Electric vehicles are definitely gaining popularity in the market. Many mainstream car manufacturers have started concentrating on this space. Even though, the electric cars that are being offered by the manufacturers come with a long range battery, the charging infrastructure still remains a big issue in the country. A start-up in Kerala has come up with a solution for this issue. They have modified a regular Renault Kwid in a way that it now works on both petrol engine and electric motor.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jszR3s7SLj4
The video has been uploaded by Baiju N Nair on his youtube channel. The brains behind this modification is a startup called Hymotiv that is started by a bunch of recently passed out engineering students. Earlier, these students had converted a Maruti 800 into an electric vehicle as part of their project during the course. Current managing director of Hymotiv pvt ltd. got in touch with the students after watching the video of their Maruti 800 and told them that he is ready to invest in their business.
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Talking about the changes, the car looks exactly the same from outside. The engine under the hood remains intact and no changes are made to it. Hymotiv has installed a small device under the hood that controls the emission levels and according to them, the car is 60 percent more cleaner than before while using the petrol engine. This device has also improved the fuel efficiency by 20 percent.
The electric motors are installed inside the rear wheels. This is called in-wheel motor technology and has been imported from US. All the four wheels now gets disc brakes as part of the upgrade. the electric motors power the rear wheels whereas the normal 800-cc petrol engine powers the front wheel. This electric Kwid can be driven for 150 kms using the power from electric motor once the charge on the batteries have finished the driver can switch to the petrol engine without worrying about re-charging.
If the driver wants to have a bit more fun with the car, then they can drive on both petrol engine and electric motor at the same time. when done so, the car generates more power and torque than any other car in the segment. On the inside, there is a manual gear shifter for the petrol engine and a regular AMT dial for the electric motor along with start-stop button on the dash with a battery health monitor. The video presenter was absolutely amazed by the way this car was working. One of the main highlights of using both eletric and petrol engine at the same time is the fuel efficiency. This Kwid Petrol Electric hybrid hatchback returns a combined fuel efficiency of 48 kmpl which is a great deal.
The car seen in the video is still a prototype and the team is currently working on minor glitches. Once all these issues have been cleared out, Hymotiv is expected to be launching it in the market. This is definitely a great achievement considering the fact that future of mobility is going to be electric. This provides the convenience of an electric vehicle without having the anxieties about the battery range.
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