The first crop of production EVs are all vehicles priced higher than the average vehicle.  So was the Th!nk City EV but in a bid to raise some cash to keep the doors open they’ve decided to blow out the existing stock of Indiana-built Citys and try over.

Fortunately, a dealer here in Baltimore saw the opportunity and bought nearly the whole lot of more than 100 cars.  I joined friends from EVA/DC John and Lanny one afternoon recently to try the Th!nks out.  It turns out I’m the only one of the three that hasn’t bought one yet.

On a test drive in rush hour traffic and then winding through some backroads, the City felt stable and solid.  Unperturbed by bumps and aided by the low center of gravity imparted by the underslung battery pack, carving through the forest on a freshly paved two lane was way more fun than the cuteness of its upright styling promises.  Torque off the line was especially impressive and the Th!nk should excel in the cut and thrust of the urban grid.  Surplus power tapers off significantly above 50mph, encouraging judicious speed management on the highway.  The Th!nk tops out at 70mph and I actually paced an example with the windows cracked open that cruised at this speed up a slight incline.

Some may be disappointed that there’s no LED lightshow instrument panel but the analog dial simplicity  has a charm keeping with the Think’s design philosophy.  Switchgear and controls come from the Ford parts bin and so spares should be easy and inexpensive to source but the only element that felt less than durable were the window switches.  The dash is covered with a textured fabric on both the top and lower surfaces, a distinguished touch that’s uncommon in any class of car.  I prefer seats with a bit more lumbar support but an aftermarket pad should remedy that if you feel the same way.  Controls are all smooth and require modest effort though the lack of a dead pedal bugged me.  It’s nice to have somewhere to put that idle left foot, though the handy will certainly fabricate a solution.  Construction is rudimentary yet solid (check out the picture of the aluminum hatch hinge), there were no squeaks and rattles and as long as you didn’t turn your head to check out the cargo area, it feels like a slightly larger car such as a Scion xA, but without the noise, harsh ride and vibration that makes most small cars in general feel cheap.  Unfortunately, the rear jump seats available on the European models isn’t certified for the US so the Th!nk is strictly a two-seater.

One very clever feature is the glass hatch that allows bumper level view of the vehicle behind while parallel parking.  Combined with the Th!nk’s short length, there should be only a handful of spaces on the planet in which this car can’t park.

From the outside, the Th!nk may look small but when I happened to come upon one a few days later on the B-W Parkway I was surprised how seamlessly it blended into traffic.  Coincidentally a Smart car came along in a neighboring lane and with them side-by-side, the Th!nk’s proportions are far more harmonious.

The Th!nk City turned out to be just the car John and Lanny were waiting for and they each took one home soon after.  I can’t blame them, at this price point there are not many new cars offered, EV or not, period.  To be able to acquire an EV as capable and competent as the Th!nk for the offered price must be the deal of the year.

Rudolf Bosnjak from Bosnia resurrected an original VW CityStromer EV by reverse engineering the broken parts without any technical help from Siemens.  Unfortunately, his page seems to disappear every once in while so try again in a few weeks if it doesn’t work for you.  According to him, these capacitors are part of the DC-DC converter though they’re also mighty close to a 300A fuse that would only be relevant on the power side of the electronics.  They must have not failed completely as the DC-DC converter still appeared to work after the smoke but maybe they were just not quite completely broken yet.

There must have been around thirty screws that required removal before the board could be eased out from under a thick busbar foot that made sliding out the circuit board far more difficult than it should have been.  I’m guessing the inverter innards are assembled  and then dropped into the box as a unit.

After cross-referencing the out-of-date part number with the current number, with a little help from my friend Jim with his nicer-soldering-iron-than-mine (and soldering skills to match), the old capacitors were unsoldered, the board carefully cleaned of all the ooze and the new capacitors soldered in place.

Despite a battery pack that can only handle a few miles on a good day, the eMR2 drove noticeably better than before the fix.  There was no cogging on regen and no fault-outs like I’d come to expect when flooring it at low SOC.  The inverter actually compensated for conditions that used to require a restart, it’s been a long time since I haven’t had to preoccupy myself with temperamental electronics.  I ran the car up and down the alley just enjoying the smooth ride and the cool breeze through the windows.  We’re back in business!

