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Air Powered Vehicles
The Air Car (Zero Pollution Motors) Interesting concept, which until now would have been laughed at, but now looks like it will actually be coming to a dealer near you (or maybe not!). The basic concept is the compress air into a tank, and then have that air released in a way that in turns a crankshaft and drives a small vehicle. Similar actually to an everyday engine, in that air is pushing against a piston, but in this case the air comes into the cylinder compressed, instead of being compressed (as with a regular engine) in the cylinder by igniting a fuel / air mixture. The inventor of this engine is a former Formula One race car driver named Guy Negre. He has received about 40 patents on the engine, and has entered into a licensing agreement with Tata Motors (India's # 1 car manufacturer) to produce the Air Car. Additionally, it's being looked at by major manufacturers from Japan, South America and Europe.
The current model is a smallish 6 seater, with about 35 cubic feet of cargo space, the equivalent of an 75 HP engine propelling the vehicle to 96 miles per hour and getting approximately 106 miles per gallon. Notice they're not stating total mileage before refueling (re-airing). The other good thing about this is that it is that it can be plugged into a regular residential outlet, which will operate the air compressor and fill the tank with compressed air. Now that's a great idea, assuming it works as advertised! Obviously, driving vehicles that use this type of fuel will reduce our dependency on foreign oil, and also significantly reduce the amounts of carbon dioxide emissions in the air, which in turn will reduce the greenhouse effect. The Air Car is slated for sale in the U.S.A., and will be offered directly from the manufacturer without the need for a middleman (dealer). This should keep the cost of the vehicle at around $17,800 (as of now). Below are 2 videos that review the actual Air Car in detail, along with the technology behind it. This next video is CNN's review of the car.
Another great concept that seems to have a practical aspect to it, and is slated to be sold in the U.S. So what's the bad news? Well, this vehicle has been sold in other parts of the world, but I still haven't seen it here. This tells me that the EPA, DOT (& all other regulating agencies) have been instrumental in delaying it's introduction in the U.S. In any case, the manufacturer has stated that the vehicle will be arriving on our shores in the 2009-2010 period. This is good news for us, because the more competition there is in producing these low or no emission vehicles, the faster prices will be dropping and the faster we'll be cleaning up our part of the world. The only thing that concerns me, is the intent to sell these without a dealer. First of all, how do you test drive this thing? Then there's the servicing issue. Who do you go to if something breaks? Are we supposed to fix this thing ourselves? Clearly, there's some additional thinking that needs to take place here, but overall it's a great concept that I hope is realized soon in this country. Stay tuned!
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