⌛ Dumaguete-made electric vehicle

This will be an answer for the ever polluted streets in and around dumaguete ,a good sign . But for the narrow streets ,how about electric tricycles ?

 

when I was a kid of 14 I used to help the local milkman, his milk float was the same as this. gees never thought 45 years later a whole town would turn out to look at a milk float, sorry but im falling off the chair laughing.

 

calm down eddy the last thing we might hear of is you're in heaven way ahead of us man , simply out of 'milk float' heart attack .:D

 

you've got loads of BOTTLE mate

 

"Everything old is new again"

 

Hmmm electric tricycles? that would be a nice thing to look at... carrying a truck load of batteries for a three-wheeled vehicle.

 

Does a small vehicle as a tricycle needs a truckload of batteries at once or are you just in your muddle out of gulping 7 bottles of SMBs prior to logging into this forum,lols.

 

AH, precisely what I was thinking as I began to read this thread. Seems to me despite the great entrapeneurial effort of the electric jeepney, that an electric substitute for the tricycle would have a much greater environmental impact on small towns and cities. Cebu, and Bacolod are in a different class, with taxi cabs, and more jeepneys, easyrides. In Dmgte, lets face it, tricycles rule the streets, or should I say clog them?
As a backyard engineer, I often muse about how I would make a "better" trike. Barring cost, it would be easy at first glance. Alloy 6061 T6 aluminum tubular frame, alloy rims, state of the art suspension allowing the trikes to go faster more safely, efficiently. Using the current design concept the motorcycle would have an efficient overhead valve motor.

Reality:
Budget: average cost of a tricycle is about P 90,000 plus.(using a 40,000k russi as base bike) Tricycle drivers owners won't spend more than what the cheapest local materials will build. Call it Filipino frugality. That means heaps of 1/4 square mild steel and carnival ride car leftovers spun into a web of ungainly ugly overweight conveyances. So the challenge would be to build something just as servicible, cheap and durable as what exists now.

There is hope; those who have traveled a little in the Philippines may have noticed every locality has their own "one design" tricycle concept. Some are better than others but are geared, no pun intended, to meet local demand.

My favorite so far is Kabakalan's incarnation. Low slung, stable(no front end sway induced by poor steering geometry*), fast, and able to carry a fair number of folk. Frankly Dumgte's version is cumbersome top heavy and unstableover 25 KMH.
Find away through a local competion perhaps, using local materials and imported technology to derive a new tricycle replacement with electric power,or even just increase the efficiency of the internal combustion conept. Should be easier from a power to weight ratio standpoint than an easyride, and maybe more efficient. But cost effective?

As an aside, the trikes in Cavite get the prize for me as most cute but entirely impossible to ride if you are 6'1" like me. The egg or cacoon shaped pasenger side car has one feeling like a Balot.

* Most 150cc trike bikes, ie Russi, Honda, do not have a forward offset front axle which makes them prone to wobble. usually induced at higher speeds. Known as a "tank slapper" in motor cycle circles.

 

Good post RHB...interesting read...

One thing I've noticed over the years is that Western embassies can be approached (hopefully by their own national - but I'm not sure that's a requirement) about financing initiatives that would put them in a good light regarding technological improvements benefitting the third world. Especially if their technology, businesses, and of course publicity...is involved. The German embassy getting a solar powered internet cafe built on Cabilao Island is an example. I know this was spearheaded by a German resident on the island.

Point is....there has to be a better way with these trikes...They are noisy, polluting, not very fuel efficient, and as you pointed out - suffer from terrible design and construction. I wouldn't have the foggiest how to cost-effectively improve trikes...but if any Westerner, or Easterner, out there thinks the technology in his country could do it....ring up your commercial attache...you may get more interest than you expect...

 

that's an interesting idea, one I was not aware of, but i just heard some figures regarding the remittances from foreign workers from the Philippines that were eye opening. Over 10 % of the Philippine gross national product comes from remittances. Almost 13 billion USD. So it would seem also quite plausible for Filipinos to contribute themselves to further economic and environmetal issues back home. Since most of the remittances are (according to government statistics) going directly to families which may spend the money to live, certainly there is an argument that some of this money might go to local developement of sustainable industry to permanently uplift families and communities. Give a man a fish and he will be hungry tommorow...you've heard it before no doubt.


This is getitng a little off topic so to bring it back some, why not approach private sector industry and have a cash prize competition for best design or re design of the tricycle. There are many resources locally and internationally that might respond.

The largest obstacle for any of this "change" is the base user or driver owner, who is quite happy it seems,to be using existing status quo gear. And considering the associated cost limitations, understandable.

Getting back to what the thread is about, sorry, Was the cost of the electric jeepney disclosed? I have heard they are already using these in Manila to a small extent.