How much power could a car covered in solar panels generate?
Question:
On a light weight car would it be enough to travel? If so for how long?
Answer:
It depends on how big the car is, but in general the answer ends up being "not much". There's about one kilowatt, a bit more than a horsepower, per square meter of sunlight in good sunny conditions with the sun close to directly overhead. Current common solar cells have a conversion rate of about 15%, as you said. So, if a car is two meters wide, and three meters long, this will get you 600 watts, about 8/10ths of a horsepower, under ideal conditions. These conditions are that the sky is clear and the sun is close to directly overhead, and so on.
As far as how advanced solar cells will change this, the best available now are around 35% efficient. These are intended for space use where every little bit of weight savings counts, and are much, much more expensive than conventional solar cells. Use of these would get you over 1.5 horsepower under ideal conditions. The maximum, assuming hypothetical 100% efficient solar cells, something we have no idea how to make currently, and which will probably never be possible, would, like I said, be about 1kW per square meter of car space, again assuming ideal conditions.
It is possible to make a solar powered car that is fully driveable and can cover a good distance, but it's going to have to be very lightweight, very aerodynamic, and have an extremely low rolling resistance if it's to have anything resembling reasonable acceleration and top speed.
440 horsepower/505 torque @ 3200 rpm
That will depend on a number of factors.
1.) The area of the solar panels used.
2.) Energy production capability of those solar panels. (you listed that)
3.) The solar index of the area where the car is kept.
More Questions & Answers...