Most Helpful Customer Reviews
17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A lot of good information, but some fluff too, August 20, 2009
This review is from: Build Your Own Plug-In Hybrid Electric Vehicle (TAB Green Guru Guides) (Paperback)
If you have read Build Your Own Electric Vehicle by Seth Leitman and Bob Brant, this book will seem like an old friend. Written by Seth Leitman alone this time, Build Your Own Plug-In Hybrid not only has the same rather folksy style as the earlier book, but it borrows a lot of the same text. Quite a lot -- about 50%, by my rough estimation.
Even with the repetition, the 50% that is new offers a lot. Seth Leitman knows what he is talking about, and has gathered information from a variety of sources, including from his own experience making a plug-in hybrid with lead-acid batteries in a Prius. Much of this information is hard to find elsewhere.
I'm not a particular fan of Seth Leitman's style. He calls out a lot of people by name to call their work and contributions "great" (a word that is clearly a favorite of his). Many of the pictures in the book are snapshots, a little poorly printed, that have these people in them. Some of the wording seems a bit corny from time to time as well.
Finally, unlike Build Your Own Electric Vehicle, this book does not really tell you how to build your own plug-in hybrid. The actual building, the book suggests, should be left to experts. This book tells more about what kits are available, and how to plan and participate in the conversion. That's helpful, but the title of the book suggests it will deliver more, and may be a bit misleading.
Despite these flaws, I recommend the book. As with Build Your Own Electric Vehicle, this book could be a lot better. There is plenty of room for improvement. But there is no other book out there that competes with it. For now, at least, it stands alone. And if its parent book is any indication, this book too may well stand out for quite a long time.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
16 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Real Title - 'Hybrid Vehicle Overview Mishmash', September 11, 2009
This review is from: Build Your Own Plug-In Hybrid Electric Vehicle (TAB Green Guru Guides) (Paperback)
This is _not_ a how to build your own hybrid vehicle book. As such it should not be put aside lightly, but rather hurled forcefully into the circular file forthwith, for its deceptive title alone.
Yes it is (mildly) interesting if a thin overview of hybrids is your goal. But it has little useful information on building any hybrid, let alone your own, and many many pages of useless 'filler'; there are lots of photographs of pcb circuit boards followed by photographs of alternate pcb circuit boards, all of no use to anyone. They serve to give the book a spurious 'this is a technical book' appearance, in typical TAB style. Wrong! It is in no way a technical book. More like a cross between a comic and a bunch of random -- and useless -- pictures of bits of hardware from some hybrid. Also in typical TAB style.
Unhappy? Moi? Don't call your book 'Build Your Own Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle', if it is nothing of the sort. Before you waste _your_ money, find a copy in a book store and make your own mind up. Dollars to doughnuts you'll agree.
By comparison, as an overview of hybrids, Hybrid Vehicles: and the Future of Personal Transportation by Allen Fuhs was endlessly fascinating. Extraordinarily broad in its coverage, it ranged from peak oil to the differences in suitable electric motors; it is filled with lots of practical nuts-and-bolts calculations that will appeal to the armchair-engineer who enjoys interpreting numbers and juggling costs, pay-offs, and alternatives in range, fuel consumption and weights. Because of Big Oil disinformation efforts -- see EV web sites and discussions hijacked by AI-generated posts of encyclopedic substance and length -- I don't accept the criticism of other reviewers as necessarily valid.
Big Oil disinformation? Surely you jest? Wally Rippel - WKTEC - "There is a $100T (T as in Trillion) worth of business still to be done (in oil in the ground). You bet there is disinformation. And a lot more besides. Got Peter Dale Scott?
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
How to fleece your own unsuspecting book buyers., June 13, 2011
This review is from: Build Your Own Plug-In Hybrid Electric Vehicle (TAB Green Guru Guides) (Paperback)
Over the course of my 40 some odd years as a reader, I have read hundreds upon hundreds of books. Some have been excellent. Most were serviceable. A very few have been truly bad. Beyond the shadow of a doubt, this book is the worst I have ever read.
This book was not written. It was cut and pasted, haphazardly, from numerous discordant sources. Most of those sources appear to have been web pages created by marginally competent high school students. Half the material is redundant, half is incomplete, and more than half is both. Some sections go into tedious detail about irrelevant minor topics, while other sections leave important concepts and terms completely unexplained. Some of it speaks about the 1990's in the present tense, speculating what 2000 will bring to the field of electric vehicles, indicating that material from decades old sources was not even read before being pasted into this book with a 2009 publication date.
Some of the material in this book, like the discussion about horsepower and the assertion that ICE drivetrain components repurposed to an EV have reduced lubrication requirements, are simply wrong. None of the material in this book justifies the title of the book. If your goal is to Build Your Own Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle, stay away from this book. Reading this book will leave you with a poorer understanding of the process of building a PHEV than you started with, and you will be $20 shorter of the necessary cash to boot.
Save yourself the money. You can get better content by Googling "PHEV" and clicking randomly thru whatever sites show up on page 10 of the search results. If you are really in need of the paper a book like this provides, a few rolls of Charmin will serve its best purpose more comfortably, at 1/10 the cost.
Help other customers find the most helpful reviews
Was this review helpful to you? Yes
No
|
