A Ford Motor Company engineer has built a 3-wheel motorbike capable of getting 125 mpg.
The fuel economy expert crafted the vehicle at his home shop in Belleville, MI. It’s a street legal, two-passenger, 3-wheel motorbike that is made from aircraft materials. Oh, and it is capable of a top speed of over 100 mph. Read the rest of this entry »
A team of British designers have created a new racing car made entirely of vegetables and powered by … chocolate.
The car, named the ecoF3, has a steering wheel made of carrots, a body made of potatoes and a seat made of soybeans. The team, from World First Racing, hope that environmentally-friendly technology used in their car will be adopted by Formula 1 teams such as McLaren and world champions Ferrari.
It took 10 years, but Richard Jenkins — a British engineer from Hampshire — has broken the land speed record for a wind-powered vehicle.
The Ecotricity Greenbird, on the dry plains of Ivanpah Lake just south of Las Vegas, hit a record breaking 126.1 mph. A speed which is 10 mph faster than the previous record which was set by American Bob Schumacher in 1999, driving his Iron Duck vehicle. Read the rest of this entry »
Rock legend Neil Young has never made a secret of his radical eco-credentials. Now it seems he’s putting his (non-fossil fuel based) creative juices to good use by releasing an entire concept album about … electric cars.
The album, called Fork in the Road, focuses on the singer’s most recent obsession – a retooled 1959 Lincoln Continental that runs entirely on alternative energy. Its main themes are inspired by Young’s involvement with the Lincvolt Project, a collaboration between the singer and biodiesel innovator Johnathan Goodwin to develop a commercially viable electric power system for automobiles.
Following the earlier release of a single, also called Fork in the Road (video), Young’s label Warner Reprise have announced that the album will be available on April 7, and revealed the full tracklist (after the jump).
Last week, the New York Daily News published a story about Ms. Sheila Bolar, 49, who was so upset that the NY city bus picking her up was not a hybrid that SHE BIT THE BUS DRIVER.
Really.
According to MTA bus driver Peter Williams, Ms. Bolar was visibly upset when he picked her up on New York’s upper West Side. “She came on the bus, and she said she waited more than an hour for a hybrid,” he explained. I told her “I’m not in control of what bus is assigned to me.”
More evidence that we’ve been bought out by the Weekly World News after the jump.
Last week, Nick told you about the plastic surgeon who discovered he could use the fat from liposuctions to fuel his two SUVs. He’s not the first person to use human fat for biodiesel, as Team Earthrace used the captain’s liposuctioned fat to beat the world record for circumventing the Earth powered by biodiesel.
In the category of “Things I’d Rather Never Read About Again,” we’ve found a winner.A plastic surgeon in Los Angeles has discovered that he can use the fat he liposuctions off of his patients to provide all the biodiesel he needs to power his and his girlfriend’s SUVs. Not only that, he says he has extra. I wonder if he’s willing to share?
Got the heebies yet?
Alan Bittner, a high scale Beverly Hills doctor, has been making the liposuctioned human fat into biodiesel for some time now. There are lots of rendering firms in the US — like Tyson Farms, for instance — that already take similar waste, such as poultry fat, and turn it into biodiesel, but I’m imaging that Bittner is the first guy to actually turn human fat into fuel.
As the tourist trolley bus made it’s way down Penn Ave, instead of ogling the famous buildings, the tourists seemed more interested in checking out the bright yellow Smart fortwo car parked at the curb, just a few feet from me. I heard the tour guide say something about the building I work in as he stopped at the light, then I saw a middle aged husband and wife pointing at the car, and telling their kids to “Check out that cute little car!” “Wow!” exclaimed a boy of about ten, “That’s just my size!” The light turned green, they were off, and I was left standing, looking at something that I see every day in this city.
Inevitably, whenever we post about small electric cars, funky three-wheelers, or any other small fuel-efficient vehicle here at Gas 2.0, we get typical responses along the lines of “It may get 60 mpg, but that thing’s a death trap,” or “It’s nice to drive electric, but would you trust that car to your family?”
After this morning’s shenanigans, I can unequivocally say “Yes. Yes I would trust my family to a small fuel-efficient car, and I’m miraculously alive and mostly uninjured… so no, it’s not a death trap.”
Who would have imagined, a luxury rickshaw in Beijing. China’s Legal Evening Post says the tricycle, dubbed “The Other Rickshaw”, was designed and produced by BMW.
The company that owns the vehicle, Chen De Bao, says it’s the only rickshaw of its kind in the world.
According to the article, the passenger area is the original rear half of a Mini car body, completely equipped with safety belts, gold-plated dragons and various other Chinese decorations. In other words, it’s a bicycle pulling a two-wheeled car body.
The driver of the rickshaw, Song, put it mildly, saying it’s “rather” heavy and takes a lot of effort to run.”
Can you imagine a pair of 300-pounders asking for a tour of the city? All downhill, of course.
Image: Ananova
It’s not all about Sarah Palin in Alaska you know. The latest news from the last frontier (or should that be the final frontier?) is that Alaskan police have pulled over a solar-powered car, which they mistakenly identified as a UFO.For almost two years, Canadian Marcelo da Luz has been driving his solar-powered car, the Power of 1 (Xof1 for short) across North America in an attempt to set a world distance record for a solar vehicle. When he reached Alaska earlier this week, the admittedly off-the-wall looking car was spotted by a concerned citizen, who dialled 911 to report a UFO sighting. Alaskan police quickly took off in hot pursuit, and pulled poor Marcelo over for interrogation.
It’s early in the pre-dawn dark hours of the morning. A group of Northern California pseudohippies just finished a game of Zonk — or rather, the game just stopped because somebody quoted a line from Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle and everybody forgot what they were doing.
Yet, by a stroke of luck, the conversation about Harold and Kumar reminds the group of their real reason for staying up so late. They pack into a truck and head down to the local fast food joint looking to load up — but it’s not the food they’re loading up on, it’s the nasty, half-rotted, leftover fryer grease.
British car-maker Lotus has unveiled an environmentally-friendly concept car, which is partly made of hemp, at the British International Motor Show. The Lotus Eco-Elise (pictured above) sports body panels manufactured entirely from hemp (they’re the brown bits on the roof and bonnet).
Compared to metal, hemp is a very lightweight material, which helps to improve vehicle performance and promote greater fuel-efficiency. Hemp is also a renewable, lightweight material that absorbs CO2 through photosynthesis. In addition, the particular type of hemp used by Lotus is ethically produced in close proximity to the manufacturing plant, keeping a lid on the emissions made through transportation.
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