Low Rolling Resistance Tire

Low Rolling Resistances Tires are designed to increase your car’s economy by reducing the amount of tire friction or resistance while driving. This means your engine or electric motor & batteries don’t have to break into a sweat just cruising down the road. In some cases the energy savings can be noticable, with up to 15% of the gasoline consumed by a typical car due to rolling resistance.

After reading that, buying a set of LRR tires for an electric vehicle sounds like a no brainer, but I recommend taking all things into consideration first, such as cost and lifespan. Depending on how much of your driving is at high speed (50+ mph) these “Tires of the Gods” may not be so heavenly after all.

For example, the differences many drivers have mentioned in the real world have been around the 2 miles-per-gallon mark. If the average set of a new set (four) of LRR tires cost $500, then it would take some time to pay itself off.

To give you an idea, let’s look at two simplified examples, both driving 30 miles per day:

Car 1 has normal tires and travels 30 miles per day at 0.3 kWh per mile, which equals 9 kWh per day. If 9 kWh per day costs $0.16 per kWh, then that’s $1.44 per day in electricity.

Car 2 has LRR tires and also travels 30 miles per day at 0.27 kWh per mile, which equals 8.1 kWh per day. If 9 kWh per day costs $0.16 per kWh, then that’s $1.30 per day in electricity.

As you can see, I’ve given “Car 2″ an improvement in economy by 10%, which has saved the driver $0.14 cents a day in electricity. This means the tires would have to last 9.7 years (or 107,000 miles) before they’d pay themselves off in saved electricity costs.
When used in a gasoline powered car however you could expect a faster payback, though this is only due to the fact that gasoline cars are inherently inneficient and use much more money in fuel per-mile than an electric vehicle.

Another option for those on a budget is to find older, used tires with a hardened tread. This harder tread doesn’t flex and heat up (losing energy as heat) as much as newer, softer rubber. The gains would be minimal in a typical electric commuter vehicle as shown, but may help with a longer range electric vehicle or gasoline vehicle.

If you have a long range electric vehicle, and if you drive long distances regularly then the benefits of installing LRR tires are there. For Jo or Joanne Average who drive small, local-range electric cars I suggest to stick to their usual budget brand.

If you’re buying new LRR tires then you should be aware of their reputation for having less grip in wet conditions due to their harder tread, and/or higher required tire pressure. Keep this in mind if you live in a wet area and ask your supplier for statistics on the particular tire you’re interested in.

BP Leads today's 5c price hike, the second in less than a month.

BP led today’s price hike, by raising the prices of all fuels including diesel by 5 cents per litre this morning, making it currently 182.9 NZ cents/litre for Regular 91, and 115.9 cents/litre for Diesel.

With the current exchange rate this equates to $4.84 US per gallon for Regular 91, and $3.07 US per gallon for Diesel.

This comes hot on the heels of last week’s 5 cent per litre price increases, seeing the price of fuel leap 10 cents per litre in less than a month. This increase pushes the average ownership cost per-kilometre of a typical 2.0 litre sedan well over the $1 per kilometre mark, compared to 0.88c per kilometre in late 2006 – when Regular 91 gasoline cost $1.29 NZ per litre (source AA NZ)

The blame has been laid squarely on the international increase in the cost of crude oil. This has affected many countries recently, including the USA which experienced increases of around 5 to 10 cents per gallon during the past two weeks.

More increases are expected in the near future as the international economy recovers and the demand for fuel exceeds 2009 levels. At the current rate New Zealand motorists could expect to again break the $2 NZ per litre ($5.30 US per gallon) barrier before Christmas this year.

In order to increase economy, motorists are recommended to check their tyre pressure, limit their driving and remove unnecessary items from their cars to reduce weight.

These increases will add pressure to major manufacturers to add more fuel efficient vehicles into their line-ups, as well as begin their reluctant and long-overdue electric vehicle plans before fuel prices approach the distant, but inevitable $3 NZ per litre ($8 US per gallon) mark.

