Car runs on compressed air, but will it sell?

[abdulhakeem]

not really new but still interesting:

Lofty idea initially aimed at French market

Oct. 4, 2004
Associated Press

PARIS - Record-high oil prices might seem like bad news for the auto industry. But one European manufacturer plans to make a type of car unaffected by $50-a-barrel crude — cars that run on compressed air.

Luxembourg-based Moteur Developpment International is gearing up for the launch of its Air Car line next year.

"It's safe, doesn't pollute, doesn't explode, it's not poisonous and it's not expensive," said MDI representative Sebastien Braud.

The company says the cars will initially go on sale in France, where the first assembly line is due to start production in the middle of next year.

The MiniCATS three-seater compact, a commercial version of a prototype showcased at the 2002 Paris Motor Show, will be priced at $9,850. The CitiCATS six-seater sedan will retail for $16,000.

How it works

In both cars, an electric pump compresses air into the tank at a pressure of 300 bars. The pump plugs straight into an ordinary household socket and takes four hours to complete the recharge.

"When you get home you normally plug in your cell phone," said Braud. "Well, now you do that with your car too."

The already attractive economics of the Air Car — MDI claims a recharge costs just $2.50 at French electricity prices — can only get more persuasive if oil prices stay high.

"It certainly can't hurt," said Braud. "It will help encourage people to switch over."

The Air Car's pistons, pumped by the escaping compressed air, can take the vehicle up to 70 miles per hour. It can travel 50 miles at top speed on a full tank, or further at lower speeds.

Slightly pricier hybrid versions achieve higher speeds and longer ranges by running on a combination of compressed air and conventional gasoline, or bio-fuels derived from organic matter.

MDI says the air-only models meet the needs of most urban drivers, who average just 11 miles a day. And the only exhaust that comes out of the tail pipe is cold air.

Limited appeal, benefits?

But auto analysts play down the Air Car's chances of taking off, unless a major car maker buys the technology and markets it through its own network.

"If you buy a Peugeot or a Renault, you know that there's a dealer close by if you have a problem," said Gaetan Toulemonde of Deutsche Bank Securities. "If your car has only one dealer in France, what are you going to do when it needs repairs?"

Toulemonde said about 10,000 electric cars had been sold in France since major manufacturers introduced them a decade ago. Many now outperform the Air Car in terms of speed and range but nonetheless remain niche products.

Environmentalists are also wary about the Air Car's claimed benefits. Converting energy from electricity to compressed air is inefficient, according to Karsten Krause of the European Federation for Transport and Environment, a green lobby group based in Brussels.

By consuming much more energy from the power plant than it delivers on the road, Krause said, it could even do as much environmental damage as some gasoline cars.

"You may not have any pollution from the car itself," he said, "but you're just transferring the environmental burden to another place."

Krause's organization pushes a much simpler recipe for cutting greenhouse gas and toxic emissions from vehicles. If consumers ditched their SUVs and four-liter guzzlers and chose engine capacities reflecting their real needs, he said, fuel consumption would drop by a third.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6138972/

further reading:

http://www.mdi.lu

http://www.theaircar.com

[abdulhakeem]

Revolutionary air car runs on compressed air

Mike Aivaz and Muriel Kane
Friday January 4, 2008

BBC News is reporting that a French company has developed a pollution-free car which runs on compressed air. India's Tata Motors has the car under production and it may be on sale in Europe and India by the end of the year.

The air car, also known as the Mini-CAT or City Cat, can be refueled in minutes from an air compressor at specially equipped gas stations and can go 200 km on a 1.5 euro fill-up -- roughly 125 miles for $3. The top speed will be almost 70 mph and the cost of the vehicle as low as $7000.

The car features a fibreglass body and a revolutionary electrical system and is completely computer-controlled. It is powered by the expansion of compressed air, using no combustion at all, and the exhaust is entirely clean and cool enough for use in the internal air conditioning system.

Tata Motors is known for its interest in innovation and has been selling compressed gas buses since 2000. It is currently working on producing the world's cheapest car, which will be almost 100% plastic and will sell in India for about $2500.

Tata is also expanding into the world market. It acquired Korea's Daweoo in 2004 and is now the top bidder to purchase the originally British Jaguar and Land Rover lines from the United States' troubled Ford Motor Company.

The following video (http://www.rawprint.com/media/2008/0801/bbc_world_jan04_2008_air_car.flv) is from BBC's BBC World, broadcast on January 04, 2008

http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Air_car_runs_on_compressed_air_0104.html

[Arsalan]

The new Audio A2 model does at least 65 Miles to the gallon and it runs on Diesel.

About £7000 , a worthier investment then this crap. And very attractive with current oil price trends particularly in western Europe.

[Arsalan]

The new Audio A2 model does at least 65 Miles to the gallon and it runs on Diesel.

About £7000 , a worthier investment then this crap. And very attractive with current oil price trends particularly in western Europe.


Here you go and its only £6000, affordable, fuel effecient , reliable and effecient. ......

