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What's New? We wuz robbed! Click here to read our burgled blues. (Rant Alert: You might be happier reading the short form here) [N] The MAX development page was getting kind of cumbersome, so we cut it at Winter 08/09 and put the newer stuff on a new page. [N] "We've withdrawn MAX from the Progressive Automotive X Prize. This Mother Earth News blog entry tells why. [N] New recently "Brink, Discovery Science Channel's fun science program, did a great feature on us and gave us this direct link to the video. [N] "Woohoo! MAX won Escape from Berkeley. Good coverage in the New York Times among others. [T, P] "Jack has a MAX Updates blog on the Mother Earth News Green Transportation web page. 300 words and a graphic, twice a month. [N] "We've added panel mounting instructions, updated the windshield mounting instructions, made some improvements to our Dzus fastener page. , (What's a Dzus fastener? Guess you need to click the page to find out), and improved our adjustable control arms page. Also check out our preliminary PVC suspension simulator info on LocostUSA. [N[ = all
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  A Locost in its natural habitat--on the edge of the desert east of the Sierra Nevada mountains, chock full of camping gear and headed for Las Vegas. This is MAX, which stands for Mother's Automotive eXperiment. No, we're not done with it. It needs a streamlined body, for one thing, since we're shooting for 100 miles per gallon. The engine is a turbocharged 1100cc Kubota diesel, and and even sans streamlining MAX is surprisingly peppy. Peppy enough to win the inaugural Escape from Berkeley race in October '08 (Berkeley to Las Vegas without petroleum fuel) thanks to good performance, great mileage, and the ability to run on cooking oil straight out of the bottle. We intend to run the same team in April 2010, when Escape from Berkeley will take us from Berkeley to Mexico; Yours Truly behind the wheel and Sharon Wescott behind the map...unless by some fluke we get a diesel motorcycle whipped together for Sharon, in which case we'll be calling for volunteers in the right seat. Click here to read all about the MAX project or here to just read about MAX this year. Meanwhile, we build and distribute a variety of Locost and Haynes Roadster chassis components and fiberglass body parts, and design new devices and techniques to improve the breed. MAX is a bit unusual, most of our users are making serious high performance cars with 5 to 10 times MAX's horsepower, it all depends on what you want and we're here to help you make a car that meets your particular goals. Please don't tease our web site. Just because I got Dreamweaver doesn't make me a web designer. Regards, Jack McCornack |