Electric Car: a few quick questions?

1. the range of the car is not based solely on the speed it's driven or on the power of the engine. It's much more a matter of storage capacity.

2. the Chevy Volt is solving the range issue with REV batteries from LG that use an on-board engine to keep the batteries charged. You can drive as far as you want as long as you have the engine running as well. Here's a link to a little debate on this topic: http://gm-volt.com/2009/04/06/tesla-ceo-critical-o...

If you want a hybrid of course, you could get a Prius right now but the Volt may be able to deliver on it's many promises. At some point we'll have batteries or super-capacitors with the range most people want and we can drop the on-board engine but that's probably over a decade away.

3. As noted, PV cells on a car would give you very little extra energy. PV cells are costly as well and these cars are already very expensive compared to ICE cars. In a typical home installation it takes a very long time for the cells to pay for themselves and that's assuming they remain at close to peak performance for a decade. You could use one to trickle-charge your battery to ensure you can start the on-board engine in a hybrid but that's about all.

The Tesla gets a pretty good range, 250 miles to be exact. Thats about a good as a tank of gas. What are you complaining about.

I have seen addon solar tops for some older prius' to help with the AC and other onboard electronics. I would personally like to see the newer hybrids and EV's have photovoltaics designed into the body, for those long days at the office when the car is out in the sun, it could be getting recharged. While the solar panels wont be enough for the car to only use solar, its still a help and will reduce plugin times and increase range.

Think if you go on a long trip and stop to eat and your car is recharging in the sun the whole time your are driving and parked. i would imagine that would increase the range a good bit.

1) Making an electric car wimpy doesn't give it any more range. That trick only works on gasoline cars.

2) Never happen. You are accustomed to the energy density of oil, which is unbeatable. Electrics are vastly more efficient than oil-burners. But still, anything other than oil is a BIG step down, which is why battery EVs will never happen in America. Plug-in hybrids might.

3) There isn't enough sunlight falling on a car to propel it down the road. Been tried, read "Solo" by Noel Perrin. It might be able to recharge batteries while parked, but it'll never have unlimited solar cruise. GM did make one car that DID have unlimited solar cruise - search "sunraycer". It was a very weird car, you wouldn't want one.

10 if you drive the tesla at 5 miles per hour, its range will be huge. If you floor it every stop light, YOU WILL NOT BE ABLE TO GET ITS POSTED RANGE. It's all physics.

2) no way to know

3) there are no plans. A semi truck and trailer covered with panels would not generate enough energy to run the electric compressor that drives the brakes. A solar panel on a car is usless and just a gimick to sell to stupid people that don't understand science.