Mate Rimac Croatian cars:
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Mate Rimac Croatian cars:
That ain't no Trabant! Better looking, and apparent performance than any Tesla...I'd hate to know the dealer price.
A wealthy oil tycoon in Texas heard of cars in East Germany so popular, buyers wait for years to take delivery of one.
He immediately sent a check to the Trabi factory.
The directors, sensed a propaganda coup in the making, arranged to send him the very next car off the line.
Two weeks later the oil man was in a bar, speaking with some friends.
“Ah ordered me one o’ them Trabis. Them folks over there in East Germany wait 12 years to get one” he drawled.
“And you know what? Them East Germans turn out to be so efficient! Wah, just last week they sent me over a little plastic model so I can know what to expect!”
1,7M€
I guess no matter how sleek they try to design the shape of these cars, and talk all of the bla bla bla about their technologies, they will never be able to turn me into a modern day car guy. Any vehicle that I would have to get in and lay down to drive will never be in my driveway. When it comes to electrics the CT electric trucks made in 1917 were the ugliest things ever made but 99 out of 100 ever produced still exist I know of 1 running ruck in Connecticut that still runs on the original Eddison batteries For comfort and ride the most comfortable CAR ever made in my opinion was my 65 Imperial crown second was my 84 Cadillac Seville Diesel and farther down on the list was my 87 Chrysler 5th avenue,which was the last actual car I ever owned because with new wife in 91 and no more kids to have to cart around I didn't have the need for stupid useless cars that couldn't be used as work vehicles.
Would I buy one of those new fangled glitzy gadget cars if I could afford one? PROBABLY but not to drive it would get sealed in a bubble as an investment in hopes that my great grand kids might reap a tidy return
This car is interesting because of its approx. 1900 + KS, 0-100km / h = 1.8s, 0-300km / h = less than 12 s, 400+ km max. speed, (as well as F1), 600+ km one charging, ....
Generally, electric cars and everything else do not consider "green," because the world's electricity is still mostly produced on coal. If we calculate energy transfer losses, one Trabant is more ecological than Tesla and Rimac.
:agree:Quote:
Originally Posted by darkoford
There are various ways to work the numbers, but it's very hard to get around the coal hard facts. And "natural" gas (primarily methane) as an energy source. There is also the fact that these are brand new vehicles, whose new design and new production necessitates additional energy expenditure that can be conveniently ignored. What I do like about electric is that it allows us the opportunity to separate the combustion of energy sources from the local use of that energy for locomotion. For example, electric vehicles make perfect sense in warehouses, mines, crowded urban centers, etc.
What is most stunning to me is the extraordinary coincidence inherent in the different meanings of the word "green". In English, green is common slang for naive and for money - respectively short for greenhorn and greenback. So while some green technology may not be environmentally beneficial, it's still fairly characterized as "green".
That is quite an observation. To me 'green' 'LEED' and many of the other programs are little but marketing schemes. Having worked within some of those 'revolutionary' buildings is all the proof I needed.Quote:
Originally Posted by Jon
I watched this a couple of days after Darkoford's posting (Thanks :hattip:) but had seen in action earlier on the show "The Grand Tour" where Richard Hammond had a hard time controlling the ponies on an uphill S on a countryside slalom and crashed horrifically. However, he survived pretty much in tact for an old geezer due to the advanced safety features.
Albeit it is definitely not a Land Yacht and certainly not a Trabant, it is the cutting edge of Hyper Cars and electric vehicles in the world today. Personally I was impressed most with the 600km range for a fairly heavy road rocket (4300lbs) and a P/W ratio of .45 for an electric vehicle. Unlike an old MKI/II mini cooper with minimal mods could achieve P/W of almost 1 and get about 25mpg souped up, but unfortunately had the comfort and safety of a soup can. Even though only maybe 5-10% of the world population can afford such a car, let alone get one of the limited productions, I liken it to what Nasa did with the moon shot in the 60's or what Tesla is doing today with his cars/trucks and rockets which is setting a Big Goal and achieving it using Kaizen (change for the better) as best we can. The improvements will continue and trickle down will follow. And it will be for the better, IMNSHO.
"Green" is a tough metric to grasp without quantified and quality definitions. Right now we are still practicing with that and why there are so many of them, with most being fudged with poor Statistics and generally leaving out the all important metric of "number of degrees of freedom" to define the system. Green to me starts with Efficiencies at all points, from "farm to table" so to speak, including human, but encompasses larger issues like turning the Human ship in more discerning, harmonious and long term directions. It can't get there all at once, unless someone can find the switch, so small steps is what we are left with. I agree with Jon about moving away from combustion technologies, but disagree about resource costs because of the limited production of these cars, when compared to what the new CERN Add-On is going to cost in Resources and Duckets or Dragoons.
As an old gear head that has worked on every thing from Austins to Zephers including tractors and farm equipment, built a couple bikes and muscle show cars in my younger decades, I still appreciate having my hair pulled back or pull a few g's once in a while. This one would definitely do that and I wouldn't turn down a chance to drive one or own it either, but I'm not one of the 5% and yet appreciate the qualities of these builds as an engineer and enthusiast. I also know there are a lot of other gear heads here at HMT and the affiliate site.
