LATEST TRENDS IN AUTOMOBILES
Abstract
In this paper, the latest trends in automobile are discussed. The object of this paper is to provide an intermediate solution to the problem of limited fossil fuels. Hydrogen, electric-fuel cell and bio-diesel offer a better longer-term solution from imported petroleum. So, the intermediate solution to the problem of limited fossil fuels is “HYBRIDS”. Hybrids just prolong the time period in which gas runs out. Now, coming to the latest trends in automobiles is Gasoline + Electric power. The hybrid-powered cars operate in the combination of both gasoline & electric power.
The main advantage of these hybrid vehicles is that they have a provision for shutting off the gasoline engine when the car is stopped. So, fuel is not wasted while idling. The hybrid drive runs on both the gas and the electric motors to produce continuously variable output, a process the inventor calls “torque amplification”. The parts of automobile that transmit power from the engine to the driving wheels make up the power train. But the latest trend in automobile is “hybrid power train” which gains respect and is discussed below.
1. INTRODUCTION
Two motivators for the use of hydrogen as an energy carrier today are:
1. To provide a transition strategy from hydrocarbon fuels to a carbonless society.
2. To enable renewable energy sources. The motivation requires a little discussion while the second one is self-evident.
The most common and cost effective way to produce hydrogen today is the reformation of hydrocarbon fuels specifically natural gas.
Power train is one that transmits power from the engine to the driving wheels. This power train forms one of the parts of an automobile. These are the clutch, transmission, drive shaft and differential. In most of the cars, power is delivered to the rear wheels (rear-wheel drive). Increasing number of car engines however, transmit power to the front wheels (front-wheel drive).
The popular hybrid vehicles, which have been introduced officially by Lexus, are RX 400h and RX 330.The hybrid functioning is nothing but based on gasoline and electric power. Commonly in automobiles “gasoline engine” is dominant. The battery power is supplementary in Honda vehicles then the electric motors come into play. Whereas in Toyota vehicles, it is quite opposite with a gasoline engine providing additional power.
The present trends in automobiles are nothing but these are running with battery and electric system. Electric automobile is a motor vehicle powered by rechargeable batteries without the use of other fuel. The advantage of these hybrid vehicles is: in both systems, the battery is recharged while driving. At times, when the car is coasting. Neither gasoline nor electric power is needed, they need not be plugged into an electrical outlet for charging.
2. HOW AN AUTOMOBILE CREATES ENERGY?
When fuel mixes with air in the engine of an automobile, a very powerful chemical reaction takes place. Gasoline combines with oxygen to produce new gases and a great deal of heat. The gases expand violently inside the combustion chamber of the engine and turn the motor to propel the car.
Much of the chemical energy in the automobile is lost in the form of heat energy that doesn’t work to move the car. Instead, parts of the vehicle absorb the heat. The hot gases push the pistons up and down.
This vertical motion is then changed to a rotary motion and causes the wheels to move. Pistons move up and down the cylinders several thousands times a minute. Fuel must be continually burned and exhaust gases removed to keep a car running.
2.1 Gasoline
Perhaps, the most widely used product refined from petroleum is gasoline. Gasoline is burned in an internal-combustion engine to provide energy to power automobiles, airplanes, and other machinery. In some English –speaking countries, such as the United Kingdom, gasoline is referred to as petrol. Gasoline is a complex mixture containing hundreds of different hydrocarbons. Hydrocarbons are compounds comprised of the chemical elements hydrogen and carbon. Most of the hydrocarbons in gasoline contain 4 to 12 carbon atoms per molecule, but they differ widely in structure. Gasoline is used as an automobile fuel because it easily evaporates to a gas, or vaporizes, even at ordinary temperatures. When it is burned, it releases a great deal of energy. This energy of combustion can be contained within a system to do work such as drive an engine.
One such additive designed to improve the combustion of gasoline is tetraethyl lead (TEL). Gasoline to which TEL has been added is called ethyl gasoline. An internal-combustion engine runs best on a fuel that burns smoothly without exploding, or knocking. The addition of TEL causes gasoline to burn with less knocking. It has been determined, however, that the lead of TEL in ethyl gasoline produces poisonous lead oxide exhaust. Because of increased awareness of the problem of air pollution, automobiles are now manufactured to accept lead free gasoline.
