Pietro's Electric Fiat · 6 April 07
Today’s EV update comes from Italy. Our friend Pietro Cambi has embarked on an electric conversion of a little blue Fiat 500.
Click on through for pics and a couple movies.
- Massey University in New Zealand has announced a Solar power breakthrough. Using a patented range of synthetic dies they are somehow able to produce electricity. “We now have the most efficient porphyrin dye in the world,” said the centre’s director, Ashton Partridge. Hey, maybe our NZ friends can get samples?
- The KillaCycle, electric motorcycle, is now the fastest electric vehicle of all time. It completed a quarter mile in 8.168 seconds, at up to 155.87 miles an hour. The bike is powered by 990 lithium ion cells from A123.
- Last year when I bought our Prius it included a $3,200 tax rebate. As Toyota sells more hybrids the rebate is going down (hmm, wonder if the tax rebate for buying a hummer is going down?) so Toyota is starting to offer their own incentives.
- A couple EV links sent in this week: Mannyman’s EVorBust and the EV Enthusiasts of Maine
Forkenboogie · 4 April 07
Darin and Ivan reached a momentous milestone in their “not an EV” EV conversion: the first test drive of Forkenswift!
Ray's Electric Motorcycle · 3 April 07
Ray sent over some in-progress pics of his electric motorcycle conversion.
- Gavin, from New Zealand, has started a web page for sharing progress on his new EV project. He’s rushing to beat the on-coming winter (while we are waving it goodbye!).
- Mark emailed last week to share a link to a data logger. He also runs an EV related website chock full of information, head on over and check out EVHelp.
- Driving without gas for a year, can she do it? “Crawford is so intent on going a year without gas that she’s selling her Prius because at 50 mpg, it uses “too much” gasoline.”
- You may have seen or heard of the report circulating, claiming a Hummer is more “green” than a Prius. I’ve written it off as a case of creative rounding taken to its extreme, but a fellow over at Grist posted a longer, more reasoned analysis of the report. If you have a couple of hours to kill, here’s the /. comment thread.
Last Gas(p) · 19 March 07
In case you missed it in the comments Gavin (New Zealand, right?) has picked up his donor car and has started the process of his first electric car conversion.
The photo is from one of his youtube videos, both of which can be found after the link.
- Toyota new hybrid concept car: Hybrid X.
- Speaking of concept cars, GM is now targeting 2010 for it’s Chevy Volt. Some interesting quotes (backsliding?) in the article, notably that the chance of it looking like the concept car that everyone’s been seeing is slim to none. Seems like a lot of unknowns for a company that made one of the first commercial electric cars.
- King of the hyper-milers, Wayne is able to squeeze 59mpg out of his old Accord. Faint of heart need not apply. Over at Kottke there’s an interesting comment thread on the subject.
- Looks like automobile telematics is starting to gather more interest than speed and power.
Comment [6]
- Maybe wishful thinking, but according to this article, Cheap solar power is poised to undercut oil and gas by half. The article talks about Flisom Solar but we’ve also seen similar advancements in cost cutting and power increase with other companies, including our friend Mr. Ovshinsky (inventor of the NiMh battery) over at Ovonics ECD.
- Flagstaff is hoping to be the home site of the new Tesla EV Plant. (update: they decided on Albuquerque, NM instead (because it’s so fun to spell?))
- This sounds like something Darin either has, or will do: Software patch to improve engine efficiency 2.6% by turning off the alternator at key moments.
- Not EV related, but some interesting stuff all the same, I’ve been spending time reading up on house physics over at BuildingScience.com. And it’s not all dry science, they even take time out to shoot fence posts at walls.
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Sir Forkenswift · 14 February 07
A brief update and a couple pictures from project Forkenswift.
Joe's 280Z EV Pictures · 13 February 07
Click on through to see an updated collection of images from Joe’s 280Z EV conversion…