 0 to 60 mph will take 4.8 seconds for the Sport model, the quickest of the three offered. The standard model gets to 60 in 5.6 seconds and the base in 5.7 seconds "or so." With production so far off, these figures could conceivably change.
http://www.autoweek.com/article/20090327/CARNEWS/903279971
Oh yeah, and it seats five, seven if you want to put two kids in the "way back". The print article in the actual magazine is slightly different, and it also includes the following quote:
With the cost of gas, our car is really $35,000, said Musk. About the cost of a Ford Taurus
(Elon Musk being the founder and CEO of Tesla). He has a very good point there, although people are not used to financing the cost of five years' gas into their car purchases. OTOH, no Ford Taurus is going to get to 60 mph or go through the slalom in the kinds of times this thing will.
Interestingly, they are thinking of renting out battery packs, for which swap-out time is "five minutes". So you could carry extra "juice" if you needed to go on a long trip, for instance.
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
I believe the acceleration will be good. I don't see the handling being so great with a ton or more of batteries. Will the acceleration be good when you buy the long range battery? I think at this point it is a lot of speculation.
No way will the batteries be a ton, BTW. Way WAY off.
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
Handling remains a mystery but they'll get it eventually.
The 2010 Mitsubishi i-MiEV may handle like a Chevy Aveo, but I'm still interested in it. It needs a longer range. The 2010 Pininfarina-Bollore BlueCar and the 2011 BYD e6 both beat the i-MiEV in range, but I regard Mitsu's engineering group higher than the other two put together at this point.
This whole exercise is gonna be a gas, or should I keep it to ghastly, and call it good.
2021 Kia Soul LX 6-speed stick
And if they use lots of other weight-saving techniques in its design, the battery pack could entirely cease to be a handicap to its sporting credentials.
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
We recently heard that Bolivia has over one half the world’s known lithium reserves, and that mining those salts is very important to the future electric car industry. It is also known that politics and lack of development are stumbling blocks to a successful mining industry there.
A new report from Reuters indicates that Korea-based LG Chem, who has been chosen as the supplier of the Chevy Volts lithium-ion battery cells, has been seeking talks with the Bolivian government.
Evo Morales head the country and has been unfriendly towards the US and has nationalized the gas and petroleum industries there.
According to the report, Bolivia state mining director Freddy Beltran said “LG has expressed a willingness to start talks, to make a proposal. For what we know they have an agreement to produce lithium batteries for General Motors.”
Their goal is to be able to tap into Bolivia’s vast Uyuni salt lake, with rivals Mitsubishi of Japan, and Bollore of France already in the race for the reserves.
The Focus in question is the new Focus, which Ford insists it really really really will (this time, unlike the much-promised bringing-over-intact that never happened last time) bring over intact from Europe.
I am imagining a Focus RS with an electric powertrain and a 200-mile range - could be quite the fun! :-)
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
A lot more weight on narrow low-rolling resistance tires aired up to approximatly 752.5 psi.
It may handle well compared to, say, a Taurus, but it will not even come close to the Elise it shares a platform with.
They don't plan on LRRs for this one either.
Or were you speaking of something other than Tesla's Model S concept?
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
I think that will apply in general, though - the electric version of a normal car will not handle as well. Compare a Civic Si with a Civic Hybrid, for instance.
Tesla's creator of the S hatchback has specifically stated his goals with regard to handling, and I'm sure there will be no LRRs or skinny tires involved.
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
Even in the case of the Telsa I'm sure the batteries will weigh more than a tank of gas would have.
What does a gallon of gasoline weigh, about 7-8 lbs?
There's no battery technology today that can store as much energy with that same amount of weight.
Either you sacrifice range or weight. Likely both.
I don't see a way around that - at least not yet.
Anyway, I sound like a spokesperson for Tesla, and I didn't mean to. But all it would require is for battery technology to advance and we would have lighter and lighter battery packs, perhaps before the next decade is out. And Tesla's concept, if nothing else, shows the performance potential of an all-electric powertrain.
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
NiMH batteries are heavy.
Li-ion are lighter but require complex cooling systems which themselves add weight and cost.
So it's either oil from the middle east, nickel from Zimbabwe, or that Lithium you talked about.
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
All for under $500.
Flash memory anyone?
With SYNC in Fords, you do have to wonder where the Mac automotive tie-in is.
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
Yup, much better to buy a disposable PC with an 15 month life span. Even before that its so full of spam and spyware it can't function. Its a lot of fun to reboot the machine every 24 hours.
PS
I had the original 1985 Mac with 9" monochrome. Sold it and bought an Atari 1040. Much better machine with color monitor. I developed the companies database on that machine then ported it to our first IBM PC in 1990.
I think we better start a computer discussion over in Off Topic Chatter 'cause the OS wars will never die. We may as well be talking synthetic v. dead dino.
Back to the topic, here's an exciting RAV4. Exciting if you want an all electric ride anyway. But Tom seems to be enjoying it. Er, that is, one of his employees is enjoying driving it.
Tom Hanks Tells All About His Toyota RAV4 Electric Vehicle (Green Car Advisor)
Imagine, those cars are close to ten years old, and have never consumed one DROP of gas......
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
http://www.lionev.com/Home_Page.html
We basically replaced every single one we had. Nightmare. I'm sure the cost of replacement was enormous.
Battery packs are expensive and something like that would do serious harm to the supplier.
The device is a solid-state battery-like material that stores energy in a composition-modified alumina-coated barium titanate compound that is screen-printed and pressed in layers. Theoretically this material can hold 10 times the energy of a lithium ion battery at a fraction of the weight, size, and cost making it ideal for electric car use.
Zenn Motors (ZMC), a Canadian company that makes neighborhood electric vehicles, has partial ownership and an agreement with EEStor to use the technology exclusively in vehicles under 3086 pounds.
After years of mysterious debate and passed milestones, recently EEStor announced their material had the permittivity, or ability to store energy, that it claimed.
On Thursday, ZMC has confirmed on their own independent testing that indeed it was true. The material had a permittivity (a ratio) of at least 22,500 and that this was true over a temperature range of -20 to +65 degrees centigrade.
It still remains unknown if the material will operate at the high voltages necessary and what leakage current, if any, may be. The material also outperforms lithium-ion on longevity by a factor of 10 as well.
This confirmation of function has triggered ZMC to increase their investment in EEStor up to ownership of 10.5%.
The next and final milestone will be actual delivery of production-ready EESUs to ZMC who will then put them in ZennCity electric cars.
"The permittivity results are a very significant event for ZMC," said Ian Clifford, Chief Executive Officer of ZENN Motor Company. "We look forward to the achievement of the final milestone under our agreement, the delivery of a full production quality EESU in accordance with our specifications."
http://www.allcarselectric.com/blog/1020897_zenn-motors-confirms-eestor-technolo- - - gy-milestone
This will be the very important next step to fully develop:
It still remains unknown if the material will operate at the high voltages necessary and what leakage current, if any, may be. The material also outperforms lithium-ion on longevity by a factor of 10 as well.
I may just hold off on buying an i-MiEV while I follow ZENN with their adaptation of this increased method of storing battery power. Weight will not be a problem with this storage method, and that is huge. It's the rest of the above that needs attention right now from ZENN engineers. Working with EEStor, they should concentrate fully on that right now.
2021 Kia Soul LX 6-speed stick