New Hybrid RVs Look Like They Belong to the "Dead Head" Generation
As an RVer, it's OK, I'll date myself: I remember riding in VW "hippie vans." Psychedelic colors on the outside, antiwar bumper stickers, the whole nine yards. If you remember those days, don't think they're completely gone.
A Canadian firm, Verdier, is resurrecting the VW bus and creating a hybrid power RV based on the VW Westfalia. The new "woody" style bus comes topped with GPS controlled solar panels to provide juice for camping occupations, while 'under the hood' (such as it is) a hybrid (gas or diesel plus electric) engine that claims to lower carbon dioxide emissions to the level of a VW Beetle.
It may not be the fulltimers' dream, but it does rank up there for those conscious of their greenhouse gas releases. With a possible price of around $89,000, the little RV is packed with innovations including a galley stove that swivels to allow inside or outside culinary machinations; a passenger seat that transforms itself into a set of stairs--allowing for easy access to the "second stage" or "upstairs" if you will; and the requisite computer with wifi capability to keep you in touch.
The initial production run is set to produce about a thousand of these little darlings; about 150 have already been sold--mostly to folks from California.
Visit the website and order yours today.
Labels: green RV, hybrid fuel vehicles, Verdier RV
posted by Russ and Tiña De Maris at
1/09/2008 01:37:00 PM
1 Comments:
"... claims to lower carbon dioxide emissions to the level of a VW Beetle"
One of the main reasons VW stopped selling their AIR-COOLED beetle in the US was that it had very high levels of pollution and couldn't meet the EPA requirements. Supposedly the old Beetles spewed out several times the amount of pollution that a big, WATER-COOLED V-8 of the era did, even though they had a smaller engine. (The pollutants involved might not have been specifically carbon dioxide, which up until a few years ago was regarded as benign.) This has something to do with the air-cooled engine not being able to control its operating temperature, and hence its pollution output, as well as a water-cooled engine. (The "new" beetles use a water-cooled engine, in the front of the car.)
Despite claims to the contrary by the “simple-living” people; VWs were MUCH LESS reliable, harder to work on, significantly underpowered, and required more maintenance that a water-cooled V-8 engine of the period. Running them at freeway speeds for any length of time invariably resulted in a blown engine. I know; I owned one. (I was young and didn’t know any better.) Once I had the money, I promptly went out and bought a Dodge 225 Slant 6. It lasted me 175,000 miles, before it even needed a valve job. People used to brag about how their VWs got 80,000 miles in between engine overhauls. Oh, really? - Even in the early 70s, a well-maintained V-8 could get 150,000+ miles in between overhauls, while motoring along over hill and dale at considerably more than post-55-speed-limit velocities. And adjusting the VW’s valves every 3000 miles? - That went out for American cars in the early 1930s. Even their ads claimed they got only an “Honest” 25 mpg – Even some full size cars do much better than that, now.
OK, I admit, the ‘old” beetles are cute, at least in a perverse sort of way. They could be “chick magnets” for a young unmarried guy.
Even today, many of the environmental types talk about how wonderful a car the "old" beetle was, and how the US manufacturers should make cars more like it. It goes to show that sometimes things that are toted as being good for the environment; often aren't as good as they're represented as being.
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Anonymous, at 12:52 PM, January 28, 2008
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