Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Solar Car To Retrace Cross-Australian Route

Posted by timothy on from the too-bad-about-the-ac dept.

Dave Snowdon writes "Its been 20 years since Quiet Achiever, the first solar car, crossed Australia from West to East (~4000km). Sunswift 2, the UNSW solar car is set to retrace the original route, in order to set a new transcontinental record. The original car took 21 days, Sunswift is expected to complete in less than 7."

6 of 84 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Interesting, but... by dadragon · · Score: 3, Funny

    Yea, but in the UK an hour of sun is all you'd need to cross it :)

    --
    God save our Queen, and Heaven bless The Maple Leaf Forever!
  2. transcontinental record by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    Wouldn't it be easier to cross a continent where it is thin, like crossing America at the level of Panama?

  3. Wow! by Hilleh · · Score: 2, Funny
    That is the coolest thing since sliced bread. And I mean, that stuffs pretty cool. Because, you know, at first you're like "Oh I have to slice my own bread." Then you're like "Holy shit! No I don't!" Then some Ninjas jump out.

    However, I digress. Kudos to UNSW for taking steps to put environmentally sound cars on the market. Granted, this technology won't be applicable everywhere. For the forseeable future, people are still going to need gas-powered cars. Though, if these are cheap enough (once mass produced), it might be very economical to have one around for daily use and only bring out the gas-powered ones on long hauls/cloudy days. Anyone know how long (on a full charge) this car can go without a significant amount of light? That's going to be a make or break factor.

  4. A ha! by vectus · · Score: 2, Funny

    The original car took 21 days, Sunswift is expected to complete in less than 7

    If the original thingy took like, 21 days, and this new thingy is going to take 7 days, then that means that

    21/7 = 3

    The new one is like, 3 times as good as the old one.

    And people say us liberal arts students are good for nothing.

  5. New business-model? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Funny

    1: Write free software.
    2: ?
    3: Drive solar car.
    4: Profit!

  6. It's been 20 years... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    a 3-fold improvement in 20 years means a 3^(1/20) = 1.056 improvement per year, or log(2^(1/1.5))/log(3^(1/20)) = 8.41 times slower than Moore's Law (doubling every 18 months). That's what you could compute with a math degree.