Later this Bangalore based car company almost vanished from the Indian market owing to the disappointing sales figures. Company’s hardwork was not paid off until Mahindra & Mahindra took interest in buying 20% stakes of this not so popular brand.

The new avatars of Revas,known as Reva NXG and Reva NXR were recently showcased at the 2009 Frankfurt Motor Show and surprisingly the new models were highly appreciated for their beautifully carved bodies and new age technology. At the 2010 Auto Expo the company again presented its two concept models aimed at making customers more inclined towards their products.

Pawan Goenka, Chairman, Mahindra Reva Electric Vehicle Co, said,”A lot of work is going on at the moment and the launch of the new Reva NXR and NXG should be by Q4 of 2011,”

The cars will be introduced in the Indian automobile market before the final quarter of 2011 and will certainly be exported to other countries across the globe for better sales and more significantly better exposure for the company. For the timing the cars are being tested carefully ensuring the best from the brand.

We hope that the era that the Reva Electric Car Company started back in 1994 is carried over by the Mahindra and we expect the latter to bring in some innovations making the products appeal more.

According to a study conducted by the United Nations after a decade or two the scenario of the cities will worsen with nearly 5 billion people(Estimated one megacity population by 2030) on the roads and no space for driving cars and to overcome these problems in the future the designers have started working on vehicles which are built better,require low space and are affordable for the masses.

Starting the race is GM, who some time back showcased the EN-V followed by Ford START Concept and now BMW has presented the preliminary sketches of its concept called the BMW Mega City Vehicle(MCV).

Adrian van Hooydonk, director of BMW Group Design said that its the technology and material they are using to bring it to reality and the aim is to build a sustainable yet premium car.Mr. van Hooydonk added,“They are highly emotional, with refined materials and high level of attention to detail. But there was a belief that premium and sustainable could not go together.”

They have assembled a special group 15 designers comprising of exterior and interior designers together with the engineers in order to complete the project in a short time.The team leader is Mr.Benoit Jacob, a French designer who designed a successful small car,Dacia Logan when working with Renault and now works for BMW.

The design team has used CRPF(Carbon Fiber Reinforced Plastics) since it is very light and can translate easily into a design as steel does.Mr. van Hooydonk said “It is sometimes hard for designers to get their heads around the change.The chance to work on such a new formula is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,”

General Specifications Of BMW Mega City Vehicle

The vehicle is a zero-emission one and accommodates four passengers. It would be a rear-wheel drive car generating a maximum power of 150 hp (112 kW / 152 PS) through an electric motor powered by a 35 kWh lithium-ion battery. According to BMW this vehicle will deliver a mileage of at least 100 miles (161 km) along with a top speed of 95 mph (153 km/hr).

BMW also has plans to launch two more variants by 2015 and 2017 which will be known as ICV (Intra-city Vehicle) and UCV (Urban Commuter Vehicle).While the ICV will be a two door product accommodating 2 passengers, the UCV will get a longer wheelbase,four doors accommodating 5 passengers.

What is Range Of an EV ?

Range is the maximum distance an electric vehicle can travel on one full charge. Here are some tips to increase the range of your electric vehicle. These tips can marginally improve the range, but still its not sufficient to make it manifolds.

What is charging time of an EV ?

Charging time is the time taken to fully charge the Electric Vehicle from almost completely discharged state. This charge time is up to few hours for most conventional electric vehicles available commercially these days.

image credit : Sanyo

Japan Electric Vehicle Club has converted a petrol engine Mira car into an Electric car and powered it with whooping 8320 Lithium Ion batteries in the battery assembly for the modified Mira. The car then broke the Guinness World Record of longest range on a single charge by travelling 1003.18 KM on a single charge !

The car was driven from on a track for 22 hours and a total distance of 623.76 miles or 1003.18 KM. The previous record was of 345 miles which was set in November 2009. The cost of batteries used in making the battery pack for electric Mira costs over $56,000 USD. This experiment proves that a set of efficient batteries and dynamics of the electric car can make it go places without a recharge.

The ally for Renault will provide for the infrastructure, charging stations and battery servicing facilities. As there are lots of reforms going on from Govt. of India to support and encourage Electric cars. The decision of Renault to enter Indian markets with its EVs will largely depends on the Government’s policies and support.

