Well, we are going to be hearing more and more about hybrid cars, for there are motor manufacturers who believe that the way forward is to produce hybrids. For then they can make cars which have ‘the best of all worlds’. Whether that’s true or false, we as consumers and car buyers will find out!
Hybrid vehicles are good as when one needs to go fast one can as they can make use of petrol-powered engines when in a hurry. But for city driving they use electric motors which run on batteries, just as the Honda Civic hybrid does.
Some manufacturers would like cars involved in crashes to be repaired whenever possible. But it seems that most car owners prefer damaged parts to be replaced. However, replacing parts is usually far more expensive than using repaired parts.
Already there are hybrid cars on the market and also others, claimed to be even more environmentally friendly, such as hydrogen fuel cell-powered cars, which are more expensive to buy and run. But whether to buy or not, depends on car buyers themselves.
A multi-purpose vehicle is the Axon Automotive 2+2 multi-purpose vehicle. But it’s not yet on the market! However, Axon claims that when it is manufactured – they hope next year – it will be ‘the most fuel-efficient’ car made and will be sold in Europe. It will be a city car, a motorway car, a countryside car; a multi-purpose car for two adults, or for two adults and two children plus luggage – or to take goods for recycling – for a family on holiday; and, best of all perhaps, a small car which can carry big items. Unhook the tailgate and it becomes a green pick-up.
To quote Axon again: ‘We are specialists in carbon fibre – to make cars light, safe and fuel-efficient. New manufacturing techniques mean that this Formula One technology is now affordable for eco cars. By making cars light and giving them good aerodynamics you can halve fuel consumption. The fuel consumption, in fact, is so low that you’ll no longer need to pay road fund tax on this car (for it will fall into band ‘A’ road tax).’
But so far this Axon multi-purpose 2+2 is only a dream. There are so far no serious plans to produce it. In 2009 or the following year? Perhaps.
But the Honda Civic hybrid is already available, and the Honda FCX Clarity, ‘the world’s first fuel cell production car’, is going on sale about now in California.
As the world’s largest engine maker, Honda claims to take its environmental responsibilities ‘very seriously’. In fact, in l956, Soichiro Honda, the company founder, declared: ‘After materials are carried into the factory, nothing but products should be carried out.’
The Morgan LIFEcar is a fuel cell powered electric sports car, built in a joint venture by Morgan Motor and transport company RiverSimple. Research and development was by Qinetic, Linde, Cranfield University and BERR.
Four stacks of fuel cells convert hydrogen fuel into electricity to run motor generators. One is attached to each wheel. Energy recovered in braking is stored in capacitors rather than batteries and the performance is calculated to be equivalent to a 150 miles per gallon petrol engine. Top speed is claimed to be 85 mph, with an 0-60 mph of less than seven seconds and a 150 mile range. This Morgan sports car is light – because the lightest possible materials are used: aluminium, wood and leather. Likely cost? No one is saying – yet….
But we are likely to be seeing and hearing lots more about hybrids – at London’s Motor Show at Excel next month, at Paris Auto Salon in the early autumn, just as we did earlier this year in Detroit, New York and Geneva and last autumn in Frankfurt and elsewhere. Hybrids are here to stay awhile.
Honda has produced a useful booklet on WHAT IS A HYBRIDE? And the reply: Hybrid is the latest everyday application in (Honda’s) quest to produce lighter, more powerful petrol engines which produce lower emissions and deliver improved fuel economy.
‘Honda’s hybrid system is called IMA, which stands for “integrated motor assist”. The system was launched in the Honda Insight and on a combined cycle the Insight is capable of 83 miles per gallon – the highest fuel economy of any mass produced vehicle in the world. The Insight also produces less than half the CO2 of the average car today.
Honda has already sold more than 130,000 hybrid cars – mainly in Japan and the USA. In Europe Honda has sold more than 2,000 hybrids – mainly in the U.K.
And Honda engineers are hard at work developing cleaner, alternative energy cars such as the FCX, its Fuel cell car, which runs on hydrogen and produces no NOx or CO2
The Honda press release was printed on an unusual material – Elite Poo – paper made from recycled elephant dung – yes, real life elephant dung collected from London Zoo.
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