Car Of The Future? Open Source Vehicles.

[neanderthal]

Don't know if you guys have heard of OSV. (http://www.osvehicle.com/) Open Source Vehicles.

I think that drive train in an EG (92- 96) Honda Civic hatchback would be stellar.


I've always wondered why the Chevy Volt wasn't supplied with a 500- 900cc IC engine like from a generator or small motorcycle. They make a few horsepower. Enough to turn the generator, and arguably, enough for power generation and mobility if you were driving on a flat surface. I imagine with enough battery power one could have a drivetrain with electric only, hybrid (electric and IC,) hybrid generation (IC engine running to provide motivation, but electric motor charging batteries, not turning wheels) and IC only modes. the latter would be useful if, say, one were to drive from Los Angeles to Phoenix. Save the batteries for ascending.

I've always wondered why they don't make cars with a much smaller engine that drives it permanently, and a large electric motor that provides acceleration and climbing torque. It's not like cars don't have the computing power to be able to do that anymore.

[thesameguy]

I'm not sure I follow... The Chevy Volt is a series hybrid. It has an IC motor - a 1.4l gasoline motor - that charges batteries, and the batteries power a 111kwh electric motor which makes the car go. The size of the generator motor ultimately doesn't matter, and I'm sure the 1.4l was chosen because it's an existing, refined design. It a good compromise of size & loudness. A smaller motor would either need to make a lot of power to make 55kwh, so you'd either be running a dangerously high (for pump gas) compression ratio, a turbo, or high engine speed. You might save some packaging, but you'd be making some sacrifices in the process.

An electric motor charging batteries would be a waste... you'd need an electric motor with greater that 100% efficiency in order for it to produce more electricity than it consumed.

There are several cars out there that use electric motors for boost - everything from Acuras to Porsches. I believe there some traditional series hybrids that may do that too, but I'm not sure. It's certainly being done right now.

[Crazed_Insanity]

I'd like to see them be just the integrator of all the nice things in the automotive/electronic industry. No need to reinvent the wheel if there are plenty of good wheels in the market already. All this OSV companies need to do is to provide a chassis that can ease integration of whatever engine, drivetrain, perhaps even suspension too. They don't need to be wasting time developing producing their own engines or whatever parts we can already find on the shelf. Similarly the vehicle infotainment systems too. Just provide the space and connection so that we can connect to our own tablets and smartphones, let us pick and choose or write our own apps.

Unless I heavily crashed or damaged this chassis, ideally I should be able to continually upgrade or swap things in and out as wear and tear parts need replacing over the years. That's what I'd like to see.

[thesameguy]

See, I see it the opposite. They should choose a motor and possibly a platform to retrofit with electricity. There are still bazillions of oval Taureses and w-body cars kicking around, or Corollas and Civics. Find one of those platforms that it ubiquitous and cheap and find a way to rip crappy old pushrod motors and fit a 150hp motor and a 24kwh battery pack. Turn useless old junk cars into useful old junk cars.

[MR2 Fan]

See, I see it the opposite. They should choose a motor and possibly a platform to retrofit with electricity. There are still bazillions of oval Taureses and w-body cars kicking around, or Corollas and Civics. Find one of those platforms that it ubiquitous and cheap and find a way to rip crappy old pushrod motors and fit a 150hp motor and a 24kwh battery pack. Turn useless old junk cars into useful old junk cars.

THIS

[Godson]

See, I see it the opposite. They should choose a motor and possibly a platform to retrofit with electricity. There are still bazillions of oval Taureses and w-body cars kicking around, or Corollas and Civics. Find one of those platforms that it ubiquitous and cheap and find a way to rip crappy old pushrod motors and fit a 150hp motor and a 24kwh battery pack. Turn useless old junk cars into useful old junk cars.


Couldn't agree more. But the issue is with crash standards getting tougher.

[thesameguy]

Couldn't agree more. But the issue is with crash standards getting tougher.

Crash standards are only a problem with selling new cars. If you sell a kit to retrofit a drivetrain into an old body, you aren't subject to any off those rules. You could probably get away with selling a body minus engine and an electric drivetrain to the same person and get away under kit car rules... as long as you aren't selling a new, ready to run car you can dodo just about anything.

