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Range Extender for the TWIKE: good or bad?
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Written on: 07 January 2008 [00:23]
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ecoadmin
Administrator
Topic creator
registered since: 20.07.2007
Posts: 583
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The Twike has recently won the World Solar Challenge in Australia. The vehicle used for the occasion, had a Range Extender attached. There is a video available about the Range extended Twike on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DPQVkQWIGLg Range Extended EV's are increasingly popular among car manufacturers (GM Volt). What is your opinion on the range extended TWIKE? Useful or not? Greeetings ecoadmin Twike 890
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Written on: 07 January 2008 [18:07]
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Franko30
Administrator
registered since: 08.09.2007
Posts: 88
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ecoadmin wrote: What is your opinion on the range extended TWIKE? Useful or not? Hi, Useful as a "proof of concept"? Yes. But useful as s.th. we might end up having in any ordinary Twike? Definitely "No"! The RE re-introduces a lot of things from "normal cars" the Twike luckily got rid of, being:
In my opinion, all drivers of electric vehicles would be better off if everybody who might want a range extender for his/her Twike would put his/her power outlets in the online directory of "electric-fuel-stations", the LEMnet at http://ds1.dreifels.ch/LEMnet/. Even better, people who might want to spend money on the RE could use that money to buy a Park & Charge box to have a secure, childproof electric-fuel-station, see: http://www.park-charge.de/. Cheers Frank Mitsubishi i-MiEV + Citysax 002, davor/formerly Twike 808 and 891
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Written on: 30 January 2008 [22:07]
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childress
Administrator
registered since: 14.08.2007
Posts: 140
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In the United States, the range extender could potentially open up a huge can of worms legally: a 3-wheeled vehicle is considered a motorcycle and so does not have to meet the same safety regulations as a car (bumpers, seat belts, crash testing)... Since the range extender puts a 4th wheel on the ground, at that point it becomes a car, and then the laws for cars apply  That being said, I've seen 4-wheel motorcycles (ie, they look like a motorcycle with 'training wheels') for older folks... dunno how they get around that legally.Ethically, as long as it stays a high mileage vehicle, and is easily detachable I think I'm ok with it -- especially if I could flex-fuel it with biodiesel/diesel: I live about 2-3 hours away from Chicago (where my inlaws live), so I imagine I would snap the extender on for the trip up there, take it off and drive around as an EV locally while I'm there, and then snap it on for the drive home. I think it would also help to sell Twikes to folks that think they drive more than they do -- the range issue looms a lot larger on our side of the pond, where folks have the idea that they must be able to drive 300 miles per fill-up, when in actuality something like 80% of Americans drive less-than 20 miles a day. Commute suck? Twike it; You'll like it!
http://www.uiuc.edu/goto/twike |
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