What a novel idea! 14 years ago I left NYC with a Slide-in camper with 240 watts of PV on the roof. So I guess you could say I had an RV that was powered by PV... in fact I wrote an article about it that appeared in Homepower, "RE on a PV", Aug/Sept 1998, issue #66, page 40.
Those Ford engineers, always up to date! Rush www.TucsonEV.com > -----Original Message----- > From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf > Of Jamie K > Sent: Thursday, January 02, 2014 5:31 PM > To: Electric Vehicle Discussion List > Subject: Re: [EVDL] Ford to debut solar car > > > For those who haven't yet RTA, it says that the solar concentrator is mounted > on a carport, not on the car. The idea is to project more sunlight from a larger > area down onto the car's roof-mounted solar panels. > > here's the relevant excerpt: > > "The concept car's roof is covered with a solar cells provided by SunPower Corp > (SPWR). But because it takes awhile to charge, Ford has also teamed with > Georgia Tech to offer a special car port for charging. > > Ford calls it an "off-vehicle solar concentrator" -- essentially, a magnifying > glass that can track the sun as it moves across the sky. The car port boosts the > power that can be collected from sunlight by a factor of eight, according to > Ford, allowing a full 8 kilowatt charge over the course of a day. The glass was > originally designed for a lighthouse. > > Ford said its internal data show that the sun could power up to 75% of all trips > made by an average driver. And it estimates that the solar C-Max could reduce > the annual greenhouse gas emissions a typical owner would produce by four > metric tons." > > > I like the notion of getting some help from the sun when parked outside, even if > it's not the major source of power. The tiny solar panel on the Leaf SL doesn't > do much, but it can help with keeping the 12 volt battery charged under the > right conditions. The Ford concept has a much larger solar panel so it would be > that much better, even if it doesn't create a truly solar car by itself. Future solar > panels could become more efficient but this is a start. > > The Carport idea is an interesting idea for leveraging the larger roof area of a > carport for those times when a vehicle can be parked under a carport during the > day, although I wonder about how that might heat up the paint and interior of > the vehicle over time. Right now it might be more efficient to just put more > panels directly on the carport roof (even though that loses the advantage of > having a small extra charging source with the car itself), but I'm glad to see > Ford playing around with ideas. At some point, ideas and economics mesh and > things become practical. > > Cheers, > -Jamie > > > On 1/2/14 5:11 PM, Michael Ross wrote: > > Bill is right about concentrating solar, there is no magic gift doing it. > > > > I test solar thermal collectors in my professional capacity. I recently > > tested a concentrating system that made 400F temperatures in the heat > > transfer medium. > > > > Do you really want a concentrating system? If you put 3000W into one meter > > on the roof of a car that is what you will get (a 1 meter collector, with > > two meters of reflectors around it). There are a number of other contrary > > details beyond this show stopper. Much more practical to fold out a bunch > > more PV. > > > > > > On Thu, Jan 2, 2014 at 6:37 PM, Bill Woodcock <[email protected]> wrote: > > > >>>> The roof of the car is the roof of the car. It has a fixed area. > >> > >> > >>> What you are saying makes no sense. > >>> By using a collector as a type of solar funnel you can certainly > >> concentrate the energy that was going to be disbursed over a larger area > >> onto a smaller one. > >> > >> How are you planning to explain to your wife why she should drive a car > >> with a big-ass funnel strapped to the roof? > >> > >> It's not the _bottom_ of the funnel that's roof-sized, it's the _top_. > >> The bottom of the funnel is the PV receptors. Using a concentrator > >> doesn't increase the amount of energy collected, because it doesn't > >> increase the area of the roof. It decreases the size of the PV receptor > >> needed, which allows for different economies of production of the lens > >> versus PV receptor. It doesn't make magic extra energy. > >> > >> -Bill > >> > >> > > _______________________________________________ > UNSUBSCRIBE: http://www.evdl.org/help/index.html#usub > http://lists.evdl.org/listinfo.cgi/ev-evdl.org > For EV drag racing discussion, please use NEDRA > (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NEDRA) > > > > ----- > No virus found in this message. > Checked by AVG - www.avg.com > Version: 2014.0.4259 / Virus Database: 3658/6969 - Release Date: 01/02/14 _______________________________________________________ Unlimited Disk, Data Transfer, PHP/MySQL Domain Hosting http://www.doteasy.com _______________________________________________ UNSUBSCRIBE: http://www.evdl.org/help/index.html#usub http://lists.evdl.org/listinfo.cgi/ev-evdl.org For EV drag racing discussion, please use NEDRA (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NEDRA)
