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New X-Prize for Fuel Efficient Cars Announced
miowpurr writes "A new X-Prize for ultra fuel efficient cars has been announced. The winning car must 'carry four or more passengers and have climate control, an audio system and 10 cubic feet of cargo space. They also must have four or more wheels, hit 60 miles per hour in less than 12 seconds and have a minimum top speed of 100 miles per hour and a range of 200 miles. Those that qualify will race their vehicles in cross-country races in 2009 and 2010 that will combine speed, distance, urban driving and overall performance.'"
This is just not as exciting as the other X-prizes. Maybe more valuable, but still. Just saying.
Not mentioned in the summary.
It's all good.
The requirements are reasonably realistic as far as the car specs go. Sounds like an ordinary mid-sized sedan to me. Let's hope we get some good entrants!
Official Heretic from the "Church of Global Warming". Proven right thanks to whistle blowers. AGW = Flat Earth Theory
I think this is great and is going to have a lot more impact on our daily lives than the space prize. It does seem like quite a challenge though. Are there any restrictions on the type of fuel though? Does it have to use regular gas? Can it use anything that can be measured in gallons?
carry four or more passengers and have climate control, an audio system and 10 cubic feet of cargo space. They also must have four or more wheels, hit 60 miles per hour in less than 12 seconds and have a minimum top speed of 100 miles per hour and a range of 200 miles.
My car does that now. The summary left out the most important piece of information: the car must get 100 MPG or more.
Developers: We can use your help.
The summary fails to mention that the goal is a 100-mpg vehicle! Kind of need that in the summary or the TITLE.
ER
Unless they add in a stipulation for some kind of 'maintained speed', I can think of dozens of ways to abuse the rules ...
I think battery technology is advancing fast enough to make the listed criteria too easily attainable by 2010 or 2011. Why not make the requirements difficult so as to promote some really groundbreaking new technology. The criteria as set is essentially the same as needed for a comercially viable pure electric (assuming the price is competitive too....) I think that an "X" prize should be at the very limits of technology, this one is more of a "P" prize.
A positive attitude may not solve all your problems, but it will annoy enough people to make it worth the effort.
So you test cars designed for an urban environment by sending them into a cross country race ? and people wonder why American auto makers have lost their way, perhaps they could test the space shuttle by seeing how well it performs as a boat
Sure, it's less exciting on a sci-fi-this-is-awesome level, but it seems to me like the most practical of the X prizes. This is the first that could very conceivably have a massive effect on worldwide transportation and even politics and the global economy in the next decade. What other x prize is tied so closely to the major environmental concerns of the day?
Maybe fewer people will follow the prize closely, but I suspect that more will follow its aftermath.
"I zero-index my hamsters" - Willtor (147206)
This guy got 180 mpg out of a Honda Insight on a 20-mile urban course in the rain, using energy-conserving driving techniques.
The requested URL
"The environmentally friendly technologies created as a result of this competition will affect everyone who drives in ways we can't even imagine today," X Prize Chairman and Chief Executive Dr. Peter Diamandis said in a statement.
There's nothing environmentally friendly about the production and use of ANY vehicle. I think "environmentally less-destructive" may be more appropriate way to phrase this.
EP
It's really not fun to drive a car near its maximum speeds. (Acceleration goes to hell). And, at some point, someone will probably want to go 75 up a hill.
Recently, I have examined an implementation of something that seems very simple and very effective. It reads to me as "too good to be true" and yet I can't presently see what's wrong with it.
The technology is essentially "use electrolysis to split hydrogen and oxygen from water and feed that into your fuel system as a supplement." The vehicle I saw this on had been running it for about 6 to 8 weeks. It consisted of a couple of mason jars, some simple hardware and hoses tapping into the existing fuel system of the vehicle. (If it helps to know, it was a 6 cylinder minivan with a fairly heavy load of tools inside at all times.) This vehicle is now getting approximately 46 miles per gallon of gasoline.
As to emissions, I could smell none. There was exhaust, but I couldn't smell anything at all... just warmed, slightly damp, air. It has been said that the hydrogen combustion does things to the gasoline combustion that helps create a more complete burn or something to that end reducing carbon build-up. (In my mind, the laws of conservation of matter register telling me carbon is still there, but I am uncertain what form it may be taking... carbon-dioxide? carbon-monoxide?)
I don't claim to know and understand all of what's going on and my "snake oil" warning lights are flashing. So I pose this somewhat relevant question to the really smart people here on Slashdot:
Why is this a bad idea?
