Tesla pickup, possibly

[crazyal]

My take on the Walmart electric truck idea would be to have a battery on the truck but a larger battery on the trailer that could be recharged when the trailer was at the dock.

Since Walmart sends the trucks to the same store with a trailer, and all stores are within a days drive of the regional distribution center, drop trailer and return with empty while the store crew unloads the trailer it could be recharging. So each store would have a charger and the distribution center would have one for the truck battery and one for the trailer.

A few years ago they were playing around with an electric truck with a large battery and a small high speed diesel that could maintain truck on the flats and the batteries would help out on the hills with regenerative brakes recharging on the downhill.

David

I'm thinking that since the stores are all pretty close together each one will be fitted with charging stations for each bay. The truck will back in to be unloaded while the driver plugs the truck in. While it may not fully charge the truck it could put enough extra charge into the battery so it can make it through the day. WalMart has a few advantages. First they can afford to pay for then take all the tax breaks to do it. They have lots of stores and depots so a charging station is not far away. They can afford to have spare tractors waiting at each store just in case one needs more time to recharge. But most of all they don't need to make a profit off of their trucks. To them the PR of going green can offset the added costs (installing their own supercharging stations at each store, the extra trucks, the extra batteries, etc.).

 

[cqaigy2]

And that "bigger higher definition" one is hardly the current state of the art set...just like LCD and plasma went down when LED entered the market and it's been well surpassed...

Not to mention solid state hard drives. The cost per gigabyte keeps going down. So okay the current location of the goalpost is to mean 'brand new' technology is going to be more expensive and has surpassed the tech of yesteryear.

 

[cqaigy2]

Next generation battery technology: Goodbye lithium? | Financial Post

5 times would be good.

 

[cqaigy2]

H-fuel cells have been around a long time...it seems they have had a lot of time to perfect them but for some reason they have not been able to get them safely usable for the average consumer level applications...but they would be an alternative to rechargeable batteries...

Yes, I think all those toys that use lithium batteries have had something to do with that. I've only seen fuel cells in use for building sized applications.

 

[/pine]

Yes, I think all those toys that use lithium batteries have had something to do with that. I've only seen fuel cells in use for building sized applications.

Couldn't agree more...toys are one of the most applicable uses for batteries...BTW...H-fuel cells seemed to have worked OK on the two passenger Gemini capsule...circa 1965-66...

 

[Stimw]

Speaking of current weather conditions, Just what will these magic battery cars/PU's/Semi's do about heat or AC?????
My Chevy will get nice and TOASTY or COLD regardless of out side temp.
Maybe they could put a luggage rack on the back where they could put a generator to charge the batteries or run Window Unit Heatpump.

 

[4570Man]

Speaking of current weather conditions, Just what will these magic battery cars/PU's/Semi's do about heat or AC?????
My Chevy will get nice and TOASTY or COLD regardless of out side temp.
Maybe they could put a luggage rack on the back where they could put a generator to charge the batteries or run Window Unit Heatpump.

Use more battery energy making the limited range shorter. Maybe they’ll use diesel or kerosene for heat because electric resistance heat takes a lot of energy.

 

[Btown]

It was warm today up here in New England 15F wonder how long the battery lasts in this weather. Wonder if they fixed the battery drain problems in really cold weather when left unplugged overnight?

 

[sd455dan]

Use more battery energy making the limited range shorter. Maybe they値l diesel or kerosene for heat because electric resistance heat takes a lot of energy.

Most have a remote pre conditioning mode that will warm or cool as needed before unplugging and driving off.

Here is a Tesla Model X that the owner tested it's ability to warm the car in cold weather. from 21*F didn't take to long to get to 104* F then 108*F

starts off with funny scene, Bjorn testing his model X off road- where it broke body pieces off

Tesla Model X sauna - YouTube

math suggested 3-6 kwh to pre heat or 2 -4 minutes at a supercharger

 

[4570Man]

Most have a remote pre conditioning mode that will warm or cool as needed before unplugging and driving off.

Here is a Tesla Model X that the owner tested it's ability to warm the car in cold weather. from 21*F didn't take to long to get to 104* F then 108*F

starts off with funny scene, Bjorn testing his model X off road- where it broke body pieces off

Tesla Model X sauna - YouTube

math suggested 3-6 kwh to pre heat or 2 -4 minutes at a supercharger

That’s a nice feature, but it still takes a lot of energy to maintain a comfortable temperature with the outside temperatures at either extreme. My experience with cold batteries is they have a drastically reduced power output. Same problem with the car batteries?