Thanks again Darkoford for posting this.
:hattip: PJ
PJs an I sprinkle IMNSHO's readily and liberally, likely neither of us dispense mere HO's at all...Quote:
Originally Posted by PJs
Genau;, creative movements have to start somewhere.
Very few have resources or capability boot something like this into reality. So when 'new' appears, that very naturally initiates chain reactions in other bright minds. Even misinterpreted, it still is a spark. Such instances are so vast in number, I doubt few creations can legitimately claim full originality.
Over 3 million Trabant owners couldn't have all been wrong.Quote:
Originally Posted by Toolmaker51
But then for the well to do they could always be chauffeured around in this
Attachment 22928
Or a modified
Attachment 22929
The Trabi as many called them actually stayed in production until sometime around 1990.Low cost easy to maintain very basic transportation really not much more than a spark plug with a roof, as some would say.
Trabant = three meters of plastic + fifteen meters of smoke. :)
What would one expect from a 2 stroke prior to the upgrade to needle bearing connecting rods so 50 to 1 mix ratio could be used.Quote:
Originally Posted by darkoford
Not sure if any of them could run fast enough to leave a 15 meter smoke trail before it dissipated add a little Citronella to the mix and the Mosquito population could have been placed on the endangered species list.
Funny thing is the Trabant is still a popular platform to make rally cars out of
The Trabant Safari Rally Car
https://www.stagweb.co.uk/activities/trabantrally.asp
https://youtu.be/y0VNqepgyi4
:rofl: I love the smell of unburned hydrocarbons in the morning!Quote:
Originally Posted by darkoford
Not sure what year this Trabant is but a funny true story from my sorted past in reference to "Green". I bought a 70' Sedan DeVille (~76') out of a big flood in our area for $100 because I wanted to drive it in the local demo-derby and figured a big motor, solid frame and body of a land yacht like this would be perfect. It had been in water up half way in the dash, so I opened it all up pulled out the seats and carpets to dry it out then drained/changed all the fluids and scraped mud for 3 days...and much more. Bottom line was it ran fine after taking the key switch and a few other things apart to get the mud out...even the window & seat motors. That 472 purred like a kitten and had low miles as it was owned by an older couple mainly driving around town. Unfortunately my first wife and I broke up about then so I ended up keeping it (leaving her the Audi) and lived in it for two weeks until I could get situated...not too bad with some shag carpet and a sleeping bag waking up seeing the beach in the morning. Hemingway, I kept it for several years and could say it probably saved my life in some ways during that period.
I've always been pretty good about keeping my cars/bikes running like a top and have only been stranded once in 6+ decades. In California the smog requirement is every two years and the morning I had to get it done I went out to start it and it was flooded to beat the band. Popped the massive hood and futzed for a minute then finally pulled the top off the Quadrajet and the floats had sunk!!! Called my buddy, went to the parts store for a float and carb kit. Pulled the carb and luckly had a half can of carb dip. Tore it down put it in the dip for a 1/2hr rinsed and blew it out and put it back together in about an hour total. Stuck my tack and dwell meter, a vacuum gauge, and a timing light on it and proceeded to dial it in. I specialized in carbs and fuel systems my last few years of turning a wrench and have been to all the schools back then including 3C school so I could dial in a carb with out a smog machine pretty well by ear and was about to find out how good.
At the smog shop I didn't say to much to the guy or tell him I just flash rebuilt the carb and stood out side the stall to watch. He hooked it all up to the machine and put the sniffer in the tail pipe and started it up. Purred like a kitten and he ran it up and down a few times and then stood there for a minute then came out and moved the sniffer in and out into a different position, went back in ran it up and down a few more times...rinse and repeat...3 times total. Then he called me in to look at the machine. As I had my smog license I knew what the numbers were and he said; "I've never seen anything like this, it's cleaner than any new car with all the smog gear and a CAT". Basically it barely registered on CO and NOx. I just looked at him and smiled and told him I just rebuilt the carb an hour ago and dialed it in by ear...we had a good laugh and talked shop for a few. I didn't tell him that I used to take care of all the local GTO club cars, (especially 3 deuces) or did a half dozen Weber conversions on Z cars and VW's and anything with SU's were my specialty. Think I could still rebuild a quadrajet in my sleep.
Loved that boat and have many fond memories until I picked up a 72" Olds Cutlass...headers, meats, suspension...then sold the Caddy for $300 to a kid that needed some wheels cheep. Then passed the Cutlass to my son because of a long commute when I was teaching and picked up a 1500S Honda (fun slot car on rails, swapped for a computer) then my 92' SC400, which his son will probably get. Haven't put a ton of money into my wheels over my decades, except maybe the bikes but they all ran clean and have had long lives.
Not sure this belongs here or in "Shop Truths, Phrases, Tales; and Outright Lies" but it feels appropriate to this idea of Cutting Edge Vs Old School and what is "Green" and what isn't...and it is probably WTMI in my normal dissertation fascism. :p
:hattip: PJ
