Anyone thought of a Hybrid Metro?

[Mohave]

I spend way too much time driving in traffic each day and have been thinking lately of converting my Metro to a hybrid. Have there been any discussions here in the past on this topic?

[DavidLang]

Back in the late 60's, early 70's Whole Earth Catalog carried a story about a Hybrid Corvair. As I remember it used a 5 hp Briggs & Stratton, a generator, batteries, and a starter motor from a jet engine. It seems this configuration would work in a Metro too. The Metro keeps coming up in online discussions as being ideal for an all electric car project. I suppose a hybrid would be more practical.

How about an electric trailer that pushes you along? http://www.jstraubel.com/EVpusher/EVpusher2.htm. Not quite the same but it gives you the general idea.

For now I'm sitting tight keeping my two Metros on the road and letting things settle a bit.

[Mohave]

The hybrid trailer gives me some interesting ideas for supplemental power for towing a boat.

I am thinking about adding a 10 HP 48 volt electric motor to the existing engine and use it for additional power on on-ramps and when starting and stopping in city or heavy commute traffic. There is a similar, and much larger, electrocharger out there, but it is not available and their web site has not been updated in years.

[frets14]

I've been toying with the idea of either running the Metro engine on hydrogen extracted from water thru eloctrolosis or supplementing the fuel/air intake with hydrogen to increase the mileage. When I had the head off my Metro this summer, I coated the top of the pistons and valves with a high temperature ceramic coating. However, I got sidetracked from that project when I had to install a furnace and heat pump in my home. Perhaps I'll be able to follw up on it in the near future. The furnace/heat pump isn't quite right yet and it will still be a high priority until it's correct. By the way, coating the pistons and valves have not altered the way the car runs at all.

[tmaxmetro]

Any way you slice it - its gonna be hard to beat the 3cyl which is already in the metro - especially for the price and ease of use.

I've seen quite a few Kubota 2 cyl and 3 cyl diesels around - a diesel powered Metro would be a neat toy... something in the 25 - 35hp range. There was someone (was it a university experiment?) on the net who converted a metro to a Kubota diesel - ran it on bio-diesel and almost hit 100mpg (if memory serves).

I believe there are already electric kits for the metro - but the kits are pricey ($7k) and then you're left dealing with lots of expensive batteries.

cheers,

[Mohave]

My initial idea was to add about a 20 hp electric motor to the metro, which would be in the same category as my Civic Hybrid. About 20K for the motor, controller, and batteries. Then I scaled the idea back to a 10 hp golf cart motor, 48 volt with 4 batteries, a small regin controller, and a small go/regen lever next to the transmission selector. Total cost would be around 1.5 K.

I just bought the Civic and I am impressed with its power and mileage. A manual version might work in the Metro.