Electric Cars: Chev Bolt seems to be the first practical one.

[jmc]

It will get back to electrics soon enough. Land Cruisers are toys and clearly not a significant part of future transportation.

Actually, I hadn't seen your post before I posted. Mine was in response to 'clueless housewives' and 'real men' needing to drive gas guzzlers.

 

[houstonscott]

Actually, I hadn't seen your post before I posted. Mine was in response to 'clueless housewives' and 'real men' needing to drive gas guzzlers.

I'll chime out and let you girls talk battery cars, and saving the world. Lol.

 

[Luke'sScreenName]

I'll chime out and let you girls talk battery cars, and saving the world. Lol.

Thank God! :dance1:

 

[IslandTractor]

I'll chime out and let you girls talk battery cars, and saving the world. Lol.

Says the dude with photovoltaic panels.

We'll miss you. See ya next time. Have fun driving the land cruiser to the mall.

 

[California]

Sorry about your thread, California.

Thanks JMC. And to everybody interested in exploring the topic, or already living in the EV/hybrid world. I hope the sharing of information will continue.

I don't see why this thread is causing such a mean-spirited backlash.

 

[buickanddeere]

Read your own post. "What pollution?" you ask and then talk about "3rd world countries" that have "no regard for the environment". Do you realize that US companies polluted just as much before the EPA was created to set air pollution standards. Do you not understand that the only reason we don't have the gross air pollution of the 1970's is because we have become progressively "greener" in the past 50 years. Electric vehicle propulsion is just the next step in a continuing effort to keep air clean as population densities increase and more people consume resources. Green is about being efficient, it isn't a religion.

"What pollution" in the west. If you want to be concerned about pollution today, you will have to travel to the 3rd world.

 

[buickanddeere]

Nope, wrong.

Don't try and go breaking out Ohm's Law on me, now you're in *my* industry . Battery life is affected by *temperature* not charge rate and Tesla has a massive cooling system on the Model S(see my previous comment about louvers on the front of the car). It'll favor battery temperature over charging speed every time(although I've never seen less than 120kW in WA).

You're also way off on the charge rates. Supercharging keeps above L2 charging until about 90% of the pack(which you'd leave at anyway since 60% is enough to make the next supercharger) and L1 only happens at 97%(I know since I range charge on my Seattle trips).

View attachment 509983

Here's a random graph I grabbed from a 90kW user. The low graph is probably when he was at a full charger and sharing(in that case you don't quite get the full 120kW), however you can clearly see that it never drops below L2 rates.

Also I've been supercharging about once a week and have yet to see degradation related to it. It's a hot topic on the Tesla forums that people have researched extensively and found no evidence of degradation.

High capacity cooling or not, the battery internals are heating up and electrolyte is being gassed.
For those claiming "high EV efficiency". How about those KW hours of heat being dissipated by battery cooling systems and wasted by rapidly charging batteries

 

[buickanddeere]

I don't see why this thread is causing such a mean-spirited backlash.

You don't know why ?

 

[California]

I don't see why this thread is causing such a mean-spirited backlash.

You don't know why ?

Seriously, no.

 

[Redneck in training]

If gasoline price goes significantly up many detractors will consider electric cars. Just about every manufacturer is planning to make one or more models. I think the adoption rate will first increase in Europe because they can get by with shorter range and thus cheaper cars while gasoline costs just about double than in the USA. Electric car makes sense to me. Our PV produces excess of power that we are paid wholesale rate for so it makes a sense to use the excess charing the batteries. We are retired so we can adjust our driving timing and we drive enough distance spending significant money for the fuel. Right now the fuel is cheap but that might not be the case later on, while cost of electricity is more or less predictable. And we need new car as all but one car we currently own were born in this milenia. If we need to drive long distance we could rent a car or borrow kids car and give them the electric to drive.
There is some new development in battery technology every month. It looks like it follows the same pattern as computer technology in the past three decades. The energy density of batteries might not increase much but the cost/kWh will go down. I also think that with the right software and enough storage capacity the electric grid might benefit.