[Crazed_Insanity]

I just can't see people would want to be in old junkers unless it's some sort of classic model. (People here probably don't represent the masses in terms of what kinda cars we want...) Seriously, would you want to be in a electric 1980s Toyota Corolla? Even if you don't mind the looks, and it doesn't have to meet current crash standards, you're not worried about it being unsafe? Besides the fact it was an older design, the chassis itself may have been damaged or corroded over the decades. It's not like these old cars are so indestructible. Furthermore, unless we made incredible advancements in battery tech, where will you fit the batteries in your old Corolla? Packaging of all these new technologies into an old car would just be tougher.

Whereas I'd like to see this "integrator" design and build a more customized, safer and longer lasting chassis. Higher strength and more corrosion resistant steel... or perhaps even composites. If I want to put in an old reliable and efficient Toyota Corolla engine in there, I could. Ideally this newer chassis should not only offer better safety and look, but also would end up with higher MPG #s than the original Corolla. If you want to put in a new engine, you could too. If you want an electric engine, you could do that too. Basically it's all up to what you want and how much you have in your pocket.

[Godson]

Crash standards are only a problem with selling new cars. If you sell a kit to retrofit a drivetrain into an old body, you aren't subject to any off those rules. You could probably get away with selling a body minus engine and an electric drivetrain to the same person and get away under kit car rules... as long as you aren't selling a new, ready to run car you can dodo just about anything.

Ah, that makes more sense. I misunderstood you with the thought of current Manufacturers using the older cars. No problem then from me.




I wonder how well an E30 would work out for being all electric...

[thesameguy]

I just can't see people would want to be in old junkers unless it's some sort of classic model. (People here probably don't represent the masses in terms of what kinda cars we want...) Seriously, would you want to be in a electric 1980s Toyota Corolla? Even if you don't mind the looks, and it doesn't have to meet current crash standards, you're not worried about it being unsafe? Besides the fact it was an older design, the chassis itself may have been damaged or corroded over the decades. It's not like these old cars are so indestructible. Furthermore, unless we made incredible advancements in battery tech, where will you fit the batteries in your old Corolla? Packaging of all these new technologies into an old car would just be tougher.

'80s cars are much too old. Not only are they too small, but there aren't enough of them left on the road to make them worth developing for and they are terribly unsafe. Ford sold bazillions of oval Tauruses and they have proven to be fairly durable in the sheet metal and they were reasonably safe cars. That's the type of car you'd want to choose - recent enough to be relevant, old enough to be cheap and possibly on the verge of mechanical failure anyway. Stuff in the 10-15 year range is what you'd want to target, as these cars all have approaching 200k on them and are worthless as tradeins. Batteries are not big giant things, they are fairly small and can be packaged any way you like. The Fiat has something like 200 Samsung Li-Ion cells packaged in a couple sections and stuck under the floor of what was an existing gasoline-only model. If Bosch could figure out how to pack a 24kwh battery into a Fiat 500, they could probably figure out how to do it in a much larger Taurus. Don't forget, you win back the space of a 20 gallon gas tank and a significant part of the engine bay. You could also put a false floor in the trunk and probably cram more under the back seat.

Really, the worst aspect of electrifying a gasoline engine car is the brakes. Regenerative braking really helps out, and I imagine retrofitting that type of a technology would be difficult and expensive. Although, I suppose if you were really going to do this to a million Tauruses, you could probably work that out.

The reason to retrofit older cars is cost. Consider a gasoline 500 is $20k. Going electric adds $14k. What if you could turn that base $20k into $2k for a used Taurus? What if you could reduce that $14k premium through volume that Fiat can't? What if instead of stamping out a bunch of new sheet metal and doing new crash testing and development work you could just sell someone a $10k kit to convert any old Taurus to a 100% EV? I think that would be attractive.


Whereas I'd like to see this "integrator" design and build a more customized, safer and longer lasting chassis. Higher strength and more corrosion resistant steel... or perhaps even composites. If I want to put in an old reliable and efficient Toyota Corolla engine in there, I could. Ideally this newer chassis should not only offer better safety and look, but also would end up with higher MPG #s than the original Corolla. If you want to put in a new engine, you could too. If you want an electric engine, you could do that too. Basically it's all up to what you want and how much you have in your pocket.

