Clean, affordable energy for everyone
By Jan Welda-Fleetham, Haleakala Times
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Reliable, efficient, affordable - all these words could be used to describe longtime Napili resident Randy Draper's new invention - a simple, long-lasting solar powered electric motor attached to an ordinary bike frame.
The bikes can go "up to 30 miles per hour, create no pollution, are totally silent, can go up any hill, are simple to repair, and the batteries can be recharged with energy from two things we have an abundance of here on Maui - sun and wind," Randy explained.
I visited his workshop in his home in Napili recently, where he showed me the solar panels and windmill he had set up on his roof about sixteen years ago, and said he has saved over $200 a month on his electricity bill ever since then. At the time, it cost him about $3,000 to get the system fully operating, but he says "it would be cheaper now because some of the components cost less."
He said he's "always wanted to do something with electricity," and in 1993 made an electric motor, which he had patented as an "electric submersible motor," and used it on a fiberglass kayak that he sailed to Lana'i and back.
It's quite an experience just talking with Randy Draper; he leaps rapidly from one subject to the next with amazing speed. His workshop is filled with hundreds of projects, thousands of components, reminding me of descriptions of Thomas Edison's, bursting with creative ideas and inventions.
Randy says he grew up playing with nuts and bolts; his father was an electronics engineer who made the first starter motors for Boeing's jet aircraft engines; he later developed guidance systems for the aerospace program while working at Vandenburg Air Force Base in California.
His grandfather owned a bike shop in Salt Lake City, Utah, and later a washing machine and lawnmower repair shop in Provo, Utah; every summer the family would visit, where Randy developed his interest electronics and mechanics.
He says that when he was in seventh grade, he built an electric motor with thread, spools, magnets and wire, for a science fair that was held at his junior high school in Redondo Beach, California. The teacher was so impressed that he asked Randy if he could keep it, and used it for years after that to show to his other students.
Last month Randy had the opportunity to make a bicycle for Maui's annual Cycle to the Sun, a race billed as the world's steepest, climbing nonstop from sea level to the very top of Haleakala.
He started building the bike about a week before the race, in between his job as a boat captain on Hawai'i Ocean Raftings' snorkeling cruises to Lana'i, and ferrying Navy personnel to and from their ship near Lahaina. He says "I didn't sleep for the last 48 hours, didn't even get a chance to try out the bike or the batteries, but it worked out perfect."
You can visit
www.evworld.com/databases/storybuilder.cfm?storyid=562
to read the article written about it for EV World Magazine.
This article generated an enormous amount of interest in his invention; he's gotten email from people in Germany, China, New Zealand, etc., and has been corresponding with representatives of several major battery and bicycle manufacturers in the United States about mass producing these bikes for worldwide distribution.
A company called New Energy Electric, in particular, whose co-founders are Carroll Shelby and Lee Eastman, has offered their Lithium/Ion battery technology (as used in the electric Shelby Cobra automobile) is very interested in working with him on these innovative bicycles.
Randy says he could have "a million bikes manufactured in a year or so" if he had the orders for them.
"The ideal situation would be a series of juice stands or snack shops in various locations here on Maui that would be refueling stations with solar panels and windmills on top of the buildings, where you could rent, lease or buy an electric bike.
"You could go to one in, say, Hana, rent a bike and ride to Ulupalakua, trade your battery for a fully charged one, ride to Pa'ia, Kihei, Lahaina, wherever you wanted to go," Randy continued.
Retail price would be about $1,000, with an additional $200 a year for batteries. Randy says they would be ideal for ecotours, and that private ranches could purchase them for their employees to use; they could go places that most other vehicles wouldn't have access to.
So, all in all, this seems like one of those ideas "whose time has come." If you'd like to talk with Randy, you can call him at 669-7776, or email him at SolarCraft@webtv.net.
You can also visit
www.EV-Motors.com or www.pleiades-enterprises.com
for more information.
"What we need is more people who specialize in the impossible." -
Theodore Roethke
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