Renault has an impressive lineup of existing Electric Vehicles, EVs selling in many countries, these EVs include – Kangoo is a goods moving vehicle,  Zoe is a mid-sized sedan and Twizy is a two-seater concept car which was displayed at the Auto Expo 2010 at Delhi, India in January 2010.

What Is Range Of An Electric Vehicle?

Range of an electric vehicle is the distance it can travel on a full charge. The range varies significantly depending on your driving habits, driving conditions, charging habits and load on the electric vehicle.

In this article I will share some general tips which you can follow to increase or improve the range of your electric car or electric scooter.

1. Accelerate Gently – This is a general tip which will increase the range of most Electric Vehicles in City driving conditions with turns, signals and high traffic. The reason is simple, too much acceleration drains battery faster and more power is lost in case of braking in city driving conditions as city driving is more stop-and-go type of driving.
2. Charge Battery Everyday – Battery experts may not like the idea of charging very frequently, but in automobile batteries and Electric vehicle batteries, its best to keep them close to full charge. This ensures smooth ride and better motor performance and better range.
3. Optimum Tyre Pressure – All Electric vehicles have recommended tyre pressure listed in the user manual. Please remember it and get the pressure checked once in a week or fortnight. This will ensure that you are not running the Electric Vehicle with un-necessary drag, it improves the range as well as handling.
4. Timely Service – Although the service of an electric vehicle is not as extensive as of a conventional engine vehicle which involves engine maintenance, yet servicing of Electric Vehicle is important. Usually in service, the authorized service-operator will check battery health, electrical and inspect motor for any problems, inspect brakes and lubrication of bearings etc. Getting your Electric Vehicle serviced on time will ensure a smooth ride with improved range.
5. Loose Some Weight – I am not asking you to loose weight, I am suggesting you to remove extra stuff from the Electric vehicle which might be lying around for long time in the boot space unattended. Removing few Kg from the car will ease the load on the electric car / scooter.
6. Keep The Charger In Good Health – It may not sound very important, but good health of charger is very important for good health of batteries. Keep the charger clean and wires properly. The wires should not entangle too much. Keep the charger clean of excessive dust or moisture. A bad charger may damage battery health hurting the range of your electric vehicle.
7. Load Capacity – Read the user manual of your Electric car or electric scooter for the rated load capacity of the same. Try to keep the load on your electric vehicle within or up to the load carrying capacity. Overloading the vehicle can adversely affect the motor, batteries and may permanently reduce the range by damaging them even after you reduce the load afterwards.
8. Electrical Accessories – Avoid adding too much electric accessories as they consume the battery and reduce the range of your EV. Get the electrical accessories fitted by a trained technician or from the authorized centers to avoid any damage to the electrical circuitry of your Electrical Car / Scooter.
9. Highway Driving – In an electric car, keep the glass windows closed on high speed highway driving for better aerodynamics and less air-drag. This will help to improve the range of your electric vehicle.
10. City Driving – Avoid sudden acceleration and braking, rather go slow in congested driving conditions and maintain a continuous speed for uniform load on battery, less braking losses and improved range.

There may be many more which might have not come to my mind, please share the same through comments below. You might also like to check out some Tips To Improve Mileage Of Your Petrol / Diesel Cars and Scooters from CarBlogIndia Technology Articles Section.

In India the question might not be answered well since there are hardly any buyers running electric vehicles but on the Global level there is a solution emerging out of a tie up made between two of the most renowned companies.

Nissan and General Electric have joined their hands with an agreement for a duration of 3 years, to develop an infrastructure delivering numerous reliable charging locations in most of the states. Specifically talking the two majors have come together to develop “SMART CHARGING” Technology for electric vehicles like Nissan Leaf and other EV’s and Nissan is also working with ECOTALITY to create charging infrastructure in most of the states.

The SMART CHARGING Technology is termed as a medium which would let EV’s to communicate with local utilities ensuring least impact on grid and economical charging conditions.

The idea have been extracted from the fact that owners running EV’s are only interested in finding charging outlets to plug in their vehicles and charge, and never interested in knowing the grid structure working behind these outlets. This new plan will pour in a number of positive aspects including the most important – Efficient & Optimal charging and use of nation’s grid.

