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Comments
Oh, let me think..... maybe as little as 400K miles ago.
Use tire pressure monitors and a cell phone.
I averaged about 44 MPG, but the thing that stuck me was how often, how much time overall, the system spent using the engine to propel the car and simultaneously charge the batteries, batteries that were seemingly fully charged at the beginning of our trip.
I suspect that had it not spent so much time needlessly charging the batteries I might have averaged more like 60MPG.
Speaking of recharging the batteries with the IC engine, what is the efficiency, overall, of this process? There are rather substantial losses in the charging process, and not insignificant losses in using the batteries to drive the motor.
I don't have any problem at all seeing the extraordinary gains in storing vehicular inertia using the regenerative charging process, but I'm not sure otherwise.
The latest rumor on next generation NSX is just that, except for a switch in postion. A 3.5 liter V6, sitting behind the driver, powering the rear wheels, and in-wheel electric motors powering the front wheels. The overall power is estimated to be about 400 HP. Sounds interesting, but don't know much about the specifics.
Apparently, Nissan is also working on a similar concept for its AWD GT-R.
To return to the past is not an option.
http://www.auto.com/industry/access11_20011011.htm
let's not call it desperation just yet
As far as Detroit is concerned, I haven't heard about it in a while (since the new President). The policies regarding R&D for hybrid technology seem to have changed since then, and soon after I did read about GM staring at Toyota's hybrid system for its lineup, which didn't work for some reason.
The fed funding towards getting an 80 mpg family sedan was a bit impractical I think. Perhaps too much improvement. Should have kept lower, attainable targets, like 50-60 mpg or so, and then with technology, improve upon it.
Curious to see... what next!
Personally, I don't think an 80 mpg sedan is unattainable, but even if it were, it's a good place to put the number. If you put it at a goal you know you can reach, there's no challenge, and no pressure to innovate. If you put the number just out of your reach, you have to do a little outside-the-box thinking, and that's where innovation and improvement come. The day before JFK made his speech, if you had asked scientists if we could put a man on the moon in 10 years, they'd have laughed you out of their office and went back to putting monkeys in orbit. John Kennedy threw down the gauntlet, and they had to push to meet the goal. Same with the 80 mpg car. Is it impossible? I don't know. I think not. However, it's pushing scientists to work harder to make better cars. We may never have gotten to the moon is Kennedy had given us a "realistic" date like 25 years, rather than an impossible one. Wether carmakers succeed or fail at an 80 mpg family car, they will do better than they would have with a 50 or 60 mpg goal.
One step at a time is the right approach IMO. It is nice to set high goals, and work towards getting there. But how high?
From Insight/Prius to Dual Note in just a few years! What's next?
- snip -
Ford Motor Co. said last week it has signed an exclusive agreement with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to develop a new kind of high-mileage "hybrid" engine for trucks and sport utility vehicles. Instead of electric batteries, the Ford-EPA system uses a pressurized liquid to store energy. Hydraulic motors and pumps recover energy from the engine and brakes, then use the pressure from the tanks to help power the vehicle.
Ford said the system was still in the laboratory, but could offer some advantages over conventional hybrids electrics. The tanks needed to store pressurized liquid may be lighter and cheaper than hybrid batteries and possibly more efficient.
DaimlerChrysler is, however, developing a system that really does deliver better than V8 performance in a V6-powered Dodge Durango sport-utility. The company demonstrated such a vehicle to us in a series of drag races: the 175-horsepower 3.9-liter V6 Durango vaulted off the line and left the 250-horsepower 5.9 liter V8-powered version. This is because it got a significant boost from a 73-horsepower electric motor. Gas mileage is also up: The hybrid V6 gets 18.6 miles per gallon, compared with the V8's 15.5 mpg, , a 20-percent improvement. - snip -
http://www.newcartestdrive.com/
here's the direct link
http://www.nctd.com/sneakpreviews/03durango_sp.cfm
http://world.honda.com/Tokyo2001/auto/DUALNOTE
It has 2+2 seating with four doors.
why not recover the energy lost from the up and down movement of the suspensions? after all, bouncing up and down 2 tons of steel even on say only 3 or 4 inches when multiplied with gears could probably generate enough force to spin generators to high speed (the generators could be designed to produce electricity on both up and down movements, and each suspension should have one).
think of it: every time you break/accelerate, hit a pothole, change lane, turn, or get gusted sideways by winds. Each of this will generate suspension movements which can produce continuous freebee sources of electricity (...you could even ask your kids to jump up and down when your car is out of juice)
the worse/best part would be since the longer travelling suspensions would clearly have the advantage, SUV owners would finally have their day. The advantages for SUVs would be many:
Longer suspensions, heavier bodies generating more force, more lean on turns, more dives and squats on stop and go, more often blown by winds, and more often used in rough terrain.
Yeah... drive in rough terrain when possible could be an SUV ad slogan.
Best of all, you could probably control the damping action of your shocks by shifting the "gear ratios" that multiplies the spin of the generators.
http://edmunds.yellowbrix.com/pages/edmunds/Story.nsp?story_id=26084526&ID=edmunds
The Civic hybrid is getting ONLY 50mpg combined driving... that RAV-4 sure is expensive even with an incentive break...
Mini-vans hybrids... that would be very nice for many folks.... eventually...
The latter would allow it to get about the same gas mileage as MDX (17/23), assuming that it weighs no more (MDX and Odyssey are both 4350 lb. vehicles).
http://www.honda.co.jp/CIVICHYBRID
Projected price tag is under $20K for the sedan in USA!
I'll wait for the real world fuel economy numbers... long-term tests....