I’ll bet you want an electric car. If you weren’t interested in owning one then you probably wouldn’t have clicked to read this article.
On another note, how much did you pay for gas in the last 12 months? Alternatively, how much did you fork out for your last fill-up? What could you have done with that money instead?
Surely you can’t enjoy emptying your account just to get around town?

So why don’t you own an electric car yet, and why aren’t you driving past the gas stations smiling, instead of driving into them frowning. Oh yes, I know, the kids, the cashflow, the knowledge barrier etc. I’ve heard them all. The list of reasons why people won’t break their oil addictions are like radio DJs, just going on and on. In fact I’ve heard so many of them I created a list that encompasses them all.

Which one are you?

The “Too Hard” guy
This chap keeps putting the conversion off because he doesn’t feel he knows what’s involved. It looks complicated and the internet’s awash with all kinds of technical jargon. It’s a pity because this person may never get an EV due to this fear of the unknown. It’s not a justifiable excuse, because my first conversion proved that anyone without mechanical knowledge can convert a car, and there are a great selection of ebooks and publications out there for the first-time converter.

The “Busy” guy
It’s ok, we’ve all been there. My own conversion was delayed for years because of me being the “Busy guy”, putting it off because I didn’t have a garage, or I didn’t have time, or because of the kids/wife/cat/ant farm etc. If others can find the time to do it with two kids to look after then you can too. Get the kids to help out! It’ll be their car as much as yours.

The “Broke” guy
Many of us are in this boat – in fact I’m probably one of the more broke among you all, but it’s not getting in my way. People assume electric car conversions are impossibly expensive so they don’t bother. Of course it doesn’t have to be expensive (remember www.forkenswift.com?) but people think it is – and prohibitively so, so they don’t bother. The amount of intelligent cost-cutting methods I’ve seen over the past 3 years show that it’s just not a realistic excuse to use any more.

The “I’ll wait” guy
This chap often has one or more of the above reasons for avoiding a conversion, and subsequently decides to wait for Detroit to produce an affordable, factory-made EV. Problem is, the Volt won’t be released until later this year for a whopping $40,000 – and even then it’ll be in very limited numbers. This means it won’t be in his (or my) price range for 10 to 15 years – and 10 to 15 years is a lot of money in gas.

I realised recently that I’m one of those “guys” above. It shocked me to learn that I was giving the same excuses I’ve seen hundreds of times before, so last week I got off my butt and started scouring the local ads for dead donor cars to get my next EV started. I’m determined to stop paying for gas as soon as possible. Join me and the thousands of others around the globe. I hope after reading this you’ll get off that chair and do the same. You’ve really got no excuse.

When I converted my own gas clunker to electric I was terrified. I almost gave up twice in fact. The only reasons I powered through it were my determination and the fact I’d uploaded videos to youtube showing my progress to hoardes of eager viewers. This meant there was no way I could back out!

There were a couple of EV conversion publications available which I read, though one was severely outdated, and the other (more popular) one was so overwhelmingly technical I put it back on the shelf several times. This just added to my burden but still I pressed on. I ended up emailing thousands of beginner’s questions to complete strangers from all over the globe. It’s here where I learned just how many friendly and helpful Americans are out there. I now have many great “yank” friends because of it.

Now I’ve been able to change my own motor oil for years – I even figured out how to change brake pads last year – but I’m by no means a mechanic. I’m the sort of person who reluctantly pays other people to stop my car from making “that noise” or generating “that smell”. It always seems to cost me hundreds too. If only I could get all the money I’ve spent on engine or exhaust repairs back in my wallet I’d be somewhere on a cruise ship right now. Though I’d probably be alone; my wife seems to get seasick just walking past a swimming pool.

Anyway, as soon as I had my electric motor installed in the car I realised I had nothing to worry about. As simple as it is, the motor-to-gearbox connection is the hardest technical part of any conversion. Once you’ve got that figured out, and your motor installed, the remaining tasks simply involve screwing things in and bolting things together. I ended up paying an engineer to join my motor and gearbox together. I regret that now as I could have saved hundreds by doing it myself, but there was no plain-English guide telling me how to do it at the time.

