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What is a Hybrid Car?

A hybrid car is one that uses more than one propulsion system to give the car the power to move. Normally, they are gasoline-electric hybrid cars. These hybrid cars use gasoline to muscle internal-combustion engines and electric batteries to muscle electric motors.

Some of the most popular hybrid cars today, recharge their batteries by collecting kinetic energy by way of regenerative braking. While the car is cruising or idling, some of this output from the combustion engine is fed back to a generator, which will produce the electricity that is needed to charge the batteries. This is different however, from electric cars that only use batteries that are charged by an outside source like a range extending trailer. Most hybrids do require gasoline as their fuel source, but you can find some that also use diesel or ethanol.

The very first hybrid car was created in 1972, the Buick skylark and was a prototype by Victor Wouk. This was a program designed by GM called the Federal Clean Car Incentive Program, however the EPA shut down this program in 1976. During President Clinton’s administration a partnership was began with Ford, General Motors, Chrysler, USCAR, and the DOE for a PNGV better known as the New Generation of Vehicles. This program was started on September 29, 1993. This was supposed to be the beginning of efficient and clean vehicles. However, these prototypes were never put into production. With President Bush in office, the new hydrogen FreedomCAR in 2001 was pushed forward.

The first hybrid cars to make it off the assembly line were in the 1990’s; the Toyota Prius and the Honda Insight. These cars have proven to be very fuel-efficient and have been advancing throughout the years in not only their performance but also their style and design.

Practically all hybrid cars offer fuel efficiency of around 50% from the average car and will deliver around 50 mpg’s. Throughout the years, hybrid cars have changed and have advanced into improvement with passenger room, a larger cargo area, power output, and the increase of energy efficiency and reduction in emissions.

In 2005, the first hybrid SUV was released by the Ford Motor company, the Ford Escape Hybrid. Toyota and Ford were in on this one together to create a hybrid car that every person would desire for their clean choice in an automobile.

Many of the hybrid cars you see around town today are the gasoline-electric hybrid. There are however, in France two diesel-electric hybrid cars in the creation stage.

What hybrid cars do in essence is combine the power of gasoline cars with the cleanliness of electric cars into one awesome car. You will see that with this combination you can receive driving a distance of 300 miles without needing more fuel, refuel easily, and drive just as fast as other cars on the road.

The hybrid car can also have a much smaller engine that a normal gasoline engine which will give you more efficiency without reducing your power. These smaller engines are more efficient in many ways such as the energy you save when you accelerate or drive up a hill, the pistons are small and weigh less so they will not require as much energy when going up and down in the cylinder, the displacement of the cylinders are smaller so you will use less fuel, and the smaller engines of the hybrid car have less cylinders so you save more fuel.