The article says the trip is "an 1,800-mile (3,000km) road trip across western Europe". Are you allowed to drive around in self built vehicles in Europe? Or did they convince all countries they cross to give them a special permit? How does that even work? When the polic stops them and says "The papers of the car please", they say "Hey, check this out, we have a letter from your chancellor who says we are cool to do t…
Students’ solar-powered camper van turns heads on 1,800-mile road trip
11–20 of 24 posts
Re: Students’ solar-powered camper van turns heads on 1,800-mile road trip
#12The article says the trip is "an 1,800-mile (3,000km) road trip across western Europe". Are you allowed to drive around in self built vehicles in Europe? Or did they convince all countries they cross to give them a special permit? How does that even work? When the polic stops them and says "The papers of the car please", they say "Hey, check this out, we have a letter from your chancellor who says we are cool to do t…
The car has been inspected by the RDW (Dutch vehicle authority) [1] and given a vehicle registration plate. So yes, they're allowed to drive around :)
[1] https://www.tue.nl/en/our-university/departments/biomedical-...
Re: Students’ solar-powered camper van turns heads on 1,800-mile road trip
#13The article says the trip is "an 1,800-mile (3,000km) road trip across western Europe". Are you allowed to drive around in self built vehicles in Europe? Or did they convince all countries they cross to give them a special permit? How does that even work? When the polic stops them and says "The papers of the car please", they say "Hey, check this out, we have a letter from your chancellor who says we are cool to do t…
In the UK at least, as long as you meet the requirements for road safety (which are remarkably little, for custom cars), you can register custom vehicles on the road. We have a wonderful history of insane people building cars in their sheds: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0DGtf7asP8I
Re: Students’ solar-powered camper van turns heads on 1,800-mile road trip
#14The article says the trip is "an 1,800-mile (3,000km) road trip across western Europe". Are you allowed to drive around in self built vehicles in Europe? Or did they convince all countries they cross to give them a special permit? How does that even work? When the polic stops them and says "The papers of the car please", they say "Hey, check this out, we have a letter from your chancellor who says we are cool to do t…
Re: Students’ solar-powered camper van turns heads on 1,800-mile road trip
#15I wonder how they got to 450 miles a day on solar. I remember the Prius solar roof option would only give you a couple of miles a day in ideal circumstances. This camper has more panels but that’s still a bit jump to 450 miles.
Way more panels, as seen in this image [1] and shown on specs [2] as 17.5 m^2 of panels unfolded. [1] https://images.prismic.io/solarehv/62d397ae-9839-4d31-b316-a... [2] https://vita.solarteameindhoven.nl/about-show
Re: Students’ solar-powered camper van turns heads on 1,800-mile road trip
#16The article says the trip is "an 1,800-mile (3,000km) road trip across western Europe". Are you allowed to drive around in self built vehicles in Europe? Or did they convince all countries they cross to give them a special permit? How does that even work? When the polic stops them and says "The papers of the car please", they say "Hey, check this out, we have a letter from your chancellor who says we are cool to do t…
Here's a blog post from when they registered a previous car a few years ago: https://web.archive.org/web/20210506002307/https://solarteam...
I think they have a genuine registration from the Netherlands that they can produce if someone stops them.
Re: Students’ solar-powered camper van turns heads on 1,800-mile road trip
#17The article says the trip is "an 1,800-mile (3,000km) road trip across western Europe". Are you allowed to drive around in self built vehicles in Europe? Or did they convince all countries they cross to give them a special permit? How does that even work? When the polic stops them and says "The papers of the car please", they say "Hey, check this out, we have a letter from your chancellor who says we are cool to do t…
Re: Students’ solar-powered camper van turns heads on 1,800-mile road trip
#18I wonder how they got to 450 miles a day on solar. I remember the Prius solar roof option would only give you a couple of miles a day in ideal circumstances. This camper has more panels but that’s still a bit jump to 450 miles.
It sounds like they are averaging around 60 miles/day on their road trip. Given the regular RV loads they will have for cooking and lighting, in addition to cloud days, it seems like they are fully utilizing their solar gain.
Re: Students’ solar-powered camper van turns heads on 1,800-mile road trip
#19The article says the trip is "an 1,800-mile (3,000km) road trip across western Europe". Are you allowed to drive around in self built vehicles in Europe? Or did they convince all countries they cross to give them a special permit? How does that even work? When the polic stops them and says "The papers of the car please", they say "Hey, check this out, we have a letter from your chancellor who says we are cool to do t…
Re: Students’ solar-powered camper van turns heads on 1,800-mile road trip
#20I wonder how they got to 450 miles a day on solar. I remember the Prius solar roof option would only give you a couple of miles a day in ideal circumstances. This camper has more panels but that’s still a bit jump to 450 miles.
Is it a limit on acceleration coupled with larger solar area that allows this?