Electric Vehicles

[bruto]

Or, perhaps buyers, now they can get a low-maintenance drive train, should demand vehicles that don't rust. Obviously, suppliers will not like that, because vehicles with a life-span of several decades are not good for business, but if customers insist, they are going to have to supply them.

Hans

That is a possibility, but I think there are some likely problems. First cost is one, as school budgets are usually pretty tight already. Evolving standards are another. No point buying a 50 year school bus if standards require getting a new one every dozen years. Changing demographics yet another in some places, where the school population is hard to predict. It's hard for people to plan that far ahead.

The article I saw referenced California and Maryland, so chances are good that rust will be of little consequence, and as long as the buses meet standards, and withstand normal wear and tear, I expect they'll serve well. And if the running costs are as much lower as I suspect they might be, the lifespan will be a lagniappe anyway.

 

[acbytesla]

Lucid's new offering looks pretty interesting.

See the Lucid Air.

https://youtu.be/xsBhrmj4i-M

 

[Shalamar]

Lucid's new offering looks pretty interesting.

See the Lucid Air.

https://youtu.be/xsBhrmj4i-M

Competition and options are great!

 

[bruto]

The Lucid does look good. A bit rich for my blood. I could probably afford one, but I'd never get it. Heated seats and air conditioning and all that stuff are nice but I'd rather have a lighter car with longer range.

I'm still hoping for a base model electric hot rod. Put a Lucid motor in something the size of my Hyundai accent, skip the fancy wheels and the power this and that. It would go like a rocket. Make it a 4WD station wagon about the size of a Ford Focus and I'm in.

I know some of this stuff is mandatory these days, and I do like power windows and rear window defrosters and wipers, but you could skip the ABS and traction control and tire pressure monitors and lane change beepers. Drop the AC and bring back vent windows and sunroofs that open all the way.

Ok, I know I'm a retro curmudgeon about this. If I could change one thing on newer cars it would be the insanely stupid idea of coupling the air conditioner to the windshield defroster. Here in New England half the year you can't actually defrost the damned windshield without having to use the wipers to get the condensation off, and once you start, you can't turn it off again. Back in the day, a heated defroster would take longer, but it actually did the job, and when it finished you could turn it off again and the windshield wouldn't immediately become opaque again. Grrr. And get off my lawn, too!

 

[Filippo Lippi]

Well, according to figures given in this thread, it seems the current EVs have about 5:1 operation to charge ratio, perhaps even better in an optimized set-up. So instead of battery swapping, which in an automated setting would require it's own class of robotics, you could simply have 20% extra robots. They could then just seek the charging station when needed. Commercial robots like vacuum cleaners and lawn movers already do this.

Hans

Just catching up with this thread. At the point where there is a lot of talk about battery swapping, so my first contribution is point out that this is happening in China. Apologies if this information has already been posted.

Back to catching up

 

[Filippo Lippi]

I have the comparative luxury of a free car park at work. In recent years there's been political pressure around the idea of pushing commuters out of their cars and onto public transport by making employers pay tax on car park provision and perhaps charge their employees a parking fee.

The idea that I and colleagues might persuade my employer to pay to install and maintain charging points so we can charge our cars with their electricity seems far-fetched.

My employer has approaching 50 free 6.6 KW charging points at my work place. There were plans for more, but they may have been shelved since we were all sent home for covid. There are grants available for installation, I believe

 

[Filippo Lippi]

Just catching up with this thread. At the point where there is a lot of talk about battery swapping, so my first contribution is point out that this is happening in China. Apologies if this information has already been posted.

Back to catching up

Further, it was trialled in Europe (I think), but we didn't like it, in the same way we didn't like leasing the battery in the Renault Zoe we'd just paid for. We want to own the car, not just some bits of it

ETA - UK person. Long time interest in EV's, and bought a Nissan Leaf 40KW three years ago and had a home charger installed at the same time. Now completed 36K miles. Love it, don't want another ICE car. Work installed about 40 charging units, so could fill up during the day. Now on an EV tariff, so can charge the battery in the small hours for 40% of the cost of a KWH during the day. Range hasn't been a problem, though some places are more difficult to get to. Agree that the cars are too expensive and that charging is difficult in some places

 

[GlennB]

Of hybrids:

"Plug-in hybrid cars burn significantly more fuel than official tests record, according to research that suggests pollution from the vehicles could be much worse than advertised.

