Hybrid electric vehicle

A hybrid electric vehicle (HEV) is a type of hybrid vehicle and electric vehicle that combines a conventional internal combustion engine (ICE) propulsion system with an electric propulsion system (hybrid vehicle drivetrain). The presence of the electric powertrain is intended to achieve either better fuel economy than a conventional vehicle or better performance. There are a variety of HEV types, and the degree to which each functions as an electric vehicle (EV) varies as well. The most common form of HEV is the hybrid electric car, although hybrid electric trucks (pickups and tractors) and buses also exist.

Modern HEVs make use of efficiency-improving technologies such as regenerative brakes, which converts the vehicle's kinetic energy into electric energy to charge the battery, rather than wasting it as heat energy as conventional brakes do. Some varieties of HEVs use their internal combustion engine to generate electricity by spinning an electrical generator (this combination is known as a motor–generator), to either recharge their batteries or to directly power the electric drive motors. Many HEVs reduce idle emissions by shutting down the ICE at idle and restarting it when needed; this is known as a start-stop system. A hybrid-electric produces less emissions from its ICE than a comparably sized gasoline car, since an HEV's gasoline engine is usually smaller than a comparably sized pure gasoline-burning vehicle (natural gas and propane fuels produce lower emissions) and if not used to directly drive the car, can be geared to run at maximum efficiency, further improving fuel economy.

Electric vehicle

An electric vehicle (EV), also referred to as an electric drive vehicle, uses one or more electric motors or traction motors for propulsion. An electric vehicle may be powered through a collector system by electricity from off-vehicle sources, or may be self-contained with a battery or generator to convert fuel to electricity. EVs include road and rail vehicles, surface and underwater vessels, electric aircraft and electric spacecraft.

EVs first came into existence in the mid-19th century, when electricity was among the preferred methods for motor vehicle propulsion, providing a level of comfort and ease of operation that could not be achieved by the gasoline cars of the time. The internal combustion engine (ICE) has been the dominant propulsion method for motor vehicles for almost 100 years, but electric power has remained commonplace in other vehicle types, such as trains and smaller vehicles of all types.

History

Electric motive power started in 1827, when Slovak-Hungarian priest Ányos Jedlik built the first crude but viable electric motor, provided with stator, rotor and commutator, and the year after he used it to power a tiny car. A few years later, in 1835, professor Sibrandus Stratingh of University of Groningen, the Netherlands, built a small scale electric car and a Robert Anderson of Scotland is reported to have made a crude electric carriage sometime between the years of 1832 and 1839. Around the same period, early experimental electrical cars were moving on rails, too. American blacksmith and inventor Thomas Davenport built a toy electric locomotive, powered by a primitive electric motor, in 1835. In 1838, a Scotsman named Robert Davidson built an electric locomotive that attained a speed of four miles per hour (6 km/h). In England a patent was granted in 1840 for the use of rails as conductors of electric current, and similar American patents were issued to Lilley and Colten in 1847.

Electric Vehicle (1899 automobile)

The Electric Vehicle was an American automobile manufactured only in 1899. An electric cab, it was widely used in New York City; the company pioneered the use of pressed steel for wheels, and its cars featured front-wheel drive and brakes and rear wheel steering.

See also

References

David Burgess Wise, The New Illustrated Encyclopedia of Automobiles.

External links