Hot Rod Heirs Customize Cars to get 300 MPG

London Telegraph ^ | 08/16/2005 | Catherine Ellsworth

[narby]

He plugs it into a domestic socket at night using power from solar panels.

Sounds like MSM logic.....

I never believe anything they say.

[flying Elvis]

"Unlike electric cars, they never need to be plugged in and achieve 60-72mpg

Most of what I have read by Freepers who own these cars claim that it is a struggle to get them to achieve even a semblance of parity in gas mileage with some of the more fuel efficient standard vehicles.

[Monti Cello]

convert hybrids to plug-ins for £6,500 next year.

For that price you could hire your own personal rickshaw drriver and get infinite mpg.

[BJungNan]

A buddy of mine is a service tech at Toyota. He says they do get better milage but that many customers do not calculate their milage correctly. This is caused by the "bladder" style gas tank that is not always filled with the same amount of gas (the bladder is like it sounds, not a metal tank with a set volume).

Someone will have more information on this than I do. Consider this repeating what I have heard and not what I know. I have heard the same reports as you have that they are not up to the milage ratings claimed.

[TheMightyQuinn]

America's insatiable appetite for foreign oil is partly responsible for fuelling terrorism.

That's all I needed to hear: terrorism is America's fault.

[Squantos]

Agree, but wouldn't a gas pump reading of say 10 gallons still be 10 gallons regardless of the type of container, bladder or not ?

Good info BTW....just asking....

[KC_for_Freedom]

Its not hard to understand. They put in more batteries, run more of the time on electricity and claim higher mileage. What would be the mileage of an all electric car? But other Freepers have calculated that the cost per mile is higher, the generation of the power is just shifted to solar or hydro, or fossil fuel depending on what serves the home user and his plug.

Since you can't get something for nothing, its not really 300 mpg. What is happening is people are driving efficient electrical powered cars. They don't go very fast, or carry lots of load, or pull boats or RVs but they have a place in terms of short distance commutes. (Oh, and the user pays for some of his commute in his power bill)

[grey_whiskers]

P.J. O'Rourke has performed a hilarious comparison of the efficiency of the human body--in particular, rickshaw pullers--with the efficiency of the gasoline-powered engine. He notes that the chemical energy available in one gallon of gasoline is equivalent to over 30,000 calories, an amount of food sufficient to feed a person for two weeks. As he puts it (from the Overpopulation chapter in his book All the Trouble in the World): A tricycle rickshaw is energy efficient like a Kuwaiti oil-well fire. The average food intake in Bangladesh is said by the Bangladeshi government to be 2,215 calories a day. One gallon of gasoline produces 125,000 BTUs, which is equivalent to 31,250 calories. In other words, a gallon of gasoline is a box of sugar doughnuts, a half-dozen twelve-ounce steaks, three six-packs of beer, a pizza, an apple pie, a twenty-piece bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken, one hundred chocolate chip cookies, a birthday cake, a quart of bourbon, and a Big Mac and fries--which is more than a rickshaw puller gets in two weeks, if ever. And a gallon of unleaded regular costs [it did when he wrote this, at least] seventy-five cents before taxes. Try feeding anybody for two weeks on seventy-five cents, even in Dhaka.

Cheers!

[truth_seeker]

Any recent new technology announcements by GM or Ford or Chrysler(Detroit-American) lately?

None I've heard of.

Only capable of glacier speed, $3.00 gasoline has caught them flatfooted, again. Sad.

Half the vehicles sold in Europe today are diesels; capable of higher MPG. With turbos, the performance equals gasoline technology; sometimes better.

[Monti Cello]

Heh...my own mileage is about 12 miles to the bucket (Original Recipe) but the uphill performance is a little lacking!

[ApplegateRanch]

He plugs it into a domestic socket at night using power from solar panels.

Works great, until the street lights set.

[aft_lizard]

Its not about how much you put in, its how efficient the engine is. I used to be able to run 15 miles every other day on a 3000 calorie a day diet, so I was 10 times more efficient than a vehicle who drives the same distance on 1 gallon.

Maybe, I am right now not in a very good mathematical state. I think I need to factor in weight and other stuff too.

[FreedomCalls]

This is caused by the "bladder" style gas tank that is not always filled with the same amount of gas (the bladder is like it sounds, not a metal tank with a set volume).

What happens when you drive it for several hours over a really really bumpy road? ;)

[agitator]

If I wanted to drive a golf cart, I would have bought one.

[ApplegateRanch]

my own mileage is about 12 miles to the bucket (Original Recipe)

Sheesh! I never got better than 5 miles/milkshake.

[Rokurota]

One gallon of gasoline produces 125,000 BTUs, which is equivalent to 31,250 calories.

To be fair, it must be noted that a typical engine never gets all that energy into good use. Maybe only 7,000 calories of that ~30,000 actually gets put to use.

[cryptical]

But other Freepers have calculated that the cost per mile is higher, the generation of the power is just shifted to solar or hydro, or fossil fuel depending on what serves the home user and his plug.

I notice that nobody wants to talk about nuclear energy. The new pebble bed reactors look interesting, and W mentioned supporting nukes in a speech recently.

As for the Prius, I work with a guy who has one, he likes it a lot, but he does acknowledge that it's not settled technology and there are improvements on the way.

[Echo Talon]

300mpg and over $5000 worth of batteries.

[carumba]

LOL I missed that. Maybe its another engineering marvel. Photons from outer space powering the economy.