Opening up the inverter revealed a couple of capacitors that were swelled and ruptured, leaving their burnt entrails across the board.

I don’t know what these capacitors do but I’m hoping that replacing them is all that’s needed to get back on the road.  I have read it’s reasonable to expect capacitors to dry out and fail after some time even if they haven’t been used.  I suspect these Siemens inverters are about 20 years old now so it may be that they just came to the end of their functional lives.

Hopefully its not any bigger problem than that.  I’m in the process of removing the board and taking a closer look.

This episode (more like tragedy) is well documented in the movie “Taken for a Ride”, a film I finally got to see this past weekend when a spare 90 minutes fell into my lap.  Check out the movie here and then read in more detail about how the Philadelphia system succumbed  here.

If anything, the urgency to fill the need for people to get around comfortably and in a healthy manner has only increased.  Bike lanes and pedestrian ways are becoming a standard part of road planning and bike ridership continues to increase.  I notice a lot more bikers here in Baltimore and “sharrows” are popping up everywhere.  Whereas previously I didn’t even imagine the need to take along a passenger in a velomobile, today I can’t fathom designing one that doesn’t have a comfortable space for a little kid to watch the world go by while being pedaled to the market, library or just for fun.

Just as importantly was listening to the input of my non-biking wife as her concerns are representative of a large segment of people who would like to get around via human power but have a low tolerance for the risks that transportation bikers take in stride.

Though I occasionally find the non-biker’s perspective annoying, as a designer there is much value in resolving problems that enthusiasts simply tolerate.  For example, eye height level has been a frustrating issue to tackle as a tall velo lends itself to a (so far) slightly awkward aesthetic that would alienate a typical velomobile enthusiast regardless of the fact that in the big picture, having the rider feel comfortable in traffic is beneficial to all riders and helps make the velo a true car substitute (though it doesn’t help that cars have gotten significantly taller over the past ten years).

Electric assist is another issue that bike enthusiasts aren’t too keen on but, as evidenced by my friend Mark who uses a Catrike with BionX to navigate the hills of Berkeley, not having to pedal all the time is a strong incentive to use a (nominally) human-powered vehicle all the time.

But taking a step back, the real design problem is not the fact that the designer doesn’t necessarily agree with what some customers want but rather is still working to synthesize a solution that satisfies apparently contradicting criteria.

Through many iterations a solution is slowly emerging though, and the resulting product will be far better for it.  With the addition of a fourth wheel, rear wheel steering has been ditched while the tilting function is much improved.  Overall the design is far simpler to ensure that more people can make the economic jump from bike to velomobile. Those are the just the rational points but there are plenty of features that will make the Turanga velomobile the most enjoyable way to get around town whether it’s raining, snowing or sunny outside.

Next time I’ll run down the myriad updates the eMR2 has been through, it’s finally driving like I dreamed it would!

While inside, I got a better look at a Leitra chassis being constructed of stainless steel and top flight components like a SON generator hub and a Rohloff.  Since each Leitra is built to order with a variety of components and options, it may be possible that Carl-Georg has never built the exact same Leitra twice.  The factory has several Leitra on hand as demos, mine was white and green with wheel fairings.  Luckily, the bottom bracket boom was of the right length for my legs though the fairing was a little higher than I’d like for good visibility.  I quickly settled in and in a few minutes our convoy started pedaling towards Copenhagen…

Over the nearly 25 years of production, the nearly 300 Leitras around the world have traveled more miles than any other velomobile.  If it’s not quite the newest and sexiest velo out there, It’s designer and builder Carl-Georg Rasmussen has constantly refined it into certainly the most practical and livable vehicle whose virtues of practicality and livability are revealed over miles and hours in the seat.

Even with just a thin cushion, the fiberglass seat was quite comfortable.  The fasteners are sited well away from any place where your body might touch them and the seat has just a little give to accommodate different body shapes.  My ride was equipped with a Sachs 3×7 drive and drum brakes up front and both felt like they had done many miles.   The brakes were not all that powerful but after a little practice, modulation became easier and it was at least possible to slow down smoothly.  The Sachs system suited the Leitra well but it happened to keep shifting past the gear I wanted to ride in most of the time.  For a while I tried to hold the gripshifter to keep it in gear but that became annoying and I just dealt with being in a gear just a little to high or a little too low.  I can imagine the Sachs would be a good choice as the internal gears ensure you won’t be caught out in too high a gear at a stop and the gears were spaced well with a range that made only one front sprocket necessary.