They actually tried that. It was called the Aptera. High strength steel and composites cost big dollars - huge dollars. And then you do need to do crash testing work, and then you're a new car company competing with all the established brands... and they will do everything they can do shut you down and block you out. Tesla has been fighting an uphill battle for years on this front, and the way they got traction was by selling an $80k car to rich people. You're not going to get the bulk of humanity into EVs by selling $80k cars. Even the Aptera got bumped up to approaching $40k. If you want "the people" to buy EVs, you need to make EVs financially attractive on the front end and the back end, and that means $26k or less... witness the success of the Prius. I don't think New Car Company can develop and market anything for $26k in this country. The ramp up costs are just too high. That's my $0.02!

[Crazed_Insanity]

Yeah, if you're thinking of making affordable electric cars, your way certain would be the cheapest way. However, think of all the labor necessary to retrofit a car, not sure if we can reach any significant mass volume with just hobbyists doing it in their garages. If you do build a special factory and plan on doing lots of retrofitting on Taurus, then I guess another issue would be all of a sudden Taurus used car prices would probably then shoot up? ;)

I think unless perhaps if someday we can develop better in-wheel motors. Then the conversion would be piece of cake... just a matter of swapping out wheels. That'd instantly transform any vehicle into a hybrid/electric car without doing much retrofitting... and just stuff the batteries in the trunk...

Anyway, I guess my dream is that we can customize our cars based on variety of on the shelf parts as much as possible. Be able to pick and choose the best parts out of different companies. Kinda like PCs where you can just add on whatever CPU, memory, graphics card, HD, etc... in order to build your own dream machine. However, unlike PCs, vehicle chassis' not going to drastically improve in performance by that much over the years. It's just a piece of structure... unlike a PC's motherboard. Unless I crash it, I can pretty much stick with a single 'chassis' for the rest of my life and just trade-in and upgrade engines and whatever other parts in order to improve my cars performance... whether you want it to be fast or cheap or green.

I wonder how much would a Tesla S cost if we could put regular gas engine in there. Surely not $100k? And whatever IC engine you put in there, surely it'll perform better and more efficient considering how light and aero-dynamic the vehicle chassis is.

Currently IC engines are still king, but we are branching out... still not sure which way we're gonna go. Are we really going full electric? Or perhaps hydrogen fuel cell? Or who knows what else. This is another reason why I think it's important for cars of the future to be more customizable.

[Dicknose]

Putting a 10k kit on a 2k junker and having to do it yourself.
I'd hate to guess the resale value of that car, might be 5k.
Who wants to invest that much money on an old car, where the interior is worn.
I know people do engine replacements on older cars, but mostly for a similar engine that's cheap.
If someone put in a new fancy engine in an old car, where the engine cost many times the car, you would think they were crazy.

[Godson]

They do it all the time with hotrods and other designs...

[thesameguy]

Putting a 10k kit on a 2k junker and having to do it yourself.

Someone who is investing in an "open source vehicle" is probably not opposed to doing it themself. And, like other open source projects I would imagine enterprises will spring up to do the heavy lifting, just like with Android phones manufacturers and Redhat Linux consultants.


I'd hate to guess the resale value of that car, might be 5k.

So you'd lose $7k, maybe? Care to take a stab at what sort of depreciation was-new, now three year old car looks like?


Who wants to invest that much money on an old car, where the interior is worn.

Why not just find one that doesn't have a worn interior? That would be my advice.


If someone put in a new fancy engine in an old car, where the engine cost many times the car, you would think they were crazy.

I think you need to re-examine what people do to old cars and how much people put into their daily drivers just to keep them alive. I just put $4k into a Fiero. My neighbor put nearly that into a 2000-ish Avalon when the transmission puked.

[Godson]

I have almost equal invested into my M3 as what I spent to purchase it. But that is counting oil changes and odds and ends.

[Godson]

Hell, I spent more than half of what I paid for my Monsters on my 22,500 mile service.

[Dicknose]

I don't see how a single model of old junker woul do their aims of selectable options.
Sure you can do an engine swap, but you can do that now.

As for depreciation, I'm talking over capitalization.
You could put 10k worth of engine in and have it lose a lot of that value day 1
Sure a new car might drop 10% first day off the floor.
This is more like gold plating your new car and finding it's dropped 50% day one.

