My dream RL?

One that has a compact super efficient diesel generator that powers a fully electric drive system in the truck . I could live with a max speed of 50mph or so but it would need some good climbing and AWD characteristics.
Batteries could be an option for a plug in style system meaning short trips could use greener power options than fuel. Truck could charge batts with braking and when parked at work/home.

How about it Honda (and ROC) engineers?

I think they call them, "Locomotives", guy. :rolleyes: :D
By the way, how did you make out on the vote for your video??

I have always wondered why we have never seen this configuration. I'd think with the proper battery pack that this would be a fairly easy conversion with a few new suspension parts for most cars. It would also be ideal for the Ridgeline.

I would gladly give up my trunk space in lieu of a battery pack. I'd scrap the 6 cylinder in favor of a 3 cylinder diesel that does nothing but charge the battery pack. I'd bet you could easily make the RL get 40 mpg with this setup. It would also help front/rear weight bias.

A diesel electric setup would instantly make the RL the #1 selling truck in the country.

Right now, the larger hybrid vehicles are designed for gasoline-like performance. Most people don't need that kind of performance anymore. I am looking forward to alternative drivetrains that are designed for gas mileage first, like the original Honda Insight.

I have always wondered why we have never seen this configuration. I'd think with the proper battery pack that this would be a fairly easy conversion with a few new suspension parts for most cars. It would also be ideal for the Ridgeline.

I would gladly give up my trunk space in lieu of a battery pack. I'd scrap the 6 cylinder in favor of a 3 cylinder diesel that does nothing but charge the battery pack. I'd bet you could easily make the RL get 40 mpg with this setup. It would also help front/rear weight bias.

A diesel electric setup would instantly make the RL the #1 selling truck in the country.

I've been searching for parts for a couple of years, ever since I read this article in popular science....

Step 3: Rev Up Our Hybrid Rides | Popular Science (http://www.popsci.com/environment/article/2006-07/step-3-rev-our-hybrid-rides)

The 300mpg drag racer

In the late 1940s, Andrew Frank was a hot-rodding teenager who mounted a Cadillac V12 engine in his 1936 Ford. By the 1990s, he was a mechanical-engineering professor at the University of California at Davis who pulled big engines out of SUVs and swapped them for smaller ones boosted by plug-in electric motors. His first "plug-in hy-brid" got 68 mpg without sacrificing horsepower.
Frank is now fielding a student team for the U.S. Department of Energy´s clean-vehicle competition, Challenge X. The group is building a 300- mpg plug-in hybrid with an ethanol-powered gasoline engine and a solar-powered electric motor. Sounds responsibly efficient. But the professor is still a hot-rodder at heart: "Last year we had a Ford Explorer that we converted into a plug-in hybrid, and it had so much torque that we couldn´t keep the axles from snapping. With six of my students in there, it could still burn rubber."