2.2 Power Train
The parts of the automobile that transmit power from the engine to the driving wheels makeup the power train. These are the clutch, transmission, drive shaft, and differential. Due to the power delivered to the rear wheels, transmission of power to the front wheels, which improves the traction because the engines weight is centered over the wheels that power the automobile. It also eliminates the drive shaft and the hump in the automobiles floor to accommodate it. This, in turn, increases interior legroom. An alternative with similar advantages is the rear-engine, rear-wheel, drive automobile. Four-wheel drive automobiles have been better traction and are generally used to travel rough country or to drive through snow.
2.3 Hybrid power trains
The latest trends in gasoline + electric power Figure 1.
Figure 1. Detroit city
DETROIT-Hybrid-powered cars which operate on a combination of gasoline and battery power. Detroit, is a city placed in Michigan situated in Canada which is also near to the United States Of America named after this city to the Hybrid powered car.
Background: Detroit has been a city of industrial excitement ever since Henry Ford rolled his first rickety contraption out of his shed and onto the streets of the city back in 1896. Detroit, the nation's seventh largest city, is a land of immense industrial power, and it owes almost all of it to the automobile. In a real sense they make Detroit "America's muscle”.
2.4 Luxury Hybrids
At Detroit’s auto show in early January 2004,Lexus officially introduced a hybrid sport-utility vehicle based on the popular RX 330 (Figure.2), RX 400h will have a second generation version of Toyota’s Hybrid synergy Drive that generates upto 270HP. Lexus general manager Denny Clements calls RX 400h “The World’s First Luxury Hybrid Vehicle” and promises a driving range of more than 600 miles on one tank of gasoline.
Figure.2 A Back-View of RX 330.
Toyota also will offer a Hybrid ‘SUV’, using it’s Highlander as a foundation. With output of 270 HP, The Highlander Hybrid can accelerate to 60mph in less than 8 seconds, while yielding better fuel economy than a compact sedan.
2.5 Hybrid Accord
This fall, Honda will make a Hybrid power train available for it’s top selling Accord V-6 sedan. Innovative Variable Cylinder Management Technology is supposed to give it a better performance than a regular V-6 sedan, combined with four-cylinder fuel economy. Even Mercedes – Benz got into the act in Detroit, with an S-class sedan dubbed the world’s first rear-wheel-drive hybrid concept vehicle.
2.5.1. How They Work?
Two different systems are used in today’s models. In Honda vehicles, the gasoline engine is dominant. Battery power is supplementary. Electric motors come into play, augmenting the output of the gas engine, when extra energy is needed for accelerating, passing or merging.
Toyota’s system is essentially opposite, with the gasoline engine providing additional power. For that reason, a Prius can run for a while on battery power alone. When you stop on the accelerator pedal, the gasoline engine switches on and the two power sources work in unison.
2.5.2. Go and Charge:
In both systems, the battery is recharged while driving, at times when the car is coasting and when neither gasoline nor electric power is needed (temporarily). Hybrid automobiles never need to be plugged into an electrical outlet for charging. If driven under more demanding conditions, with little or no coasting, the gasoline engine will keep operating as long as needed until the battery is suitably charged.
Without sophisticated computer control, hybrids could not function at all. The computer must constantly analyze operating conditions to determine which power sources need to be active, and to what extent. The driver needs no action. Hybrid systems work transparently. The only evidence of their presence is a tiny jolt when the gasoline engine turns itself on or off.
Hybrid vehicles also have a provision for shutting off the gasoline engine when the car is stopped, so fuel is not wasted while idling. In Honda's hybrids, the gasoline engine starts up again when you push on the accelerator pedal, or move the manual shift lever into first gear. Toyotas can start off from a stoplight or stop sign under battery power alone. The gasoline engine kicks on when its additional energy is needed.
2.5.3. Miles of Appeal:
Frugal gas mileage is the main attraction. According to EPA estimates, the 2004 Prius can get up to 60 miles per gallon in city driving and 51 mpg on the highway. Honda's Civic Hybrid earns an EPA estimate of 48-mpg city/ 47 mpg highway with manual shift, or 46/51 mpg with a continuously variable (clutchless) transmission.
