Retrofit Plug in Hybrid?

[andy30thz]

I thought this was interesting....
It wouldn't help us country folks that don't do much in town driving... But it looks like a pretty simple setup.
Although, in a day and age where people won't change their own flat tires....it would have to be a pretty robust system for it to go very far.

http://www.foxnews.com/leisure/2012/08/06/student-hybrid-car-project-could-bring-millions-to-tennessee-university/?intcmp=features

[BBR]

I saw that and it is interesting. I still have problems with the whole concept of spending money to save money.

[Barry Donovan]

its like having split case halves where precision is needed. alternators are tight permanent for a reason.
I don't like that, but idea is good.
bearings wear, energy from ign coils like to go to wheels and tires to earth in higher rpms.

I like KERS idea..

I was thinking of my subaru, converted to RWD has two axle stubs driven, not doing anyhting. I joked of a double KERS like formula 1 on each stub.

they'd not only see me rolling, they'd hear the space ship coming.

[DanStokes]

The article doesn't say if there's any regenerative braking or not. This a pretty big deal as it keeps much of the energy of the forward motion of the vehicle from being lost to heat. If it has some sort of regen braking it's probably a decent idea depending on the use of resources to make it.

Dan

[squirrel]

The article doesn't do a very good job of explaining anything about how the car works. They do mention plug-in, my guess is that there is no regen braking. But I could be wrong.

[Beagle]

it they're wheel motors, how hard could it be to set them up as revenerative? Shunt wound? I saw quite a few Delco generator / starters on old lawnmowers, never really gave it much though how that was controlled. I know that one BIG cost on these currently is the controller... and the ones I was looking at (Zilla, 640,000 Watts capable) were not, they were for series wound motors.

I'm kinda with James on this, same as for Solar / Wind. The startup is pretty high. The maintenance cost (battery replacement) is high. 600-700 gallons of gas at current prices, on a honda, at 30mpg. Let's say 20,000 miles. About a year and a half for most folks, and how long does your battery pack last? Down here where AC is mandatory, how does it get run? 2400cc is a helluva big motor for an AC compressor and windshield defroster. Electric power steering is alreay here so the yards should be filling up with that stuff (Escape, there's a bazillion of them down here)

Yet, with 200 lbs you have tripled your Honda's output, now what about its weak suck brakes? I sure as hell HOPE it's using those motors for brakes. Then, blam, you locked it up and you're going off the bridge backwards in the rain. Not to mention you just put a 1/2 ton of batteries somewhere, and the only ones I'm interested in are Lithium Ion or Lipo. $$$ but at least they last. It's gonna take some computer trickery to get your ABS to play nice with all that extra weight.

Great idea that I'd want a lot more information on. The Nissan Leaf at 20k after rebates is designed to be pure electric, I think I'd stick with that if I were gonna go electric. However, I wouldn't mind being a student these days with a budget / project to jack around with this stuff at school. I think it would be a blast.

huh, that was an all over the place way of saying I agree with the James's

oh yeah, and I need to get the 460 block decked .018. That's what it made me think.

[squirrel]

With or without regen braking, it is still a neat idea. The regen braking just means you can go farther on one charge. But it increases the control system cmplexity quite a bit.

[Whelk]

The article mentions just two 10 hp motors. It looks to me like all it really does is overcome inertia from a stop and get the car moving. Then you can just feather the gas pedal for around town driving.

[Beagle]

I think it was 10hp for both, and 10 hp electric doesn't translate well to internal combustion engines. 200 foot pounds does... Hell, I have a 4hp elevator motor and that thing is about as big as and weighs more than the 4 cylinder in an Accord I think.

It should more than move it from a stop. If it's an 1800 rpm rating, that's 40-45 mph. If they were on the rear wheels and your front wheels still put their 140hp or so down, it might actually be mildly entertaining in town!

[squirrel]

Foot pounds means something if you keep in mind the gear ratio of the drivetrain, and that the motors are direct drive. so that 200 ft lbs is not multiplied by 10 or 12 or whatever the overall gear ratio is in first gear. Meaning it's only about 20 ft lbs of "engine" torque in low gear.

[milner351]

want lower fuel consumption costs? Buy a TDI VW.

They last a long time, have a very long range per tank, and won't need $$$$ batteries replaced after ??? miles.

[tedly]

I've had it in the back of my mind to see if this kind of thing is available for awhile, but never have. I thought it would be cool to take a diesel, make it a french fry car with some kind of hybrid electric system. Way beyond my current knowledge but it could be fun to learn about.

[Beagle]

Foot pounds means something if you keep in mind the gear ratio of the drivetrain, and that the motors are direct drive. so that 200 ft lbs is not multiplied by 10 or 12 or whatever the overall gear ratio is in first gear. Meaning it's only about 20 ft lbs of "engine" torque in low gear.

excellent point, Squirrel, thanks for that. Ironically, I was just reading something else and thinking about the ratio of the rear and the gear and what you see at the tires and hope to get to the ground, then made the direct drive comment about MPH, then promptly forgot the relationship. Doh.

/edit - just occurred to me that a well ironed out CVT might be a good thing to tie to an electric motor?

Tedly, check out NEDRA, there is some interesting junk to be learned!

http://www.nedra.com/

[Huskinhano]

Looks like a permanent magnet motor set up to me. Spending dollars to save pennies is what I think on the whole hybrid thing. City driving is the ideal environment for hybrid with the stop start driving for regenerative braking/charging. Now what seems like an oxymoron to me, why not use mass transit instead of clogging the roads with hybrids in the city? That is a waste of energy and pollution, mass transit is not.

Who was it here a few years back posted the manufacturing path from mining the ore to completed product globe trotting of a hybrid battery? And I thought I read some place it takes 250,000 miles for a Prius to be greener then a Hummer with all the energy used in manufacturing?

[tedly]

d out CVT might be a good thing to tie to an electric motor?

Tedly, check out NEDRA, there is some interesting junk to be learned!

http://www.nedra.com/

Thanks, added to my favorites list to check out in detail later!

Spending dollars to save pennies is what I think on the whole hybrid thing.

For the most part I agree with you, and as for the eco-friendly crap, you're just trading one pollution for another. I'm not interested in that malarkey though. My thought was to make a reliable car that's as non-reliant on oil as possible, just to see if it could be done by an average gearhead. Since that little thought started worming it's way through my brain I've stumbled across some people here and there who have done this in various ways, our own Thumpin455 among them. The technical talk can be way over my head but it's really cool to learn about. Maybe I'm weird but I think stuff like this springs from the same genes as hot rodding, at least before it gets twisted into a trendy agenda. Besides it would fry so many eco-wienies minds to find out that something like an old 1 ton diesel truck is greener than their bland little smugmobile and tremendously more useful too.