Links for 27 July 08

• Is this BMW’s future Electric Car?. Dunno, but watching the news these days it seems like pretty much everyone has an EV on the drawing board.
• One of the options when making a battery box is to use a thick plastic “board” and weld it into a box (I can’t remember the material’s name). To do this you’ll need a plastic welder. I ran across some plastic welding videos recently along with a wikipedia article on it. Here’s the videos: one, two, three, and more.
• Speaking of youtube, here’s a vid of an EV Mini QED with PML Wheel Motors.
• Most of the wheel motors I’ve seen have been for electric bikes.
• Less than 30% of the energy in gasoline actually gets put into use and over the years folks have looked into converting some of the waste heat into electricity. Here’s a new try from Ohio State.

Comment [4]

Links for 14 July 08

• If you haven’t heard by now Tesla Motors is finally delivering their high-end electric sports car to customers. Let me know when yours shows up! “:^)
• Shai Agassi sat down with the US house of representatives to let them know what he thinks about EV Infrastructure. Agassi cajoled the house, noting that with American’s averaging 2.6 cars per household (one usually a big brute of an SUV driven by a chirpy ‘soccer mom’) “there is no reason that one of them can’t be all electric for use on every trip of 120 miles or less.”
• Think Electric cars coming to the states? It’s frustrating that the people who write these articles are so uninformed (or worse), saying things like: “To date, most electric cars available in the U.S.—small, unsafe, and underpowered—have been intended strictly for the earliest early adopters and the most faithful green believers.”
• It’s certainly not an EV but VW’s been working on a 282 MPG car. Usually when I see these lightweight, streamlined designs I think, “Hey, that would make a great EV donor car!”

Comment [9]

Tools Update · 26 June 08

Just wanted to post a quick update about some changes to the EV Calculator. A number of readers were wondering how hard it would be to add driving cost to the computation and it turned out to be relatively easy.

Continue reading »»

Links for 26 June 08

• Reva – India’s first electric car.
• Oil prices keep climbing and automakers are spending more time focusing on Electric Cars. “I’ve actually made a prediction that, within 30 years, a majority of new cars made in the United States will be electric. And I don’t mean hybrid; I mean fully electric.”
• Honda has rolled out their new hydrogen car in limited availability and areas (mostly Los Angeles).
• Meanwhile Toyota has been having a hard time meeting demand for the Prius due to battery shortages.
• I got an email the other day from one of the TV networks wondering if I’d like to come on to talk about Senator McCain’s EV Battery “prize.” Being on vacation it was the first I’d heard of it and looking around the net it doesn’t sound like everyone is buying it. One person pointed out that anyone developing such a battery would rake in billions of dollars in sales, far more than any incentive prize. Still, it’s great to see the discussions and increased focus on alternatives, along with the new battery research.

Comment [4]

Links for 15 June 08

• Greg Zanis’ Dream Electric Car. “We’re very set on the shape,” he said. “It’s also a very safe car – it[s built with 12-inch I-beams all around in order to take on any kid of a crash. So we like the spaceship kind of feel to it.” Color me dubious.
• While we are on crazy EV designs, how about some Inflatable Electric Cars that can drive off cliffs? Seriously, that’s the headline, not usually something one looks for when shopping for a new car. “… the miracle behind the 2,500-mile range is a “hot-swap XPack Multi-Core Battery/Fuel Cell power plant” invented by the founders of XP Vehicles. Or, without the hot-swap technology, the car can travel up to 300 miles on a single charge, thanks to its light weight.”
• Eight reasons you’ll rejoice when gas hits 8 dollars a gallon. I’m not sure if “rejoice” is the right word, no matter what the beneficial side effects might be.
• Superlattice cathode extends EV range by 65%. “Our objective is to create the next generation of Lithium Ion Polymer battery that is environmentally non-toxic, safe, less expensive and more powerful.”

Comment [5]

Still Crazy After All These Years · 8 June 08

First off, as a weak defense, most folks don’t plan to start a project and then have it delayed for a couple of years. But life comes at you in ways you can’t always control. You make the best of a bad situation, lemons to lemonade, etc…

All of that being said life is still crazy and yet I managed to get in a whole weekend of work on Eve.

Continue reading »»

Your First Electric Car · 8 June 08

As the price of gas soars so to does the number of folks visiting this web site. Perhaps you searched the web for electric car (EV) information and ended up here? Or maybe you’ve been checking in for years, the idea of a conversion tickling at the back of your brain. However you found us, welcome!

There’s a lot of information on this web site and not all of it is organized with the first time converter in mind. This article is meant to try and help organize the information you need along with providing a few pointers in getting started.

Continue reading »»

Links for 3 June 08

• AMP converts Saturn Sky into a 300-hp, 125mpg electric car. The company’s website is here. They use lithium iron phosphate batteries for the conversion and, unfortunately, are only accepting orders from folks in the Greater Cincinnati, Ohio area.
• Tired of high gas prices but are stuck driving a gas car for a while? Join the ranks of the hypermiling drivers, “A method of increasing your car’s gas mileage by making skillful changes in the way you drive.”
• Toyota and Matsushita are teaming up to build more plants for hybrid vehicle batteries, mostly lithium ion.
• Thanks to a reader for the link to this announcement from Firefly that the Oasis battery is going to be released this Summer. You might remember them as the microcell foam AGM battery guys, getting higher density out of lead acid. I asked about the price, considering the battery is relatively similar in specs to the Odyssey Hawker’s, and they guessed around $400 per battery.
• Billionaire oilman backs wind power. Put a turbine on your land, earn $20,000 a year income.

Comment [5]