Volvo’s 4 Wheel Drive Electric Car? 4 In-Wheel Motors That Is!
By George Lewis | July 27th, 2008 | Category: Featured, Tech |
Volvo’s Recharge Electric Vehicle is a 4 wheel drive (4 in-wheel electric drive!). Each wheel is actually a motor/generator. The vehicle (a modified c-30) looks normal, which is the reason for the green colored wheels.
This is, in my opinion, the logical future for electric vehicles… since electric motors today have such high torque and can be so precisely controlled by computer algorithms, it is much more efficient to connect them directly: eliminating the inefficiencies of transmissions. The 4 motors can take the car about 60 miles after only a 3 hour charge, so most people (who don’t travel over 60 miles a day) can be 100% green most of the time… and when they need to go further (on a weekend trip, say) they are secure in knowing they won’t have to leave their car on the side of the road - who knows where… which is a major concern of potential electric-only vehicle owners… and should be taken seriously by those who sell these type of vehicles.
Other car makers have decided against using in-wheel motors due to vibration and wear issues, but I’m sure that the only way to perfect these issues is to forge ahead and test them - and make each generation better.
Other companies, like the Electric Mini and the ZAP Alias will be using In-wheel motors, although I don’t know if they’re from the same company.
The car is designed as an electric vehicle. It’s fuel engine is connected only to a generator to recharge the batteries. This, in my opinion, is the best use of fuel engines because they are most efficient when run at a constant velocity.
My Take: I’m happy at Volvo, and mad at the same time - at all these major car companies (who suddenly are now producing viable electric cars). Are we to applaud them now? or should we demand much more. I say we should demand MUCH more! They’ve had this technology for many years! How many people would be alive today - and how many wars could have been avoided if these electric vehicles would have existed after our last oil crisis in the 70’s!
The idea that electric cars could have been sold in earlier years with modest gas prices is totally
idiotic - the EV-1, Toyota Rav4 electric and Honda EV were all produced beginning in 1996 and for 6 years
thereafter - they were ALL colossal flops, for a very simple reason - battery-only electric cars make no sense, either then or now. Fact : the EV-1 cost 4 times more than a far superior Honda Accord; the battery pack cost over $25,000 and lasted a mere 5 years, making battery costs five times higher than gasoline fuel bills; the cars couldn’t travel to destinations over 40 miles away, at least not if you expected to get back home; the cars required 8 hours to recharge their batteries; Only a simpleminded fool would ever have wasted their money on one of those
vehicles. Battery-only cars still don’t make any sense - you don’t have to use that technology when plug-in hybrids can accomplish everything they can and don’t require owning, maintaining , garaging, and insuring a second, gas powered car. Until battery prices and recharge rates come way down, battery-only cars are oxymorons. And the
biggest laugh is that they aren’t even needed : plug-ins can do it all. I hope all of you people who are conning the public into wasting their money oon this crappy technology go out and buy one of these battery-only electrics yourselves. That would be poetic justice.
The only reason Volvo and others are building this inferior technology is because it’s easy
to build a battery-only electric, and there seem to be a lot of ignorant souls out there who think they make either economic or environmental sense. They make neither - a plug-in with a 40 mile driving range can avoid over 95% of gasoline consumption, as much as a fleet of all electrics can, since those car owners will require gas powered vehicles for all trips over 40 to 50 miles away, while a plug-in hybrid can get double the gas mileage on those trips and use electricity for 40 miles to boot. And even if 100% of the private transportation fleet were to use electricity alone, that would leave over 40% of petroluem still required for trucks and fuel oil, plastics, etc.
I’m astounded at the ignorance out there about electric cars, of any kind. This country seems ot be composed of loudmouthed idiots who don’t seem to even comprehend what a car’s purpose is.
Thanks for taking the time to write your comments. You make some very good points about electric only vehicles, but the vehicle above is a plug-in hybrid. It’s just that it’s electric first (like todays trains) it drives 40 miles on electricity and then a very efficient flex-fuel generator kicks-in to recharge the batteries as you drive and extend the range.
It’s obvious that if you drive over 40 miles a day you shouldn’t buy an electric only vehicle. That type of vehicle only makes sense if someone (say in a family) lives close to work or just has to get kids to school, etc. If these people buy a low-cost vehicle like the ZAP Xebra at just $12,000, they could save money and be part of the solution.
The reason I like to write about alternative vehicles is because I like to see the big picture and think where we’ll be in 10 years. Where will gas prices be in 10 years? I realize that some products don’t help me personally right now, but they’re steps in the right direction. WE NEED TO GET OFF FOREIGN OIL.
If we had built wind and solar-thermal technology after the 70’s energy crisis (I realize you might not have been around then) - and if millions of electric cars were helping to store that energy at night… would we even be in Iraq now (protecting the flow of oil?) - Would we have so many smoggy days in LA? How many less tons of pollution particles would we have? How many less deaths from health related issues AND war!
I think the 20th century will be remembered as the petroleum era (when we almost asphyxiated the planet)… and left the bills and the clean-up to our grandkids! I want this century to be the one where we stop thinking about what’s best for the individual and start thinking about what’s best for our country first - and the planet second. Because we have much to fix here… we consume most of the oil so we need to get our act together first.
Did you know that the first plug-in hybrid was built in 1901? http://www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lohner-Porsche_Mixte_Hybrid