|
English
|

1987 GM Sunraycer

GM Sunraycer, 1987
GM Sunraycer, 1987
Images: Concept Car Central
Rating:  22    -22    +44
The 1988 GM Sunraycer solar-powered experimental vehicle designed and built by the team of GM, Hughes Aircraft and AeroVironment, Inc., won the 1,950-mile inaugural World Solar Challenge Race across Australia, finishing 2-1/2 days ahead of the runner-up.

www.gmphotostore.com


In 1987, General Motors entered the Sunraycer concept in a 1,950-mile electric-car race in Adelaide, Australia. When the Sunraycer won in first place, it proved that a solar-powered car could be a car for the future. The one-seat, four-wheeled, teardrop-shaped Sunraycer was powered by 7,200 solar panels. General Motors entered the car in the race to develop and demonstrate technology in lightweight structures and materials, low-speed aerodynamics, high-efficiency batteries, lightweight engines, and solar cells. Though nearly twenty feet long, the car, with aluminum tube and plastic skin framing, weighed only 390 pounds. It was propelled by a single direct-current engine weighing eight pounds. The Sunraycer used bicycle tire technology and a technique for braking which returned energy back to the batteries. The left-rear wheel - the drive wheel - ran the drive motor as a generator when the driver released the accelerator, feeding energy back to the car's battery system.

Concept Car Central
Comments
brett
Thursday, November 11, 2021
hi
Discuss this car
Author
E-mail
Add your comments