ideas go in an out of vogue, who knows how things will play out as conditions change in the state over the years. electric has a major problem in that it will overwhelm the grid, transfers pollution elsewhere and rare earth minerals are in countries with which we have tenuous relations. in fact some are discussing that electric might have a larger carbon footprint.

 

I think its inevitable, irrespective of what the politicians do. Technology is overtaking the IC engine, just like digital cameras wiped out film, electric vehicles will wipe out IC vehicles.

 

In an urban environment it may be a possibility but out here in the real world the need to travel 4 to 6 hours just to get to a city may just be fly in that ointment.

 

regardless of the politics, logic or non application of, or whether carbon regulation is a good idea, we will probably evolve to a blended system where vehicles are purpose built to their intended use. this would make more sense in that accepting shorter range for EV's would allow simpler and less expensive batteries. a local community runabout does not need even a 100 mile range. an issue with batteries is the replacement cost which makes an otherwise good used vehicle valueless. you can rebuild major components of an IC vehicle for much less.

most also forget the much of the EV's power will be from combustion engines, just burning the fuel elsewhere usually in a much less pristine manner. the further you remove the point of generation from the point of use the greater your transmission losses. Additionally, this electrical load will also require nice things like nuclear power based upon 1960's design and technology. Wind and solar while having their places cannot by definition handle peak loads or instant demand loads.

it should be interesting to see how things are going to play out for the EV's when Mazda's newest technology achieves better mileage without hybrid drive trains or batteries.

 

You don't think battery technology will improve?

 

improvements are of course possible, however there are hard limits based upon things like physics and that pesky math thing. outside the hard limits of science, there are the hard limits of cost and materials as well as safety. the more that you try to do in a battery in a limited space with high performance options such as fast charging and high storage capacity, the greater the risk of catastrophic failures. batteries can and do explode and these events are much harder to deal with than conventional fuels.

this is all a moot point as the politics will push something that is not necessary logical and people in some areas are accustomed to using something without bearing its true cost which is usually passed on to others or the future in terms of both actual monetary obligations and environmental damage.

electric cars are cute now and a few people using them get the low cost due to non-reflective electric charging rates and government subsidies. if there is a massive adoption, you will see electrical grid issues, large increase in electrical usage rates and pressure on lower income people due to these factors. warm weather areas will be hardest hit such as our California and Southern states where many areas and/or styles of living would be impossible without electrical cooling. This latter requires major peak demand load capability and most of these states trade with other areas for electrical capacity. at least in the USA there is a lot of talk about how major urban areas are outsourcing their pollution to other areas for electrical generation. this places these states in the position of being at the mercy of an energy market and the various movements to partition the grid. the situation in Europe is similar in many regards. most people have no idea the extent that things that they use are subsidized.

this is all politics driven to benefit a few and few companies at the expense of the well meaning people who might not know the math behind it.

 

In the UK, where 65 million people live, the very longest journey you can do is Lands End to Jon o'Groats - a road distance of 874 miles - which is about three times the range of the latest Tesla. The supercharger charging stations can recharge a car in around 75 minutes or partially charge it in 30 minutes for 170 miles range, so you can see that even now we aren't that far off in terms of what technology can deliver.

Certainly for the driving I used to do in the UK, with regular journeys of 200-250 miles, a Tesla would have covered that.

Nowadays my round trips are 100 miles at the most, well within the capability of current technology.

Granted that isn't good enough for an awful lot of people, but my point is technology will change and more and more people will find electric is a very practical alternative to petrol. Eventually a tipping point will be reached and that will probably be a lot sooner than we think.

 

I had been thinking allot about the major problem inherent to the electric vehicle. Insufficient battery range, high cost of battery replacement, as well as inconvenient travel delays due to charging times or even being able to find one, or become restricted to a route of travel to get to a charging station, especially near smaller towns and cities, as well as grid impact.

'They' either cannot design a better battery, not very likely, or are being restricted in how fast they can move with their technology, the most likely scenario. As we surely cannot get a better battery anytime soon, I think we will see, or should see, a 'Universal' battery-pack, located in the eccentric shaft, trunk (boot), or hood (bonnet) with a 'standardized' battery-pack connector.

