California Funds Development of Hydraulic Hybrids

[Tuckerfan1053]

If you'll remember, Preston Tucker's original idea was to use such a system in his cars. [url=http://www.greencarcongress.com/2008/05/htuf-selects-hy.html]Now, California is building pilot vehicles which use this technology to test as delivery trucks.

The Hybrid Truck Users Forum (HTUF), a government-corporate partnership led by CALSTART, has selected Hybra-Drive Systems LLC (HDS) to build three identical Class 6 hydraulic series hybrid delivery trucks for real-world testing by UPS, FedEx Ground and Purolator.

Under the new agreement, which is being funded by the Department of Energy, Hybra-Drive will build and deliver three hydraulic hybrid trucks over the next 9 to 12 months. UPS, FedEx Ground and Purolator then will each conduct a 6 to 9 month evaluation of the vehicle. Hybra-Drive anticipates that the evaluations will demonstrate up to a 60% cut in fuel use along with an accompanying reduction in emissions.

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[NailheadRocketdriver]

The US should have hopped on the Hydrostatic bandwagon a long time ago. I dont know why we didnt. Pumps and lines could fail and conventional transmissions have their advantages, but on a vehicle like a delivery van or a mail truck, who cares? I mean, there is already decent sized tractors that use this technology and they seem to be going along pretty well. You're not exactly going for performance in a utility vehicle, so why not use a simple and efficient propulsion system? It will be cheaper in the long run. Here in MN, we are working to convert all of our buses to alternative fuel, fryer grease and the rest of the buses are being replaced by Hybrids. Both of the buses run just as good as the normal diesel versions did before and you can barely tell the difference in the way that they sound or perform. Now if only the technology that allowed internal combustion engined cars, including old ones to run on alternative fuels was cheap..... the gas prices would drop like a rock. Bush has to keep Halliburton, ExxonMobil, Chevron and BP happy though. Speaking of alternative fuel, check out this new engine/cylinder head system that can be adapted to any car, even a Tucker. You can run your car cleaner and more efficiently. http://www.coatesengine.com/technology.html

[Tuckerfan1053]

The reason we've not done it is because car makers are lazy. In 1974 Car and Driver magazine showed how for $11 you could modify a Pinto to increase mileage by 25%. You can read about it here: http://www.ecomodder.com/blog/2008/03/1 ... mpg-by-25/

Minor modifications that boost fuel economy at a very low price, and the car makers were crying that they couldn't do anything to improve fuel economy.

As for the Coates engine, they've been hawking that for about a decade now, with no biters. The engineers I've talked to about it have serious doubts about the company's claims, and these engineers aren't the type to dismiss stuff out of hand, so I have to think that there's something the company's not telling us.

[NailheadRocketdriver]

That 25% would have helped, but then again, it was a Pinto. Ever see one of those get into a crash with a Galaxy, it isnt pretty Another thing, only 18 MPG with that little car???????? My 3800 pound 56' Oldsmobile Super 88 with its 324 cubic inch v8 and 4 speed automatic transmission got 21 to the gallon out of the factory and about 17-18 in the city. Pintos really were piles of junk if they only got 15 mpg stock and barely more with those modifications. I think that car was a step backwards for Ford. No wonder why the imports got the upper hand.

[NailheadRocketdriver]

Totally Off Topic, but anything we can do to get the porno spammers to stay off the site? People should regularly post here too, to maintain the board so that this stuff doesn't keep getting put on here, especially twice in one day. Sometimes this forum reminds me of the MNOldsclub forum, big gaps between postings and no responses from club members to pertinent threads. not good. It's kinda a bad thing when the threads that get answered sometimes are ones that are 2-3 years old.

[NailheadRocketdriver]

Totally Off Topic, but anything we can do to get the porno spammers to stay off the site? People should regularly post here too, to maintain the board so that this stuff doesn't keep getting put on here, especially twice in one day. Sometimes this forum reminds me of the MNOldsclub forum, big gaps between postings and no responses from club members to pertinent threads. not good. It's kinda a bad thing when the threads that get answered sometimes are ones that are 2-3 years old.

[NailheadRocketdriver]

Totally Off Topic, but anything we can do to get the porno spammers to stay off the site? People should regularly post here too, to maintain the board so that this stuff doesn't keep getting put on here, especially twice in one day. Sometimes this forum reminds me of the MN Oldsclub forum, big gaps between postings and no responses from club members to pertinent threads. not good. It's kinda a bad thing when the threads that get answered sometimes are ones that are 2-3 years old.

[Tuckerfan1053]

Sadly, there's not much that can be done to block the spammers. Everything that we can do to trip the spammers up, gets bypassed by them at some point, so it's an arms race, with us putting in new features to block them, and them coming up with new countermeasures.

As for the lack of people posting here, it would be really nice if that would happen. There's several folks who've forgotten more about Tuckers than I'll ever know. I don't know what the answer is to get them (and everyone else) to contribute more. I wish I did. I've noticed that there's been some board glitches in the past, such as new posts not really showing up, or email notifications not being sent out, which no doubt play a factor in this. Setting up a myspace or facebook page for the club might help raise awareness of the club, but I don't have time to do that, and I wouldn't want to undertake such a thing, even if I did have the time, without the permission of the club. You might want to start a seperate thread on this, to see if you can't get the opinion of other folks on the matter. We might get some ideas to help out.

[NailheadRocketdriver]

Actually, there already isa Facebook page for the Tucker car. It has only three members from this site on it though and a fourth, which would be myself. No one has posted anything interesting on there as of recent though.

[NailheadRocketdriver]

Actually, there already isa Facebook page for the Tucker car. It has only three members from this site on it though and a fourth, which would be myself. No one has posted anything interesting on there as of recent though.