Date:         Sat, 24 May 1997 13:26:30 -0500
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         Bruce.B.Wood@hanover.valley.net (Bruce Wood)
Subject:      solar bus

We had an interesting sighting here on the Vermont-New Hampshire border
this week: a 1971 VW Microbus entered in The American Tour de Sol, U.S.
Electric Vehicle Championship. The competition is a seven-day, five-state
electric vehicle road rally.

The bus in question was converted into a solar vehicle by children at the
Riverside School in Lyndonville, Vermont (grades 4-8) during shop classes.
They've been working on the project since Thanksgiving.

The bus has a powder blue lower with a white upper. Fitted on the top is a
solar panel virtually the same size as the roof. According to the story in
Thursday's paper, the kids' bus covered a school-record 69.8 miles the
other day. No mention of MPH.

Interestingly, the newspaper ran four photos of the rally and three
included the bus, called Helios the Heron in honor of the Greek sun god and
the school mascot. The story noted that the bus was "complete with love
beads on the rear-view mirror and paintings on the side."

Information on the race and entries is available at:  http://www.nesea.org/

bruce \/\/