Victor Wouk
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Victor Wouk (; April 27, 1919 – May 19, 2005) was an American scientist. He was the pioneer in the development of
electric Electricity is the set of physical phenomena associated with the presence and motion of matter possessing an electric charge. Electricity is related to magnetism, both being part of the phenomenon of electromagnetism, as described by Maxwel ...
and
hybrid vehicle A hybrid vehicle is one that uses two or more distinct types of power, such as submarines that use diesel when surfaced and batteries when submerged. Other means to store energy include pressurized fluid in hydraulic hybrids. Hybrid powertrai ...
s.


Early life

Victor Wouk, the younger brother of the writer
Herman Wouk Herman Wouk ( ; May 27, 1915 – May 17, 2019) was an American author. He published fifteen novels, many of them historical fiction such as ''The Caine Mutiny'' (1951), for which he won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, Pulitzer Prize in fiction. ...
, was born in 1919 in
New York City New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...
, the son of Esther (née Levine) and Abraham Isaac Wouk. His parents were Russian Jewish immigrants from what is today Belarus. His father toiled for many years to raise the family out of poverty before opening a successful laundry service. He earned a bachelor's degree from
Columbia University Columbia University in the City of New York, commonly referred to as Columbia University, is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Churc ...
in 1939 and received his Ph.D. from the
California Institute of Technology The California Institute of Technology (branded as Caltech) is a private research university in Pasadena, California, United States. The university is responsible for many modern scientific advancements and is among a small group of institutes ...
in 1942. His dissertation was ''Static electricity generated during the distribution of gasoline''.