Vehicles will pull into a bay at the gas station, not unlike the standalone single vehicle car wash at the station, and shut down the vehicle, then proceed to swipe their debit card. Meanwhile, a platform rises under the vehicle to support the battery-pack while a 'standardized' external power socket is connected to the vehicle to maintain power to the computer modules and settings, and facilitate the battery-pack replacement.

Automated socket wrenches remove the 'standardized' ~four to six bolt retaining nuts and retract. The platform lowers, and conveyors the spent battery-pack aside, then rises again with a fully charged battery-pack into the vehicles battery-pack storage compartment, automatically connecting to the 'standardized' connector as it is installed.

The automated socket wrenches re-secure the nuts and the platform retracts, disconnecting external power, outer door opens and you drive away in less time than it would take to pump 18 gallons. This obviously follows the model of the automated BBQ propane bottle replacement machines that are outside of gas stations and convenience stores today.

These type of units can be constructed at regular gas stations, supermarkets or in the middle of no-where and with a small footprint as everything save the 'exchange booth' would be located underground. They would be fully automated, and once the spent battery is received, it is conveyed to a recharging slot in a 'battery bank' where it can be trickle charged during non peak usage hours, the middle of the night etc., whenever grid demand is low.

Incorporating solar power into the charging operation is now beneficial, due to trickle charging the battery-packs instead of rapidly supercharging them, since there is no longer a need to do so as you simply drive off in minutes with a fully charged battery-pack from the Charging Stations Store Inventory. You would no longer have to worry about putting your foot down to the floor and experiencing everything your car has to offer at every stop light, without the fear of depleting your battery, or having to drive like a grandma before you have finished running around for the day.

This would also allow smaller, lighter and less expensive battery-packs to be utilized as they can be changed out as quickly as filling up a gas tank when you are on the go, or traveling across state, or charge at home as usual. This would eliminate the cost of the batteries by utilizing a 'Universal' design and no longer actually 'owning' the battery-pack itself, the cost of maintenance, repair, or replacement would become irrelevant for the vehicle owner. The business could profit with proper management structure, reconditioning battery-packs, recycling them, etc. Not to mention that all the older cars that become worthless when the battery goes out, due to the cost of replacement, could be re-fitted to accept these new 'Universal' battery-packs as well and be on the road again without future battery problems to worry about. Of course this could only happen if the individual automakers would come together and agree to develop 'standardized' hardware, and connectors and an accessible battery-pack type storage compartment in the aforementioned locations. Just a thought.

 

Tesla tried that idea on the Model S - it seems owners didn't like the idea of swapping their very expensive battery packs around. To avoid that the battery packs would have to be in some way leased, rather than owned outright.

I think its more likely that improvements in battery technology, both in terms of capacity and recharge times will solve the range issue. Until then hybrids are a great solution if you live in a city but want the range of a petrol vehicle.

 

That's where l think you have hit the nail on the head.
Many of us don't.
I know nothing of infrastructure overseas but in Australia it is basically massive centerilisation in a half dozen major cities with well serviced connecting highways up the east coast and the attitude that everywhere else is on it's own.

 

while i really dislike the hijacking of threads, we are all having a nice discussion.

your proposal is brilliant and has been considered. actually what would really work well with it would be to do something similar to what you are proposing, but not have a battery rather a fuel cell. batteries are limited for one key reason in that they must carry their oxidizer with them whereas fuel cells and IC systems get it free from the air. a battery is having the total reaction in its chamber with built-in moderators and facilitating metals. using a fuel cell, you keep some of this in the vehicle and switch less of a package. in the Tesla the batteries appear to be a stressed member of the monocoque. they are also of great weight. there are hard limits due to physics that can never be violated. there will never be a "new" technology that will get past this much more than a 15% weight saving over what we have now. there is no exotic metal combination, gel pack, anything that can get past this as there are fundamental principles that will not be violated. anytime you see an EV go further with a new design, they are chasing efficiency refinements or carrying a heavier battery which is an efficiency loosing proposition as there is more weight to be accelerated.

reconditioning EV batteries is very energy intensive as they are not simple like lead-acid packs which very easily recycle with low energy costs.

