"My car has "Semi-Hybrid Technology". Sometimes I turn the motor off."

Prius envy has me thinking... If I could create a new car, what would it be like?

Until Mr. Fusion becomes a reality, I believe a container of fuel like gasoline has more energy per pound or cubic foot than things that store electricity like batteries. Therefore my ultimate car will burn fuel. But surely there's a simpler way to get energy out of fuel than with pistons. I believe that's the reasoning behind Crysler's turbine powered cars of the 1960's. A turbine can/does have much fewer moving parts, and IMHO will be a better engine for a car.

For high efficiency, a car ought to capture and store energy from slowing, stopping, and going down hills for use later. The batteries and electric motor/generators in modern hybrids do a nice job of this. Next, all normal cars have a very complex machine called a transmission to match the capabilities of the engine to the needs of the wheels. Electric motors can do without any transmission. The diesel locomotives that haul trains across our country are driven by electric motors with no transmission. The Chevy Volt has no transmission. The (very cool) Tesla Roadster mentions a "complex two speed" transmission and a no transmission. If they call a two speed "complex", what would they call the common four speed automatic? A lot of extra parts and weight! Hammacher Schlemmer eliminated the transmission years ago from their 120MPH novelty electric car.

A really great electric car would have the following characteristics:
-All wheel drive. If a two wheel drive vehicle is desirable, then the difference compared to an all wheel drive model may be minimal.
-No transmission; This would eliminate about a thousand moving parts, and weight equivelant to two or three passengers.
-The turbine engine could operate at whatever speed is most efficient since there is no mechanical connection to the wheels.
-A turbine engine could use a wide variety of fuels, and probably could be optimized to run on a fuel that is easier and cheaper to refine and/or cleaner than gasoline, or maybe even recycled french fry oil.
-Fewer moving parts. The single fan in a turbine engine would replace the pistons, connecting rods, crank shaft, valves... of an internal combustion engine, and the transmission (thousands of moving parts) and driveshaft would be replaced by some electronic components, wire, and four electric motors.

Such a car would have the following advantages:
-All wheel drive, to keep me out the ditch on a snowy day.
-Cheaper and more reliable. Fewer moving parts will cost less and fail less often. If one of the electric motors failed, the car would still run.
-Quieter. A turbine's noise is much higher pitch, and I believe it would be a fairly uniform pitch, so the muffler could be smaller, lighter, and optimized to the pitch of the turbine.
-Use less fuel. The weight saved and the optimization possible, and the energy recovery possible by having batteries like a modern hybrid car should all make for a very efficient car.

And to be fair, my dream car may not be able to reach the theoretical efficiency of a Prius. See HybridCenter.org for an excellent explaination of differrent types of hybrids. My dream car is a "series hybrid" in order to minimize mechanical complexity.