I had the same reaction when I read the summary, but on reading the article it sounds like the car is required to use gasoline. If not, how would they convert their 100 mpg requirement into electric-car terms? I can imagine several possibilities, but none seem really neutral.
It's not really fair (or in the spirit of the competition) to disallow electric cars, but it's not fair to say they get infinite mpg, either. Do we measure their cost in electricity, or in fossil fuel burning to generate that power? That would be difficult, since it varies from market to market. Instead, it sounds like the X people are just banning them.
Note: I only read the CNN article. If someone finds more specific information on electrics, let me know.
"I zero-index my hamsters" - Willtor (147206)
I don't know if a 3 wheeled vehicle would be a non efficient platform or couldn't cope with all the other requirements, but if they're looking for something extraordinary, why limit themselves with something like "Must have 4 or more wheels"?
I hated that car at the time (gas was cheap, and I was a teenager), but I think I'd feel differently about it now if I could have it back
I suspect your reasoning is right, but it is also forward looking to have a 100MPH top speed. As more automated controls are added to cars, highway speeds of 100MPH would be reasonable.
I would love to get 100 MPG, but why do they require acceleration to 60 in 12 seconds? 15-20 seconds would be just fine. And more importantly, why do they require a minimum top speed of 100 MPH? 80 MPH would be more than sufficient for 99.99% of roads worldwide. I'd be happy with 100 MPG even if I could never get it over 75 MPH. Of course I'd be happy if most of the cars on the highway would drive the same speed, instead of having some people driving slow in the fast lanes and other people constantly swerving across lanes to maintain their speed 10-20 MPH over the general traffic flow. I'm not advocating artificially restricting the speed capabilities; I'm just questioning why they make such a high speed (that only police cars and people running from police cars need) a requirement.
Edward Burr
Having a smoking section in a restaurant is like having a peeing section in a swimming pool.
Is Water4gas a scam or does it increase your mpg using cutting edge techniques?
A Certified Master Mechanics review of the water4gas system.
http://www.auto-facts.org/water4gas-scam.html
Sometimes you need acceleration, even at relatively high speeds.
For that you need power.
More power increases the top speed.
If you've ever driven a car at its top speed you would know. You don't want to make the top speed the highest speed you expect people to travel. In this case they probably want to allow the driver to go 70 mph up a hill.
Computers allow humans to make mistakes at the fastest speeds known, with the possible exception of tequila and handguns
Just modify an old Volkswagen TDI. The problem is making a 100MPG car that meets the USA safety and emissions standards. The car that results from this challenge won't be practical for those two simple reasons.
One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
Draft Guidelines can be found here: http://www.progressiveautoxprize.org/auto/prize-details/draft-guidelines [PDF Warning]
Ever drive a car near its top speed? For long drives you don't want to run the car near its extremes. You'll wear out the car very quickly and you probably won't enjoy the ride.
Developers: We can use your help.
for a commercially viable car (which I assume they are going for), shouldn't the range be more like 300 miles? 200 seems a little low for some reason and the lowest range I got on any number of gasoline cars was maybe 260-280....
"...and have a minimum top speed of 100 miles per hour..."
Do they say how high the cliff is allowed to be?
More music, fewer hits
You're putting in fuel at two different places. How hard is this to see?
No sig today...
Well, Germany springs to mind, Ohio during the day (was it Ohio that has unrestricted speed limits during the day - or have they revoked that rule already!).
Is it safe? The Government, well ours in the UK anyway, have been doing a great job trying to make people think that speed is somehow inherently dangerous. Heads up folks ... it isn't!
On a (reasonably) clear motorway in good weather in a well maintained car and 100MPH is actually fine. On the other side of the coin, 20MPH outside a junior school at chucking out time may well be the posted speed limit but could be way to fast! This is the basic reason why most people have no respect for the law when it comes to speed limits - 99.9% of the time the posted limit isn't appropriate, and yet they try and enforce the limits 100% of the time - exactly who are you protecting by giving a ticket to someone passing a school (often now a 20 limit in the UK) at 25 or 30 MPH at midnight? It's farcical!
We've had variable speed limits on the M25 for years now ... why not have a 15MPH limit by schools when it's the times that the kids arrive and leave school (in mummy's humvee usually!), 20MPH for the rest of a normal school day, + 1hr either side of school time, and 30MPH (or whatever is the prevailing limit in the area) the rest of the time?