Career

Wouk organized a company, Beta Electric, and in 1956, sold it only to form a new one, the Electronic Energy Conversion Corporation (EECC). In 1960, he designed smaller and higher-efficiency AC-to-DC converters. In 1962, Wouk was noticed by Russell Feldmann, president of the National Union Electric Company and one of the founders of
Motorola Motorola, Inc. () was an American multinational telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois. It was founded by brothers Paul and Joseph Galvin in 1928 and had been named Motorola since 1947. Many of Motorola's products had been ...
, who had
Renault Dauphine The Renault Dauphine () is a rear-engine, rear-wheel-drive four-door economy car, economy sedan (car), sedan with three-box styling, manufactured and marketed by Renault from 1956 to 1967 across a single generation. Along with such cars as the C ...
s converted to electric power (known as Henney Kilowatt cars), and was in need of an efficient speed controller for them. In 1963, Wouk sold EECC to Gulton Industries and continued his work with them. Because the domestic Big Three automakers (GM, Ford, and Chrysler) had their own electric car programs, the much smaller
American Motors Corporation American Motors Corporation (AMC; commonly referred to as American Motors) was an American automobile manufacturing company formed by the mergers and acquisitions, merger of Nash-Kelvinator Corporation and Hudson Motor Car Company on May 1, 19 ...
(AMC) partnered with Gulton to develop a new battery based car using
lithium Lithium (from , , ) is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol, symbol Li and atomic number 3. It is a soft, silvery-white alkali metal. Under standard temperature and pressure, standard conditions, it is the least dense metal and the ...
and the advanced speed controller designed by Wouk. The running prototype was a 1969
Rambler American The Rambler American is a compact car that was manufactured by the American Motors Corporation (AMC) between 1958 and 1969. The American was the second incarnation of AMC forerunner Nash Motors' compact Nash Rambler, Rambler that was introduced ...
station wagon converted from AMC's gasoline
V8 engine A V8 engine is an eight- cylinder piston engine in which two banks of four cylinders share a common crankshaft and are arranged in a V configuration. Origins The first known V8 was the Antoinette, designed by Léon Levavasseur, a ...
, to an all-electric car. Power consisted of 160 Gulton nickel–cadmium batteries, each rated at 75
ampere hour An ampere-hour or amp-hour (symbol: A⋅h or A h; often simplified as Ah) is a unit of electric charge, having dimensions of electric current multiplied by time, equal to the charge transferred by a steady current of one ampere flowing for ...
s, and controlled through Wouk designed electronics. It had good acceleration, but relying on batteries alone limited the car's range. The experiments with the Rambler American convinced Wouk that battery problems were not going to be solved easily to satisfy consumers. He started to design a system that would combine an internal combustion engine with an electric motor for motive power. Wouk began working on ideas for a hybrid for American Motors. The
United States Environmental Protection Agency The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is an independent agency of the United States government tasked with environmental protection matters. President Richard Nixon proposed the establishment of EPA on July 9, 1970; it began operation on De ...
(EPA) established a "Clean Car Incentive Program" that funded innovative designs from the auto industry and inventors. Wouk's idea to create a hybrid car was approved in 1971, and the EPA was "to consider a nationwide test of vehicles based on his design if satisfied with the prototype." Wouk and friends invested about $300,000, and successfully converted a 1972
Buick Skylark The Buick Skylark is a passenger car formerly produced by Buick. The model was made in six production runs, during 46 years, over which the car's design varied dramatically due to changing technology, tastes, and new standards implemented over t ...
sedan. This was the first full-sized hybrid vehicle featuring a 20-kilowatt direct-current electric motor and an RX-2
Mazda is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational automotive manufacturer headquartered in Fuchū, Hiroshima (town), Fuchū, Hiroshima Prefecture, Hiroshima, Japan. The company was founded on January 30, 1920, as Toyo Cork Kogyo Co., Ltd. ...
rotary engine The rotary engine is an early type of internal combustion engine, usually designed with an odd number of cylinders per row in a radial configuration. The engine's crankshaft remained stationary in operation, while the entire crankcase and its ...
. This vehicle was tested at EPA's emissions-testing laboratories in
Ann Arbor, Michigan Ann Arbor is a city in Washtenaw County, Michigan, United States, and its county seat. The 2020 United States census, 2020 census recorded its population to be 123,851, making it the List of municipalities in Michigan, fifth-most populous cit ...
, where it obtained more than twice the fuel economy of the vehicle before it was converted. Furthermore, the vehicle's emission rates were only about nine percent of those of a gasoline-powered car from that era. In 1974, the EPA awarded $33,000 to Wouk and Dr. Charles L. Rosen and began its own analysis of the car, but the agency did not make additional cars for the planned nationwide tests. This pioneering work gained Wouk the nickname of ''the grandfather of electric and hybrid vehicles in the United States''. Even though they were not a new idea, mass-production hybrid vehicles aimed at the general market would in fact only appear by the late 1990s. The second modern hybrid car marketed to consumers was the
Toyota Prius The is a Compact car, compact/small family car, small family liftback (supermini/subcompact sedan (car), sedan until 2003) produced by Toyota. The Prius has a Hybrid vehicle drivetrain, hybrid drivetrain, combined with an internal combustion ...
(the first was the Honda Insight), which was based on principles similar to Wouk's. The Prius became available in the U.S. as a 2001 model, and Wouk
lease A lease is a contractual arrangement calling for the user (referred to as the ''lessee'') to pay the owner (referred to as the ''lessor'') for the use of an asset. Property, buildings and vehicles are common assets that are leased. Industrial ...
d one. Wouk was also actively involved in the field of electric vehicle
standardization Standardization (American English) or standardisation (British English) is the process of implementing and developing technical standards based on the consensus of different parties that include firms, users, interest groups, standards organiza ...
, participating in relevant technical committees such as the
IEC The International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC; ) is an international standards organization that prepares and publishes international standards for all electrical, electronic and related technologies. IEC standards cover a vast range of ...
TC69 and the
ISO The International Organization for Standardization (ISO ; ; ) is an independent, non-governmental, international standard development organization composed of representatives from the national standards organizations of member countries. Me ...
TC22 SC21 on electric vehicles. He remained an active member of these committees until the early 2000s. Wouk was awarded The Elmer A. Sperry Award for Advancing the Art of Transportation, posthumously, "for his visionary approach to developing the gasoline engine-electric motor hybrid systems for automobiles...." The archives of Victor Wouk are kept at
Caltech The California Institute of Technology (branded as Caltech) is a private university, private research university in Pasadena, California, United States. The university is responsible for many modern scientific advancements and is among a small g ...
.


Personal life

Victor Wouk died of cancer on May 19, 2005, in his Manhattan, New York home. He was survived by his wife Joy (died September 29, 2008), and sons Jonathan and Jordan. His nephew was
Alan I. Green Alan Ivan Green (November 7, 1943 – November 26, 2020) was an American psychiatrist. He was the Raymond Sobel Professor of Psychiatry at Geisel School of Medicine and longtime chairman of the school's psychiatry department. Biography Green w ...
, a psychiatrist at
Dartmouth College Dartmouth College ( ) is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Hanover, New Hampshire, United States. Established in 1769 by Eleazar Wheelock, Dartmouth is one of the nine colonial colleges chartered before the America ...
.


References


External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Wouk, Victor 1919 births 2005 deaths Scientists from New York City American automotive engineers American people of Belarusian-Jewish descent Columbia College (New York) alumni California Institute of Technology alumni Deaths from cancer in New York (state) Jewish American scientists Jewish engineers 20th-century American engineers 20th-century American Jews 21st-century American Jews