2003 AUDI A2 1.4 TDI SE 5dr Diesel Hatchback

Price:
£5,895





Features:

52,000 miles
Manual
BLACK
Diesel
Hatchback
1422 cc
Full Description:

Glossary of Terms (http://www.autotrader.co.uk/common/ola/help/carshelp.jsp#glossaryterms)
Manual, 52,000 miles, BLACK 2003 52 REG, 1.4 TDI SE, 5 SPEED MANUAL, 52000 MILES, ONE OWNER FROM NEW, 11 MONTHS MOT, 12 MONTHS TAX, FULL AUDI SERVICE HISTORY, ABS, PAS, TRACTION CONTROL, MULTIPLE AIRBAGS, ESP, ALARM, REMOTE CENTRAL LOCKING. DIGITAL CLIMATE CONTROL, CRUISE CONTROL, COMPUTER, ELECTRIC WINDOWS, ELECTRIC HEATED MIRRORS, ELECTRIC SEATS, AUDI 6 CD FRONT LOADING STEREO / TAPE PLAYER, FRONT AND REAR HEADRESTS, FOLDING REAR SEATS, XENNON LIGHTS, FOGLIGHTS, ALLOYWHEELS, REAR SPOILER, FULLY COLOUR CODED, 60/70 MPG, VERY RARE CAR WITH ALL THESE EXTRAS WELL WORTH A LOOK. LOOKS AND DRIVES SUPERB. £5,895.

Trade Seller:

[abdulhakeem]

Five-seat concept car runs on air

Wednesday, 13 February 2008#
By Roger Harrabin
Environment analyst, BBC News

Video: Test driving the clean car (http://news.bbc.co.uk/player/nol/newsid_7240000/newsid_7242000/7242070.stm?bw=bb&mp=rm&asb=1&news=1&bbcws=1)

An engineer has promised that within a year he will start selling a car that runs on compressed air, producing no emissions at all in town.

The OneCAT will be a five-seater with a fibre-glass body, weighing just 350kg and could cost just over £2,500.

It will be driven by compressed air stored in carbon-fibre tanks built into the chassis.

The tanks can be filled with air from a compressor in just three minutes - much quicker than a battery car.

Alternatively, it can be plugged into the mains for four hours and an on-board compressor will do the job.

For long journeys the compressed air driving the pistons can be boosted by a fuel burner which heats the air so it expands and increases the pressure on the pistons. The burner will use all kinds of liquid fuel.

The designers say on long journeys the car will do the equivalent of 120mpg. In town, running on air, it will be cheaper than that.

"The first buyers will be people who care about the environment," says French inventor Guy Negre.

"It also has to be economical."

Major savings

Mr Negre has been promising for more than a decade to be on the verge of a breakthrough. Independent observers are more convinced this time because he recently secured backing from the giant Indian conglomerate Tata to put the finishing touches to the engine.

Tata is the only big firm he'll license to sell the car - and they are limited to India. For the rest of the world he hopes to persuade hundreds of investors to set up their own factories, making the car from 80% locally-sourced materials.

"This will be a major saving in total emissions," he says.

"Imagine we will be able to save all those components travelling the world and all those transporters."

He wants each local factory to sell its own cars to cut out the middle man and he aims for 1% of global sales - about 680,000 per year.

Terry Spall from the Institution of Mechanical Engineers says: "I really hope he succeeds. It is a really brave experiment in producing a sustainable car."

But he said he was interested to see how the car would fare with safety tests and how much it would appeal to a public conditioned to expect luxury fittings adding to the weight of the vehicle.

Mr Negre says there's no issue with safety - if the air-car crashes the air tanks won't shatter - they will split with a very loud bang. "The biggest risk is to the ears."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7241909.stm

[imported_MMS]

what happens if you crash in that little plastic car :S

[Phoenix CG]

do they purposely make these ugly?

[abdulhakeem]

Air-Powered Car Coming to U.S. in 2009 to 2010 at Sub-$18,000, Could Hit 1000-Mile Range

By Matt Sullivan
February 22, 2008

The Air Car caused a huge stir when we reported last year that Tata Motors would begin producing it (http://www.popularmechanics.com/automotive/new_cars/4217016.html?series=19) in India. Now the little gas-free ride that could is headed Stateside in a big-time way.

Zero Pollution Motors (http://zeropollutionmotors.us/) (ZPM) confirmed to PopularMechanics.com on Thursday that it expects to produce the world’s first air-powered car (http://www.popularmechanics.com/automotive/new_cars/4251491.html?series=19#) for the United States by late 2009 or early 2010. As the U.S. licensee for Luxembourg-based MDI, which developed the Air Car as a compression-based alternative to the internal combustion engine, ZPM has attained rights to build the first of several modular plants, which are likely to begin manufacturing in the Northeast and grow for regional production around the country, at a clip of up to 10,000 Air Cars per year.

