http://blog.wired.com/cars/2008/01/ultrabattery-co.html

I want one of these for my Camry, in about 10 years...

 

I work in the transportation industry and because of that I was invited a couple years ago to a demonstration out at Long Beach Transit. The engineering team from Siemens (Germany) was there to demo a city bus they built with a massive slide-out bank of Super Capacitors over a CNG hybrid system.

They cleared out the entire lot so it was essentially a test track for the day and we got to go ride this thing. We were amply warned to hold on to the seats and grab bars. Then they launched it........

Obviously the drive line software had been tweaked to 'show off mode' but this 55 passenger rocket sled went from 0 to 50 in about 4 seconds, throwing us backwards in a way few could have expected. And it did this, SILENTLY!

Wicked Cool Technology!

I can't wait.

 

I understand the benefits of supercapacitors, I just don't understand the lead-acid battery part and it's benefit at all. If the capacitors are main energy storage, why batteries at all? if they are needed for energizing and some other supporting roles, NIMH or Li-ion would be smaller and lighter anyway you look at it? And since you don't need huge capacity, the price difference wouldn't be big factor either. Also, if everything is working perfectly why they're not setting up huge production lines already, the potential market is beyond imagination and there should be no problem at all to attract investors . On the other hand if they still need to solve some major problems, who knows if those can be overcome at all, many projects like that never see light of the day, due to some "tiny" problem they forget to mention . And those prices seem very optimistic at best. Lets hope for the best but I wouldn't hold my breath.

 

I would think the main fiscal reason it has not been mass produced is the instability of the world price of lead. In the last two years it has gone through some amazing changes. From $0.40/lb. in 2005 to $1.82/lb at the end of 2007. Make no mistake, to get the power density and reliability required for this, you need nearly pure lead. That is not cheap right now.

NiMH requires special charging care and Lithium in most applications is dangerous. The configurations of Lithium that are not dangerous are very $$$$$.

The supercapacitor idea sounds cool though.

 

First Prize goes to Larry. Nearly all metals are through the roof right now.

I was out at a truck maintenance yard on Friday examining a cold-weather problem with a piece of equipment. Long story, short... my advice was to add 50 pounds of lead shot internally to a rotating part of this machine as a ballast. This is something our company has done successfully in some rare cases for many years and it solves a specific operational problem quite well.

The shop foreman looked at me like I'd lost my mind. He asked me if I knew how much money 50 pounds of lead would cost, especially for his fleet where a dozen or so units would need to be treated. He asked in a hopeful voice: "Can I use sand instead?"

Gold is over $900/oz and Platinum is so high that crack heads are sawing catalytic converters off cars in parking lots. Cats are the car stereos for a new generation of thieves.

 

I hear that copper is so high that the copper wiring in streetlights is being stolen!!!!!

 

That has been happening all over LA for the past few years. The LA River bed is especially vulnerable where street lights are anchored to the side of a cement wall.

The funniest part is that these dummies typically start hacking at live lines. This has fueled a huge uptick in the number of "John Doe" crispy critters dropped off at the coroners office lately.

I think we lost the "war on drugs" (TM) a long time ago.

 

Then there was the kid the other month who got shot while firing off bullets by sticking them in a vice and hammering the back of the casing, just for the metal.

 

I never knew this stuff (taking cats, cutting down street lights, bullet casing) happened. This is so sad it is even funny. So sad. oye....well I have a few copper blocks in my apartment from my previous CPU heat sinks. I should see if I can sell it somewhere.