- Don’t forget the big Midwest AFV event in Joliet, IL. I’ve been following the EVList progress as some of the notable EV racers make their way across the country for EV Drag Races at the High Voltage Nationals to be be held May 13 at the Route 66 Dragway in Joliet. UPDATE: unfortunately the weather turned cold and damp, with temps in the low 30’s expected tonight and no chance for the track surface to recover. They have canceled the event, no new date yet.
- For those of us on the soggy East coast there’s the Tour de Sol. More picture from the Tour de Sol: one, two, three, and four.
- Newly developed high strength, heat resistant bio plastic for automobiles made from “natural” products.
- This year’s Tour de Sol kicked off yesterday in Saratoga Spa State Park, NY with the technical testing for championship vehicles. The folks over at AutoAuditorium have posted some photographs from the event. The entrants come from all across the US and Canada, with one entry making the trip from Delhi College of Engineering in India. Today is the press and fleet-only events, tomorrow is “Student Day,” and Saturday is the big auto show at Saratoga Automobile Museum’s Spring Auto Show. Here’s a map of Saratoga for directions.
- Living in the Albemarle, NC area? Stanly Community College will be offering classes starting next week on building an electric car.
- AFT Trinity has filed for a patent on a plug-in hybrid system claiming an effective fuel economy of 250mpg, using ultra-capacitors and grid-charged batteries. It looks like what they’ve really done is string together a bunch of buzzwords and concocted an attention getting mpg, while failing to mention how much electricity it takes to achieve this and the non-gas costs.
- Shifting Gears, a 20 point plan from the Natural Resources Council of Maine and Environment Maine.
- The DOE has announced the H-Prize, “Scientists, inventors and entrepreneurs will be able to vie for a grand prize of $10 million, and smaller prizes reaching millions of dollars, under House-passed legislation to encourage research into hydrogen as an alternative fuel.”
- Shawn’s Zero, electric zero-turn mower. Shawn was the big guy (on the electric team) in the Monster Garage EV episode. Shawn also created an EV dragster, Orange Juice. More news on the mower.
- File this under better late than never (I forgot to post about it): the Midwest AFV Expo (alt fueled vehicles) is this Saturday the 13th in Joliet, IL. More info over at FVEAA.org. Sounds like a number of fellow EV’ers will be there.
- I stumbled across Chris’s ‘94 Geo Electricar in the EVAlbum. What caught my eye is the removable battery pack.
- ProEV has a nice photo series on how to build your own braided battery interconnects. They also make up some longer straps.
- Not ready for EVs yet (if ever) but it might be cool to have one or two of these flywheels buried in the back yard storing wind/sun/hydro energy during the day to be dumped into your EV at night and augment the household power.
- An interesting article on the history of maps.
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- Daimler & BMW developing a advanced integrated electric motor and fixed-gear tranny for hybrids.
- Best tires for fuel economy
- Debunking the myth of EVs and Smokestacks (27Kb PDF). [via ElectricMotorcycles.net]
- Want some of that free learnin’? Berkeley is podcasting courses with Engineering, Physical Sciences, Science & Tech Events and many others.
- Cadsoft free electronics layout editor, Eagle
- Thinking of making an electric lawnmower? Here’s a couple candidate motors: 24vdc 1.54hp and a 115vac motor w/switch
- Ladies and Gentlemen, start your electric car conversions! Administration says gas prices will remain high.
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EVAlbum · 2 May 06
For the past few months (it’s all a blur!) we’ve been spending some free evenings and weekends working on an important EV project. Not making an EV this time, but creating a tool for all of the folks who have made or are thinking of making their own electric car, bike, scooter, boat, lawnmower, tractor, and, hey, maybe even an electric airplane.
It’s the new EVAlbum:
Bob's EV · 1 May 06
A few days ago I posted a link to a story about Bob Hurst and the EV he made during the 70’s oil crisis.
As chance would have it his son ran across another part of this site a few days later and sent an email suggesting I post something about his Dad’s story.
We exchanged emails and James sent a few photos over for our viewing pleasure.
Update 5/1/06: added some more pictures
- Plug-in cars to the rescue? Like EVs the plug-in hybrids could be used to “shore up” the power grid when needed:
The batteries in thousands of plug-in hybrids, connected to the grid through two-way household outlets, could bridge this gap between generation and delivery. Indeed, some studies estimate utilities might pay EV owners $1,000 to $2,000 a year for using their batteries to help balance and stabilize the grid.
I have used the batteries in our first ev for running an inverter to keep our fridge/freezer going during extended power outages. It was a hack, but useful one all the same. - Steven Miracle, living in neighboring Vermont, is wrapping up work on his EV to enter it in the upcoming Tour de Sol (May 10-14).
- Been meaning to post that Peter has updated his website with more information on the conversion from DC to AC: www.solarvan.co.uk
- Modec Electric Van, from England, has a 100 miles range, a top speed of 50 mph, and over two tons of carrying capacity.
- Some wiki entries to fill in your lunch break reading time: theplug-in hybrid wiki has an article on state of charge manipulation and wikipedia has a large entry on battery EVs
- Matt has done a great job so far on documenting the progress of his 1990 Nissan 240SX electric conversion. I particularly like the dualing DC motors, but his work on the back batteries is nice, too. Looks like he’s going to custom make the back-end enclosure (covering the battery sub-floor and sides like Peter did), but he doesn’t mention the material yet.
- Speaking of conversions, Ryan Bohm and Bill Dennis’s electric car projects both got a mention in their local paper.
- An anonymous reader sent in a link to the Minneapolis/St. Paul International Film Festival where they will be showing Who Killed the Electric Car? this Friday at 5pm.
- Jerry Hood sent along a link to this story about the electric car with 300 miles of range. It’s from Hybrid technologies and the $35k EV uses lithium (unobtanium maximus) batteries.
- Finally there’s this cool three wheel electric car prototype over in Bath. This is starting to look a little bit like my SUV wedge idea: a car that features a low-to-the-ground profile and wedge shape such that when hit by an SUV it causes the behemoth to go flying/flipping through the air like you see in action movies. (just kidding)
Batten down the hatches... · 26 April 06
...the internet is here!
Oh, boy, looks like the price of gas has been going up a bit? No, that chart isn’t following gas trends it’s traffic to this site in the past year (the site’s only been around since late August). It’s been a period of, more or less, steady growth in traffic. Except for a couple dramatic spikes.
There’s only one possible explanation:
EVConvert traffic is being controlled by the oil industry!
- Build a smart battery charger using a single transistor. (mind you this is a small battery)
- A large collectioon of electronic circuits for hobbyists.
- Medusa power analyzer
- Swing by and visit Teo over at the newly formed Mericars (Minnesota Electric Ride Cars). He’s started converting a 1990 Toyota Celica.
- Toyota says that they are stepping up work on the plug-in Prius or some facsimile thereof.
- A woodworker’s guide to Tool Steel and Heat Treating.
- Omninerd analyzes and tries to optimize commuting