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Solar-powered car makes sun-stop at USF

Photo by MARCELO DA LUZ

Marcelo da Luz is driving down to the Florida Keys after traveling over 14,000 miles from Buffalo through many northern states and some Canadian provinces.

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By KEITH MORELLI | The Tampa Tribune

Published: May 12, 2009

Updated: 05/12/2009 12:59 pm

Made in Canada with parts from as far away as Korea, the world's most traveled solar car swung through Tampa on Tuesday en route to Key West. It didn't go unnoticed and was pulled over by Tampa police on Fowler Avenue as it neared its destination at the University of South Florida.

It was the second time the flying-saucer-shaped vehicle was stopped in Tampa, said the car's inventor, creator and driver Marcelo da Luz. "They just wanted to make sure it was legal," he said. "It is."

The car is registered in Barbados, he said, and once officers determined that the vehicle was legal, da Luz was allowed to climb back into the capsule and take off.

At USF's Clean Energy Research Center at Research Park, students and professors milled around the unusual looking vehicle, some asking technical questions, others taking pictures. It was a photo op for them and a chance for da Luz to tout his labor of love.

He said the vehicle was the result of a lot of hard work, including about 50,000 donated hours of labor, mostly from volunteers. Two years of research and more than two years of construction went into the vehicle, which began its North American trek in Buffalo, N.Y., in June 2008.

From there, it hummed west across the Great Lakes states and up into Canada, crossing the Rockies and ending up north of the Arctic Circle in the tiny town of Inuvik in the Northwest Territories, on the shore of the Beaufort Sea, which is part of the Arctic Ocean.

Then, the trip went south to San Francisco, and east to Florida.

In all, more than 14,000 miles were logged on the vehicle that runs on the amount of electricity it takes to heat an average toaster, da Luz said.

Solar cars have come and gone, but none have gone that far, he said, and that's what makes this one different. Using only the gentle rays of the sun to recharge the batteries, the car, named the XOF1, has never stopped at a gas pump or paused for a plug in.

That's not to say there weren't problems. In the Pacific Northwest, it once rained for days on end, and that slowed the trek.

As far as mechanical problems, there were nearly none, he said.

"It was very reliable," he said. "We had more problems with the support vehicle than the solar car."

The three-wheeled vehicle endured dusty gravel roads and icy highways and even chugged along capturing energy from the low-arcing arctic sun to power it all the way to Inuvik.

It has 26 battery cells that hold enough power to go 130 miles without the sun, he said. It has two silver-dollar size headlights, turn signals and brake lights, and is made of hard polymer-like foam. There are vents for a breeze, but no air conditioning or heater. The entire top is a shimmering wave of small solar panels that feed energy to the batteries.

"It can go from zero to 50 in six seconds," da Luz boasted to the small crowd at USF, telling them the vehicle was built without government help.

"We're always looking for the government or someone or something to save the planet," he said. "It's not going to happen."

Christopher Chow, a USF computer science major who was on hand to see the car, was impressed.

"What makes this special is that this car has been all over the place," he said. "No other car has done this. It's the only solar car that has been charged with the light of the midnight sun. I love that."

The beauty of the car is its simplicity, Chow said.

"There is nothing complicated about this car," he said. "Undergraduate programs from any university can build one."

The car was built with donations and sponsorships that brought money and volunteers into the fold. Da Luz is still looking for more volunteers and donations. For information, check his Web site at www.xof1.com.

Problems with the law often dogged him.

"We've been stopped 17 times," he said. Once Michigan state troopers argued with him that his car was illegal, and once they were proven wrong, they ended up writing a warning to the accompanying van, saying it was a commercial vehicle and needed to keep a log, da Luz said.

In Alaska, the car was stopped by officers who said they had gotten complaints about a flying saucer landing on the road.

Mostly traffic stops end with officers getting their picture taken with the vehicle, da Luz said.

After Florida, da Luz plans to head north, hopefully to the Arctic Circle again, with a stop in Washington, D.C.

"The dream," he said, "is to go from the Arctic Circle to Tierra del Fuego (the southernmost tip of South America)."

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