M.I.T.’S CUTTING EDGE EV

Goal of M.I.T. Electric Car Is 10-Minute Charge Time
Jim Motavalli, September 14, 2009 (NY Times)

"A team of six undergraduates at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has converted a 2010 Mercury Milan hybrid into a pure battery electric car. It’s part of a larger program with the goal of building an electric car that can travel 200 miles between charges and have a charging time of 10 minutes. By comparison, Tesla Motors says that its $3,000 Home Connector unit can fully charge its Roadster in less than four hours.

"The team plans to unveil its electric Milan — a former test mule with 8,000 miles on the clock, donated by Ford — at a press briefing…[Beginning] earlier this summer, the students (at least some of whom were working on $4,500 M.I.T. summer grants) put in 100-hour weeks, first to strip out the drivetrain, hybrid system, transmission and fuel lines, and then to install an A123 battery pack and a 187-kilowatt, 250-horsepower Satcon Technology electric motor designed to power a bus…"

From radude131 via YouTube

"…[T]he first iteration of the electric Milan [has an estimated] 65-mile range battery pack…[and] could accelerate from zero to 60 miles an hour in six to seven seconds. The 200-mile range version will weigh more and have a zero to 60 time in the eight second range.

"What the car can’t do, at least yet, is travel 200 miles on a charge — the larger A123 battery pack is not yet installed — or recharge in 10 minutes…[Its estimated] range with the 20-kilowatt-hour pack that now fills the trunk at 65 miles…[The students] are seeking lab space and support [to continue the project]..."

click to enlarge

"In a two-year project completed in 2008, a team of M.I.T. students had electrified a 1976 Porsche 914, modifying an existing conversion kit for that car. In August, the Porsche achieved what organizers said was the equivalent of 164 miles a gallon, effectively winning the Massachusetts-based One Gallon Challenge (against competition that included diesels and a wood burner).

"The students on the Milan project, who call their team elEVen after the less-than-11-minute recharge goal, want to have both the custom-built 10-minute charger and the 200-mile lithium-ion-phosphate battery pack (with 7,905 cells of the type used in power tools) installed by the end of next summer — after a lot of 100-hour weeks."