Eclectic beats from Leeds, UK
handmadehands.co.uk
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Seeing as how gas turbines are already so much more efficient than standard reciprocating engines, I would be interested to see a hybrid that runs the alternators with a gas turbine. A very small turbine would be adequate for the task. I suppose the problems would be the noise levels and the increased maintenance costs, with the benefits of increased efficiency and the ability to run on just about any liquid fuel available.
The 100mph on a flat surface is metric for driving the available power to the wheels of the vehicle. Power required at the wheels is driven by many factors including, vehicle weight, aero drag, road incline, current vehicle acceleration demand, and rolling resistance.
The power required to maintain 100mph does not take into account power draws for road incline or vehicle acceleration. So the idea is to drive the designed power output of the drivetrain, such that reserves exist to allow for desired levels of acceleration and speed on inclines when operating the vehicle at speeds of 25-65mph (typical operation).
Now they could have defined the requirments as 45mph on a 3% grade, 55mph on a 2% grade, minimum acceleration time between 0-60mph, 0-30 mph, and 30-60mph, but I believe they just simplified it down to having a maximum speed of 100 mph.
A top speed requirment will also, possibly, drive aerodynamic improvements on the car.
Is something missing, what's the point in this? Doesn't just about every car in existance cover this criteria? I'll just debadge my Fiat Punto take it along and say I invented it.
I've been chronicling the Automotive X Prize for months over at X Prize Cars. At X Prize Cars you can read about the various teams, Compare many of them side-by-side, and follow the news. The most impressive are of course the Tesla, Aptera, and the FuelVapor Technologies, which is actually on exhibit here at the New York Auto Show. But many other teams have cool cars as well - and it's still early, the official entry process is due to be announced today! Also, if you're curious about the rules, I have a handy AXP rules summary page.
augment your senses: http://sensebridge.net/
A positive attitude may not solve all your problems, but it will annoy enough people to make it worth the effort.
There really should be 2 more requirements for this prize to make it practical in the real world:
1). Should be able to pass a minimal crash safety test.
2). Should have a reasonable mass production cost.
Has anyone better in physics than me already calculated what is the maximum theoretically achievable efficiency?
Would be interesting to see how close we already are.
...Ohio during the day (was it Ohio that has unrestricted speed limits during the day - or have they revoked that rule already!).
As someone who has driven across Ohio on I-80 on a couple of occasions, it at least isn't the case on that road, much to my chagrin. (It's something like 4 hours across it at 65 mph, which is over a third of the time from my current home to my parents'.
Here is a brief summary of the rules as taken from the draft on X-Prise website.
Fuel economy >100MPGe
4+ passengers
Must meet US EPA Tier II bin 5
Must meet US safety regulations
Must have features considered standard in today's automobiles at a cost that is not prohibitively expensive, and must provide a business case proving so.
One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
It should be a vehicle that enough people would buy to be practical to build. And 200 miles is NOT enough.
Is buying a Harley Davidson as your first motorcycle since you were 16 at age 49 a midlife crisis issue?
Well conservation of energy for one. The energy required to split water in to hydrogen and oxygen is greater than the energy you get from burning it otherwise we'd all have perpetual motion machines running in our back yard.
/2 (as this is a 4 stroke engine) * .85 (assume this is not turbo charged so the cylinder is never completely full) = 2550 liters of air per min.
Flow rate.
Say an engine has a displacement of 3 liters and is operating at 2000 rpm.
3 liters * 2000 rpm
the electric power required to electrolyze the hydrogen equivalent to 1 gallon of gasoline is equal to (500 moles) x (0.06587 kWh/mole) = 32.935 kWh, and the approximate cost of that power = (32.935 kWh)
credit to this site http://www.stardrivedevice.com/electrolysis.html
How much current can you alternator put out? Maybe 100 amps. How much hydrogen could your car generate per min? How much power can your alternator produce 100A *13.7V 1.37 KW
How much hydrogen could your car produce per min?
1.37 * (.06587 kWh/mole) / 60min/hr * 22.4 liters/mol = 0.033 liters of hydrogen per min
Compare this to the number above for the volume of air entering the engine.
How much hydrogen would one need to run a vehicle?
If 500 mol of hydrogen = 1 gallon of gasoline
If the vehicle gets 30 mpg at 60 mph = 2 gallons of gasoline per hr or 1000 mol of hydrogen per hr * 22.4 liters / mol / 60 min / hr = 373 lites per min of hydrogen
Compare this to the number above.