This OSV will be a tough sell.
Might be hard to get it complianced in some places, esp if they decide they need to crash test it in multiple configurations.
But it's a completely different concept to just putting hybrid engines in old cars.
If they can sell extra engines to that market that would help.
But clearly they are aiming for a much bigger concept.

[MR2 Fan]

I think an electric engine and battery setup into old honda civics would be good...light cars, already known for their easy swap ability.

There's an electric MR2 on youtube, I'll link to it later. What's interesting is they retained the 5 speed transmission somehow, but I don't understand how that would work on an electric motor

[Godson]

A guy did that with an S2000 also. Maintained the stock 6 speed. Tachometer even worked.

[Godson]

http://electrichonda.blogspot.com/


Another one of more insane levels...



Here is the one that maintained the stock transmission.

http://s2kev.blogspot.com/

[Dicknose]

Or put an electric engine in an Ariel Atom
http://wrightspeed.com/about/x1/

They are also selling electric engine swaps for trucks.

[Crazed_Insanity]

That car looks awesome, but surely they can greatly improve its performance/efficiency by doing some sort of aerodynamic improvements? Put some sort of clear plastic/lexan shell around it so that you won't loose much of the car's character, but gain helluva lot in aero efficiency. Give it that see thru swatch look or something. Anyway, regardless, it looks great and looks like it drives great!

[novicius]

1. Ever-more-powerful electric motors backed by battery packs charged by onboard turbodiesel three-cylinder 1.0L engines and grid-based charging systems.
2. Stuff 'em into newly designed FWD 5-door hatches and RWD 4-seat coupes utilizing a shared platform (AWD optional? Too heavy/inefficient?).
3. Profit.

[Random]

Using electric motors takes away some of the heavy/inefficient aspects of AWD, since you can eliminate transfer cases/driveshafts/etc.

[novicius]

Good point. :up:

It takes 90 ft-lb of twist + "push to pass" from the electric motor to move the heavy Volt (3,800+ lbs.) around. I'm confident that could be achieved in a 1.0L turbodiesel triple (or smaller). Hilariously, the Chevrolet Spark EV generates 400 ft-lb. of electronically limited combined torque. (http://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/2014/01/review-2014-chevrolet-spark-ev-with-video/) I don't care how you do it, that's power! :rawk:

Here's hoping that someone takes that drivetrain and does something really great with it. Flip it around and drop it into a Mk I MR2. Just... something!

[Dicknose]

Chevrolet Spark EV generates 400 ft-lb. of electronically limited combined torque. I don't care how you do it, that's power! :rawk:

Actually it torque.

Power is better.
You can have any engine generate as much torque as you like just by using gearing.
It's just that it might only be at 1rpm and of little practical use.

Power is the ability to produce torque at revs.
Important if you want your vehicle to accelerate at a speed higher than 1 mph.

[thesameguy]

It's not *quite* that black & white, especially where electric motors are concerned. Unlike ICEs that produce a torque curve - starting at zero and increasing towards a peak before tapering off - electric motors produce essentially their maximum torque regardless of what speed they are at up to their maximum speed. ICEs rely on gearing because they produce effectively no torque at 0rpm - gearing allows them to get moving with the meager power they have available. While it's true there is a additional benefit to gear reduction with higher engine speeds, that additional power comes at the cost of NVH. The current batch of EVs have no gearboxes - they are direct-drive. They don't have a problem starting because they have full torque available. They don't have problems with NVH because they don't spin that fast. Academically, yes, they potentially suffer at high-speed acceleration vs. ICE-powered vehicles, but in the common operating window - 0mph to about 90mph - they aren't lacking. Our 500e is a direct drive motor with 150 (electronically limited) lb ft of torque and it out accelerates the much lighter 1.4l gasoline powered version even with a 6-speed gearbox. In the 1/4 mile, the ICE will barely run away from the electric only because the electric has a top speed of about 84 (IIRC) mph; the remaining six or eight miles an hour the gasoline version offers doesn't come into play hardly ever for most people. Sure, you could gear up an electric motor just like an ICE, but that adds loss, complexity, weight, and maintenance that isn't going to benefit most people most of the time.

[Kchrpm]

I thought electric motors were constant power, not constant torque, hence why they jump off the line but run out of steam at the top end, so to speak, with only the one ratio. If they had maximum torque at all revs, they would have *great* power numbers, not die off as revs increased.

