Termyn8or
Posts: 18681
Joined: 11/12/2005
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Well I said it and I am going to do it. I am going to tell you how to design a car. This can all be done with existing technology, but they won’t do it for a lot of reasons. One of them is that by the time you get something like this designed, you build it to last.
Go back to 1973 and get a Cutlass. Full frame, can handle it. Remember what I said 400HP and 40MPG. My Grampa would claw his way out of the grave and kill me if I tried to use a bigger frame than that for this. They can dress it up, but for this you need a full frame, no question about it.
And the floorpan will have to be modified for the transmission. You start off with the old 350, but you hook it up to a computer, one, maybe even two injectors per cylinder. Even give it a bit more radical curves on the cam, the electronics can make it run good anyway instead of how a racecar idles. They are already doing that, with sophisticated ignition control and multiple injectors, they made four cylinders run like a V6, and V6s run like
V8s. But with the focus on performance I am sure you can get 400HP out of a 350.
Should be a piece of cake, and really, but do we even care if it is only 300 ?
The tranny is the trick, and might require a bigger hump. It will contain an electric motor and a flywheel. The batteries for the motor are completely seperate from the system battery, and would probably be in or under the trunk.
Here is how it works, you hop in and start the car. You got it all on tap right then and there, and you just go where you are going to go. You get on the freeway and they don’t want to let you on, depress the accelerator and they will have nothing to say about it.
But eventually you do get on and once up to speed you back off, don’t want a ticket do you ? When you reach cruising speed, the engine actually shuts off, and you run on the electric motor. Of course it has real brakes, but if you just tap them to slow down, a DC convertor kicks in to charge the batteries, but first it makes sure the flywheel is up to speed.
To avoid ridiculous weight the flywheel needs to have a large diameter. This is why there might have to be a modification to the floor pan. Also the entire transmission will be quite a bit larger. The other engineers can deal with that.
You hit the gas and immediately the flywheel is connected to the engine, supplying starting torque, and if it can be done, some of the power to accelerate as well. And newer cars start very quickly. So this thing moves. I mean moves. I have had cars with 400 HP but nothing ever this light, you will be moving in notime.
But again, no matter how fast you want to go eventually you hit cruising speed, and when you back off, the engine shuts down and you run on an electric motor. When you hit the gas, power comes from the flywheel which is also used to restart the engine. You are movin, stoovin and proven. And getting good mileage. The V8 only runs when it has to, the rest of the time you are on batteries, which are charged continuously. But anytime you hit the gas pedal, the engine immediately restarts. This is doable with current technology. I know it is.
The transmission is the whole works. The motor will be built into it because I can see that it is the only way to make such a design practical. Otherwise it has the outward appearance of a normal rear wheel drive car, but within the transmission is a motor/generator as well as a pretty hefty flywheel. Both are "charged" whenever you hit the brake pedal. The drive wheels would most likely be driven by the normal planetary set, but the flywheel and the motor are connected by something akin to a CVT, or even have their own planetary gearsets. This would be a large transmission and that is one of the reasons that I think it should be done on a rear wheel drive. At least at first. Later when we know more maybe it can be adapted to smaller vehicles, and when the happens, think about it. If I can get 40 MPG out of a V8, what do you think this system could do with a V6 ? Or for that matter a four banger ?
One of the problems is the weight of the car. Airplay can be handled by making it aerodynamic, but acceleration and deceleration take energy. With good aerodynamics it might only take ten horsepower to propel it at a hundred miles an hour, but that is unrealistic. Though it can be done, it won’t. Being more reasonable, let’s go for twelve to fifteen horsepower at seventy miles per hour. That can be done and has been done.
And folks, I don’t know how many are really into engineering, but once the conveyance is moving at the desired speed, it’s mass means very little. The only thing is, if it is really heavy the tires will need a lot of air in them. As long as the drag coefficient is low, that is the only other factor, and it is manageable. The only problem is starting and stopping., THAT is what eats up the energy.
The exact suspension technology I dunno, I would have to say I might go with the Audi or Wolksvagon approach. American technology was good, but there is better, and if I am asking you for thirty grand, I better have something to offer.
With computer control and everything, it should be able to offer almost seamless performance. When it goes to start the monster under the hood, it needs to be on a one way clutch, when you lay down on it, the flywheel is connected to the engine, which is connected to the drive through a one way clutch. That way it doesn’t thump or put your head through the windshield, even if you forgot to put gas in it. And that could happen, hopefully.
At this point though I see it needs a mode in which it can lope home or to a gas station, to the extent that the drive batteries hold out. I do not see a big problem with that.
So that’s my idea, for good or for bad. It is the only way I can see to give the performance some people want, with the efficiency we need. Very complicated yes, but go take apart a helicopter if you think it is too hard. We are the US, and I want to bring something back. I want to see people actually pass a gas station in a car that can drive circles around this Jap junk.
I want to see this country come back from these dark ages, I want to see foreigners ordering these cars. I want to do SOMETHING. And none of this is any kind of pie in the sky shit, we HAVE the technology to do this right now. If some other people with money will come with me maybe we can get this done, I will put my money where my mouth is, but that is only so much money, and it is not quite enough. After the prototypes an assembly line must be built, that is not cheap.
But know this, it is an idea, and even if someone steals it, so what, it should help the world a little bit. I know full well that I can’t do it by myself, there are a few things I would have to outsource for sure. But I still got the idea.
I mean something DA would drive and plunk down the money. There are plenty of people in this country who can afford to buy something like this, but who can afford to build it ?
That is a bigger problem than most people think. I am not Henry Ford. And while I do have a measure of respect for the Man, I wonder where the money came from. See I am a realist. Yes it was a lot cheaper back then, but people used to make three dollars a week, and they were doing good !
Everything is relative.
T
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Sorry to step on the other post, but this is how to bui... - 
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