Mark Little, senior vice president and director of GE Global Research, has stated “In the past few years, we have seen an acceleration of innovations in plug-in hybrid and electric cars that have sparked a revolution in smart-charging technologies. Together with Nissan, we will take a comprehensive look at what technologies will be needed in the car, on the grid and at home or work to make smart charging a reality,”

Nissan will take care of the technological aspect of the project from its technical centers in Farmington Hills, Michigan and in Japan while General Electric will look at the electrical generation and distribution aspect through its Research and Development center in Niskayuna, New York.

Such projects are aimed at delivering the best and the cheapest electric charging conditions and we hope to see similar projects coming to our country soon.

The Govt. of India has make a core group of representatives from Road Transport, petroleum, environment and heavy industry ministries and NMCC (national manufacturing and competitiveness council) to come up with a policy suggestion to promote small electric cars in India. The group will find out the ways to encourage Auto Industry to develop and sell small cars which run on battery. The group will also look into ways of encouraging R&D in this field and promote joint ventures for production of Automobile batteries to power electric cars.

The number of vehicles are adding up at the counter with passage of every second and in the near future global manufacturers will seriously concentrate on the concept of Personal mobility and will certainly try on redefining it.

The cities will become as crowded as they were never and at that point of time compact and less polluting vehicles is one thought that would come to every automotive firm’s mind. But if we are talking about the future then who has designed the above vehicle? General Motors is the global major which has been working on such concepts for a very long time and has inspired Volkswagen to follow the trend.

General Motors EN-V and Volkswagen’s L1 Diesel Hybrid Concept are the respective vehicles which will very soon be seen on the roads worldwide.Although last month at the launch of EN-V, a lot of people laughed out this concept but the need of the hour is to understand the probability of nearly 2 Billion vehicles expected to flood this planet by 2030,eventually making the traffic scenario more complex.

Leading the EN-V project Chris Borroni-Bird said “We need to find a solution for emerging markets in particular, where we’re expecting a lot of our growth in big cities,”

GM’s latest product has been invented to address to six major problems, to be faced in the coming times:-

• Energy use
• Environmental concerns
• Safety
• Congestion
• Parking
• Affordability

Take a look at the official EN-V video to get a clearer idea of the ongoing study

With such an amazing product on its path of evolvement,we wish the brand rolls it out for the masses soon. It has somewhat similar looks like the Honda 3R-C.

REVA the first car brand to launch an electric car is in talks with SUV major Mahindra & Mahindra for a deal which would let the latter to buy at least 51% stakes of the former car brand. Reva never did much with its cars in the Indian Market since at the time of their launch electric vehicles were in their infantry stages and were less efficient.

Now after the approval by General Motors to supply technology and with Mahindra’s growing inclination towards investing in REVA with a whopping amount of over 100 Crores, the brand seems to be getting some support. US based Global Environment Fund and Draper Fisher Jurvetson are the present stake holders with an investment of nearly $25 Million and are speculated to leave the brand by selling their share to Mahindra.

News is also coming that Mahindra & Mahindra’s team made a visit to Reva’s Bangalore plant, regarding the deal. Maini Group and AEV LLC respectively, with their Joint Venture are responsible for the origination of Reva Electric Car Company and are planning to introduce 2 more models and manufacturing plants in other countries as well.

American company Bannon Auto already holds a tie-up with the firm to produce cars in the U.S and now with this deal coming up, we expect the brand to bring in some new and interesting products.

The U3X is enclosed in a very sleek and neat way, the lower half of it houses the wheel of the Honda U3C and the Upper half of it provides a way to fold the seat. To operate it, just open the seat, press the power button to power it on, sit on it and lean in the direction you wan to move.

Its small and sleeker than Segway and can move in all directions just by leaning forward, backward or sideways. Unlike the VeeWay Personal transporter, it is much more sophisticated, sleek and intelligent device. Even more sophisticated than a Segway. The speed of U3X will be limited to 3.5 Miles/hour and it is designed to match the usage environment of pedestrians and indoor transportation needs.

This was a press demo and there is not announcement of official launch date or price of the device. Its not known when it will hit the market. Its more of a concept and display of Honda’s commitment to technological research.

Here is a video of Honda U3X in action:

I really like the device in terms of the technology it represents and gives an insight into possibilities of future transportation devices which are electric and zero-emission.