Well, well, well, so you thought James Dyson could only do bagless vacuums.  Not anymore.  Dyson wants to create a lightweight motor for an electric car.  And he has a definite vision of how an electric car should function and get recharged.

Sir James Dyson is better known as a vacuum innovator having created the bagless vacuum and made a $141 million fortune off it.   He also has very definite ideas about electric cars as he told The Independent:

At the moment, electric cars are seen as city cars and to go 30mph is quite enough, but in the future that will change. An electric motor can go to very high speeds….Most of the time a car isn’t being used so a photo voltaic [solar] charge over a long period of time is an absolutely suitable way of charging a car.

Sir James is of the opinion that electric cars should be able to go much further than they can today on an electric charge.  As hinted above he also thinks that solar panels on the roofs are also the wave of the future.

He is very interested in helping create this reality and thinks that his “extra strong” digital engines may just be the ticket.  His motors turn 10,000 per minute using a microchip, and are very lightweight.  By using a similar motor modified for an automobile, electric cars would be lighter and more powerful.

Including solar panels for recharging adds an extra touch of green giving the cars a zero footprint.  Sir James envisions electric cars being more numerous on roads in ten years than fossil fuel cars. 

Whether that becomes reality or not, his vision of a long range, faster electric car is a must.  Without increased speed and distance, adoption of electric cars will be limited to large cities where people rarely if ever need to reach speeds over 45 mph or go farther than 40 – 80 miles. 

In the U.S. where a 30 mile commute is considered normal and long driving trips a part of many different professions, the current crop of electric cars just won’t do.  Without more power and distance, electric cars may enter a household as a novelty, but won’t really catch on.

More than likely, Dyson won’t be designing cars on his own but will partner with a well known car maker to work on designing and improving the performance of electric car engines.  The fact that both cars and vacuums can run on digital electric engines does not qualify Dyson as a credible car innovator.

Now if we had an electric car that would hold at least four adults, go 500 to 800 miles on a charge (with the aid of solar panels), and could run at a consistent 70-80 mph, that would be a car most American’s would consider buying.  If the car could also vacuum itself out, well, that would be worth sacrificing a little on the distance.

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Entry was posted on Wednesday, June 25th, 2008 at 12:17 pm under Auto, Green Technology, Technology.  Print This Post

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