http://www.acmphotography.com/cheeseweb2/cwblog/2008/01/the-zenn-car.html
ZENN to Introduce More Powerful AC Motor in Its Electric Car
Source: CNET News
[Feb 03, 2008]
SYNOPSIS: Zenn Motor plans to release a new line of cars in a few weeks that will run on more powerful AC motors--but consumers will have to wait for vehicles that feature new EEStor energy technology.
To date, Toronto-based Zenn has inserted DC motors into its cars. A DC motor can provide a lot of torque at low speeds, but it begins to decline fairly rapidly as the engine runs at higher rpms (revolutions per minute), said Zenn CEO Ian Clifford. The amount of torque an engine can produce directly relates to its performance, so the more torque, the more performance.
In an AC motor, torque doesn't decline in the same manner. "In a city like San Francisco, you can accelerate into a hill and keep your speed," Clifford said.
Zenn swaps motors in latest electric cars
Zenn Motor plans to release a new line of cars in a few weeks that will run on more powerful AC motors--but consumers will have to wait for vehicles that feature new energy technology.
To date, Toronto-based Zenn has inserted DC motors into its cars. A DC motor can provide a lot of torque at low speeds, but it begins to decline fairly rapidly as the engine runs at higher rpms (revolutions per minute), said Zenn CEO Ian Clifford. The amount of torque an engine can produce directly relates to its performance, so the more torque, the more performance.
In an AC motor, torque doesn't decline in the same manner. "In a city like San Francisco, you can accelerate into a hill and keep your speed," Clifford said.
The new cars also go farther. The older DC motor-powered cars can go about 30 to 35 miles on a charge, he said, while the news ones with AC motors will go 40 to 50 miles. Zenn also made the roof black on the new cars for a touch of style. The cars now look more like Mini Coopers.
Rival Miles Automotive already sells low-speed, limited-range electric car with AC motors.
While a 50-mile range is probably too low for a regular consumer car, it works in the niche market that Zenn mines. Zenn's cars are low-speed electric vehicles. That is, they contain governors that limit the speed to 25 miles per hour, tops. Universities and military bases buy them to replace the diesel-burning maintenance and grounds-keeping trucks. (The Department of Defense, in fact, has a mandate to increase its purchases of low-speed vehicles.)
Although you can't take them on freeways, low-speed vehicles are legal on city streets, so you can use them for beer runs to the convenience stores; retirement communities are a target market.
Washington state and Montana, ever the rebels, have passed laws allowing these cars to crank it up to 35 miles per hour, but Zenn for the moment is sticking to the federal standard.
Approximately 20,000 to 40,000 low-speed vehicles are shipped a year, Clifford estimated. Competitors in the market include Miles (check out a test drive of a Miles car here) and Zap. A few dealerships in California (Davis, Berkeley) have Zenns on the lot.
Zenn's new cars run on an EV31A-A Discover lead acid battery pack, which was an upgrade from earlier models.
Zenn plans to produce freeway-legal cars, but is waiting to get energy storage units from EEStor. The somewhat secretive EEStor says it has an ultracapacitor that can power an electric car better (and farther) than a lithium-ion battery pack. EEStor has several partisans and detractors, but few have seen the company's technology up close.
Although EEStor has had to delay its energy storage units, Zenn expects to start receiving some this year. An investor in the company, Zenn has the right to obtain the first units from EEStor. Lockheed Martin has signed a development deal with EEStor as well and is expected to receive prototypes late in 2008.
"They are pretty bullish about delivering product to us in 2008," Clifford said.
GM's alternative-energy cars
GM brought a prototype of its Chevy Volt and the Equinox, a hydrogen-powered SUV, to the Hollywood Goes Green conference this week. The company is developing vehicles that use a variety of alternative fuels, including electricity, solar energy, and hydrogen.
The full view of the Volt. It's unclear what the final car will look like, but the prototype is snappy.
Credit: Michael Kanellos/CNET News.com
Larry Hagman, solar advocate and former star of I Dream of Jeannie, came to look at the car.
He liked it, but not the transparent roof. No word if Major Healy disapproved, too.
The Chevy Equinox, a fuel cell SUV powered by hydrogen.
GM hopes to bring it out sometime in the not-too-distant future.
The myriad problems of building a hydrogen economy will likely hold the car up.
It's fast; I drove it for a few miles on Hollywood Boulevard.
The dash on the Equinox tells you how much carbon dioxide you are not burning.
What comes out of the exhaust of a hydrogen car? Water vapor.
There are a couple of outlets on the back. The car has a regular-size trunk.
The fuel cell itself. Note the lack of grease.
Tata's $2,500 car
You've undoubtedly heard of the iPod Nano, and may even have the tiny music player tucked in a pocket or hanging from a lanyard around your neck. You can't tote the Tata Nano that way, but Mumbai-based Tata Motors is hoping its new subcompact has as powerful an effect on the automotive market as Apple's iPod did in media gadgetry.
The most striking thing about the car, though, isn't its size. It's the price: about 100,000 rupees, or just $2,500. Tata's goal is to get the Nano in the driveways of Indian citizens who otherwise couldn't afford four-wheeled transportation. Hence the company's preferred description of the vehicle: the People's Car.
Correction: This caption originally gave an incorrect location for the headquarters of Tata Motors. The company is based in Mumbai.
Ratan Tata, chairman of parent company Tata Group, stands with the Nano after driving it on stage at the New Delhi Auto Expo on Thursday. He explained the motivation behind the car this way:
"I observed families riding on two-wheelers--the father driving the scooter, his young kid standing in front of him, his wife seated behind him holding a little baby," he said at the unveiling ceremony, according to Tata's press release. "It lead me to wonder whether one could conceive of a safe, affordable, all-weather form of transport for such a family."
The cabin of the car seats four people--"comfortably," the company says, "with generous leg space and head room." The four-door (plus tail gate) car is taller than it is wide: 1.6 meters tall by 1.5 meters across. From front to back, it measures 3.1 meters.
The car has a two-cylinder, 623-cc fuel-injection engine. Tata says that this marks the first time that a two-cylinder gas engine is being used in a car with a single balancer shaft. The model pictured here is the standard version.
This is the deluxe model, though Tata didn't specify how it qualifies as such. The company emphasized that despite its size, the People's Car meets safety requirements. The car has an all-sheet-metal body, crumple zones, seat belts, and tubeless tires. Tailpipe emissions are within regulatory bounds, and the fuel-efficient Nano "has a lower pollution level than two-wheelers being manufactured in India today," the company says.
The cars will go on sale in India later this year. According to The Wall Street Journal, Tata will hold off on exports for several years.
Tata has aspirations at the high end of the auto industry as well as the bargain basement. Ford Motor confirmed last week that it is in talks to potentially sell its Jaguar and Land Rover lines to Tata.
Small cars were a common sighting as the New Delhi Auto Expo kicked off, as were European and U.S.
automakers looking to catch favor with Indian auto buyers. This is the Fiat 500.
Also on display was the Volkswagen Up concept car, a design intended for urban settings.
It features a rear-mounted engine, a hallmark of the enduringly classic VW Beetle
(the original "people's car"--that's how "Volkswagen" translates from the German).
A key competitor for Tata Motors is Maruti Suzuki India, a branch of Japan's Suzuki Motor
that dominates the Indian market. This is Maruti Suzuki's A-Star concept car, which,
the company says without offering any details on eventual production models,
"symbolizes the next level of (Suzuki Motor's) India commitment."
2 σχόλια:
Attention!
Δημοσίευση σχολίου