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Some may remember the initial press on the Aptera streamlined solar-assisted BEV...that was 2005. For some reason, looking at the aircraft-like shape again reminded me of the Buffalo Springfield / Neil Young song, "If flying on the ground is wrong..."
After one bankruptcy, resurrection and continued development, the company is still going. Here's a recent release including video of a road trip, which claimed about 20 miles of solar charging during the part-cloudy day, https://www.automotivetestingtechnologyinternational.com/news/prototypes/apteras-test-vehicle-completes-solar-supported-road-trip.html
No obvious drama in driving it, but it was all highway and rural 2 lane. No city traffic.
It's exactly the sort of thing I'd like, but the company history is pretty sketchy. I'm typically not an early adopter and looking from here I doubt that the company will ever be well enough established to risk buying one.
Overview of the company here, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aptera_Motors
(Score: 4, Insightful) by VLM on Friday April 11 2025, @12:36PM (8 children)
something that has normalized in low crime areas is solar battery charging for regular cars. A remarkably small panel will keep the wireless entry and security system running with a 100% charged battery in perpetuity.
You can't have that in high crime "blue state" areas, obviously, but they're pretty popular where I live.
I think they got popular during the covid party when cars would sometimes sit two weeks or more between uses.
(Score: 2) by Username on Friday April 11 2025, @02:21PM (1 child)
I never understood why cars don't have a small panel built in to the roof by default. That would be awesome.
I know the cybertruck has a bed cover that doubles as a solar panel, extends range by 15 miles.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Friday April 11 2025, @04:51PM
They'd leak like sunroofs if installed by the people who install sunroofs. What works really well is some car designs have a shelf under the back window or a shelf under the front windshield.
It doesn't take a large panel to provide more mAh than the keyless entry works. Small fraction of an amp is usually more than enough.
You can buy a whole kit for less than $50 from Amazon today, plug into the cigarette lighter outlet (who smokes any more?) and sticky tape it to the little shelf and its all done.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 11 2025, @02:35PM (2 children)
> solar battery charging for regular cars
I've been tempted by this, but:
One question -- how can you tell if the cheap panel from AliExpress actually includes some charge limiting to avoid slowly frying the battery on summer/sunny days?
And one problem -- my newer car that runs the battery down is often garaged, no sun!
(Score: 2) by VLM on Friday April 11 2025, @04:47PM (1 child)
Its really a two parter.
The first part is in this climate batteries die in about four/five years if you don't baby them so when it dies in half a decade, blaming the charger is ineffective it would be just as dead without it.
The boat people have been doing this for a long time and wiring the panel to power a small commercially available float charger is the way to go. I think it might be harder now as the death of the transformer power supply means you can't just feed in 24V from two panels and call it good, they have little switching power supplied with raw AC input now-a-days. Looks like there's commercial solar trickle charge controller for less than $100 now a days on Amazon.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 11 2025, @07:52PM
> in this climate batteries die in about four/five years if you don't baby them
I must baby them, I'm in western NY State with cars usually parked outdoors and it gets down around 0F a few times each winter. But, I don't drive every day, so that limits the number of engine starts. My car batteries normally last 10+ years, the record was 13 years--on a 1992 smaller car. That car was "manual", no key fob for the door locks, etc. When it was turned off there was no battery drain that I knew of.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 11 2025, @03:27PM (2 children)
You just can't even help yourself, can you. douchebag
(Score: 2) by VLM on Friday April 11 2025, @05:07PM (1 child)
LOL no poop on the sidewalks where I live, I guess its just not civilized.
(Score: 2) by dwilson on Saturday April 12 2025, @04:14AM
No poop on the sidewalks where I live, either. But it's more of a 'blue country' than a 'blue state', if you're using the USA-sense of the word state.
Hey! Maybe the real problem isn't the color, it's the states?
- D