And while ZPM is also licensed to build MDI’s two-seater OneCAT economy model (the one headed for India) and three-seat MiniCAT (like a SmartForTwo without the gas), the New Paltz, N.Y., startup is aiming bigger: Company officials want to make the first air-powered car to hit U.S. roads a $17,800, 75-hp equivalent, six-seat modified version of MDI’s CityCAT (pictured above) that, thanks to an even more radical engine, is said to travel as far as 1000 miles at up to 96 mph with each tiny fill-up.

We’ll believe that when we drive it, but MDI’s new dual-energy engine—currently being installed in models at MDI facilities overseas—is still pretty damn cool in concept. After using compressed air fed from the same Airbus-built tanks in earlier models to run its pistons, the next-gen Air Car has a supplemental energy source to kick in north of 35 mph, ZPM says. A custom heating chamber heats the air in a process officials refused to elaborate upon, though they insisted it would increase volume and thus the car’s range and speed.

“I want to stress that these are estimates, and that we’ll know soon more precisely from our engineers,” ZPM spokesman Kevin Haydon told PM, “but a vehicle with one tank of air and, say, 8 gal. of either conventional petrol, ethanol or biofuel could hit between 800 and 1000 miles.”

Those figures would make the Air Car, along with Aptera’s Typ-1 (http://www.popularmechanics.com/automotive/new_cars/4237853.html?series=19) and Tesla’s Roadster (http://www.popularmechanics.com/blogs/automotive_news/3700136.html?series=19), a favorite among early entrants for the Automotive X Prize (http://www.popularmechanics.com/blogs/automotive_news/4244759.html?series=19), for which MDI and ZPM have already signed up. But with the family-size, four-door CityCAT undergoing standard safety tests in Europe, then side-impact tests once it arrives in the States, could it be the first 100-mpg, nonelectric car you can actually buy?

photo:
The CityCAT, already being developed in India (bottom left), will be available for U.S. production in three different four-door styles. But it's the radical dual-energy engine, with a possible 1000-mile range at 96 mph, that could move the Air Car beyond Auto X Prize dreams and into American garages.

http://www.popularmechanics.com/automotive/new_cars/4251491.html?series=19

[Rosalie-Beauty]

whoa. It looks like it ran into a wall and never got fixed.

Why are environmentaly-sound cars so hideous?

[Riceball]

I personally don't care about the 'echo friendly' rubbish! I am more interested in looks + performance... So I rather get a not so echo friendly car! :)

[abdulhakeem]

Compressed air car coming with 2010 Breeze

BY JOSH MAX
Monday, March 24th 2008

New Paltz, N.Y., has long been known as a bastion of progressive thinking, living and being, man. So it's no surprise the town is headquarters for a company planning to produce the world's first air-powered automobile for the U.S. by 2010. The France-based Zero Pollution Motors says it's manufacturing 10,000 vehicles in its first year and expects to sell them for about $17,800. The cars will have 75 horsepower — that's a little less than the SmartForTwo — will seat six and will produce zero emissions.

"Electricity powers an onboard compressor to compress air to 4,500 pounds per square inch into a pressure tank contained in the vehicle," ZPM communications director Kevin Haydon told the Daily News from New Paltz. "This can be done in a garage overnight and it will take 1-2 hours. The compressed air is then used to power the engine."

Their car will travel about 1,000 miles at up to 96 mph on one fill-up.

Haydon says he's received over 3,000 e-mails in the last month alone from people wanting to know more, or get an air car. "They're saying things like 'I need an alternative to sky-high gas prices,' and 'I am really concerned about pollution and CO2 emissions and want to reduce my own carbon footprint.' Many express disappointment and mystification that big automakers haven't made more progress on fuel efficiency and emissions, and some even want to volunteer to promote the air car to their friends and communities."

ZPM's parent company, Motor Development International, is a 15-year-old French-based business headed by Air Car inventor Guy Negre. A former aeronautics and Formula One racecar engineer, Negre worked with his son, Cyril, an engineer with Bugatti, and about 30 other engineers to bring the compressed air technology to market. To date, the company holds patents in over 120 countries for their Air Car vehicles. "The air car was born out of Guy's passion for building energy efficient engines for automobiles and airplanes," Haydon says.

"It was a logical next step for him to create clean, ecofriendly engines. The green concept goes beyond the cars themselves and into production. The MDI business model is to license many small regional factories throughout the world that also serve as distributors. The whole concept cuts down the carbon emissions associated with vehicle manufacture and distribution by well over a half."

ZPM will begin taking reservations in early 2008 for U.S. deliveries of the Air Car in early 2010.

http://www.nydailynews.com/services/autos/2008/03/24/2008-03-24_compressed_air_car_coming_with_2010_bree.html

[Stogie]

what happens if you crash in that little plastic car :S


Anyone that knows anything about the properties of compressed air at 225 to 300 bar will tell you that if you crash and an air bottle gets ruptured there will be an lethal explosion. The fragments could rip a mans head off 100 yards away. All someone has to do is pull out in front of you and BOOOOM.

For this reason alone this idea is a non starter.

Its a nice idea, but its back to the drawing board.