Convert your Car to a Hybrid With Bolt On Electric Motor Hubs, Very Cool!

This is pretty awesome technology that anyone can benefit from. This is good ole fashion ingenuity! Check it out. if I understand correctly these are two electric motor hubs that bolt on to the rear hubs with a battery in the rear. Without any modification to suspension etc. They have doubled gas mileage in many cases. They are priced within reach. at $3000 but am sure they will come down once they go into production... I am sure they will get opposition from the oil companies as people will need less gasoline and they will lose revenues forcing them to lower prices...

I was thinking they now have flexible roll solar panels too that stick on you could add those and do even better.

Solar Film


Check it out:

Dr. Perry, his collaborators and students are very close, very close indeed.

MTSU Wheel Hub Motor Retrofit Kit. Click image for more info.
Perry, who holds the Russell Chair of Manufacturing Excellence, and this year’s five-member team saw gas mileage increase anywhere from 50 to 100 percent on a 1994 Honda station wagon retrofitted with laboratory prototype plug-in hybrid capability.

The Honda wagon research vehicle has been fitted with electric motors at each rear wheel and a large lithium-ion battery that’s mounted in the rear of the vehicle. Perry said, “The whole point was to demonstrate the feasibility of adding the electrical motor to the rear wheel of the car without changing the brakes, bearings, suspension – anything mechanical. As lithium-battery technology improves the battery size can be reduced in production models.”

Read the rest here: Link

Interestingly, if you put these on the rear wheels of a front wheel drive you would have an all wheel drive minus the computer control.

P

Never mind it was drum brakes, in rotor which most cars abandoned.
It will work on application shown.

Originally posted by Rudy2shoes
Rear Brakes ?
I watched the video, it did not explain, or show if it uses caliper/rotor brakes oem,
or if the magnets are now used as part of the rear braking system through the controller.
If I am wrong just point it out.

“The whole point was to demonstrate the feasibility of adding the electrical motor to the rear wheel of the car without changing the brakes, bearings, suspension — anything mechanical,” Perry said.

I see the claim,
but saw no picture with oem brake caliper installed.
I think it is a good idea but need to see oem brake function with claim.

edit on 28-10-2012 by Rudy2shoes because: (no reason given)

There is pictures on the site showing the rear "drum" brake with the motor. it's a 95 Honda most of the 90's cars have drums on he rear not calipers. I don't know if that has changed or not on newer cars but I am sure many still use drums on the rear and calipers on the front. Drums are cheaper and last longer.

Edit to add: he did say this would work on most cars so maybe they have a version or adaptation that will work with rear disc brakes? Although that would pose more problems and would need special calipers I would think as the motor part would have to be behind the caliper...

reply to post by hawkiye


Reminds me of the electric motor hub kits for bicycles.

reply to post by hawkiye

One of the things I like about some hybrids is that when you push the brake, it charges the battery. I always hated all that wasted energy braking with ordinary brakes.

Unfortunately since this design doesn't change the brakes, it lacks that advantage, so I would actually prefer a version that does involve braking which charges the battery. On the other hand, how safe it would be to be on the road with do-it-yourselfers who have modified their brakes is unclear.

Originally posted by Arbitrageur
reply to post by hawkiye

 

One of the things I like about some hybrids is that when you push the brake, it charges the battery. I always hated all that wasted energy braking with ordinary brakes.

Unfortunately since this design doesn't change the brakes, it lacks that advantage, so I would actually prefer a version that does involve braking which charges the battery. On the other hand, how safe it would be to be on the road with do-it-yourselfers who have modified their brakes is unclear.

Yeah I like this design though because it can be done by the DIY but to keep it simple the design is limited. Still doubling gas mileage is pretty significant IMO.

I wonder if it would be neater to mount the rotor in the prop shaft...that way you would only need one...or, perhaps you could use a bunch all along to get more power back. (front engine, rear wheel drive, obviously).

Looks very interesting, do you have any info on the name of the project or system for further research?

Originally posted by RussianScientists
reply to post by hawkiye

 

Reminds me of the electric motor hub kits for bicycles.

I own an electric bike and I'm convinced, they stole this idea from electric bikes. All the technology in that system is used in electric bikes, has been for over 10 years.

I know my Lithium Iron Phosphate battery costs 600 to replace and thats a 48 volt 20 ah battery. His 80 volt 100 ah battery has to be really expensive. he did Not mention that you had to recharge the battery but I suspect he's charging that battery from the alternator also. He didn't say what watts those hub motors were rated at. My E-bike uses a 750 watt hub motor and can do 30 miles per hour. If you made the car really light and just used 2 or 4 hub motors you can build a cheap electric car.

This might work as proof of concept but i don't think it's very practical. I think his claims of doubling your gas mileage is kinda high. His brushless hub motor would have to be extremely powerful to move the two tons of weight that is the car.

Enjoyed the presentation.

Like he stated, it has to get smaller and I think cheaper.

Thanks for showing the video!

reply to post by JohnPhoenix


The hub motors are not solely moving the car they are assisting the gas motor to move the car within a certain speed range hence the improved gas mileage since the gas motor does not have to work as hard.

I have no doubt they got the idea from the bicycle hub motors...

You just gave me an idea I have been thinking of getting one of those gas motors for a bike. It would be cool to do the same thing and have an electric hub motor assisting the gas motor on a bike or even just switching back and forth when the battery needs to be charged. I bet that would improve mileage on a bike quite a lot...

reply to post by hawkiye


Explanation: How awesome ... now the DMV can add on all these nonstandard vehicle device attatchment fee's.

Personal Disclosure: I hope everybody is aware that regardless of what you do you will be made to pay for it ... over and over again.