Because gasoline prices are still near their lowest point ever, compared to the overall cost of living, fuel savings alone aren't enough to offset the price of a hybrid automobile. Shoppers are turning to hybrids because they produce fewer emissions, and because they don't like to drive wasteful vehicles. In short, many buy hybrids because "it's the right thing to do," rather than for strict economic reasons.
2.5.4. Why hybrids are for today:
Hybrids are an intermediate solution to the problem of limited fossil fuels. Hydrogen, electric, fuel cell (right) and biodiesel offer a better longer-term solution from imported petroleum. Hybrids just prolong the date in which gas runs out. In effect, the more fuel efficient we become, the slower the rate of rising gas prices and ergo buys us time to develop alternative fuels. We’ll all be using gas until an alternative technology ends up costing us less.
2.5.5. Performance factor:
If all else – performance, safety, reliability, etc. – were equal, not many people would buy a hybrid. But they are not. The Escape and Accord and the RX400h are expected to offer better performance, for less gas due to their high-torque electric motor.
Let’s take the hybrid Honda for example, if you drive 15,000 miles a year and gas averages $2.50 a gallon, you could save $391 a year on fuel. Include the tax deduction, add additional interest for the extra $3,300 you’ll need to shell out, and in 5 years, you could still be $1,200 or more behind a normal Accord. So ask yourself. Is the additional performance, and the earth-friendly glow of the digital dashboard worth the extra cash? You might decide yes, but certainly it’s not a bad thing to say no.
Let’s take the hybrid Honda for example, if you drive 15,000 miles a year and gas averages $2.50 a gallon, you could save $391 a year on fuel. Include the tax deduction, add additional interest for the extra $3,300 you’ll need to shell out, and in 5 years, you could still be $1,200 or more behind a normal Accord. So ask yourself. Is the additional performance, and the earth-friendly glow of the digital dashboard worth the extra cash? You might decide yes, but certainly it’s not a bad thing to say no.
Figure.4 Hybrid Car (RX400h Engine)
2.5.6. Hybrid successor? Or rival?
The drive runs both gas and electric motors to produce continuously variable output, a process the inventor calls “torque amplification.” Many of the designs are similar to continuously variable transmissions (CVTs) used by such vehicles as the Toyota Prius, Ford Five Hundred/Mercury Montego (4WD), and the Nissan Murano. Because the drive uses electric motors, it resembles the Prius closely, though, according to Van Cor, the symbiotic drive would always be engaged unlike the Prius engine which switches to gasoline depending on driving conditions.
3. Electric Automobile
A motor vehicle powered by rechargeable batteries without the use of other fuel. The first electric automobiles were produced from the 1880s until the 1920s. Such cars had low speed and limited range but were quiet, with low maintenance costs. They were rendered unpopular by the advent of cars with powerful internal-combustion engines, which were also eventually cheaper to produce. Because of concern over petroleum scarcity and pollution, new experimental versions of electric cars emerged beginning in the 1960s. Their speed and range increased somewhat, but the cars showed no sign of catching on. In mid-1990, General Motors announced the creation of an electric car, Impact, which could reach a top speed of 75 miles (121 kilometers) per hour and could travel 120 miles (193 kilometers) on one charge, though it could not do both at the same time.
The inefficiency of the battery (one twentieth the fuel efficiency of gasoline-fueled cars) prohibits mass marketing, along with the cost of replacing the lead-acid battery. Several experimental, electrically powered automobiles were built in Europe during the 1880s. One of the first "electrics" in the United States was produced by William Morrison in 1891. About 54 United States manufacturers turned out almost 35,000 electric cars between 1896 and 1915--the period of their greatest popularity. The Columbia, the Baker, and the Riker were among the more famous makes.
The electric car ran smoothly and was simple to operate. However, it did not run efficiently at speeds of more than 20 miles per hour and could not travel more than 50 miles without having its batteries recharged.
At a solar and electric power exposition in Phoenix, Ariz., a man attends to an experimental electric car made by California Electric Cars.
4. CONCLUSION
Research and development in automobile manufacturing are centered on substituting fossil fuels. Hydrogen electric fuel cells, with hybrid accord is the current trend. Hydrogen is an abundant and productive fuel with many potential uses. Transition to “Hydrogen Economy” is on its way barriers do exist, can be broken with education environmental impacts of hydrogen energy are low. These facts make hydrogen the energy of the future.
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