By Bob Ewing

The world's first commercial compressed air-powered vehicle is rolling towards the production line. The Air Car, developed by ex-Formula One engineer Guy Nègre, will be built by India's largest automaker, Tata Motors.
The Air Car uses compressed air to push its engine's pistons. It is anticipated that approximately 6000 Air Cars will be cruising the streets of India by 2008. If the manufacturers have no surprises up their exhaust pipes the car will be practical and reasonably priced. The CityCat model will clock out at 68 mph with a driving range of 125 miles.
Refueling is simple and will only take a few minutes. That is, if you live nearby a gas station with custom air compressor units. The cost of a fill up is approximately $2.00. If a driver doesn't have access to a compressor station, they will be able to plug into the electrical grid and use the car's built-in compressor to refill the tank in about 4 hours.
The compressed air technology is basically just a way of storing electrical energy without the need for costly, heavy, and occasionally toxic batteries. So, in a sense, this is an electric car. It just doesn't have an electric motor.
But don't let anyone tell you this is an "emissions free" vehicle. Sure, the only thing coming out of the tailpipe is air. But, chances are, fossil fuels were burned to create the electricity. In India, that mostly means coal. But the carbon emissions per mile of these things still far outdoes any gasoline car on the market.

Unfortunately, the streets of North America may never see the Air Car, though; it's light-weight, glued-together fiberglass construction might not do so well in our crash tests. However, that does not mean the Air car is confined to the sub-continent. Nègre has signed deals to bring its design to 12 more countries, including Germany, Israel and South Africa.
And this isn't the last we'll hear of the technology. The folks making the Air Car are already working on a hybrid version that would use an on-board, gasoline-powered compressor to refill the air tanks when they run low. Negre says that technology could easily squeeze a cross country trip out of one tank of gasoline.

A variety of videos (of varying quality) on this technology can be found on YouTube, or after the jump.
Via: Popular Mechanics

Check it out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QmqpGZv0YT4

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Neat stuff. Safety concerns aside, I think one of these (especially a hybrid one) would be really fun!

Those are pretty cool. Neat concept. Unfortunately we'll never see anything near that here thanks to the NHTSA and liability issues.

It's too bad there couldn't be a limited registration for a 40 mph (pick a local road speed limit) or less use for city or around town driving. I could easily and safely use one of those electric GEMs for a lot of my daily running around since the speed limits are 30 mph or less.

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Wow! That is really cool!!

They'll be selling less oil-based cars in all the other nations, I hope that decreases demand and lowers the price for us.

God knows, we'll never see anything like this here.

Very cool!

the cost estimates for operation seem outlandish.

tom w

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..I also have a 427 Cobra replica with an aluminum chassis.

I have this visual of the streets in India sounding like the tire bays at the Firestone store.

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Curious... what makes you say that?

Are you serious? It's called "Tata Motors?" What's their logo? A big boob? Main competitor? Hoo-Haw Motors?

Sorry, I couldn't resist.

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The economy of other countries has the controlling effect on consumption of products more than the technology described here. The masses are too poor to make a difference.

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MB-less

Yeah. It was my way of saying, "We'll never see technology here because the Neo-Cons will keep pushing us toward the stone age." -- but I was trying to look at the bright side.

I would imagine as the pressure drops you would creep along. At some point there would not be enough pressure to overcome friction. Plus I would like to see the onboard compressor that can fill those tanks to 5000+ psi in 4 hours.

And forget about torque, you couldn't pull a poodle off a toilet.

Of course you would have built in air conditioning due to gas expansion.

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MB-less

Actually if you watch the video, you'll see there is torque... and enough to pull a tow-vehicle. As for the reduction in pressure, this can easily be taken care of with a regulator. When you think that we use the combustion of fuel to create compression, why not start with the source? Compression -- a cutting out of the middle-man, if you will... Naturally, this cuts out the oil-man... and well... we aren't going to taint a good thread with that topic.

Anyway... the on-board compressor and the NY-LA on one tank of fuel... THAT I would like to see specifics on.

You can make torque with the proper gearing, those little vehicles tooling around inside factories can be geared low since they do not need to go fast. A real car is a different story.

A regulator does not prevent pressure loss. A regulator can do one of 2 things: a) deliver at a constant pressure, or b) if you reverse it, it will deliver at a constant volume.

Their engine will require a minimum pressure to operate and the performance will drop linearly with pressure, and the amount of weight you are trying to move. Have you ever operated an impact wrench? It is the exact same thing. There is a huge difference in performance from a 20psi difference in pressure. It is a neat concept, but like electric vehicles, the claims about distance and performance are way overblown. I have an electric and you can figure on those if you cut the claims in half you will be about right.

Fred

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MB-less

Interesting idea, but not necessarily a free lunch from an environmental standpoint. How will the mondo air compressors be powered?

C'mon Gotta, I know we're responsible for everything bad and dark, but what keeps most of these micro cars out of the US are the safety standards and the threat of a lawsuit the first time someone is killed for what would usually be a fender bender. I would personally love to be able to drive one of these (or other) streetable go-karts. They would fit in with most of my daily activities. But no manufacturer in their right mind would ever dare sell a micro in the U.S.

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1980 300TD-China Blue/Blue MBTex-2nd Owner, 107K (Alt Blau) OBK #15
'06 Chevy Tahoe Z71 (for the wife & 4 kids, current mule) '03 Honda Odyssey (son #1's ride, reluctantly) '99 GMC Suburban (255K+ miles, semi-retired mule) 21' SeaRay Seville (summer escape pod)