interview
>
frank
> frank 17
Frank 17 (1:58)
Topic(s): Electric & Hybrid / Future Transport
User Comments
© WGBH Educational Foundation
Please watch the clip first. If you plan to use it, review
the Rules of Use, then click on the download button.
This clip is licenced under a Creative Commons Attribution
Noncommercial 3.0 Unported License.
Video Transcript
Over this 20-30 years or so, I've been working on this kind of
concept of the plug-in hybrid is—I have found that there
were many pieces, many missing technologies, that just needed
to be a little better in order to make it work in the plug-in
hybrid. For example, the transmission technology is one of
them.
A good efficient, continuously variable transmission is needed
or can be very useful. None of the car companies have really
gotten into it. None of the car companies in this country I
ever, I can tell you, the car companies that are abroad,
they're already adopting the technology and they're moving
that forward at a very fast rate.
Another technology that was glaringly missing when I started
this 30 years ago, we didn't have computers and without
computers, this kind of technology would be very different to
implement. And, in fact, the very first cars that I built, I
had essentially mechanical computers that was, that was not
acceptable, really.
And another technology was electric motors and high-powered
electronics. We didn't have the silicon concepts to be able to
control a big electric motor I'm talking about a hundred, 200
horsepower electric motor efficiently. We—all that stuff
is here, so today the plug-in hybrid now becomes technically
possible to be manufactured in high volume because all the
bits and pieces of missing technology are all here and I think
the time is right, ripe right now to—for some big
manufacturers to get into it in a big way. And, I guarantee
you, the first company to get out there will make the most
money.