If anything all those hydrogen generator scams are going to do is create a vacuum leak that will turn on your check engine light.
That was Montana from 1995-1999.
I'm not really sure what you are trying to ask. 100 MPH is a reasonable speed for the German Autobahn (at a glance it appears that the generic recommended speed is 130 km/s which is slower). Most other roads have speed limits far short of 100 MPH.
One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
The problem is that people try to go that fast even when none of those conditions is satisfied. In fog, snow and heavy traffic I see people who think they are great drivers trying to go faster than is safe. People may overestimate how safe they are in their nice quiet car with its ABS and airbags. I don't deny that you are probably much less likely to die than in a 1960s Jaguar E-Type or similar from when the first motorways opened in the UK.
I would be interested to see:
a. Details of fuel consumption for a given car at 70, 80, 90 and 100mph. I expect to see a substantial difference
b. How survivable a crash into, for example, a bridge pillar is at each of those speeds
of the damn contest, the car has to be practical, has to be able to be manufactured on a large scale.
Apparently quite a few companies think they can meet that objective.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
I wonder, must the winner meet recognized safety standards to win the prize? It's considerably easier to design a vehicle that won't ever come close to government crash standards and thus couldn't possibly be licensed as a car... If the winner builds a glorified ultralight autorickshaw that would probably kill all occupants in case of a low-speed collision with a Pinto, some kind of 3-wheel motorcycle with a full fairing or some other contraption that is "unsafe at any speed", then I see little point to this contest.
The news article didn't even mention safety, so I went looking on the X-Prize site for additional information, which I found here http://www.progressiveautoxprize.org/auto/prize-details/draft-guidelines . "Vehicles must be designed to meet safety regulations in the U.S. and other markets."
Well, looks like I answered my own question. The car does have to meet safety standards. Great contest then... Go X-Prize!
Sure wish I had mod points today.
KE = 1/2*M*V*V: kinetic energy rises as the square of the speed. Claiming that speed isn't inherently dangerous is like claiming jumping off buildings isn't inherently dangerous. While it might be possible, though skill and safety equipment, to minimize that danger, it still clearly rises with speed.
Add to that, that while well-trained drivers with excellent reflexes might be capable of driving at high speeds safely, many inexperienced drivers with below-average skills or reflexes cannot, and they may not be aware that they cannot. Most people think they're excellent drivers, even people who clearly aren't.
I'd love to see driver tests done like pilot tests: every two years (or more often for professional drivers) complete retest, and loss of driving privileges until the driver takes classes and passes the retest.
Nostalgia's not what it used to be.
I don't get it....wouldn't the market dictate progress for massive fuel efficiency gains? Do you think if people were honest-to-goodness clamoring for 200mpg alternative vehicles, the companies would already be doing it? I would think there's a much greater reward than $10M that the market would provide. You don't think that if GM or Ford or Honda or Toyota or Joe Garage inventor could come up with a *normal* vehicle that fit cars, trucks, and SUVs, and make it get 100+ mpg, all for a competitive cost (ie, same as or less than our cars are now) that they wouldn't?
The truth is, as much as the idealists would like to think otherwise, price and value are running the show. Fuel efficiency is an added bonus, and as gas gets more expensive this will only increase. Although, I honestly don't see it REALLY making a difference until gas gets $20+/gallon, maybe more. Think about it - it sucks paying $3 a gallon, but we do it because we have to. If it jumped to $5, it would suck even more, but we'd still pay it because hey, most people gotta get to work somehow and that's the only option. Rising gas prices crimp our lifestyles that we've chosen, but at what actual price point does the price of gas and the cost of driving actually truly outweigh the need for your chosen employment? For the majority of people? The automakers, all of them, are only giving the people what they want.
Back on topic, I don't really see this as anything more than a novelty, and a stupid one at that. How much would GM make if tomorrow they released say an Impala priced at the same it is today, but with 200mpg, and where you don't have to change your driving habits or make any radical fueling style changes. You can "fill" it up the same places you can now; i.e., it's not more work for you the consumer. Wouldn't that be worth a heck of a lot more than $10M? You don't think they're already thinking about this?
The point is people want fuel economy and savings, but they don't want to drastically change their lifestyles, rightfully so. I want the insanely high Miles Per Fillup. But I want to pay a comparable price to what today's average "normal" car sells for...a $5-10k premium is too much. I want the ease of being able to refuel it anywhere - I don't want to have to come back to my home base, or only be able to go to certain filling stations. And I want this in any vehicle I choose - be it car, truck, van, SUV, motorcycle, etc. Why does fuel efficiency have to equal econobox? Why can't I have a 200mpg Hummer? This isn't rocket science, and this "prize" isn't going to push the revolution any faster.