Tests of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) by Which?, the UK consumer group, found that some popular cars achieved as little as a third of the fuel economy advertised in official tests."

Full report in The Guardian

 

[Lplus]

Of hybrids:

"Plug-in hybrid cars burn significantly more fuel than official tests record, according to research that suggests pollution from the vehicles could be much worse than advertised.

Tests of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) by Which?, the UK consumer group, found that some popular cars achieved as little as a third of the fuel economy advertised in official tests."

Full report in The Guardian

All cars sold in Europe must, by law, be tested according to the worldwide harmonised light vehicle test procedure (WLTP). Which? argues they do not accurately reflect real-world driving conditions, and so tests cars over long ranges while using air conditioning and the radio, as well as running PHEVs for portions of its tests with an empty battery.

Oh No! Standardised tests aren't realistic!

They never have been - and I don't think they've ever purported to be either.

 

[MRC_Hans]

I don't think they can be realistic, but they must be relevant. That is they must test relevant usage patterns. The value of standardized tests is that they are comparable. If car A performs better than car B in the test it should also do so in real life (even if none of them will perform like the test).

Hans

 

[bruto]

I think to a great extent it's true that standardized tests help, but you have to be careful to evaluate what is being tested and where.

The further away your use is from some perceived average, the less useful those figures are.

As a trivial example, when I rented a Prius a while ago, its mileage was very impressive in city driving, but dropped drastically on the highway. By comparison, my lowly Hyundai Excel regularly delivers much better mileage than its rating in the kind of country driving I do.

The more a test involves urban stop and go and idle time, or superhighway use, the less useful it is to the person who is likely to be cruising nearly non-stop in 20 to 50 mile legs at medium speed.

 

[MRC_Hans]

I think to a great extent it's true that standardized tests help, but you have to be careful to evaluate what is being tested and where.

The further away your use is from some perceived average, the less useful those figures are.

As a trivial example, when I rented a Prius a while ago, its mileage was very impressive in city driving, but dropped drastically on the highway. By comparison, my lowly Hyundai Excel regularly delivers much better mileage than its rating in the kind of country driving I do.

The more a test involves urban stop and go and idle time, or superhighway use, the less useful it is to the person who is likely to be cruising nearly non-stop in 20 to 50 mile legs at medium speed.

A relevant standard should reflect a normal driving pattern. But of course, some special use could be different, as you note. The solution could be to additionally specify mileage on say, pure city stop-and-go, medium speed highway, and motorway. But then car manufacturers are really not big fans of too much transparency, and most buyers don't really choose from specs, anyway.

Hans

 

[Dr. Keith]

I don't think they can be realistic, but they must be relevant. That is they must test relevant usage patterns. The value of standardized tests is that they are comparable. If car A performs better than car B in the test it should also do so in real life (even if none of them will perform like the test).

Hans

The problem is that as soon as you publish the test the engineers begin work on tweaking their designs to meet the test.

As an example, BMW had huge batteries in some seven series cars so that they could run most of the mileage tests without having the alternator kick in except during the highway portions. Thousands of cars sold with unnecessarily large batteries that only charged at highway speeds just to do a bit better on the test. Yes, this was a problem for some owners.

And thats leaving said the illegal stuff that VW pulled to get their diesels through testing.

 

[bruto]

A relevant standard should reflect a normal driving pattern. But of course, some special use could be different, as you note. The solution could be to additionally specify mileage on say, pure city stop-and-go, medium speed highway, and motorway. But then car manufacturers are really not big fans of too much transparency, and most buyers don't really choose from specs, anyway.

Hans

Indeed, I imagine the tests do try their best to simulate a normal driving pattern but of course it's a statistical average that doesn't favor outliers on both ends, even though they do try with country and city cycles.

If I lived in town, I'd jump at a full plugin electric, but out here, given the cheapness and convenience of a little ICE, it's a harder sell.

My current Hyundai accent now has a bit over 95 thousand miles on it, and has needed almost no maintenance in its life: a front brake job, a couple of cheap strut mounts, a set of tires, and that's about it. I have a long time average of about 40 mpg. Although I bought it used with about 30K on it, it was one of the cheapest cars made, even new. An electric would likely be approaching battery end of life, and with first cost as a factor, I doubt it could give better cost benefit ratio. That's likely to change in the near future, but so far, it's a hard sell.

