Automotive X PRIZE People love their cars. They are vital links to our jobs, our community, ourselves. For everything we love about them, cars are chained to the most severe global crises of our time: oil dependence and climate change. We aim to break this deadlock through the most radical ...
11-06-2007, 02:45 PM
| #1 | ||||
| Deuteronomy 32:41  Paleolibertarian USA 
| automotive x-prize Automotive X PRIZE
GM had the EV1, which COULD have been a huge success. Regardless of the conspiracy theory or impracticality, GM took them all back at the end of the lease cycle, and had them all destroyed. Why?!? Next is the hybrids, which they're putting "hybrid" technology into SUVs, which is stupid and not worth the effort (not to mention an old idea which is being passed off as a new one). Some say the solution is hydrogen. Others say it is ethanol. The x-prize seeks to get people to try ANYTHING to create a vehicle that would be practical enough to be sellable (as in, not be made of carbon fiber, exotic battery technology, and cost $1.8 million each in a production environmnt). I think it's a great idea. I almost feel like I'm wasting my time building a long-range electric truck. It seems like the manufacturers are, any day now, going to build electric cars, or hybrids that actually work, or something else that will just blow the doors off everything else in terms of fuel economy. Thing is, I bet people that built their own electric car 10 years ago were thinking the same thing (the EV1 was built from 1996 to 1999), yet obviously there is no massive fleet of EVs from any manufacturer. The closest thing you can get right now is Chrysler's GEM cars or Ford's TH!NK, which are just neighborhood electric vehicles, federally regulated to 25mph speeds (although many are capable of going 40+ without mods). Should entrepenuers like myself build and sell alternative powered vehicles, or should we wait until the manufacturers do something? Should the government step in to get the manufacturers to "work together" to create something? Will this new automotive x-prize spawn a new Microsoft? My electric truck is coming together, and will likely be finished by Dec 15th.
__________________ -Avengeance | ||||
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11-07-2007, 09:49 AM
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| Dirty Liberal  Democrat South Jersey
| Honestly the technology is already there and it's already viable. The problem is infrastructure. You can build a fuel cell car that will go 500 miles on a tank of hydrogen and produce no pollution... But if there is no where to fill up with hyrdogen then what's the point? Electric is the same. We currently make the vast majority of our electricity by burning coal and natural gas. So if you are making an electric car, you are still burning fossil fuels by proxy. Again if we had a better power infrastucture that wouldn't be an issue. The fossil fuel infrastructure is so firmly entrenched into our society that making a real change is quite difficult. | ||||
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11-07-2007, 10:38 AM
| #3 | ||||
| Deuteronomy 32:41 Paleolibertarian USA
| Originally Posted by WickedLou9 Infrastructure will be addressed, I think, in this x-prize, but I don't think they're putting too much weight on it. If an electric car could charge in 10 minutes, gas stations would have to start putting pay-outlets in place of pumps, or they'd lose business. My PT Cruiser took 6 hours for a 90% charge (granted, at under 5amp @ 120vac). My truck will go 60+ miles on a charge, but take 8 hrs. @ 6amp @ 120vac to charge (exact numbers to be determined by real-world testing).
Fuel cells are still very expensive to make. Some of the battery technologies take complex controllers and chargers to make sure they charge and discharge without exploding. My EV truck is going to use more conventional Pb-acid batteries. If I could, I'd go with lithium or something (same power at about 1/3 the weight!), but it's not feasable. I'm hoping this x-prize brings out some technologies and puts them in the public sector so "regular people" like me can harness them. You mention still using coal, etc. with an EV. That's not true everywhere. The state I live in is primarily powered with nuclear and hydroelectric. If you REALLY wanted to lower your transportation bill, you could throw some solar panels on your house and a battery array in the garage, and charge your car on sun-power. Doesn't get much cleaner than that. The big thud with EVs isn't infrastructure. I mean, really, go into a building. Do they have electricity? Do they have gasoline? Only gas stations have gasoline. EVERYBODY has electric. It would only be a matter of CHARGING for the electricity. It would be pretty easy to put together a pair of outlets (110 and 220), a KWH meter, and a credit card reader. Right now the big issue is speed. It just takes too long to recharge an EV. If we can somehow make a battery array that can recharge in 30 min. or less and make a car go 100 miles or more, I think we could tell OPEC where to stick it. | ||||
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11-07-2007, 10:44 AM
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| Dirty Liberal Democrat South Jersey
| Originally Posted by AVengeance Perhaps some sort of capacitor that doesn't lose charge quite as fast?
Or maybe a bunch of capacitors that charge up fast and then charge up a traditional battery as they discharge over time. I dunno though, it's not really my area of expertise. | ||||
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11-07-2007, 11:14 AM
| #5 | ||||
| Bokonist  Independent Kansas City
| A swappable battery would do the job. If you could let one battery charge all day, using the other, then switch them every day. | ||||
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11-07-2007, 02:07 PM
| #6 | ||||
| Dirty Liberal Democrat South Jersey
| Originally Posted by nbiggershaft Ooh kinda like how you swap propane tanks at the home depot for your gas grille. You pull up, they take your old battery out and you take a new fully charged one. They can then take thier time charging the other battery.
All we need is the infrastructure  | ||||
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11-09-2007, 08:58 AM
| #7 | ||||
| Deuteronomy 32:41 Paleolibertarian USA
| Originally Posted by nbiggershaft That's the way electric forklifts work that I've used. It's already been done, just not in the automotive arena. What would be cool, though, is that you could also charge at home without removing the battery back, so you'd have the CHOICE to fill up at home or at the refueling station.
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11-14-2007, 10:26 AM
| #8 | ||||
| Noob  Republican Abilene TX
| wow sounds like you guys have pretty much got it figured out. personaly i think that the way to go would be the Solar energy. and i believe that magnetism is a very good sourse of a lot of power for moving things that isn't used enough. the reason is because it costs so much to make. i think that if we had MagLev trains in america that cost next to nothing to run becuase they essentiol power themselves it would make thing like intercity travel much easyer and if we use the legs God gave us alittle more then we do it would get rid of a lot more problems then just cars. | ||||
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11-14-2007, 06:33 PM
| #9 | ||||
| Member Green Party
| the infrastructure thing can be dealt with by having an auto that recharges off he grid.. the infrastructure is already here the problem is 1) producing the extra electricity from renewables... we are going to have to do that anyway no matter what 2) battery fuel cell tech that isn't impractical to build as AV pointed out yeah its a ok idea i think... something whacky like storing energy in spinning wheels or something no one has thought of taking seriousily... we have to do something... Boris London | ||||
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