Motor Trend Tells Its Side Of The Mercedes F-Cell Fiasco Story
Published: February 4th, 2011
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So, what really happened when two of the three hydrogen fuel-cell cars on Mercedes’s F-Cell World Tour ran out of fuel on an early leg? Previously we’d only heard the German perspective on events (not to mention Daimler’s non-telling of the story in the video above), but now TTAC Alum Jonny Lieberman has posted his extended take on the trip over at Motor Trend. Yes, you’ll have to give MT ten page-clicks to read the whole thing, but Lieberman goes into far more detail than any account of the mini PR fiasco yet published. Do give it a look.
More by Edward Niedermeyer
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If you click on the print radio button below the first section, you can read the whole thing on one screen.
200 kilometers range? Not much better than an EV. BTW, very funny story! :-)
Speed takes energy. The mileage at the driven speeds was too low to complete the course. The energy density of hydrogen is not good at atmospheric temperature and pressures (hence the high storage pressures). Where do they obtain the hydrogen? It's everywhere attached to other atoms and is expensive to get into pure form (it takes a lot of energy).
Since I rarely read Motor Trend even when I was reading a lot of motor mags, I was a little concerned, but JL did a nice job--sure, no wing-wangs were squeezed, at least that we know of, but entertaining nonetheless, and frankly drunk-driving a 308 and then writing about it is probably something we won't see again in our lifetime. Oh, wait-you've got Baruth working here don't you. I didn't note much of a discrepancy between the German and American versions of the trip, so there's no real controversy there. I did enjoy this quote: "...as Fred Smith, CEO of FedEx just wrote about petroleum consumption in Fortune, "We cannot continue down this path..." Since the FedEx business model is predicated on extensive use of aircraft to provide those overnight deliveries, and there is currently no real plan to replace fossil fuel power in commercial aircraft, I'll bet he IS worried about an alternative form of propulsion. Anyway, all in all a good read, thanks for the link.