Abstract
All autonomous cars must use propulsive energy stored in the car. Vehicles using chemical storage run on the energy stored in gasoline or other hydrocarbon fuels. Solar energy can be stored in several ways: by sensible storage (heating a mass), by phase change storage (melting a substance), by electrochemical storage or capacitive storage (conversion to electric energy and storage in a battery of capacitor, respectively), or by flywheel inertial storage (converting electric energy to rotational kinetic energy and storing it in a spinning flywheel). Note that inertial storage is intrinsic to all vehicles because each stores kinetic energy in its own mass and the rotating masses of its wheels and drive.
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Notes
- 1.
Chapter 16 contains sample battery regulations.
- 2.
The charge carried by an electron is 1.602(10−19) C.
- 3.
The conventional current, I, is conceived as positive charge flow. So it flows opposite to the electron flow.
- 4.
The converse is the state of charge, F, the fractional amount (or percentage) of full charge in the battery; DODÂ +Â FÂ =Â 1.
- 5.
Extending the life of the battery beyond the race is not an important constraint. Often an entirely new car will be built for the next race, and the current car will be used for training and public relations.
- 6.
With nearly exhausted batteries, Clarkson used this procedure to descend into the Ohio River valley during the 1990 Sunrayce. It allowed that team to charge enough energy to cross the river and make the midday stop.
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Thacher, E. (2015). Storing Electric Energy. In: A Solar Car Primer. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-17494-5_4
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