Paul Tan on the Automotive Industry
Ssangyong has announced that the company will be exhibiting a turbodiesel-hybrid concept at the 2008 Geneva Motor Show which will improve efficiency of their existing vehicles by about 30%. No other details has been released, so we’ll just have to wait until Geneva rolls by just next month to find out what the Korean manufacturers have in store for us.
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Guy Negre was a Formula One motor racing engineer. The Frenchman has been looking for 15 years for backers for his invention – a car that runs on air – and he now has the backing of Tata, who have invested 20 million Euros in his project.
Negre’s car uses compressed air to move pistons, which in turn also helps compress the air again in a reservoir. The car also has an electric motor, which also compresses air. This electric motor uses batteries that need to be charged. The compressed air can also be filled up at service stations in a matter of minutes.
His company Motor Development International based in France has developed an entire series of engine and car prototypes, some of which include fuel engine options together with the compressed air system. The fuel engine is used to extend the car’s range when not in reach of a special power point or a service station.
The car will be built in India and pre-production will start this year. It is protected by 50 patents, and the car will cost between 3,500 to 4,000 euros (RM17,000 to RM19,400). It weighs not more than 330kg and goes up to a top speed of 150km/h. Projected range is about between 160 to 320 km, depending on traffic conditions.
“It is clear that with oil at $100 a barrel this will force people to change their use of fuel and pollute less. My car is zero pollution in town and almost no pollution on the highways,” said Negre.
Look after the jump for a video on how the engine works.
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The Volkswagen space up! blue is the third in the range of New Small Family concepts that include the Volkswagen up! concept and the Volkswagen space up! concept. The blue suffix on this concept refers to the fuel cell powertrain that the space up! blue uses instead of the space up!’s FSI engine.
The electric motor in the Volkswagen space up! blue can be powered by one of two sources – an array of lithium ion batteries that can be charged by a conventional electrical outlet, or a high temperature fuel cell. If both energy sources are combined, the space up! blue can travel up to 354km thanks to the fuel cell’s 250km extra capacity.
The high temperature fuel cell is lighter and cheaper than a conventional fuel cell, and was developed at a dedicated research center in Germany. This fuel cell is located at the front of the car, while the batteries are under the rear seats.
More photos after the jump.
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Nothing much is known about the new Toyota Crown Hybrid Concept that will be displayed at the 2007 Tokyo Motor Show other than a list of new features to be showcased – so we will have to wait until the motorshow rolls by to find out exactly what these new technologies are.
Anyway onto the features – the Toyota Crown Hybrid Concept will features Toyota Hybrid System II, an evolution of the current system being used in production hybrid vehicles – this uses a two-stage motor speed reduction device which helps achieve smoother acceleration, better fuel efficiency, low emissions and lower noise.
A new Finegraphic Meter TFT LCD display will be employed in the interior to provide information to the driver in an easy to see and understand manner – this could finally make its way into Toyota vehicles the same way Optitron started being used in Lexus cars first, so I think we should pay attention to this particular technology.
Vehicle stability will be enhanced with VDIM and active steering control, which I think has already made its debut on cars like the Toyota Mark X ZiO – using an optimal balance between drive power, steering and braking to help regain control of the vehicle in emergency cases. For passive safety, the car has 10 SRS airbags.
Like the Toyota Crowns before it, this new concept will likely be a front engine, rear wheel drive car. It is Toyota’s largest sedan and is about the same size as a Lexus LS.
An interesting fact to share: many Toyota sedans have been named after variations of the word Crown. There’s the Toyota Corona, where Corona is latin for crown, and there’s also the Corolla, which means small crown and usually refers to the small center “crown” of a flower. The Toyota Camry gets its name from kan-muri, meaning small crown.
More photos after the jump.
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Lotus Engineering will have this on display at the 2007 Geneva Motor Show, a Proton GEN2 equipped with Lotus Engineering’s EVE Hybrid technology. EVE, which stands for Efficient, Viable, Environmental, basically pairs Proton’s 1.6 litre Campro engine with a 30 kilowatt (40 horsepower) electric motor. The hybrid petrol-electric drivetrain drives the front wheels using a continuously variable transmission (CVT) gearbox.
The hybrid system also has a start-stop system for the gasoline engine to be shut off when unneeded. The engine restarts automatically when the brake pedal is released. The electric motor is positioned between the engine and the gearbox, and supports regenerative braking to recharge its 144V battery located in the GEN2′s boot.
The Proton GEN2 EVE Hybrid Concept has significantly lower emissions than it’s pure petrol sibling, with CO2 output only 134g/km from 172g/km. Average fuel economy rose from 6 litres per 100km to 4.6 litres per 100km. The combined output of the electric motor and the Campro 1.6 litre engine is 141hp, equivalent to a 1.8 to 2.0 litre engine in modern times, giving it a 0-100km/h time of 9 seconds and a top speed of 190km/h. Torque rises from the stock 148Nm at 4,000rpm to 233Nm at 1,500rpm.
Perhaps we can see this Lotus EVE Hybrid technology being implemented in our local Proton cars soon, or perhaps we will be able to use that CVT transmission to replace the current 4-speed auto of which ratio’s do not match the Campro’s torque curve at all. A CVT would be wonderful for keeping the Campro’s revs within it’s powerband, allowing for a more comfortable and stressless drive.