Every time I was on it traffic was flowing at 85-90 MPH max. Sometimes it is above 100 MPH in the left hand lane but there are at least two lanes everywhere and the right lanes are generally moving at approximately US highway speed limits. However 100 MPH is not reasonable on a lot of US highways.
100mph (and well beyond) is reasonable if:
No automated controls are necessary. As long as the cars are in good operating condition and everyone is moving the same direction, speeds well in excess of 150mph are well within human abilities.
The problem in the US is that nobody wants to be forced to do good maintenance or to increase licensing restrictions, the hiway bends are too tight, and the roads aren't thick enough to take the abuse. None of which has been a problem for Germany.
Not a typewriter
Not just less exciting but also unnecessary. An X-prize is needed to stimulate development in areas like private space travel where there is currently no market. Full efficient cars already have a market and every auto maker is already working this, with or without an X-prize. The real prize (market share) is bigger than anything X-prize is offering, so I fail to see how this creates any extra incentive (other than perhaps the prestige winning and some free advertising).
Support Right To Repair Legislation.
Greenpeace did almost 70mpg in 1996 with simple mods to an existing car
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SmILE
I have driven a car that has a top speed of 78 mph. By the book, its 0-60 mph time is 30 seconds. It's 18 seconds to go from 0-50 and 12 seconds to go from 50 to 60. Slow, but this is still better than a fully loaded 18 wheeler. The car gets about 40 mpg. If you can restrain yourself to 50 mph, it will get 46 mpg. We have even taken this car on long trips of 800 plus miles. You get used to its limitations.
I think their 0-60 in 12 seconds is too restrictive. What's the point of that kind of acceleration? So we can jackrabbit out from stoplights? People have become accustomed to thinking of anything that takes more than 10 seconds as slow. And our roads could be better designed. Stoplights every mile on a road meant for 55+ mph are awful no matter what acceleration your car has, but they're especially cruel to slow moving vehicles. Those can take a mile to get up to the speed limit. Making everyone go from 0 to 60 and back to 0 every 2 or 3 miles is murder for fuel economy no matter what car is used. I think 15 or even 18 seconds would be just fine, and any blame for situations where faster acceleration is desirable should go to the road, not the cars. 18 seconds is still plenty fast enough to get around a slow truck.
This desire to go 75 up a hill is just another classic way to waste gas. Roll with the hills, don't fight them. I've also observed that most drivers waiting at a red light often take a full second or more to realize the light has changed.
Intellectual Property is a monopolistic, selfish, and defective concept. It is "tyranny over the mind of man"
Safe? Yes.
It's not reasonable because fuel/energy consumption goes way up.
I have solutions already in place:
I have a 15 mile rt commute to work, with another 15 for errands on the weekend, gives me 90 miles a week. My current car (Toyota Corolla) gets 30+ miles per gallon. If I ride my bike to work 4.2 days per week (right now I do 5 days a week but I guess I could cut back). I can get my gasoline usage down the equivalent of a 100 mpg car.
or if you rather, if I move to 1.2 miles from work (a bit pricey as I work on a college campus, but not undoable) I could get my gasoline usage down the equivalent of a 100 mph car. By combining bike and car usage I can dial things to somewhere in between.
X-prize foundation, I'd like my 10 million in small bills, you only need to give me the award once, thanks!
Speaking as someone who races motorcycles, in the USA it's safe far more often than it's legal.
With well maintained roads, it's would not be particularly dangerous to hit those speeds within the flow of traffic, on in the absence of traffic. Frankly, I would feel safer at 100MPH around focused drivers than I do around our current breed of latte drinking, cell phone talking, SUV driving, no-dozeing, 65MPH traffic.
As other people have pointed out, cruising speed is always somewhat below maximum speed. Generally a vehicle with a maximum speed of 100MPH can comfortably drive somewhere between 60 and 80 MPH. Reaching maximum speed usually requires flooring it far longer than most people feel comfortable. It also encourages drivers to maintain momentum in situations where it's really best to slow down.
But what's the point of having an article about an X-Prize if they don't actually say what target the car has to meet?
