Electric Cars - Automobile Industry

[Davo]

GM electric car

Cheers for the link.

This would seem to support the view that GM and other Large automobile manufacturers are leading a deliberate mis-information campaign against electric cars.

The basic reason would be that electric cars will not reap in the profits that conventional vehicles bring in.

Because of the battery capacity electric cars would be limited to about 150 mile range, which accounts for most peoples daily travel.

For further range Hybrid or Hydrogen electric would seem the better alternative.

 

[ponderingturtle]

Cheers for the link.

This would seem to support the view that GM and other Large automobile manufacturers are leading a deliberate mis-information campaign against electric cars.

The basic reason would be that electric cars will not reap in the profits that conventional vehicles bring in.

Because of the battery capacity electric cars would be limited to about 150 mile range, which accounts for most peoples daily travel.

And of course no one want a car to be able to go away for the weekend, or go on a road trip.

A electic car is a second car, and their are not enough people who want them to support electic cars. You can buy an electic car if you want one, there are plenty of places that will convert a car to electric.

 

[joobz]

All of that coupled with the fact that they got burned (pun intended) by their only attempt. Sure the fire issue would be an easy thing to prevent by proper redesign. It just wasn't worth it. I'd agree with that.

The part I think is most amusing is that batteries degrade over time. Sure you'd get a 150mile distance on the initial charge...but
As year 1 became year 2 the 150 mile charge would become a 100 mile... 50 mile...10 mile. Think of a Laptop. Who hasn't seen their brand new long lasting laptop change into one that needed to be plugged into an outlet all the time. (or at least until you shell out the cash for a new battery or laptop).

 

[Davo]

I don`t believe it was an attempt by GM to introduce electric cars, which was why they didn`t sell them, only lease.

Even when people wanted to buy the vehicles theye chose to scrap the fleet.

The reason they were produced was to comply with one of the california clean air regulations.

Take the point of the battery life and degradation. From what I`ve read the degradation curve starts after 500 battery charges. That would give you about 75,000 miles before battery would become less effective. I would like to see this figure confirmed from actual road tests rather than theoretical values.

To the other post I would agree that electrical would not seem practical for a road trip, or a long weekend trip. Given that most of people spend their driving time commuting I would say that the electrical vehicle could easily be the primary vehicle, with combustion engine vehicle being a secondary vehicle.

I disagree with the point about people not wanting electric vehicles. In general the public are not aware of their practicality and there is certainly a lot of mis-information being circulated.

 

[joobz]

Take the point of the battery life and degradation. From what I`ve read the degradation curve starts after 500 battery charges. That would give you about 75,000 miles before battery would become less effective. I would like to see this figure confirmed from actual road tests rather than theoretical values.

I'd like to see that info. All rechargable battery experience that I've had would argue otherwise.
Maybe there's a benefit to larger batteries, but I somehow doubt it. Laptops, cell phones, batteries have a 1-2year life span. Hybrids cars presumably have a 4-5year life span. Although, the real world data is still out on this. If you switch to a format where the entire energy comes from the battery, I'd expect it to degrade much sooner.

I've never doubted that there wasn't a market for electric cars. There's a wide variety of people out there. But for a car company, that market just isn't large enough for them to bother with. And I'd believe that most people wouldn't want it. You got to remember, SUVs are still the trend (Dieing now, thankfully). People in America Love their big cars. I don't. But that is what people buy.

So a sleak little electric sounds wussy compared to a HEMI V8 truck with extra large "tailpipe".

 

[ponderingturtle]

I don`t believe it was an attempt by GM to introduce electric cars, which was why they didn`t sell them, only lease.

Even when people wanted to buy the vehicles theye chose to scrap the fleet.

So what? Unless those people wanted to spend something like $300,000+ each, it is not like they would have made money and the write off might have been better. Also in the thread from before if you read it, people point out things like that if sold, then they would have obligations as having sold the car under american law. That put additional liabilities on what was already a massive loss of money.

So it makes sense that they just wanted to get rid of it, and the ammount the people would pay was irrelevent compaired to the cost of the development and such, and possibly less that they would have had to spend if they sold the vehicals.

This is not simple, but has lots of accounting and legal issues in it.

 

[ponderingturtle]

To the other post I would agree that electrical would not seem practical for a road trip, or a long weekend trip. Given that most of people spend their driving time commuting I would say that the electrical vehicle could easily be the primary vehicle, with combustion engine vehicle being a secondary vehicle.

I disagree with the point about people not wanting electric vehicles. In general the public are not aware of their practicality and there is certainly a lot of mis-information being circulated.

Electric vehicals are available, if you want them, there are lots of people who will convert a car into an electric car. They are not doing great business.

The point about weekend trips is the whole issue, sure you mainly use it for commuting, but if you want to be able to take a weekend trip then you need 2 cars. So it only is even possible for multipal car households, and then you have to still lock youself into only having one of the vehicals possible for such trips.

It is a lack of flexibility that most people can not afford, so only wealthy people who can afford to have a commuter vehical and a weekend vehical is the market that electric vehcials are trying to supply to. And the percent of them who want electric instead of ecnobox is just not enough to support much in the way of electric vehicals.

Now I have heard that hybrids in other countries can be run as electric cars, and that might be practical, but a full electric vehical is not something most people can afford or would have to many restrictions.

It is like a house that is fine for you but you can never have anyone over. Sure most of the time you will not have friends over, but to not be able to do it would be unacceptable to most people.

 

[TjW]

I don`t believe it was an attempt by GM to introduce electric cars, which was why they didn`t sell them, only lease.

True. It was an attempt by GM to get data on the real-world use of electric cars.

Even when people wanted to buy the vehicles theye chose to scrap the fleet.

Have you looked into the consumer protection laws in California? If you manufacture more than a small number of cars, then sell even one, there are laws regarding the support in terms of spare parts, etc you must provide for the end user. That expense, and the continuing liability expense, made it cheaper to scrap them. I don't think even GM walks casually away from a billion-dollar research expenditure.

The reason they were produced was to comply with one of the california clean air regulations.

Well, they wanted to have some idea of how to avoid problems with their customers if they were going to be mandated to have 2 percent of their California sales be electric cars. The fact that two garages burned down shows that doing a relatively small-scale test was probably a good idea.

Take the point of the battery life and degradation. From what I`ve read the degradation curve starts after 500 battery charges. That would give you about 75,000 miles before battery would become less effective. I would like to see this figure confirmed from actual road tests rather than theoretical values.

I'd like to see a cite for that. My experience with batteries is that deep discharge -- as you'd have to do to get any reasonable range -- is generally bad for NiCd, NiMH, and Pb-acid batteries.

To the other post I would agree that electrical would not seem practical for a road trip, or a long weekend trip. Given that most of people spend their driving time commuting I would say that the electrical vehicle could easily be the primary vehicle, with combustion engine vehicle being a secondary vehicle.

I disagree with the point about people not wanting electric vehicles. In general the public are not aware of their practicality and there is certainly a lot of mis-information being circulated.

Yes, and most of it is by the people who want someone else to provide them with an electric car.

 

[Cuddles]

Of course, there's always the problem of demand and power distribution. no-one will want an electric car (or hydrogen, ow whatever) unless they are sure that wherever they go they can refuel it. But no-one will build refueling points all over the country unless there are enough cars to make it worthwhile. The only way for this to work is for the government to do something, businesses will never do anything if there isn't a profit.