AKA an essay on alternative power sources after spending an evening sidetracked on some very interesting sites around the subject. Comments/thoughts/experiences welcome.
Whatever happened to the Õko-Polo? As torquey as a petrol 1-litre, as much power as the 900cc (yes, it's not much, but it's "enough" and more than it should have) at about the same weight, able to peg along at 85mph.. but also capable of 80-120 mpg in daily use and recorded at 160+ mpg on an extended test cruise, if volkswagen's official figures are to be trusted. All that in a standard weight, two-bricks-in-the-mating-season Mk2 steep-tail. Makes it all seem rather odd that they had to go to such extremes to make the "one litre" car - giving it a single cylinder, normal aspiration, 10hp diesel, and basically turning it into a two-seater tandem go-kart. It's 280mpg hardly seems worth it next to those three figure Polo consumptions, especially when the Polo can carry three more people, a fair bit of luggage, go quite a bit faster, and wouldn't be *quite* so much like Cockroach vs Welly Boot when in dispute with a truck.
Seems to have been the first sighting of the modern style direct injection type diesel, with a (super)charger on it to make the most of the titchy 850cc capacity (without damaging the economy) and a rather primitive incarnation of the system that kills the motor when coasting or at lights. I wonder why we haven't seen more of this idea.. if VW were to even make any kind of low-capacity diesel again someone could do a home conversion. Even the supposedly lighter, smoother Lupo with the 1.2 unblown diesel would have trouble matching these figures, though it does have a little more power.
(heck, take that engine, make it a 3-cyl, and you're almost at 1.3 already - almost 50% extra power (for ~60hp and ~83lbft at quite low revs) without making a 50% reduction in economy... you'd still get, say, 65 to 95mpg, and that cruise would be 130mpg)
(then you do a bit of weight-treatment on the car, and alter the bodywork for improved aerodynamics, give it a modern 6 speed box as it's none too far from the diesel governor at 85 and is at best torque/economy around 45 with the standard 5th)
(and add a hybrid low-speed/restarting/boost/regen system.... in fact, with a 10kw motor - 13hp - you wouldnt need the extra cylinder on acceleration (leccy motors more torquey per hp than combustion, usually), so long as you were prepared to forgo an increased top sustainable speed - which would come with better windcheating anyway... so the hybrid would give you both benefits, better acceleration and incredible economy, so long as it's extra weight didn't harm things... reliably in the 100mpg range on all trips?)
While thinking of such frugal 80s dream machines (replete with oh so fetching rainbow-strip-on-white bodywork), ran across another site where people in the states are making quite viable electric cars from Geo Metros (like, a honda applause or something of that ilk - tiny 4-door saloon) and pickup trucks. The former being mainly good for inner city work upto 60mph (or faster, but it drains quickly then), the latter being a bit more rangeworthy because of sheer battery carrying space. (oh yes - and the Honda/GM eco-1 sports car or whatever it was called.. 0-60 in 7 seconds, almost a 200 mile range, etc, in a 2 seater droptop that wouldnt look out of place next to an elise).
It then struck me that a large majority of my journeys, and I would lay money on a large majority of other peoples journeys, are well within the parameters of that little car. It would be perfect, for example, for current trips to work. One workplace (a shop) being close enough to comfortably cycle on good days, and the other (countryside nightclub) only being 8 or 9 miles with speeds mostly under 50mph, peaking into the 70-80 range for maybe 3 or 4 whole minutes on the way there, and the trip home being rather more relaxed. Almost any trip that might be usually taken in the midlands wouldn't cause a troubling dent in it's batteries. (Well, going to/from Alton Towers or Coventry from Birmingham might be a worry if you used the cheaper 'standard' batteries rather than nickels - but if you could leave it to charge whilst in the park, or doing your business in the city, still no bother).
It also struck me, after seeing the eco-polo, and noticing the quite minimal weight of the machine (unless stacked next to a nova, panda, etc
that the mk2 would make quite a good basis for a conversion, with the different models all being rather equal because of different benefits vs drawbacks. (ie hatch has more space for batteries plus luggage than coupe, but less aerodynamic, derby both spacious and aerodynamic but heavier... etc.. any home brew estate having monster space but also very heavy AND brick shaped).It would accelerate like crazy off the line and be good for twisty country roads as well, even if powered by a modest 20kw motor (~26hp, or roughly equivalent to a 1.3 with two plugs removed)... plenty of torque, though the top speed would naturally be lacking (~65mph in that case).
