Terry Blanton wrote:
Not irony; but, information. I had no idea that White Star was
intended to be a PHEV. I always thought it would be a BEV like the
Roadster.
The thing I find confusing about it is how anyone can claim that using a
gasoline-powered motor/generator and electric drive motor combination
could be original, proprietary, or "theftable".
That concept has been in use for decades in diesel locomotives. Surely
everyone who hears of "hybrid" gas-electric vehicles thinks _first_ of a
motor/generator and traction engine combination, which is the idea they
seem to be claiming was "stolen" from them; it's about as trivial as any
useful design could be.
Now, the Prius drive train -- /that/ is a wild new concept, surely
worthy of a patent, certainly subject to being "stolen"; it seems to me
to be completely non-obvious. But a mo/gen combo and traction motor?
C'mon, haven't these people ever heard of "prior art"?
* * *
By the way, are folks here aware of this?
http://www.poulsenhybrid.com/
It's a bolt-on plug-in hybrid conversion kit for *any* petroleum powered
car.
The drive motor connects to one of the rear wheels, thus avoiding any
dependency on the particular drive train originally in use in the
vehicle. Since the "original equipment" motor doesn't get out of the
way, the converted vehicle will only operate in "assist" mode, not
"pure-electric", as far as I can see, but that's still potentially
pretty useful if what you're interested in is gas mileage on short
trips. The battery pack isn't very large, so the range in
"electric-assist" mode won't be huge, but again, for short trips it
could be quite useful -- and because it's operating in "assist" mode,
rather than solely on the electric motor, the range before the batteries
go flat may be larger than one might expect.
It apparently uses a permanent magnet motor, which, as I understand it,
means you get regenerative braking "for free" (like, you need to work to
/avoid/ the effect with a perm. mag. motor).
It's cheap, too -- a few thousand total to do the conversion. In
contrast, at least in our area, the cost of conversion from gas to "pure
electric" runs around $20,000 (if you pay someone else to do the work).
Now it all makes sense. Why would Ford agree to make the Fusion a
roadster coaster? It's not! It still eats dinosaurs. That is,
unless you keep the distance below the charge level.
What a perfect solution for Tesla. The first PHEV!
Thanks, SK!
Terry
On Tue, Apr 15, 2008 at 2:42 PM, Steven Krivit
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
SAN FRANCISCO
Tesla Motors, the Silicon Valley maker of electric sports cars, filed suit
in San Mateo Superior Court on Monday against a competing company and two of
its employees, saying they stole some of Tesla's design ideas and trade
secrets.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/15/technology/15tesla.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin
