Articles tagged with mitsubishi

Since 12th December 2009 the CABLED electric vehicle project has put 22 Mitsubishi iMiev's in the hands of 'typical members of the public'.  Each of these vehicles is fitted with GPS and data loggers and each quarter since December 2009 a report has been produced which summarizes data recorded, with the publication of the fourth quarter report a full years worth of data has now been collected.  Some interesting nuggets from the report:

• Average distance travelled was just 22 miles
• Three quarters of journeys were less than 20 minutes
• The maximum distance travelled was 126 miles
• On average cars were parked for 23.5 hours of the day
• Average state of charge (SoC) was 50% at the beginning of a charge
• Average charge time was just under three hours

While interesting a lot of this data will of course be a function of the vehicle used (iMiev) as well as the type of user and availability of charging points. More »

Robert Llewellyn of the video blog Fully Charged has posted the latest episode in which he says farewell to his beloved Mitsubishi i-Miev which he has had on loan for a year as part of the UK Cabled Project.  He talks about his experience of running an electric car for a year and the common questions he gets from conventional car drivers.More »

Mitsubishi Motors has recently signed a cooperation agreement with the Singapore Government's Economic Development Board to assist in the evaluation and promotion of electric vehicles in the island state.  Mitsubishi will supply 25 i-MiEVs from 2011 as part of the "taskforce's test bedding efforts".  Mr. Leo Yip, Chairman, Singapore Economic Development Board said, "We are delighted to welcome Mitsubishi Motors on board as the first major EV supplier for Singapore's EV test bed programme. This test bed programme is an excellent example of how Singapore presents itself as a Living Laboratory for auto-manufacturers, charging equipment suppliers and EV component players to explore R&D and capability development activities in Singapore. We see opportunities in areas such as battery management systems, power electronics and electric drive systems. Companies can leverage Singapore's electronics cluster and engineering talent to build new capabilities here."More »

Mitsubishi has marketed the i-MiEV for some time in Europe and Asia, it's due to go on sale in the UK in January 2011.  Today Mitsubishi North America announced that they will be introducing a car simply called the "i" which is effectively an i-MiEV with slightly different software and amusingly "the inside is a little bit larger for larger frame people".  The "i" weighs 2,584 lb (1,172 kg) is powered by a 47 kW (63 hp) electric motor and has a pretty tiny 16 kWh battery (providing an optimistically stated 85 mile range).  Interestingly the "MiEV" brand appears on the car (as some kind of all-electric designation) but won't be used in the name.  The "i" is due to go on sale in the US at the end of 2011 and will be priced around $30,000, Mitsubishi are quoted as expecting to sell just 20,000 units by 2015.  Mitsubishi has also stated that buyers will be able to buy an Eaton 220V charging station (8 hour full charge) directly from Best Buy.More »

Toshiba has been working on its Super-Charge Ion Battery (SCiB) for some time now as it was first announced back in 2007.  They recently announced a tie-up with Mitsubishi Motors Corp (MMC) to develop batteries for electric vehicles.  While Toshiba's SCiB batteries have been seen in electric bicycles and motorcycles this would be the first use of the innovative new battery in other types of electric vehicles.  The biggest difference between Lithium-ion and Lithium-titinate (the chemical make-up of SCiB batteries) is speed of charge, a SCiB battery can be charged at up to 12C (twelve times capacity, 12A for a 1 Ah battery for example which would only take 5 minutes) where as most Lithium-Ion batteries have to be charged at 1C (1A for a 1Ah battery, taking 60 minutes).  For more information on SCiB see this brochure on Toshiba's website, also the SCiB website.More »