[Kchrpm]

Tesla Model S torque/power curves. Looks like the torque is limited until 40-50 mph where it drops below the torque limit for each model, then just continues to drop. At first it drops consistently with the rise in revs, so power stays constant, but then the torque drops faster than the revs rise so power goes down as well.

http://www.teslamotorsclub.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=23100&d=1370283832

[thesameguy]

Torque is the twisting force, the only thing a motor can produce whether ICE or electric. Horsepower is a rating of work over time, a combination of that torque and speed.

That Tesla graph shows exactly what I'm talking about - full torque at 0rpm and consistent output within its operating range (which is apparently up to about 50mph). After that, you're outside its range and torque drops off fairly dramatically. Since HP is always the combination of torque over revs, HP builds perfectly in lock step with the consistent torque output, then drops off perfectly once the motor exceeds its optimum speed.

Electric motors have an inverse relationship between torque and operating range. You can build motors that make big torque but they will have a small operating range, or you can build motors that make less torque but have a wider operating range. It's always one of the other. On the Tesla Roadster, they tried to build the latter and couple it to a 2-speed gearbox but that ended in disaster... the motor kept shredding the gearbox. On the S, they built a low-speed, high0-torque motor and took out the gearbox. That's the route all EVs have taken because it handles the bulk of humanity doing the bulk of their driving while shedding complexity and a maintenance point.

I think - but am not sure - the reason Tesla originally did the 2-speed gearbox is because they couldn't figure out how to control the temperature of the motor/batteries in that big torque/low speed/high draw scenario. That got fixed - maybe by them? - with the modern liquid cooling scenario we have now.

Or, at least, that's my understanding of this whole situation! :)

[Kchrpm]

Gotcha.

[Dicknose]

Torque is the twisting force, the only thing a motor can produce whether ICE or electric. Horsepower is a rating of work over time, a combination of that torque and speed.
So they don't produce power?

Do you think power is just imaginary thing we dream up?
Or some abstract thing that relies on torque?

How about this, think energy is real?
Work, the measure of energy transformed or used.

I'd argue that work is what an engine produces, power is the measure of that over time.
So if you think work and time exist as real things, then power is real.

[Dicknose]

It's not *quite* that black & white, especially where electric motors are concerned. Unlike ICEs that produce a torque curve - starting at zero and increasing towards a peak before tapering off - electric motors produce essentially their maximum torque regardless of what speed they are at up to their maximum speed.

That's not right and the curves above show that.
Electric engines produce max torque at 0 revs and it decrease as revs go up.

The only reason it's flat at low revs is that they cap the max torque, so it doesn't break things.
Doesn't change the fundamental nature of how the curve could be without the artificial limit.

And they definitely don't produce max torque e whole way across their working rev range!
Those tesla curves are dropping from less than half their max speed.



ICEs rely on gearing because they produce effectively no torque at 0rpm - gearing allows them to get moving with the meager power they have available.

That's not quite right either.
They have a clutch to handle 0 revs.
If you have min revs the engine can operate at without stalling, no amount of gears will make that work at 0 speed.
Gearing could make the min revs equal a very small speed, but it can't be zero.

Gearing helps when you need a certain force to accelerate at low speed, think heavy vehicle starting on a slope. You can't do that in a high gear.

But gears are mostly about extending the operating/top speed while keeping a min speed that you can handle with a clutch and accelerate on a typical slope.


In the end your performance is best measured by power/weight.
Max torque, especially at zero or low revs, is not a good gauge of performance.

[novicius]

So wouldn't it be better to build low torque/wide operating range electric motors? Why does the Spark EV have 400 ft-lb. available at 0 RPM?

Exclusive: GM Exec Says Spark EV’s 400lb-ft of Torque No Misprint (http://insideevs.com/gm-general-says-spark-evs-400lb-ft-of-torque-no-misprint/)


I need to disabuse you of the mistaken notion that this motor has less than 400 ft-lb of torque. The Spark EV motor is designed and manufactured by GM. This motor makes 540 Nm (402 ft-lb) of torque at stall and out to about 2000 rpm. This is not gear-multiplied axle torque but actual motor shaft torque.

The very high torque is motor performance that we are very proud of, and customers will notice the difference (it has a gear reduction of 3.18 to 1, so the axle torque is the product of these two). This is a very low numerical reduction ratio, which has several great benefits.

