I was thinking if gas and diesel prices keep going up more and more people are going to want to convert their gas and diesel cars and trucks to electrical hybrids. My idea for this would be to replace the transmission area of a car with an electrical generator-electric motor combination. You would let the engine run on idle to generate the power and then rather than trying to put it into batteries just use the electricity on demand, the acceleration of the car would be done with a dimmer switch type of control. If you really needed extra power maybe one might need to accelerate the gas or diesel engine some to generate more power for hills or quick startups onto freeways.
This idea would be simply to take out the transmission of vehicles and replace it with a generator-electrical motor combination. One might have to change the rear end gear ratio to match the optimum for the electrical motor but you wouldn't need a transmission gear box because of the high range of speeds an electrical motor can operate at.
I think you will see these types of custom made devices being manufactured first on a custom basis and then later made by small companies and then possibly by car manufacturers as well, especially if gas prices and diesel prices continue to go up like they are. This would be a way to keep your gas guzzler, let it idle and still get 30 to 50 miles per gallon or more as gas and diesel prices continue to go through the roof just by taking out your transmission and replacing it with likely an equal sized generator-electrical motor combination. This particular idea works best with rear end drive systems.
However, there also might be a way to make this work for front wheel drive gas or diesels as well. The problem with transverse mounted engines with front wheel drives is they generally don't have the same space available for such a unit that a rear wheel drive does with a standard or automatic transmissions.
However, in thinking more about front wheel drive cars and trucks one might then need to change to a smaller engine built in combination with a generator-electric motor specifically designed to use the same engine mounts in your vehicle. In this way it could all still power the vehicle, be safe and still get the kinds of mileage that one could with something like a Prius.
If we see prices reach 5 to 7 Dollars a gallon for gas or diesel on the east coast of the U.S. this summer, something like what I'm talking about here would not only become economically feasible but possibly even necessary if people want to keep driving larger vehicles for work or play.
I think with this custom combo, mileage could reach 30 to 70 miles per gallon depending upon the size and weight of the vehicle.
In the end, necessity is the mother of invention.
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