I had a couple of thoughts about electric cars on the way into work today that I thought I would share, with all of my loyal followers, which is just above the number Zero.

Ok, the first [...]]]> Ever have an interesting idea, maybe even a great invention, but weren’t sure what to do with it?

I had a couple of thoughts about electric cars on the way into work today that I thought I would share, with all of my loyal followers, which is just above the number Zero.

Ok, the first thought I had, which may not really work yet, but it was a thought.  I have a high powered sports car and why couldn’t I have a high powered electric car?  the thought I had if is the car was large enough that you could have one small electric engine run the front tires, and a little larger engine run the rear tires.  I had thought that the transmission would be an issue, but the electric cars use just one transmission with variable gearing, so it might be possible to have 2 motors running the car.  I had envisioned a 40%, 60% split.  Each engine would have it’s own battery array, that would be charged by plugging in the car as is standard in electric cars now.

Here is where one idea gets interesting.  The Front engine which is smaller could be the engine that drives the whole car.  The operator would turn-off the rear engine and that would give the rear engine batteries to the front engine for longer trips.  There would be less power, but more battery life.  If you were going short distances, and/or racing the car, you would have both engines on for the power and 4 wheel drive performance.  I suppose that there would have to be some sort of regulator on that matches the correct amount of power given to both engines when they are on.  One would think that it’s feasible to have 2 independent motors driving the car if they were in unison and did not have to shift gears, or shifted gears in unison.  Well, I had to do a Google search to see if there was such thing as a dual engine car with independent transmissions and I found one by Audi. Check it out at SeriousWheels.com.    Cool so the idea of having dual engines is possible and I think the electric motors are small enough to actually fit in some sort of normal looking sports car.  If the batteries get smaller and more efficient like I hear in the news, then it is totally plausible to have a Dual Engine Electric car.  If you want power you use 2 engines, if you want efficiency you use one engine and the 2 battery arrays.

What about the Stereo. I started to think that electric cars are going to be a issue with Heat, A/C and the stereo. I love a big booming stereo and that would just suck the life out of my super hopped up dual engine race car.

Next brilliant idea.   What is the stereo was independent of the car itself?  The idea is that if the batteries are smaller now and have more juice, why not have an independent battery for the radio.  The thought progressed on my drive in to be that the radio would have it’s own battery and a small solar cell on the outside of the car that could charge just the radio battery.  If the radio battery was fully charged, then the extra energy could be diverted to charging the other battery arrays.  Sounds plausible doesn’t it.   I also thought that the radio would need some sort of stiffening capacitor for the speakers and bass to draw from when needed so as not to suck on the battery too hard.  The capacitor would be filled by the battery, and the battery filled by the solar cell, or plugged-in charging system.  I guess what would really be needed to make this cool stereo  work is a few things.
1) A car stereo and speakers that don’t suck, I mean sound bad, that use less power than normal/average.  I can just see a company like Bose capitalizing on low voltage high performance car speakers in the new and upcoming electric car market.  I wouldn’t be surprised if they weren’t already make them.

2) A battery that can drive the stereo and speakers.  This I think has to exist currently, but it would need to be small and light weight, which I think exists too.

3) A solar cell that is small enough to not look “nasty” on my sweet ride, that can charge the radio battery. I think there are new bendable solar panels out there, that may work in this case.

4) A stiffening capacitor that can be charged by the battery and deliver the proper punch to the stereo without killing the battery or “clipping” the radio.  This is old school technology and has to exist already.

Anyway, this is my brilliant idea I had while driving into work.  All I need now is about 5 million dollars, a strong leadership team, and some electrical engineers with the electric car know-how.  Maybe I could find a startup company in Asia that would spring to the chance to make my invention come to life and then be the 1st to market the low voltage/power self charging radio to the emerging electric car market.

Are my thought valid, totally insane, or already under development somewhere.  Too bad it costs so much to try and patent an idea.