EVDL Administrator:
I hate to say you are wrong, but ...
Anyone interested in Barbara Taylors book "The Lost Cord" can contact Dina
Beaumont directly.
http://rci.rutgers.edu/~crisitel/EV/The%20Lost%20Cord%20AD.pdf
This link is the AD I am running for her with information on how to get the
book at the bottom.
Also, I do have both Bob Beaumont and Bob Rice on tape from our 2009 C-Car
Gathering talking extensively about their parts in the CitiCar. I also have
Bob Beaumont and Bob Stone on the same tape with some further insights but
the audio on that part is not quite clear. Not boasting but if you haven't
figured it out by now, I am the touch stone for almost anything to do with
C-Car's. Eventually anyone who needs or wants information on them will
contact me. The online Roster project and the C-Car Gatherings I have
fostered around the country have been instrumental in making people more
aware of these funny little cheese wedges traveling down the street.
Peter Crisitello
[email protected]
----- Original Message -----
From: "EVDL Administrator" <[email protected]>
To: "Electric Vehicle Discussion List" <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, February 09, 2013 3:04 PM
Subject: Re: [EVDL] EVLN: Vanguard CitiCar, oil-crisis-anxiety-car
I suspect that by now there is as much myth as fact swirling round the C-
cars. Pity Bob Rice isn't here to give us his insider's perspective,
though
I seem to recall him dropping a few references here from time to time; you
might be able to learn a little with diligent searching in the archives.
The more or less official story of the C-car is told in Barbara Taylor's
book "The Lost Cord," but AFAIK it's out of print and now quite scarce.
http://nogas.org/ev/Lost_Cord/Lost_Cord.html
http://www.amazon.com/The-lost-cord-storytellers-electric/dp/1570742952
As the ad man says, "ask the man who owns one," and I did for a while in
the
late 1980s. By any objective standard it was a miserable car to drive.
It
was by far the loudest car I've ever owned, despite the lack of engine
noise. It was cold in winter and hot in summer, with sliding windows that
leaked when closed and barely let in any breeze when open. The defroster
was fed from the motor blower; it dispensed air slightly above ambient
temperature, scented with ozone and cooking gear oil that had leaked past
the rear axle seal into the motor.
Every hill required a running start. Even with essentially no current
limit
(only the resistance of the traction wiring), the 6hp motor was barely
adequate for flat ground. Starting on a hill was an iffy proposition.
When
I did as the owner's manual suggested and stomped the pedal to the floor
to
climb hills, I burned out the motor's brush pigtails (by the time I
smelled
the hot phenolic, it was too late).
Later I fitted a 350 amp transistor controller and a rare 8hp GE motor
from
the very last months of production. After that I didn't burn out any more
brush pigtails, but I could no longer start at all on hills. :-(
The suspension was similar to a 1950 truck's, with solid axles and leaf
springs front and rear. The ride over potholes would loosen your teeth,
and
you never knew where you'd end up if you hit a bump while taking a turn or
braking. The brakes were barely adequate for the car's ~40mph top speed
and
the car tended to swap ends under heavy braking.
Although a Comuta-car with the bumper battery boxes supposedly passed an
NHTSA bumper test, the C-car had essentially no crash protection. It had
seatbelts, but they weren't of much use with the windshield a couple
inches
from your forehead. As recounted in The Lost Cord, part of what
eventually
killed the car, if not its drivers, was the NHTSA's tests showing that the
steering column would impale the driver in a frontal collision. (That's
why
Beaumont used cable steering in the Tropica.)
That top speed of ~40mph limits where you can go, just as with any NEV.
Some of the routes you've used for years with your ICEV are no longer
practical. You have to map out every trip so you can stick to city
streets
and stay off the 55mph intracity bypasses. This means you sometimes find
yourself bouncing through some rough neighborhoods.
The 1975 Consumer Reports test of the Citicar and Elcar is infamous. Read
it here :
http://www.evdl.org/docs/cr_ev.pdf
Despite all that my Comuta-Car was a great introduction to EVs and a blast
to drive. I commuted to work in it for a couple of years. One of the
best
parts was jumpstarting co-workers ICEVs with it in the winter. ;-) I'd
drive it to chorus rehearsal and park in a parking deck so it could sip
from
the receptacles there. I only got unplugged once. (The previous owner
told
me she used to go drinking with it, charging it with a cord thrown out the
window of the bar's women's restroom.) My other half Margaret would take
her life in her hands in the passenger seat, and with her 75lb dog Bruzer
stuffed into the space behind the seats, fogging up the back window with
his
panting, we'd jounce our way round town. Fun times. ;-)
C-cars aren't hopeless. Improvements are possible and have been done.
Front
sway bars and bigger, stickier tires than the stock 600/12s or 135-13s
help
control. A resistance heater and defroster makes it much more tolerable
in
winter (at the expense of range). Higher voltage raises the top speed
(but
then the brake problems get more urgent). A transistor controller vastly
improves driving quality, but don't use a feeble one the way I did - I'd
suggest at least 600 amps.
I think it'd be interesting to try one of these recent small AC drives in
a
C-car, though you'd have to provide an oil seal and shaft bearing for the
golf car style rear axle. Converting to lithium batteries would lighten
it
even further (but then you'd want to change the spring rates).
In the end I sold mine, after deciding that the amount of work and expense
needed for improvements would be better spent on a fundamentally sounder
and
more driveable conversion EV. But those who enjoy a challenge might get a
kick out of making the most of a C-car.
David Roden - Akron, Ohio, USA
EVDL Administrator
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