As demand for electric cars continues to grow we have seen a flurry of hybrid cars coming to the market. However, are hybrid vehicles a marketing ploy by the big players?
After all they still use traditional fuels even if the gasoline engine does not directly power the vehicle itself - either recharging the electric batteries or powering the electric motor directly.
You obviously haven’t learned about the Prius line. These are in my educated opinion the best hybrids out there. True parallel hybrids can use either/or/ or both power trains to move the vehicle. On the Prius it’s totally transparent and seamless.
Is it a cheat? No - it’s a compromise. The battery technology hasn’t yet reached the point where all-electric vehicles are on an even playing field with petroleum powered internal combustion engine powered vehicles. Until some major shortcomings of battery technology are overcome, they will not be able to fairly compete with gasoline or diesel powered vehicles.
It takes too long to recharge electric vehicles, limiting their ultimate range. Liquid-fueled vehicles can fill up in a few minutes.
Weight and cost are still way too high for battery powered vehicles. Gas powered vehicles are much lighter and cheaper to purchase.
Infrastructure to charge electric vehicles is not widespread. If you want to drive a Tesla cross-country, you’d better have a few weeks set aside as your only likely charging option will be the 120 volt slow charge method.
Bob in MA
2012 Prius V hybrid
2002 GEM el xd
As bob told Hybrid isn’t a cheat, more like a compromise, thought in my opinion wrong one. If you would think more about putting 2 very different origin engines to drive same vehicle on same axis you might find out that you need very sophisticated gear box, and that would burn huge amount of efficiency. As a matter of fact in real life we tested Nissan Prius only running on electric motor against remade Renault Espace with 3 phase AC motor tuned up to spin up to 10’000 rpm at 144V and with 50KW at that moment max power. Once we compared Renault and Nissan power consumption running at 60Km/h speed results showed that Renault was using less, thought Nissan was driven by higher efficiency motor (BLDC instead AC).
To overcome these obstacles there is another way, similar to hybrid way, only difference that this way car have different motor and generator, and generator is powered by some kind of engine, it can be even gas turbine or ect. which have higher power to weight ratio, and higher efficiency but only close to maximum power. which is no problem for electric vehicle since it can store excess energy to its batteries, and turning off generator once batteries are close to full, and turning it back again when needed. This way fuel will be burned at most available efficiency, and electric car will be able to go much longer distances, and replenish it’s energy source way faster. but that have it’s downside too. Basically now you need to have 2 controllers and 2 motors, one as driving motor, other as generator. And by the way this way it is proven to be working very well, thought on very BIG vehicles. Where one huge internal combustion engine drives generator and generated power is distributed to 4 motors, for 1 motor per wheel.
It isn’t a cheat…
If, as many people expect, electric cars become the norm in the future, will hybrids become obsolete?
At this moment time the general opinion seems to be that hybrid vehicles are a stepping stone from traditional gasoline/petrol vehicles towards all electric cars of the future. If this is the case, will hybrid vehicles become obsolete or will some drivers always require that added safety net of a hybrid?
The way we produce electric for recharging, and storage technologies will have to advance greatly before there is any worry about petro burning or hybrids vehicles becoming obsolete. At this time there is no ecological benefit when most electric is coal fired. That is aside from the destructive methods used to mine coal.
Considering the success of the Toyota Prius I don’t think it is a “cheat.” Toyota is starting to turn the Prius into a whole new brand practically.
Perhaps the electric car industry should have promoted hybrids first and then moved onto electric cars? The jump from hybrids to electric cars might not be as scary for motorists?