There's also the matter that, truthfully, most of the time your car is stood not going anywhere and you may as well hook up a solar panel to it for a free trickle-charge. It won't get you the equivalent of more than a couple miles "free" each day in britain (more if you had a series of them to fold out, put on a rooftop, etc), but hey - you wouldnt get any free with petrol.
And when you're in traffic, it doesnt need to expend any power at all.
You can claim back the braking force instead of throwing it to heat.
No more stalling, choking, waiting for it to warm up. No more hard winter starts.. so long as you can prevent the batteries freezing up (and that needs colder than -25'c for a lot of them) it'll run.
Quieter, less maintenance (no clutch, air filter, oil change, plugs, timing belt, lambda probe, etc) - and "no" pollution! (particularly on solar, or renewable mains)
Only about 2p/mile energy costs (assuming you're on about 5-7p per kWh and do efficient driving) compared to 10p/mile for petrol as an average (8.1 miles per litre (37mpg), 80.9p/litre)
Etc...
Of course, it's bobbins if you need to take a long trip, say, Birmingham to Holyhead, Aberystwyth to Bournemouth, Scotland to Inters
... though you could pack a small petrol motor-generator (say, 15hp?) between the back wheels somewhere and use it either to hybrid yourself along (sharing the energy used between the two power sources, at 60mph) or top the batteries up while stationary. The american users didn't do any such thing, but broke their journey up into 40-50 mile jaunts between caravan parks that agreed to let them top up off the hitching posts. Thing is, at 45mph for best economy, and maybe 90 minutes to 2 hours per stop, thats VERY slow going, and you may as well ride a bike. (i'll never complain about slow petrol pumps again 
)And the purchase costs, installation complexity, just don't bear thinking about. You have to get the car, drop the engine, transmission, fuel tank etc, buy a good motor (or two) and transmission for it, a whole load of batteries, battery charge/discharge/usage controller, load balancers, power pack cooler/heater, replacement devices for powering demister/cabin heater, brake servo (though that's one thing skipped for the mk2
), a heavy duty charging controller stand for the garage (so you don't burn out your 13amp plugs trying to get a 30amp charge) etc..... ouch.Plus if you want solar charging, there's the cost of the photovoltaic cells, they aint cheap (those £2.50 things you can get in Maplins for your mobile phone? They put out about 1 watt at 3v when in direct summer sunlight. Do the maths for a car that can use 50kW hours on a run and uses a 150 volt power pack.. even to get a trickle top-up or maintenance charge its decidedly uncheap).
But then, the first petrol cars cost a bomb to run as well. It was only from about the 1920s onwards they got mass "affordable", and til the 50s when rationing stopped for them to become "cheap".
I'm quite taken by all this and very interested. After seeing stories of how you can get 200 miles on a set of NiMhs (or 160 on NiCad, 60 on standard lead-acid) in the right car (which, say, a weight-treated mk2 Coupe with a more aero grille would be) and still have pokey enough performance - if its fast enough for an american, it should be fine here - it looks like electrics are no longer the nasty old milk floats they used to be. Even giving fuel cell cars quite a beating (sure, take a whole lot longer to fuel up, but more 'instant' range and far safer/cleaner overall). Would like to try it out, if not for the heinous cost of it all... if only such things were mass produced... the price would come down (there'd be a bourgeoning market for reconditioned batteries amongst those of us who currently buy £500 cars... suddenly the brand-new frame and motor wouldn't be the most expensive thing, but the "fuel tank"... electricity is cheap - storing it isnt)
However, I would like to find out if any oko-polos are still running about, getting three times my economy at much the same speed.. the only mention i've seen so far is of an american VW nut who found one sitting motor-less on a dockside, after the DOT decided that, economical or not, the diesel somehow wouldn't fit with current emissions regulations and tossed it in the ocean, leaving it to rot and the would-be owner a bit too cheesed to collect it. (He then converted it to a 1.05), and some scanned magazine articles from the 80s showing all the technical bits and bobs.
And any electric mk2s that have gone before of course
After all, it should be getting a bit plain that our oil supply is definately in decline at the moment. Put all the current/recent news reports together (including Shell drastically cutting it's reserve estimate) and run up a graph of petrol prices over the last 18 months.... a switch is needed pretty damn fast.
just glad i've still got my bike.
they could just export it at twice the price and still make a bundle