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Electric Assist?
The idea occurred to me to fit in-wheel electric motors on my Sentra's rear wheels (FWD car) and use them as electric assist when low speed is all that is needed to go from stop to stop sign in town, when extra power is needed or to help keep a cruising highway speed at lower engine RPMs or even to extend coasting. Ideally the motors would be not very strong, light and capable of high RPM. The idea is to, say, neutralize the aero losses and "free up the car" to glide longer. I'm just guessing since none of you seem to have done it that there might be some insurmountable technical issues. Is there something like this out there? Is high RPM with low power consumption possible?
Also, the motors would have regenerative braking. They wouldn't have to be fully integrated into the car's electro-mechanical systems. They could just supplement the battery, instead of having an alternator. There would be a separate control for engaging the motors and for regen braking (separate from the car's accelerator/brake, I mean).
Any thoughts?
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