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Hey Mr Gas Selling Corporate- where's my little auxilary electric motor?


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My van just about left me stranded at Lowes- my favorite place to be stranded as the staff and other macho clientele usually have such pleasntries to put in the face of your Transgendered friend-

anyway- the automatic tranny finally quit pulling- just as I got out of the parking space and into the main trafficway- of course!

And so there I was- finally trying to push it out of the traffic lane again- but the big 89 Voyager wouldn't budge. There were some Lowes employees around not doing much as it was still early morn, but not volunteering any assistance in pushing it outta the main drive. Maybe I could've bribed them with some KFC.

That's another story though and a sad commentary on the changing times I've lived through in 60 years. These times could sure use some 70's style.

I got it home finally, but I think it's had it's last voyage except to the junkyard
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I usually drive an Aspire, and before that a Festiva- and if they fail anywhere it's flat I can easaily roll them a short bit at least.

But it got me thinking again about one of my themes. Now before you answer my question with the obvious answer that - yes- for some fairly good sum of money, I could buy a hybrid....

But my question is more really- why aren't all our cars equipped with a small auxilary electric motor- especially by these times ?

It's NOT rocket science- the motor might only have to do 5-10 mph, but if it had a rechargeble battery and could go a half hour even- what a good thing that would be-

I could've rolled the mile or so home from Lowes- I could shut off the gasoline at the drive-up, and in parking lots- even heavy traffic jams- and waiting two or three times through a stoplight. How many people have been killed or messed up breaking down in the left lane somewhere and then getting plowed into. A small electric motor could save lives and get people off dangerous roadways-

down a berm to the next exit-

Well, my rhetorical question really answers itself with my own opinion- we don't have small electric auxilary motors in our cars because that would hurt the sell of gasoline!

the technology by it's very weight and mass physics would probably favor the smaller cars over big and heavy ones that would need a bigger electric and more batteries- and THAT would hurt the sell of gasoline.

What has hurt the advancement of other technologies at the practical level?
Not insurmountable technical problems- No! The selling and profit from gasoiline that now dictates most of the policies of the CORPORATE CONGLOMERATE. It's profits have meant power over the whole world of business.

Even if you had a small electric runabout- the mandantory insurance laws discourage your using it- you may not be able to handle the premiums on a small urban car- so what do you do?

You choose the same old high powered gasoline car as your only car! And that car doesn't even have a small electric drive that could otherwise save your life! You wouldn't be buying so much gasoline then.




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the automatic tranny finally quit pulling

Wait, the incident was the result of transmission failure? If so, then a hybrid powerplant wouldn't have helped. Hybrids need transmissions too. CVTs, though, because conventional transmissions don't work with electric motors.

Still, hybrids are catching on. In fact, there's a few supercars either in production or on the horizon utilizing hybrid technology (LaFerrari, McLaren P1, Porsche 918). I'd like to see how those work out.

"The Devil wants his soul. I just want the man."

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You'd need a deep cycle battery, though maybe in an emergency it would be OK to use the regular battery. So, what you mainly need is at least one hub motor. While that would increase unsprung weight, maybe they could provide emergency AWD, and regenerative braking if you added something to soak up that energy, like a bank of supercaps.

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