3 ms·
A ~50ft trailer is pretty common, and it should be about 8ft wide and 8ft tall. So 24ft * 50ft is more than 1000sqft and it's approx 10sqft to the sqm. Of cour
by msandford 3y ago
A ~50ft trailer is pretty common, and it should be about 8ft wide and 8ft tall. So 24ft * 50ft is more than 1000sqft and it's approx 10sqft to the sqm.
Of course your best case scenario is only about 400sqft illuminated. Insolation tops out at 100w/sqft and the max efficiency of commercial panels is maybe 22-24%. Doing the math there you get something like 7-10kw which is nowhere near enough to push one of these down the highway.
A normal semi gets maybe 6-8mpg on diesel which means burning 8gal to go 60mi in 1hr. You get about 10hp/gal/hr out of a diesel so that means it takes something like 80hp or 60kw to drive a truck down the road.
It's more then enough to run the climate control, lights, and other cab loads and slow battery drain just a bit. But you'd have to leave the truck to charge for a week in order to drive for a day.
- 6510 3y agoYou don't really want to power the entire vehicle. The question is more like, which is the most efficient wheel, which is the best aerodynamic shape and which is the most efficient roof. If you can have components with negative load it's all good. Say that 7-10kw / 60kw is 12% to 17% savings. 6-8mpg becomes 6.72-9.36 mpg Or for laughs one could say every 10th car requires no fuel.