Case in point... my car is a 2007 Chevrolet Aveo... Not only does it meet every requirement that's actually listed in TFA, it beats them. It's classed as a LEV, and I know from experience that it pulls 40mpg at 100mph (Filled up in Vaudreiul, QC, topped off the tank an hour later in Ottawa, ON, it took 10L, total distance is just over 159km), making it far more efficient than most (non-hybrid, gasoline) cars on the market. I doubt, however, that this is in the league they're looking for.
Seriously... am I blind, or did they seriously write an article about an X-Prize for fuel efficiency without saying, anywhere in the article, what the target efficiency is?
If you believe everything you read, you'd better not read. - Japanese proverb
The Government, well ours in the UK anyway, have been doing a great job trying to make people think that speed is somehow inherently dangerous. Heads up folks ... it isn't!
So speed is like a falling? It's not the fall that kills you, its the impact. I'm not worried about driving around going 100 if I was the only one driving. I'm worried about all the other maniacs on the roads along with the road conditions. Normally, its two or more vehicles that are involved in a collision. And I don't want to be involved in a 100 mph head-on or T-bone accident. How about you?
I am willing to bet the cost it takes to build such a car would offset the cost of the prize. The problem with all new car ideas is the amount of resources it takes to develop a new concept. In the meantime our atmosphere and fossil fuels will get worse and worse. What we should do is start sharing our existing resources. For cars that means we should carpool. You save gas, save money and save the environment. I use: http://www.ridesearch.com/RideSearch.com to find someone to carpool with. That can happen right away and it doesn't require millions of dollars and a prize to do it.
They are a chief cause in the reduction of mileage in high-mileage vehicles over the last 20 years. Make the x prize meet the federal safety and emissions guidelines, which are the chief hindrances to fuel economy. And make the range a much more reasonable 500 miles between refuelings. No one wants to have to fill the tank every three hours.
Cut out the worst 25-50% drivers and improve public transportation (which you'd have to do anyway under this plan), and energy consumption is far less of a problem.
Much of the rest can be taken care of by good engine tuning (particularly the camshaft timing). American and Japanese cars are usually tuned to get optimal gas millage when they're driven at a constant speed of 60-70mph. German cars are usually around 100mph.
By far, the two largest source of carbon output are oil/coal burning for electricity and driving 5 days a week during rush hour. Those are the first two places to start optimizing, not highway or recreational use. Even if all the cars on the road were Priusen (you try coming up with the plural of Prius) driven by hypermillers, the carbon footprint of rush hour traffic would still be large. This X-Prize won't change that, as 100mpg isn't that high of a target, and I doubt any new interesting techniques will come out of it. Double or triple that, and you might get somewhere.
Not a typewriter
Make the criteria like this:
1) You have to complete the race within a certain time. (72 hours is quite reasonable for across the United States.)
2) Least fuel used wins, rounded to an arbitrary unit. (cc)
3) If two teams tie for fuel consumption, then the team that completed the trip first wins.
This motivates the teams to complete the trip in exactly 71 hours, 59 minutes, and we still get a bit of strategic jockeying at the end for "first."
Any reason why air resistance wouldn't be related to square of speed? Not saying that it isn't, but the generic wind speed / pressure equation I'm familiar with has a 2nd power term, and I'd always assumed that to be the same for cars.
Wouldn't it be easier to use a better metric like torque pounds, or something that measures power, not speed, when we want to be sure the power of the vehicle is appropriate?
Sorry to be an evil bastard but this car won't change anything (at least from a financial standpoint).
Build an ultra efficient car? Then raise the gas prices so the oil companies get the same amount of money.
Environmentally, this car would be awesome.
I believe the parent was talking about this growing trend were politicians suggest that decreasing the speed limit will make roads safer. The last paper you cited even mentions findings from Garber and Gadiraju (1989) that suggest that the crash rate is lowest when the speed limit is 5-10mph less than the design speed for the road. So if the speed limits on our roads were initial set to 5-10 mph less than the design speed then lowering the speed limit increases the crash rate.
I can't say for certain that the speed limits were actually set to 5-10mph below design speed when the roads were built, but it certainly seems like the way I would set the speed limit.
Finally if people already drive 10-15 mph above the speed limit (ever driven on 94 near Chicago, it is the main road I am familiar with and that is certainly the norm) then these results may suggest that it would be safer to just raise the speed limit. But really I know nothing of this subject so feel from to correct me as you see fit.
Montana had the "reasonable speed" limit. It's back to posted limit of 70, IIRC. Ohio is a 65 MPH state, with Columbus noted for being a high enforcement area. Kind of an anti-Montana.