Steering the Leitra is by dual joysticks that fell right to my hands.  Unlike most trike steering systems, the joysticks in the Leitra don’t end up running into your leg with lots of lock;  they do go through a slight arc but after the first few actuations it feels most like a fore and aft motion.  I was surprised how tight a turning circle the Leitra could manage, even navigating around bollards at trail entrances or turning around  on sidewalks was no problem.

The Leitra handles better than I expected, after my time with a Catrike Speed I was expecting that with the Leitra’s higher center of gravity and shorter wheelbase that lifting the inside wheel in a corner and putting daylight under the rear wheel under braking would be a common occurrence, yet neither happened.  That can be explained by the far weaker braking power of the drum brakes on the Leitra but the more forgiving handling is possibly due to the slightly slower steering, soft front suspension and wider track.  That extra stability really inspired confidence that the Leitra could safely maneuver around the odd pothole, errant pet or any other obstacle that might lay in its path.

The all wheel suspension proved its worth on cobblestone surfaces as well as helping to soften the blow of riding up on low curbs (even in Copenhagen!).  The fiberglass springs don’t have quite the wheel control of a coil spring/oil damper setup but are much lighter, simpler and compact.

I half-expected the fiberglass shell to resonate to the point of irritability over the cobblestone stretches of downtown Copenhagen but it really wasn’t an issue.  More visibility would be welcome, especially to sight the front wheels while maneuvering around obstacles but it’s a delicate balance to prevent the cockpit from becoming a solar cooker;  it’s amazing how quickly sunlight and body heat make the interior warm and eventually a little too much so.  Then one realizes the reason why the small, upright windows of a Leitra make so much more sense than the fully transparent canopy used on a Go-One, for example.  For hotter climates, more flow-through air is required.  Halfdan has had great success with the front intake duct he made to channel air directly to his face and neck.  The real glass forward section of the windshield (which never fogged up, by the way) also deserves mentioning as it provides a scratch resistant surface for the manually operated windshield wiper.

Riding to Copenhagen is a very gradual downhill journey so the Leitra felt like it rolled well.  The trip home though, felt more strenuous than it should have with the Leitra not coasting well at all.  I figured it was due its general old age but once we got back to Halfdan’s house the diagnosis was simply underinflated tires.  A short trip from his house to the factory revealed a huge difference and made the velo much more enjoyable.  At least I got a good workout!

[Show as slideshow]

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The paper, Design and Development of the Turanga Velomobile, can be found at the seminar proceedings site here and locally here.

A hardcopy of the slide presentation in pdf form can be found here (8.3MB).  As an added bonus, these slides are actually formatted correctly, as opposed to the exported-to-PowerPoint-and-very-mangled version that I used for the actual presentation.  I figured that Keynote 5.0 would have perfected this feature by now but no such luck.  I did the best I could under the circumstances though, so check out video of the presentation here.

In Copenhagen, getting around on bikes is just what people do since it happens to be the most convenient, fastest and most flexible way to get around town, not to mention a great way to stay warm and fit.  During a velomobile tour around the city the day after the seminar I noticed a very well-trimmed version of the typical kid carrier…

…another Leitra on the tour with a Burley-type kid trailer attached

…and finally this fantastic contraption: 

Instead of packing the kids in the minivan to get to school or day care, it’s commonplace to see the kids being pedaled around by mom or dad in a family trike, a vehicle I had never heard of yet upon first sight thought it was the most handy bike ever invented.  The design brings together substantial kid and cargo- carrying capability, the stability of a trike format, an upright riding position for mom or dad and the best seats in the house saved for the kids to watch the world go by under the watchful parent’s eye.

The most popular models are the Kangaroobike (pictured above) and the Mobii, both if which were ubiquitous around town.  Both have seating for two kids and space for bags while keeping and rain and wind off of the valuable contents inside the bubble.  They’re so sensible I couldn’t believe I hadn’t seen them before.  An email to the makers of Kangaroobike revealed that they are considering entering the US market but have to become comfotable with the product liability regulations here before that happens.  I can only believe they’d be a hit here, even at $3000.