First Electric Jeep DJ-5E

So ugly it's cute. That's the way Glen Burgess describes his restored Jeep® Electruck, or DJ-5E. Glen has a great Jeep DJ-5E restoration project, of perhaps the last surviving model of the 352 manufactured, one of five sold to Canada Post. The 1976 factory original electric postal truck was found by Glen in a farmers field in Ontario Canada. The restored Electruck weighs nearly twice the weight of a gas-powered Jeep DJ-5 because of the heavy lead-acid batteries. Interestingly there was a recall on the 1975 model.

AMC worked with Gould on a 20-horsepower compund wind DC Motor and two 27 volt batteries for a total of 54 volts. The vehicles were capable of attaining 4o mph for up to 29 miles. The United States Postal Service (USPS) ran a Route Profile Analysis to determine suitability of electric postal delivery vehicles and it was favorable. Interestingly Taylor-Dunn company already has an Electruck® that can reach speeds of up to 25 mph and provide over 40 miles in range. Taylor-Dunn trademarked the Electruck name in 1994. We'll have to see if the next generation of Jeep Electric Vehicles are able to find their way back into the service of the USPS.

World Record Fuel Economy

Have we reached the plateau of fuel efficiency? Turned the last screw in our push toward the envelope of known technology? At first I couldn't believe the claim: over 12,000 miles per gallon. Now I can't believe it hasn't been improved upon.

The Guinness World Record for fuel efficiency was awarded in 2005 to a Swiss team with a PAC-Car II hydrogen-powered car. Lino Guzzella and his team at ETH Zurich recorded an astounding 5,385 km per liter of gasoline (12,666 mpg!) during the Shell Eco-marathon in Ladoux (France). The vehicle weighed a feathery 60 pounds and had an aerodynamic drag coefficient of 0.075.

Hydrogen power is impressive, but it still doesn't compete with the sun-fed system of solar vehicles. The solar car can travel an indefinite distance without using any fuel at all (provided sun is readily available). I was shooting the event for The Macomb Daily newspaper on July 19, 1990 as the University of Michigan Sunrunner crossed the finish line and won the first GM Sunrayce. It was a memorable event seeing the maize and blue solar cell-covered car stealthily cross the finish line with a a cheering team in tow at the General Motors Tech Center in Warren, Michigan. The Sunrunner electric car weighed a heafty 500 pounds and had an aerodynamic drag coefficienct of .108.

Solar powered vehicles have matured and improved at an astonishing rate since that momentous event in 1990. The race to higher fuel efficiency with hydrogen powered vehicles is sure to follow a similar path, albeit not as dramatic. The fact that Hydrogen became a recognized official fuel in 2004 like gasoline and petrol helped with the path to world records.

So why hasn't another team broken the record since? Have we reached the epitome of drag coefficiency. Has the tire technology reached its limit? Or is it just that the students at ETH Zurich are taking a break for a while as everyone else catches up?

(PAC-Car 2 photos courtesy ETH Zurich)

TH!NK.NO

First off - I need to say I love the company name. TH¡NK "City" electric cars may be coming stateside - that is if they can get a piece of the $25 billion the Department of Energy has allocated to automotive retooling and advanced technology programs. The Norwegian automaker is hoping business is better in the U.S. than in Norway. This past December, TH¡NK went into Norway's version of chapter 11 bankruptcy. This was only after two months of production.

The City is a little bigger than the diminutive Smart fourtwo electric vehicle. The trunk is miniscule. The four passenger seating is welcome, but a 62 mph top speed and 112 mile range may not be enough for many folks. Also of concern is the cost - $20,000 with a $90 monthly lease plan for batteries. How this new vehicle with no track history is going to compete with the all-new Honda Insight Hybrid that's starting under $20,000 is beyond me. Right thinking, wrong timing, and wrong URL - www.think.no