Train of The Future...Battery Powered That Is!

I'm not quite sure I understand the value of the project.  

I think it's to see how slow people can be moved...I mean 6 people traveled a little over 2 miles in 20 minutes!! 

Probably works pretty well, going down hill. I didn't notice any brakes however. Still don't see the point nor value.

I am missing the point too.  I would think to be viable, a minimum speed would be used.  I could have probably peddled the thing, moved faster, and used no electricity.  Plus, to save weight, why use what looks like solid steel wheels?  I would have looked into something like delrin, possibly with a steel ring.

Then, all the effort to make it aerodynamic, to move at 2 mph?

The future's not quite here yet.  A practical application is a long way off.

Rusty

I think it's neat.  Moving 6 people with less energy than it takes to make an O scale engine move is pretty neat.    I don't know if there is any practical application here intended in the first place, but pushing what is possible does tend to trickle down to real world applications eventually.  

Here's the every-man version which is tons of fun: http://www.powerracingseries.org/  Build an electric car for less than $500 and a Power-Wheels kids toy and go race!

JGL

Great experiment - I see the value in pushing the boundary of low energy requirements; however I don't understand the specification of 6 passengers at average 110 lbs each. That's about 2 or 3 of the rest of us normal folks.......  

It was a competition to look at technologies to increase efficiency, not a prototype demonstration.  I remember a project/competition my nephew was involved in with his Cal Poly engineering team 25 years ago; the winner was the team that went the farthest with an electric car that had to stay under a certain weight. I think they went like 20 miles, and not very fast.  Now we have the Tesla car

Who knows, maybe in 25 years competition like this will lead to an Acela-like train that runs on less power than my Lionel Centipedes, which are real power hogs

Firewood posted:

Great experiment - I see the value in pushing the boundary of low energy requirements; however I don't understand the specification of 6 passengers at average 110 lbs each. That's about 2 or 3 of the rest of us normal folks.......  

Obviously they are MUCH trimmer and slimmer in Sweden than here in the U.S..

I also saw a video of guys that converted golf carts to ride the rails.  I can just see that on a busy piece of CSX mainline that caters to Amtrak (like in Petersburg).

I think they would have to limit it to 1 adult if they tried that experiment here in the US.  My daughter may have a few friends around the 100lb mark, every other adult I know may not even be able to fit inside that thing

Ok, nice experiment, maybe with bigger batteries they have got something?

Would hate to be in that thing if someone cut one loose! 

I suspect that Ace did as well with a bicycle with an out-rigger, but who will ever know.

There are Bi-powered LRT cars:  Getting power from the overhead most of the .

They are claiming a "record" in terms of energy efficiency. More of a technical stunt than a practical application.

It was powered by four 12 V, 45 W batteries linked together in parallel and a 500 W motor.

The team's final efficiency score was 0.84 Wh/person-km (watt-hours for every kilometer traveled by each passenger). Delsbo Electric claims that is a new world record.

"This is a record for rail-based travel," explains project and competition leader Delsbo Electric Lars Gustavsson to Gizmag. "We have done research and not found any information about somebody or something traveling as efficient rail-based in the world. In fact, it seems like Eximus 1 achieved a lower energy consumption per person than the current Shell Eco Marathon record."