0-60 3 seconds and pulls 1 G of acceleration, your Lotus can kiss my A$$ Sir! This has got to be the badest electric car ever! Wow, I'm really looking forward to faster electric cars, it's too bad we're so limited by battery technology right now. Oh well I'm sure we'll catch up soon!

http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...37653720181416

http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...42962130013214

 

What is the deal with the rolling start?

 

I guess the guy driving wasn't an experienced drag racer? Either way I think that's very impressive technology.

 

I thought that this car looked familiar! The Ariel Atom is the original gasoline powered version. I read about this in Road and Track and saw a road test on television. It is awesome and priced at 35,000 pounds (about $65,000). A much better price than the electric version.

Kevin

http://www.arielmotor.co.uk/04/frames.htm

 

Well it's not about which car is the better buy, it's more about developing better technology. I find it amazing that they are getting 3X more efficiency than the prius.
I look forward to the nano-tube power cells, maybe in another 20 years they will have some usable technology for the general public. It's all very exciting stuff.

 

The claim is 3 times better efficiency. How is that measured? Remember, this car is significantly lighter than the Prius and does not have all the power sapping accessories that the Prius does.

Kevin

 

They are probably measuring how much wattage is used over a certain distance, I would guess? I know it is lighter, but it is a full on electric vehicle and not a hybrid.

Actually the toyota Prius is not very efficient as a hybrid car, considering there are other gasoline powered cars able to attain better fuel consumption.

 

There are no other production cars that are powered only by a combustion engine that get better gas mileage than the Prius. And I'm not talking about EPA sticker mileage, I'm talking real world driving conditions. If you need proof, check out Consumer Reports. http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/c...ient/index.htm
We typically average 50 mpg on highway road trips and 42-44 mpg in normal suburban driving and that's calculated by what the onboard computer tells us.

 

My neighbors wife is an Engineer at Toyota headquarters here in Torrance California, And they owned a Prius for about a year. He very rarely made 50 mpg unless going down hills while driving on the freeways or around town. 40-45 mpg is more accurate, but let's not split hairs. Lol.

Actually there are combustion engine cars that do get 50 mpg. There is the 3 cylinder Geo metro, Honda civic HF the super lightweight model with lightweight forgerged wheels, and I think the Ford Fiestas might have made 45 mpg.
Back in the 70's, Smoky Yunick converted an Iron Duke 4 cylinder motor into an Adiabatic hot vapor engine from the Pontiac Fiero. It made a little better than 50 mpg, and put out around 280-300 hp. In fact the head engineers at GM thought it was total BS, until they drove the little Fiero. They where left astonished by how much power it made and how durable it was. But I doubt we will ever get to know the secret behind the idea of how old Smoky made it work...I think there's alot of ceramics involved.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/1984-...QQcmdZViewItem