It’s too late to help me now, but I’ve since written a 200+ page EV conversion guide (with videos) but obviously I didn’t have it to start with. If only I knew then what I know now.

Once the motor’s in, the rest is generally smooth sailing. If you’re using either Lead or Lithium batteries, there are a few things to keep in mind to keep your batteries healthy and happy for a long lifespan, but ultimately you just bolt them in and connect them up. It’s sounds simple, and it really is. There are screw holes for this and instructions for that. As I’ve said many times before, the hardest part is bringing home a donor car – often to the horror of your partner or spouse!

In my case my first conversion took several months to complete. It’s a shame because most of that time was spent waiting for parts to arrive, or welders to show up, or money to appear. If I did it again, and had all the parts ready to go in, or even if I used a ready-made conversion kit, the whole thing would probably only take a week or two.

Other than a percieved lack of skills, the other reason people aren’t willing to start a conversion is a lack of finance. Admittedly if you buy a complete kit, or buy ALL your parts brand new then you could spend around $6000 US for an average conversion. However there’s a brilliant gold mine out there for converters looking to cut costs. The first thing to do is just “do it yourself”. Make your own motor adapter: it’s not hard. Why not make your own battery racks too: you don’t actually need a welder.

More ways to cut costs are to remove the motor, wiring & controller from an electric forklift and bolt them into your car. Also you could look into using recycled batteries and selling the gas engine & components from your donor car. While you’re at it, why not contact car-towing agencies to grab a donor car that has been reposessed. They’ll often be glad to sell to you to avoid auction costs. This is just a tiny fraction of the cost-cutting options out there; the list just goes on and on.

The last bastion of the procrastinator is the excuse “I’ll just wait for Detroit to make an affordable EV”. This breaks my heart when people say this because it’s just not going to happen any time this decade. When the Chevy Volt is released at the end of this year it will cost $40,000 USD, and will be only available in a limited batch.

This means it’ll be about 15 years before it reaches my price range, and buying gas for another 15 years just isn’t worth the time, cost or the environmental damage. It seems doing nothing is an irresponsible choice.

This means I too have no excuse. I think I’ll call the local car towing agency now and see what unclaimed/repossessed cars they’ve got in their warehouse. While the USA gets ready for summer, it means it’s almost winter time down here & a fresh EV conversion might be just what I need to while away those long cold days.

Don’t procrastinate any longer. Grab a car, get in your garage, break your oil addiction – and have some fun while you’re doing it!

Image courtesy of papermag.com

Because of the cost & weight of batteries, there are a few cheap yet effective ways of reducing your wind resistance and increasing your distance per charge without simply jamming more batteries in the trunk.

The most popular of these is redirecting the air caught up in the front of the car by installing a grille blocker or nose cone. Depending on the existing aerodynamic properties of your car, you could achieve a potential gain of up to 20% in economy with a redesigned nose cone.

Another popular idea to reduce air resistance is installing a flat belly pan or thick plastic board underneath the car. This will allow the air to rush straight past instead of moving around the motor, gearbox, former exhaust tunnel and all the other pockets, dips and bulges that all cars have underneath them.

You wouldn’t drive around with a roof-rack full of bicycles above your car so consider smoothing out the unseen menace that is the underside of your car. Some converters use corrugated plastic sheeting (what real estate signs are made of) or if you’re familiar with spraying fibreglass or know someone who is, you could make a moulded pan yourself.

The list of options goes on. You could even try covering your rear wheel arches to eliminate the turbulence created when air rushes in &out of them while driving. The trick is to try and make it look

good! The rear wheel arches are a main visual point of any car and it’s a fine line between looking sleek or ultra tacky.

Don’t forget that you’ll have to remove it if you need to change a tire! Covering the front wheel arches is normally not possible due to both the vertical and horizontal movement of the front wheels when turning.

There are another half a dozen things you can do to increase aerodynamics (mentioned in my ebook) but I’ll save those for another day. Out of all the many aerodynamic options available to converters, the hard part is making your modifications look appealing. The last thing you want is an aerodynamic car that resembles a sausage!