More photos after the jump, as well as Lotus Engineering’s full description of the Proton GEN2 EVE Hybrid car.
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Tesla Motors, who sent shockwaves through the industry with the introduction of the Elise-based electric sportscar the Tesla Roadster (shown above) has announced that it will be making a new 4-seater sedan aimed at the BMW 5-Series, to be released by the end of the decade.
The luxury electric sedan is set to be available globally in two variants, one with a similiar engine to the Tesla Roadster (248 horsepower) with a 320 kilometer range on a single charge, and another more powerful variant with a higher range – about 480 kilometers. The sedan will be built with lightweight steel, and production is expected to be 10,000 to 20,000 units annually.
This is likely the first manufacturer to come up with a fully electric powered sedan for mass production, while other manufacturers have gone different paths – Lexus is focusing on hybrids while BMW is investing in hydrogen and turbodiesel technology.
Don’t expect anything funky like in-wheel motors though, the motor and battery pack will be positioned traditionally in the front, and power will be sent through the rear wheels.
In GreenFleet’s Capital Fuel Challenge, the Hyundai Getz 1.5 CRDi turbodiesel won first place for the private sector category, beating a Toyota Prius 1.6 petrol hybrid which got 2nd place as well as a Volkswagen Caddy 1.9 TDi turbodiesel which ended up third.
The test was conducted in London traffic, with speeds averaging from 5 to 10 mph, yup – this isn’t a highway test. City traffic only. The Getz managed to get 45.15 mpg, while the Prius only got 32.43 mpg. The third place Caddy managed 36.53 mpg, better than the Prius, but it lost the 2nd place to the Prius because Prius emissions were slightly lower – 201.85 CO2 g/km versus 204.31 CO2 g/km for the Caddy.
In the public sector category, there was a Prius which managed 45.71 mpg, as opposed to the 32.43 mpg for the Prius in the private sector category – this shows that Prius fuel efficiency is highly dependant on external factors – perhaps the driver in this case. Still, 45.71 mpg in the best performing Prius is only slightly better than the Getz’s 45.15 mpg.
Perhaps hybrids are overrated after all.
Tesla Motors is a Silicon Valley start-up founded by Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning which set out to to one thing – to design a sports car that would go as fast as a Ferrari or Porsche, but run on electricity.
The name Tesla is a tribute to genius inventor Nikola Tesla, a Serbian-born American inventor, electrical engineer, and scientist whose many inventions include the induction motor and alternating-current power transmission. He also did experiments with wireless power transmissions. Anyone here who has played C&C: Red Alert would have been warmed up to the name.
Their first production vehicle is the Tesla Roadster, which looks so much like a Lotus Elise that people have begun calling it an electric Elise. What makes the Tesla tick? More details after the jump.
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Industry insiders have confirmed that Honda will be producing a hybrid version of the Honda Fit subcompact car, known as the Honda Jazz on our Malaysian shores. Rumours of a hybrid engined version of the Honda Fit was first reported by the Nihon Keizai, a big financial daily in Japan.
Nihon Keizai mentioned in it’s previous report that Honda is developing a new 1.0 litre hybrid engine for the Honda Fit hybrid, but an anonymous source said the Honda Fit hybrid will likely use the Honda Insight’s engine, a 1.0 litre 12 valve 3-cylinder Honda Integrated Motor Assist hybrid engine. The Fit would also likely replace the Honda Insight in it’s market segment, though production of the Insight would likely continue for bragging rights as one of the most fuel-efficient vehicle manufactured on US roads, though in reality it lost the title to the Messerschmitt KR200. It was also the first hybrid car to be on sale for the mass market in the US.
The Honda Insight engine is a SOHC inline-3 1.0 litre engine making 67 horsepower at 5700rpm in gasoline mode and 73 horsepower at 5700rpm with Integrated Motor Assist. It comes with both manual and CVT gearbox options. The Honda Insight was featured in the movie Be Cool, where it was called the Cadillac of hybrids. The 1.0 litre IMA engine won the International Engine of the Year award 2000, and held the Sub-1 litre category from 2001 to 2005.
Sales for the Toyota Prius in April 2006 has dropped nearly 25% compared to April 2005, the same time period last year. Toyota sold 7,500 Toyota Prius hybrids in April 2006, compared to 11,345 in April 2005. Sales for the year 2006 to date is also 10% less compared to the same time period in 2005.
This drop has been touted as a reflection of the public’s declining interest in hybrid cars (Carlos Ghosn would be smug about this), but Toyota says the drop in sales is because of a production shortage, nota decline in the vehicle’s popularity.
Jim Lentz, group vice president and general manager for Toyota said to the media “If I had the vehicles, we could do 250,000 this year. We’re going to end April with just a four-day supply of Prius, and I don’t see that situation improving until later this year“. Toyota’s estimate of 250,000 is more than double the amount of Toyota Prius hybrids sold in 2005 (107,897 cars) but looks like whether it’s production issues or lower popularity, the figure won’t be achieved this year.
