Hi,
Quote:
Originally Posted by plusaf
wow! excellent idea! let me brainstorm it with you!
take a trailer like mine or maybe smaller, like Honda Goldwings pull...
fill it with latest-technology batteries.
with the right hitch, you could even have a one-wheeled trailer, which is in many ways, lots simpler and easier than even two wheels!
tie it into the hybrid computer and have it do lots more pushing than the on-board batteries do now. car and driver magazine recently showcased a Mini with something like 200+ hp electric motors in each of its four wheels! how about one or two of those under the trailer??? kind of how buses' engines turn the extra two wheels behind the four in back supporting the back of the rig?
i'd bet a trailer like that could be made lower than the license plate of a Prius and less than a few feet long. maybe 2-300 pounds total, but worth about another 20-30 mpg!
hm?
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Let me suggest a couple of things to think about
:
- Unicycle has severe stability challenges - to resolve you'd need at least two arms to the car body.
- Powered two-wheels has far fewer stability challenges - but under power in a turn, it could amplify the turn and even drive the vehicle 'into the ditch.' This is the most interesting challenge and using a U-joint with angle and strain sensors would be the place to start. A ball joint is totally out!
- Available power is weight limited - if the trailer is too light, the wheels will lose traction. Definitely the trailer will need traction control built into the wheel control algorithms. But the wheel loading limits how much practical power is available.
- Motors in the 3-6 kW range - primarily from fork-lift and some powered wheel chair vendors.
When folks were first talking about 'plug-in' Prius, this was my first thought to carry the batteries and possibly even self-powered to minimize the loading the mother vehicle. The trailer advantages include the ability to modularize the trailered power source to investigate any radical power source. Even if there is a catastrophic failure, the distance minimizes the risk to the mother vehicle.
Bob Wilson