ooohhhh, electric :-)

[Joe of Loath]

Originally Posted by elhigh

Hey Joe,

Is your motor generating 250w the way you run it, or is it being overdriven? Because if it's giving its rated output, 35mph on just 250w is really good.

I don't have an engine in my possession that can efficiently crank out a mere 250w of power. Imagine if we could make ourselves get by with just 35mph. Shoot, on average that's faster than most of go when you take stop-and-go traffic into account. Now just figure how much farther you could go on a gallon of fuel if you didn't ever bother with that extra 15-25mph of speed.

MMmm, nice.

the motor is rated to 250w, but we usually drive it between 250-350w (350 is pushing it!). as it's a brushed motor, it's only about 60% efficient. we could easily go half as fast again with a small brushless motor.

the thing that makes these cars unsuitable for the road is that they can't accelerate from a dead stop. as they are endurance racers, we push start them, and they wind up to about 30mph over the course of a half mile or so, and carry on until you have to pit.

stop go traffic would burn a motor out in no time. It's made to carry a fat old lady round town, remember

sorry about all the posts, multiquote only wanted 2 quotes per post!