Date: Wed, 2 Jul 2008 22:29:11 -0400
Reply-To: craig cowan <phishman068@GMAIL.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: craig cowan <phishman068@GMAIL.COM>
Subject: Re: Electric motors in each wheel, was Re: Hybrid technologies
In-Reply-To: <014b01c8dcb0$fbe19940$647ba8c0@main>
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I've seen a prototype using this technology. I was in the 9th grade and Penn
State University's team of engineers came to demonstrate future technologies
to the science classes at my highschool (this was.....5 years ago now). I
was in an entry level biology class and when the question and answer time
came along...... i was the only one with questions (and many, many
questions!) I pretty much ripped through all the flaws with the prototype
vehicles they had there (including a hydrogen vehicle storing Hydrogen at
something like 100+PSI in a tank under the drivers seat.....), and it was
then that i met the teachers of our highschool's physics department (which
later recruited me to actually teach them what i knew of the emerging
technologies so they could pass it on to thier respective classes. This was
cutting edge stuff, and i had done the research....).
Well back to the no vanagon content electric hubs at the wheels....
They had a ford explorer that had been outfitted with this technolgy. It was
a 'hybrid', with a V8 none the less (they didn't claim it to be efficient,
just 'a hybrid') With the car up on the lift i distinctly remember seeing
the way they'd done it. The front wheels used CV drive shafts attached to
both ends of a specially built double ended electric motor (imagine an
electric equivalent of the front differential on a syncro). The rear wheels
however were attached to big motors about the size and shape of a brake
drum, placed exactly where a brake drum would have been (But there were no
brakes. It relied upon a few principals of electric motors to work as brakes
and inefficient regenerative braking by producing electricity when using the
motor's resistance to brake the vehicle). It would make setting up the
brakes a real headache for a prototype (especially the front wheels. They
would ALWAYS brake exactly the same since they were fed of the same motor. I
would have done this with two counter-rotating electric motors mounted
centrally as they did, attached to drive shafts as they did, but two motors
rather than one. (And i would have loved to see the design of that screwy
motor....)
The engine ran a huge generator and wasn't attached to any transmission at
all. The generator was in the place the transmission would have been, and
was BIG. Run directly off the engine's flywheel.
This would all be adaptable to a syncro using drive motors from a washing
machine (with a planetary gear arrangement added to them), the generator off
a......generator, attached to a DIESEL engine (small. maybe 1liter or less 3
cylinder), and some minor machining of new hubs. No change to the suspension
(just pop out the rear brakes and make a new hub that has no provisions for
brakes but mounts the motors. Remove the front differential and put your
counter-rotating washing machine motors there.....your LiIon battery packs
under the rear seat, the 'regular' battery for the diesel in the engine bay,
and some solar panels on the roof (solar panels optional).
All you need is a couple of washing machines, a diesel tractor/parts, a
common generator, a home machine shop and knowledge of how to use it, scrap
metal, and......
Plenty of spare time and $10,000 worth of batteries that don't exist (YET!).
Though if you provide me with a syncro, i will provide a "proof of concept"
prototype that works only well enough to not work at all (how long do you
think an electric car will drive on a COSTCO brand Group 41 battery?) : )
I'll keep the syncro when we're done : )
Long story i know, but it ended up with vanagon content (and started out
with porsche/early volkswagen content).
So where's my syncro?
-Craig
'85GL
On Wed, Jul 2, 2008 at 10:03 PM, Robert Fisher <refisher@mchsi.com> wrote:
> Google and ye shall find; there's a ton of stuff on this. Several years ago
> I was reading a 'Popular Mechanics', I think it was, while I was waiting at
> an import shop in town and they had an article about a GM concept based on
> a
> fuel cell electric platform with AWD (motors in the hub) on which you could
> interchange the body. That is, the body could be lifted off the 'chassis'
> and changed out for another, so if you had this thing in a sedan you could
> also buy a small pickup shell or minivan shell and swap it onto the chassis
> and thus have three vehicles for a good bit less than the cost and upkeep
> of
> three separate cars. Of course they kind of glossed over the cost of the
> lift and the insanely high garage, but it was an interesting idea.
>
> In following this thread I actually thought the Vanagon, or at least the
> Syncro, might be an ideal platform for an electric hub motor conversion
> once
> the technology is really here, assuming the converter is willing to pony up
> the cash.
>
> Cya,
> Robert
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Jonathan Poole" <jfpoolio@GMAIL.COM>
> To: <vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM>
> Sent: Wednesday, July 02, 2008 6:23 PM
> Subject: Hybrid technologies
>
>
> "The drive motors would be independent electric motors on each wheel...."
>>
>> Porsche would be proud since one of his first cars was something very
>> similar.. It had a gas motor powering electric motors in the hubs. That
>> was only 108 years ago.
>>
>> http://www.autohistory.org/feature_6.html
>>
>>
>> Jonathan Poole
>>
>
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