Movin' Pitchers Paul Wilkins copyright 1992 Paul Wilkins VIDEO REVIEWS Mike Brown's Electric Vehicle Components Primer If you are interested in seeing what it takes to put an EV together, then this videotape is the way to go. Mike talks about batteries, controllers, suspension, brakes and the other EV parts. Mike has been in the automotive field a long time and one of the first people in the resurgente EV sector. He has done a lot of R&D out of his own pocket, and has developed kits for transforming RABBITS and other "econo- boxes" to EVs. One of the best parts of this video is seeing the motor controllers and other pieces of equipment that make up an EV. This 92 minute tape is $35 and includes ELECTRO's parts catalog. For the dedicated EV freaks Electro Automotive has more car stuff from The North East Sustainable Energy Symposium in NOV 1991. The production values are better than last years according to the producer. I will have a review of them in the next issue. I saw the originals and they were very interesting. Hydrogen Video The American Hydrogen Society has produced a nifty 8 minute tape called "The Solar Hydrogen Economy" a good overview of what is being done on this energy front; cars, buses, planes. Citing such sources a BMW and Lockheed, it makes the point that the industrial infrastructure already exists to make a hydrogen economy work. This tape is an excellent tape for teachers It also shows ocean windfarms, ocean tidal electric conversion and a good explanation of the Hindenburg accident. Good production values. $14.98 In the Works In October I taped the Solar Technology Institutes' Advanced PV Workshop with Johnny Weiss, Ken Olson and Richard Perez. Not edited yet, needs some titles and a little cleaning up. When it is done it will be 17-20 tapes and will be announced here. STI will market it. I am beginning to assemble a tape PV In Suburbia, that looks at PV systems which displace grid power in towns. This will include John Wiles in Las Cruces, me in Santa Fe, and more depending on how many other tapes show up to be included. Don't be shy, if you have any tape on city systems send it to me. A note on video quality Producing broadcast quality video is expensive and time consuming. Equipment is expensive and the people operating the equipment get $50+ per hour. The fact is that VHS is very popular. For a few thousand dollars you can have enough equipment to do a pretty good job. Well, a lot of folks can't afford even that. So they grab their "consumer level" camera and go shoot what interests them. Using a couple of decks and hopefully an editing controller, they cut all the redundant stuff and make a tape that is good enough to communicate. My point is that "Broadcast Quality" is for those who can afford it. Other, poorer small producers will be giving current information, and information is the entire point. If you can see what is going on, and understand the audio, that's what is important. You won't see any video busted by me for editing glitches. Please allow me to introduce myselfÉ I have been using RE for a dozen years now. I have been writing articles, booklets and since 1895, editing and publishing the PV Network News. Solar Electricity Today started out as THE PV NETWORK NEWS' yearly resource directory. It is based on a booklet, catalog and directory I started in 1981 with about 30 sources. The last SET has over 800 sources. From 1982 to 1987, I manufactured SOLAR WORKS controls and regulators for wind, solar and water pumping. I have had the same phone for 11 years and rarely hear from my customers. In 1986, I acquired a video camera and deck and started doing videos about PV and renewable energy. Later that year Kirt Lulow of the Solar Retrofit Consortium donated another deck and editing control so that I could do editing from PV wherever I went The equipment is expensive 'consumer level' Panasonic. Not 'broadcast quality'. The first Video PV Places is a tour of PV systems showing applications from home, offices, shops, RVs, water pumping and a remote control model airplane. There a few rough edges in this production. Next was RETSIE (the renewable energy trade show) were I had manufacturers give their briefest speech on their products. No longer available. Next was Windcharger Repair, for the 200 watt WINCO wind generator. How to take one apart, diagnose problems, and put it back together. Windy Dankoff and I did A SHORT COURSE IN PV which is PV from modules through growing systems applications. Two years ago at a RE conference in New Mexico I taped John Wiles who writes Code Corner for HP. Called PV Meets The Code, John covers switch gear, fusing, and connections with a fast moving slide show of acceptable vs nonacceptable equipment and methods Access Author: Paul Wilkins, 2303 Cedros Circle, Santa Fe, NM 87505 ¥ 505- 473-1067 Electro Automotive, POB 1113, Felton, CA 95018 American Hydrogen Society 602-921-0433