1. Feels much better to drive. 3.18:1 is less than half of the reduction of all other EVs. This makes for extraordinary low driveline inertia, less than 1/5 of the driveline inertia of the Nissan Leaf and 1/4 that of the Fiat 500 EV. Their cars feel like you are driving around in second gear all day long; ours feels like fourth gear.

2. Lower gear mesh, spinning losses, and lower high speed electromagnetic losses mean very high drive unit efficiency. The Spark EV efficiency from DC current to delivered wheel torque is 85% averaged over the city driving schedule and 92% when averaged over the highway schedule. This is the highest in the industry, and that is one of the reasons why the Spark EV sets the benchmark for most efficient car.

Plug-In Subcompact Comparison: Chevrolet Spark EV Vs Fiat 500e (http://insideevs.com/plug-in-compact-comparison-chevrolet-spark-vs-fiat-500e/)


As easily as the Chevy can beat the 500e off the line, the Fiat destroys the Spark EV just as handily in appearance.
Truth! :lol:


The Spark EV has a lot of performance dialed in, yet still manages to have an EPA rating of 82 miles via a A123 sourced 21 kWh battery The 500e on the other hand extracts 87 miles of range from a 24 kWh lithium pack. “Fuel economy” efficiencies are almost identical as well, with the Spark EV at 119 MPGe, and the Fiat at 116 MPGe combined.

As far as charging goes, why the Spark EV does not feature 6.6 kW Level 2charging this late in the game is a real mystery. A full charge in a Spark EV takes over 7 hours, while the Fiat is less than 4, and that is a big negative against the Chevy. On the DC fast charging side of things, the battle is just as lop-sided in favor of the electric Spark…because the Fiat 500e doesn’t have any, while the Spark features the world’s first SAE combo charger.
Hmm, significant.

[thesameguy]

That's not right and the curves above show that.

You are clearly a superior automotive engineer, and every single manufacturer in the world is doing it wrong. Good on you.

[thesameguy]

Hmm, significant.

It's this kind of stuff that makes me hesitant about making any sort of long-term investment in the current crop of vehicle. There are too many variables phasing in and out to be certain what things will really look like in a few years. I like the idea of lower operating costs and a better green footprint, but until the evolution slows down I'm not going to make any protracted investments.

[Dicknose]

You are clearly a superior automotive engineer, and every single manufacturer in the world is doing it wrong. Good on you.
No, it's just you who is wrong.

They DONT make max torque thru to their max speed.
Haven't seen manufacturers claim that. Just you.

[thesameguy]

Ok.

[Godson]

HP is simply a mathematical formula based off of torque.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/math/c/5/4/c546af195e3ac5c3af2d96a25b8b043c.png

Torque is how much work can be done, horsepower is how fast it can do it.

[Dicknose]

Torque is simply a mathematical formula based on power.
T=P/revs

That there is an equation expressing one value in terms of another doesn't make it less real.

Which of torque or power obeys the conservation of energy? Ie can be increased by gearing or levers.

Which "causes" the other depends if you take a force centric view or energy centric view.
The downside to the force centric view is that there was no force in the fuel or batteries that power the system. So where did the force (or torque) come from?

[Godson]

https://i.imgflip.com/26am.jpg

[21Kid]

What about self driving cars (http://autos.yahoo.com/blogs/motoramic/swiss-concept-imagines-self-driving-car-as-coffee-shop--movie-theater-153416643.html)?

http://l1.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/kHLc_kCxCrk6vUs7lsogNg--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Y2g9NjgzO2NyPTE7Y3c9MTAyNDtkeD0wO2 R5PTA7Zmk9dWxjcm9wO2g9NDIwO3E9NzU7dz02MzA-/http://l.yimg.com/os/publish-images/autos/2014-02-18/4b50cd50-98eb-11e3-a3b8-dd318305ab4e_rinspeed163.jpg
yes please.
http://l1.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/vkboXICeX3KWzXNqbQXaog--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7Y2g9NjgzO2NyPTE7Y3c9MTAyNDtkeD0wO2 R5PTA7Zmk9dWxjcm9wO2g9NDIwO3E9NzU7dz02MzA-/http://l.yimg.com/os/publish-images/autos/2014-02-18/44e08c30-98eb-11e3-99a6-491038eea98d_rinspeed811.jpg

[novicius]

I'm in. :up:

[thesameguy]

Ditto. I do love driving, but I hate commuting. I'm onboard with handing boring, daily routines off to robots.

