Wednesday 19 August 2009 7:24:23 pm

That is exactly why there are so few entrants ?

Many of the entrants are engineers , or are involved on the perifery of Engineering .

Engineers are very boring people, They build your aircraft so you can jet off when the whim takes you.
They design your motor car, so that you can get into and know that it will continue to carry you where you wish to go when ever you wish .

They design jet-skis so that you can irritate the whole beach front .

They design 3g phones and the chips that go inside them and make them work, so that you can hold forth in public. on whaterver subject you deem to have gravitas, for the next 15 seconds .

In case you still haven't got the picture, It is engineers who put up the satellites that bounce, all thoes meaningfuly conversations around the globe.

And if that is still too boring for your palete, Engineers are still top of this list of Society's most dangerous. More so than the total lawyers doctors and dentists put together.

Sorry we don't do Sizzle we just design the sausage skins !

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Wednesday 19 August 2009 8:21:11 pm

Hi Nigel,

I understand your question as provocative, and therefore I like it. I did the same on the Hydrogen Page, only a little more straight forward. Ok, you can have your answer to your question.

First many projects simple have nothing to do with the understanding of the competitions title - ONE IDEA CHANGE THE WORLD - what has the collection of fire hoses, redesigned and at the end again ending up in a land fill with the competition to do. It is a simple public relation gag, the idea of recycling exist already for a while, maybe in certain countries it is new.

To the idea of an Solar Velomobile, it is not clear what you want, a Velo = Def. A bicycle, bike, or cycle is a pedal-driven, human-powered vehicle with two wheels attached to a frame, one behind the other or Mobile = Def. An automobile or motor car is a wheeled motor vehicle used for transporting passengers, which also carries its own engine or motor.

I do every day my work out with an bicycle, for what would I need solar power?
In the second definition, are you sure that in future the Queen will drive you Velomobile to get to her hunting grounds?

All car makers work on the e-mobile with a little bit more capital as you want to invest into your idea and face enormous hurdles, so you are in competition with car manufacturers?

Let's say you will achieve your goal, what is the change to the world?

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Thursday 20 August 2009 7:41:43 am

Ye, Orlando, it was fully understood that you were acting as an 'agent provacateur' in order to get some life into the competition.

Unfortunately many inventors are shy creatures that only emgerge, when there are no ideas predators ,in their environs.

I can give you a definitive example, one of my friends has a superb process which converts 1 ton of choped up motor tyres into 440kg of diesel and 100kg of high grade carbon , via the pyrolisis route. When informed of the competition, he expressed no interest to enter at all.

I have briefly touched on this apect of the individuals valuation put on invention often being greater than that put on it by the market. ( see my comments on the value of licensing in business.).

I am sure that you also apreciate the fact that, the inventor is not going to make propritory information available as public domain, There is also the matter of not shouting too loud about any unusual market advantages the product may have, while you are a small dot on the radar scope

Allways take the high ground,and allways let the enemy come to you ! ( The shen Zhu )

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Thursday 20 August 2009 5:23:00 pm

> it is not clear what you want

I want a cheap car-like vehicle for the poor to use that also is an
improvement ecologically on the car in its construction and use.


> I do every day my work out with an bicycle, for what
> would I need solar power?

I too used to cycle to work every day, and it was rather tiring as
well as doing a whole days physical work! not to mention I'd get wet
(Sometimes the road would be flooded, and I'd get a bit more wet than
I had hoped for..) and the risk of being involved in an accident was
all too common. (I swear, I reckon on my many years playing computer
games gave me the super reflexes to avoid various drivers doing the
most insane things!)

So, if you don't mind dealing with the bad weather, the bad drivers,
the bad roads, and you're in good health, cycling isn't too bad. On
the other hand, if you want to cycle with your partner, it becomes a
bit more complicated, tandems do require a big wallet and also a
degree of working together. Then you get into the other difficulties
of cycling which effects a large number of people:

Saddle sore, if you're a lightweight thing, then its not really an
issue, but once you've got a few more pounds on than you should,
you'll often notice your journey is an uncomfortable one! A car
on the other hand, has generally rather nice seating in comparison!
Hence my interest in giving my vehicle recumbent seating that is as
comfy as a car and takes the strain off your bottom.

2 wheel stability, amazingly, plenty of folk don't know how to ride a
cycle, so my design having 3 wheels helps them use a vehicle straight
away that doesn't require lots of painful and risky learning approaches
as your pushed down a path by a friend and hope you don't break an
ankle when you fall off!

Many people are not very fit to cycle the average 9 miles to work;

http://uk.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080701091733AAt06C7

So would benefit from a vehicle that gave them assistance on the
hilly bits and starting off from a standing start, and even just all
the way on the flat too!

Solar powered would mean you wouldn't need to plug it into your wall
outlet to charge it, not everyone has a driveway to run a cable
to their house, nor a place of work that is so helpful.

Being in a weatherproof bubble would also appeal to those who really
don't want to don waterproofs just to pop to the shop around the
corner, or to pick up a date for the evening. Plus an improved
safety aspect to have at least something between you and the other
vehicle for when someone hits you, rather than to rely on statistics
that your only likely to be hit once every 10 years if you cycle..


> In the second definition, are you sure that in future the
> Queen will drive you Velomobile to get to her hunting grounds?

Not that particular model no, but I have a vision for the range
expanding and one day to include a vehicle that the Queen would use
that is indeed solar powered, as even the Queen has to save the odd
penny here or there


> All car makers work on the e-mobile with a little bit more
> capital as you want to invest into your idea and face enormous
> hurdles, so you are in competition with car manufacturers?

What few car makers are left you mean..

I reckon one of the main reasons why a similar vehicle has not really
been built before with a mass market in mind, is that to make a large
profit from it would be actually quite difficult, and also the risk
of trying something that appeals to the low end of the market is not
one your average car company is very prepared to make. I would say
for the most part that at this moment, I'm aiming for very low end
price models and almost every other car manufacturer (Apart from Tata
and the likes of their Nano, which is still a not cheap import into
the UK..) is looking at the higher side of the market, with the likes
of the Tesla which is hardly affordable by those on minimum wage..
We used to have a car, but got rid of it after the price of fuel rose
too high, the high cost of insurance, and the cost of getting spare
parts alone to fix it, let alone garage repair costs!

What would poor folk rather have, an old banger that is not going to
last the year, spend a fortune on fuel to get anywhere, another
fortune on insurance, or something that costs less for many than a
bus ticket to work everyday for a year, and another £100 a year in
maintenance costs.


> Let's say you will achieve your goal, what is the change
> to the world?

Less unemployment as the mobility of people increases, increased
trade due to lower transport costs of goods, less use of oil, less
need to plug your electric vehicle into the main power grid and
associated investment required to upgrade that and build more power
stations for a country. (A major issue in the UK where we can expect
a shortfall in our electricity production in the coming years as our
old stock of nuclear is turned off and our new stock has yet to be
built..)

There would still be a need for oil, for gas powered vehicles, but
for many folk at the economic bottom, a better choice than either a
bicycle or a car or bus, it is after all, about giving the consumer
what they want in a way that is less damaging to the planet.

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