Originally posted by JohnPhoenix

Originally posted by RussianScientists
reply to post by hawkiye

 

Reminds me of the electric motor hub kits for bicycles.

I own an electric bike and I'm convinced, they stole this idea from electric bikes. All the technology in that system is used in electric bikes, has been for over 10 years.

I know my Lithium Iron Phosphate battery costs 600 to replace and thats a 48 volt 20 ah battery. His 80 volt 100 ah battery has to be really expensive. he did Not mention that you had to recharge the battery but I suspect he's charging that battery from the alternator also. He didn't say what watts those hub motors were rated at. My E-bike uses a 750 watt hub motor and can do 30 miles per hour. If you made the car really light and just used 2 or 4 hub motors you can build a cheap electric car.

This might work as proof of concept but i don't think it's very practical. I think his claims of doubling your gas mileage is kinda high. His brushless hub motor would have to be extremely powerful to move the two tons of weight that is the car.

JohnPhoenix I thought the same thing also about his claim of 50-100% increase in gas milage, but I could be wrong. I have a Honda hybrid that gets really good gas mileage. At around 40-55 mph I can get really good gas milage of around 50-70 mpg, at higher speeds its reduced to around 32-36 mpg. I usually average around 41 mpg overall. My 4x4 F150 gets only 6 mpg.

JohnPhoenix you should start a thread on your electric bicycle and tell all of us more about it. I think it would be very cool to have an electric bicycle. Have you ever charged it from solar panels? How far can you go on a charge? and at how fast of speeds? Does the wind affect it? I know lots of people that are interested in electric bicycles. I also believe that this guy got all of his discoveries from bicycles.

It looks like to me, that the next alterative will be to place these same devices on motorcycles, 3-wheelers and ATVs.

Originally posted by RussianScientists

Originally posted by JohnPhoenix

JohnPhoenix I thought the same thing also about his claim of 50-100% increase in gas milage, but I could be wrong. I have a Honda hybrid that gets really good gas mileage. At around 40-55 mph I can get really good gas milage of around 50-70 mpg, at higher speeds its reduced to around 32-36 mpg. I usually average around 41 mpg overall. My 4x4 F150 gets only 6 mpg.

JohnPhoenix you should start a thread on your electric bicycle and tell all of us more about it. I think it would be very cool to have an electric bicycle. Have you ever charged it from solar panels? How far can you go on a charge? and at how fast of speeds? Does the wind affect it? I know lots of people that are interested in electric bicycles. I also believe that this guy got all of his discoveries from bicycles.

It looks like to me, that the next alterative will be to place these same devices on motorcycles, 3-wheelers and ATVs.

This thread needs a bump. And I've got to tell a little more about my comments above. I criticized this technology as not being too practical but that's not the end of it. I do think this technology is a necessary step, or a necessary evil if you will. It will help more people get less dependent on gas ( in a way) but it's really just a band-aid. Electric right now is the best idea for technology that gets our vehicles off petrol.

Yes, hawkiye here has a vehicle that runs off hydrogen gas if I'm not mistaken and I'd like to hear more about that but I understand he has to produce his own fuel.. is that right? Perhaps hawkiye can tell us more about it and the costs involved.

I think Electric is king because it's proven, practical and cheap if you do it right. The Tesla Motors cars are luxury items and the batteries are very expensive. Chevy Volts are cheaper but the batteries are just as pricy. The batteries Are the problem. In the video above the hybrid system uses a Lithium Iron Phosphate battery, commonly called LiFePo4. These batteries are Only made in China because they have one of the largest Lithium deposits on the planet. These are the most efficient and powerful electric batteries made but since they are not mass produced by very large companies, they are not cheap. To buy these, you have to find a reputable manufacturer in china and have it shipped to the US ( or anywhere else) China does not have a lot of regulation and the e-bike community has learned to trust only one manufacturer called Ping Battery. These people make excellent quality batteries for the price you have to spend. There is talk of new technologies that can extract Lithium from seawater - a much more cost effective way to obtain Lithium. I believe someone is planning to open a plant that does this in the US. If this takes off then American companies will be able to produce LiFePo4 batteries cheaply enough so everyone could afford them. I'd like to see this happen and electric cars become the norm instead of the exception. Only then will we have a chance to get rid of petrol.

As far as my e-bike, it's a mens 26 inch Next brand 10 speed mountain bike from Wal-Mart - cost 100 dollars. I paid 700 for the e-bike kit from Ampedbikes.com The e-bike kit consists of a 750 watt brushless hub motor comes with a voltage regulator/controller, a throttle and brake set, a battery pack of 3, 12 volt 12 AH sealed lead acid batteries (total of 36 volts) to which I added a forth for 48 volts. They last about a year, so I replaced those with a Ping LiFePo4 20 AH that cost about 600 and last about 3 years. It works out to be about the same price in batteries over the course of 3 years having to replace the SLA batteries once a year but the advantage of the LiFePo4 battery is you know you will have more consistent power longer and it makes the whole bike much lighter, giving you more range. Volts = speed and the battery AH rating equals range. I get more range with the LiFePo4.. I'd say a solid 10 miles there and back for a range of 20 miles round trip between charges. Cost pennies to charge and a few hours time. This is without peddling going 30 miles an hour. As you see, the initial cost is under 1000 dollars.. adding the LifePo4 has me into it for about 1500. You may want to spend extra money for headlights, turn signals, stop lights and puncture proof tires. Some places require these things. With the 3 batteries that come with the kit you can't go over 20 miles per hour in the US legally. If you add a 4th battery or go over 36 volts to go over 20 mph your not supposed to drive it without a license in the city. My experience if your careful, no one will know your going over 20 mph LOL You'd have to check your local laws.. I don't know where you live.