there will come a point where regardless of the control software, efficiency improvements, simple innovations such as regenerative braking and solar panels of the roof, etc. that the variables of cost, handling, braking, acceleration, weight, safety start to impose hard limits on further efficiency gains. you might say that once we achieve a good average service mileage that it does not matter. however, the issues of cost will increase exponentially due to the rare earth elements needed, the need to build a recycling infrastructure which will have to deal with a recycling level vastly outstripping that required for current cars and the hazardous waste involved, an electrical grid that is currently lacking adequate redundancy and an aging and inadequate electrical generation infrastructure. Using Australia for an example there were very recently areas so lacking that utility provided neutral service on the grid was not provided. this caused much waste of energy and safety issues. the greater use of electricity will require more concentrated sources of electricity and the debate over nuclear energy will arise. EV's are very tempting for cities which are accustomed to having at hand seemingly endless electrical capacity. However, these cities are plugged into sources outside of their borders and rely upon a transmission network. this by definition outsources pollution. additionally as demand for any commodity goes up, so does price. in cities across the first world, there are major advisories to conserve electricity at the smallest hint of a heat event and the system gets more taxed with the introduction of more electrical load and population expansion.

when one uses a fuel cell or gasoline or some other fuel, these are a type of battery or store of energy that do not tax the electrical grid.

a solution for cities and other dense areas is that they need to use electric surface transportation to a much greater degree and with dedicated lanes. this use of electricity per unit traveled and per passenger is many multiple times more efficient that individual EV's. cars have their uses, but as you do not use a chainsaw to cut butter, we are forced to misuse them as the public transit systems and space allocated to them must be massively increased or else you are not eliminating the problem, only creating new ones. gasoline vehicles that meet the emission standards of the late 1990's (at least in the American market) do not pollute to any appreciable degree. Diesels are a massive problem unless very recent improvements are installed and regulated.

there will come a huge debate if the EV concept is forced. there will be issues of generation and transmission capacity, environmental justice issues as communities fight to not subsidize large populations by accepting the pollution, rising utility costs for customers and the possibility of rationing schemes and restrictions on mobility as these variables are addressed. there are also major geopolitical issues as these rare earth minerals are just that and are located in countries with which we have issues and with whom we compete. One of these countries wants to embrace EV itself with a massive population, however they are not afraid to build very large electrical generation infrastructure regardless of the environmental issues associated and are even developing new forms of nuclear generation that we once considered but now such can never get done for so many reasons.

this is a nice discussion, but the thread is really for celebrating the classic status of a lovely example of human creativity and design. it should be moved OT.

 

Yes, I agree the thread should be moved. When I originally clicked on the post, I had already read the first several pages previously and skipped to the very last page; by the time I had read to the end, I had forgotten the topic of the original post, and replied to this sub-thread without realizing it has nothing to do with the original topic.

 

Buy your future classic today, only 3196 Km (2K miles)...

1997 Jaguar E-Type - EDMONTON $32,990 | autoTRADER.ca

 

An E type made in 1997? Now that is a future classic.

Back on the topic of whether our cars will become classics, I'm sure they will, but I'm not sure it will still be legal to drive them:-

Paris will ban all petrol- and diesel-fuelled cars by 2030, a decade ahead of France’s 2040 target. Copenhagen plans to ban diesel cars from 2019, while Oxford has proposed banning all non-electric vehicles from its centre from 2020. This would make central Oxford the world’s first zero-emissions zone, officials believe.

European cities announce bans on petrol and diesel cars as green initiative spreads across continent | The Independent

Its a shame Tesla don't do a convertible.

The $35,000 Model 3 base model (50 kWh) offers 220 miles of range and a 0 to 60 mph time of 5.6 seconds, while a $44,000 version (70 kWh) ups the ante with 310 miles of range and a 0 to 60 mph time of 5.1 seconds. Top speed for the spendier model is 140 mph.

That's quicker to 60mph and cheaper than my XKR was new.

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla_Roadster

Tesla did make a convertible for a few years.

Granvill​​​​​​e

 

Yes, I'd forgotten about that. A Lotus Elise with an electric motor. I was thinking of something a bit more luxurious than a plastic car from Norfolk.