That's nothing. Since there's no MPG mentioned, my 16 year old Prelude covers all the requirements listed above. Do I win?
"If it's got a switch... it's my bitch!!"
Ac Propulsion, who also make electric cars and components (they are supplying a lot of other manufacturers and do-it-your-selfers now), came up with the rigidly attached generator trailer idea, the modular hybrid approach- rigid as in no flexing, the trailer axle stays inline with the cars rear axle, it tracks, easy for noobs to back up with then-that turns a pure electric car into a modular hybrid. Around town short distance, electric only, long trips, attach the trailer and away you go, stop and fillerup as you would normally. Their model sportscar still fits within a normal parking space *with* the generator trailer attached.
And that is really the way to do hybrids, cramming all that stuff, the ICE, the electric motor, the gas tank, and the batteries, inside one car is nuts, an overly complicated cobjob, you got two of everything-drive train system and "stored power"- when you really only need one.
Datsun SSS 1.8 litre approx 190km/hr
Mazda RX2 (1200 cc) approx 200 km/hr (blows flames out of the exhaust at this speed).
Renault 17 Gordini 1.6 litre approx 220km/hr
Best car was the Gordini @ 130 BHP. Light, excellent handling/braking.
Don't be apathetic. Procrastinate!
My question is this: why are they still using gasoline? Even the most conservative estimates give us 50 years at most. A 100-MPG car will only be a stop-gap solution, and it will be years before production can ramp up and start cranking these vehicles out. We need to be investing in alternate forms of fuel, not a 100-MPG car!
Gotta get me one of these!
How are they going to pay that?
Don't be apathetic. Procrastinate!
Merging in city traffic with crazy drivers requires decent acceleration.
In general, I agree with you though.
The big problem with the trailer idea is that when you need the extra distance or power, the last thing you'll want is a trailer's weight and aerodynamic drag. The whole point of hybrids is to have a relatively high-output engine recharge a low-output electric system *for light-duty usage*, offering the same range and refueling options as any regular gas vehicle. A diesel car will beat any hybrid in a long-distance race, and will undoubtedly win this X-Prize.
While hybrids are efficient and have very low emmissions for city driving, under load they are worse than diesels in every regard. If the contestant's cars have to be street-legal, a hybrid might use marginally less fuel to complete the race, but a diesel will definitely get there faster.
Hybrids have two motors, one electric, the other typically gas, plus a big heavy power cell, plus a big alternator to charge the power cell. The two motors typically have less combined horsepower than their gas equivalents, and much less torque. So accelleration is poor and not very efficient, and at highway speeds generally the electric motor is only barely enough, so the gas motor is more frequently engaging to recharge the power cell and supplement the power when cimbing/passing. It's only when cruising at 20-40mph that the efficiency of a hybrid is truely remarkable.
But whenever the electric motor's output is exceeded for a long period of time, the relatively small gas engine has to take over. In order for a hybrid to have the necessary power to compete with a diesel, the motors and power cells will weigh more than the entire diesel car. So in a race, the hybrid loses every time.
Hybrids are great for city drivers, but diesels have many applications which are being ignored and aren't served well by hybrids. And for under $1000 you can put together a rig to filter waste vegetable oil for use in an unmodified diesel vehicle. That's even better for the environment than biodiesel because it's a recycled product and no chemicals are necessary to prepare it, where biodiesel requires enough lye and methanol that it competes with petro diesel for environmental damage. Just run the waste oil through a centrifuge filter (removes water and particulate down to under 0.5 microns, including glycerin). It's even possible to clean the oil on the road using the engine's power to heat and pump the oil through the centrifuge. Waste veg oil cleaning waste veg oil, in transit.
Let's face it, hybrids are sexy, diesels aren't. But just watch which engine type wins this prize.
War as we knew it was obsolete
Nothing could beat complete denial
- Emily Haines
Where will you park it?
It's one thing to reduce emissions, but quite another to reduce traffic congestion.
- RG>
Hey pal, this isn't a pleasantforest, so don't waste my time with pleasantries!
Sounds like the prize was made for the Loremo...
http://evolution.loremo.com/index.php?lang=en
Hybrid autos get good mileage because they recycle wasted energy with regenerative brakes and such.
But they directly drive the wheels with the engine which must run a varying speed.