 

[Fast Eddie B]

Just stumbled on a little podcast called Quick Charge. It's by electrec and is 5 to 10 minute daily summaries of what’s new with electric vehicles. Might be worth a listen for those who want to stay up to date on the latest news.

 

[crescent]

Indeed, I imagine the tests do try their best to simulate a normal driving pattern but of course it's a statistical average that doesn't favor outliers on both ends, even though they do try with country and city cycles.

If I lived in town, I'd jump at a full plugin electric, but out here, given the cheapness and convenience of a little ICE, it's a harder sell.

My current Hyundai accent now has a bit over 95 thousand miles on it, and has needed almost no maintenance in its life: a front brake job, a couple of cheap strut mounts, a set of tires, and that's about it. I have a long time average of about 40 mpg. Although I bought it used with about 30K on it, it was one of the cheapest cars made, even new. An electric would likely be approaching battery end of life, and with first cost as a factor, I doubt it could give better cost benefit ratio. That's likely to change in the near future, but so far, it's a hard sell.

Not even close. An electric with good thermal management (which is nearly all of htem) would have used less than half of its battery life. Perhaps substantially less than half.

HOW LONG SHOULD AN ELECTRIC CAR’S BATTERY LAST?

The bottom line here is that if it’s properly cared for, an electric car’s battery pack should last for well in excess of 100,000 miles before its range becomes restricted. Consumer Reports estimates the average EV battery pack’s lifespan to be at around 200,000 miles, which is nearly 17 years of use if driven 12,000 miles per year.

Looking forward, Tesla says it’s working on technology that would enable its electric car batteries to last for as many as one million miles,

 

[JoeMorgue]

"Properly cared for" is a bit of a weasel phrase there though, especially if "battery swapping" becomes the norm and you have zero idea how good the battery in your car has actually been treated.

 

[JoeMorgue]

Tesla warranties their batteries for 8 years or 150,000 miles, which ever comes first.

Chevy warranties the Volt's batteries for 10 years or 100,000 miles, which ever comes first.

Toyota warranties the Prius's batteries for either 10 year/150,000 miles OR 8 years/100,000 miles depending on which state you are in, going by emissions laws apparently.

So I'd say that 8-10 years, 100-150 thousand miles-ish is probably a fairly good upper limit to how much you can fully trust your batteries since that's as far as the big players are willing to put their money on the line.

//ETA: Rewording the last line//

 

[crescent]

"Properly cared for" is a bit of a weasel phrase there though, especially if "battery swapping" becomes the norm and you have zero idea how good the battery in your car has actually been treated.

I don't think battery swapping will ever become the norm. The batteries are too big and that requires them to be integral to the frame.

I mean, I know it gets discussed here, but there seems to be zero interest from any of the manufacturers.

"Well cared for" also gets into the design of the battery pack because the thermal cooling system is part of the battery design. As far as I know, the Nissan leaf is the only EV sold in the U.S. that does not have liquid cooled batteries. Tesla and GM do, and they are showing very little battery degradation over time. Cars on the road now will likely still have 90% of their battery capacity at 300k miles - except the Nissan Leafs in hot climates.

 

[TurkeysGhost]

I don't think battery swapping will ever become the norm. The batteries are too big and that requires them to be integral to the frame.

I mean, I know it gets discussed here, but there seems to be zero interest from any of the manufacturers.

"Well cared for" also gets into the design of the battery pack because the thermal cooling system is part of the battery design. As far as I know, the Nissan leaf is the only EV sold in the U.S. that does not have liguid cooled batteries. Tesla and GM do, and they are showing very little battery degradation over time. Cars on the road now will likely still have 90% of their battery capacity at 300k miles - except the Nisssan Leafs in hot climates.

How much of an ordeal is it to swap a battery? I mean, people get engines and transmissions rebuilt all the time, and that's usually an expensive and time consuming process. I'm not saying it has to be super fast and easy, but if such a swap means doubling the lifespan of the car, it's probably worth spending a small bit rather than paying for a new vehicle.

The rest of the car usually has a lot of life left in it at 100,000 miles. It strikes me as awfully wasteful if battery lifespan means that the whole car is basically junk at only 150,000 miles.