Californian student up to the rescue!
Submitted by Arthur Vijghen on November 21, 2008 - 5:25pm.
This month, Eric Van Gelder, a recent graduate from the University of California, Davis, joined us to share his expertise. He is currently traveling around the world having just been to Uganda and preparing for more adventures in Asia. At UC Davis, Eric got a master's degree in mechanical engineering and developed a prototype super efficient commuter vehicle, the Pedal Electric Tricycle (PET) Project. He also worked for a year at the Institute of Transportation Studies as a researcher developing energy use of models of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles.
Here at GROEP T Eric has been specifying and sourcing the battery pack for the VISION GT. The advanced lithium iron phospate pack will weigh less than 200 kg and will be able to propell the vehicle more than 100 km per charge and to a total of more than 200000 km over its lifetime. Eric will continue to work with us after he leaves via his laptop, modeling the VISION GT in Imagine.Lab, vehicle modeling software from LMS, to perfect the powertrain design and devleop a controlls system before building it.