So my idea to build a high mileage car would be to start with a fully electric drive system. Place
one electric motor at each wheel. This will give you a four wheel drive system with electric
differential. Directly couple an alternator to the output of the engine. The alternator will drive
the electrical system, recharging the batteries. The engine only runs when required, to charge the
batteries and to supply excess power when required. The engine runs at a constant speed (but not at
a constant throttle setting, the throttle varies to keep the engine / alternator running at a constant
speed under varying loads). This drive system is the same as on all current diesel locomotives.
The engine would be a multi-fuel design. Perhaps with two sets of cylinders, one for otto cycle combustion
(gas, ethenol, etc) and another set for diesel (diesel fuel, jet-A, used McDonolds fry oil).
All exposed surfaces of the car are covered with solar panels. When the
car is parked there are internal panels that can be placed behind the windows with velcro to keep the
sun out of the car, and these are also solar panels. So the batteries are passively re-charged when
the car is parked (in the sun).
Statistics eh! If the likelhood of accidents was directly proportional to speed you would expect motorways to have more accidents than the slower "A" and "B" roads, but this isn't the case, indeed motorways are the safest roads to drive on.
Also, there are fewer accidents on the German autobahns (unrestricted) than on the Portugese motorways (lowest speed limit in Europe) which seems to contradict the results of the survey!
The Survey (severity and likelyhood): ... hang on ... isn't that what I said? Facts Schmacts eh!
"Both types of studies found evidence that crash rate increases faster with an increase in speed on minor roads than on major roads."
Of course speed will be a factor - if you are stationary you are less likely to be in an accident (but it still may, and does, happen) - but the abstract might suggest (actually, it says it!) that speed is less of a factor in accidents on major roads? Oh
"vehicle that moved (much) faster than other traffic around it, had a higher crash rate" ... that's speed differential, not speed per se. That's one of the reasons why motorways are safer at speed than minor roads, everyone is going in the same direction at roughly the same speed.
Wait a minute
Eclectic beats from Leeds, UK
handmadehands.co.uk
"On a (reasonably) clear motorway ..."
No, actually, I said exactly that! Of course it would be stupid to drive faster than the conditions warrant - conditions being everything from (but not limited too - for the pedants!) traffic, weather, light, vehicle, driver, star sign, wind direction, latest lunar eclipse!.
If you agree that 100MPH on an empty motorway ... yada yada yada ... isn't inherently unsafe, indeed could be deemed safer than 40MPH outside an infants school at kicking out time, then you have agreed that speed isn't inherently dangerous.
Eclectic beats from Leeds, UK
handmadehands.co.uk
Which is pretty much what I was suggesting (reasonably clear motorway) isn't it? So, if 100MPH is OK if you are the only one driving doesn't that suggest that speed isn't inherently dangerous? Or is that just me?
How about you?
As it 'appens, I have an allergy to accidents of all kinds, and tend to come out in a nasty (road) rash and broken bones, etc, but when there are other muppets on the road I tend to drive a lot slower, and far more defensively. I pretty much assume that all the other road users are suicidal and hell bent on crashing into, or jumping out in front of, me and give them a wide berth accordingly, but when I've got the road to myself I will indeed make like a towel, and press on!
Eclectic beats from Leeds, UK
handmadehands.co.uk
the car must hit 88 mph.
I don't have the data handy, but as I recall the Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) operates most efficiently at somewhere between 50% and 70% of maximum load. To stay in this sweet spot, you'd actually want to hold the gas pedal steady, not hold the vehicle's speed steady like a cruise control does. So that means the car will slow down on the ups, and speed back up on the downs. Trying to keep the speed steady wastes gas on both sides of the hill. On the up, you may have loaded the engine enough that it's operating outside its best area, but that depends heavily on how overpowered the car is. Sports and muscle cars might do very well under more load, but the average car won't. If the down is steep enough that your foot is completely off the gas pedal, and the car would actually roll downhill faster if you shifted to neutral, all that energy you've stored by going uphill fast is now being wasted. In that case it doesn't matter what kind of engine you have. Think also how a roller coaster ride works.
There have been experiments on this and other ways of saving gas. A tried and true but tiresome and annoying way to save gas is Pulse and Glide. Because most cars have a little extra power to deal with hills, headwinds, passing situations and the like, they will operate a bit below the optimum at steady speed on flat ground. So the driver can "pulse", that is, accelerate slowly to some target maximum speed, and then "glide", which means shut the engine off and coast in neutral until reaching some target minimum speed. Best done with a stick shift so you can roll or bump start the car as they call it, and not use the starter. Then you repeat. P&G has been known since the 1950's.
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