That said, I'd really prefer mass transit. Although I could basically get to work via mass transit, the problem is that our rail loops around the entire city, turning a 15 minute drive into a near hour ride PLUS having to walk/ride a mile or two at each end. I'd be okay with the walk/ride if the train didn't triple the transit time, but I can't afford to turn 15 minutes of my life into an hour and half. That's nuts. The bus is more direct, but stopping every couple of blocks doesn't make it a shorter trip. Unfortunately, I'm not one of those people who could really get work done during transit time, and my employer certainly wouldn't pay me for that time. I'm not willing to make my ~8 hour day into a ~10 hour day.

So, self-driving cars it is! Trip to SoCal could be pretty darned awesome like that.

[21Kid]

Oof... Yeah. I use the CTA bus/EL combo. And my travel time is about 10 minutes longer. But, it could take longer than that to find parking near my home and office if I were to drive. It probably would end up being a wash.

I'd want to have the option to drive manually too. For the other times. But, for daily commuting or road tripping, I would much prefer automation. I love being on the train and realizing I'm at my stop. Much less stress than dealing with traffic jams.

[Dicknose]

Get a motorbike, less traffic jams and easy parking.

I'd also like a self drive, mostly for freeway driving.

[21Kid]

How are there less traffic jams while riding a bike? Unless you are illegally riding on the shoulder or swerving between cars.

[thesameguy]

Lane splitting? There aren't less traffic jams, just less traffic jams that affect you.

[Dicknose]

I have lanes most traffic is not allowed to go in.
Transit lanes that require 2 or 3 people for a car.
Bus lanes, no cars but taxis and motorcycles.
Didn't have any on my commute to where I used to work, but that was also not in the same direction as most traffic. Now I work closer to the city centre I'm with most of the traffic. These lanes are fantastic. Doing 70 while the cars are stopped.
And lane splitting is legal here if traffic is stopped.


And definitely traffic jams are only the ones that affect you.
Even in a car you wouldn't call it a traffic jam if the traffic going the other way was stopped. It's only a jam if you are jammed.


My commute is
Motorbike 20m
Car 30m, but worse case could be 50min (then no peaty parking)
Train 40-50m
That's with a train station walking distance and only 4 stops.

Self drive car, I'd still be in the same slow moving traffic, just that I wouldn't be driving. Still rather get to work quicker and the bike is fun even for a commute.

I've toyed with getting an electric bike, probably a Zero.
Could be good for commute, range is not a factor, nor top speed.
Freed up some garage space when I got rid of the Honda bike.

[21Kid]

:up: I'd probably get a bike if they were that favorable ride here.

[Crazed_Insanity]

It makes more sense for mass transit or perhaps self driving taxis, which can transport you from point A to B directly. It doesn't really make sense to purchase such a vehicle and still have to worry about parking it somewhere.

For folks who enjoys riding/driving, I'm sure they'd rather continue with the task themselves...

Bikes are for sure superior commuters, but safety concerns and weather constraints probably won't make it too popular. Which is good for bikers I guess. I'm sure they don't want to see more bikers sharing their lanes! ;)

[Kchrpm]

http://jalopnik.com/will-this-car-named-for-a-cat-be-the-first-real-open-so-1529921819

[MR2 Fan]

^^ I like it...back to basics approach.

[retsmah]

I like simple cars... that might be overdoing it a bit though! Trying to get registered and download the CAD files. It doesn't look to me like the car has any suspension, and the biggest motor is 20hp.

I'm living in a pretty small town, and there are a few people that can get around town with a small, low power, all electric car with not much range, so they buy golf carts.

[Kchrpm]

Related: http://green.autoblog.com/2014/04/28/factory-five-racing-818-ev-battery-powered-electric/


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8bV8SKeQOo

[neanderthal]

I filled up today and wished I had an electric car.

No reason for these gas prices. None whatsoever.

[Random]

We might see $5/gallon this summer. :|

[Dicknose]

Zero motorcycles are importing to Australia again.

[21Kid]

Zero S is only $13k? :? I thought it was more. I wonder what kind of incentives they qualify for...

[Dicknose]

Over 20k here.
Bastards