Saab Turnaround

Following its acquisition from General Motors by Spyker, Saab has been on the move with a number of notable projects:

• Introduction of the new 9-5 for 2011.  Much of the development was done by GM prior to the transition.  The results look promising.
• Saab recently signed Jason Castriota, formerly of Bertone and Pininfarina, as design director.  Some of his works include the Ferrari 4/5 one-off and the Maserati GranTurismo.
• Beginning in 2012 BMW will be supplying turbocharged 1.6 liter 4 cylinder engines.
• The 9-3 will be updated for 2012, presumably with the BMW engine as one of the engine choices.
• There is a smaller 9-2 model now under development. 
• And Saab also began researching a fully electric 9-3 project with a Swedish coalition, with batteries coming from Boston-Power.  The EV is expected to reach the market mid-decade (2016).

With all of these changes, it looks like the venerable brand may have a future yet.

Waste Heat to Electricity

Lots of interest lately in capturing the energy in exhaust heat from internal combustion engines. Converting that energy to useful work makes a lot of sense - if it can be done cost effectively.

Last week I sat in on a presentation by John Fairbanks of the U.S. Department of Energy about thermoelectric applications in vehicles. He estimates a there's enough waste heat generated by a Chevy Suburban (and space under the chassis for the system to fit) to produce up to 800 W of power. Efficiently capturing such energy would enable the vehicle to power accessory loads such as the cooling fans, navigation and entertainment systems, and so forth. This is intended to help enable the "beltless" vehicle in which the engines don't have the parasitic loads they're currently saddled with.

Air conditioning is a big load so there are also proposals to eliminate R134 (a big source of greenhouse gas emissions) and shift to "zone air conditioning", which would blow cool air from individual seating positions. This would only require a fraction of the power needed to cool the entire cabin. So perhaps a thermoelectric generator would have enough power to handle it.

GM, BMW and Rolls-Royce (owned by BMW) are all currently developing such systems and are targeting the year 2012 for production. Something else interesting was said. If the efficiency of such systems reach more than about 35% efficiency, the IC engine could be replaced by an external combustion engine that burned anything, since that would be a more efficient method.

BMW Mini E Announced

BMW will launch an electric version of the Mini at next month's LA Auto Show. There will be a limited run of 500 units for the US market. The quick stats are that it has a 150 mile range (probably with a lightfoot), has a one speed transmission, and is limited to a top speed of 95 mph.

This is a pure electric. There is no engine. It's also a two seater since the backseat of the gasonline version has given way to a large lithium ion battery pack. The car also gained about 600 to 700 lbs in the conversion from gasoline power, now weighing about 3,200 lbs.

Seems like an interesting city car. Also, it'll come with a quick charging station for home garages which will enable a quick 2.5 hour full charge.

More info here:

http://jalopnik.com/5065786/electric-mini-e-officially-revealed-bringing-204+hp-li+ion-battery-pack-to-la-auto-show

Fisker Karma Debut in Detroit

Saw this story about the Fisker Karma and had to comment. I'm cautiously optimistic that they will deliver as announced. It seemingly came out of nowhere in a very short amount of time. Last I heard Fisker had just finished the two BMW and Mercedes based coachbuild series, and was starting on a new car project.

It's a gorgeous set of photos. I wonder how much regenerative braking it will do. There are some mighty big conventional disc brakes behind those wheels. Anyway, it reminds me of the BMW Concept CS car shown in Shanghai and I would love to see it on the road before 2010.

Even more significant, I want to see independent companies successfully producing electric cars, which would mean the commercial availability of electric powertrains. That would be a huge boost to the industry. And it would take away many of the reasons the established manufacturers have not built electric cars on a large scale.