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Electric Cars, Anyone Got One?

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So what about my idea (9 posts ago) ? Is it a good idea or not and why/why not?

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On 02/11/2019 at 13:00, woolyhead said:

MY MISTAKE, THIS POST BELONGS IN ELECTRIC CARS. I CAN"T MOVE IT.

Replacing (not recharging) the battery while on a journey would save you a lot of time. If companies with enough investment money established battery replacing stations up and down the country and were to get the car manufacturers to make the battery fixings and connections quickly undoable (not an impossible task), your battery (and several others) could have been charged up in advance of you arriving at the station so that a quick replacement could take place. In case there were to be a problem with people leaving a very old battery and getting a newish one in exchange, this could be covered by you having taken out a scheme parcipation membership so any losses all becomes swings and roundabouts for the battery replacement station, their losses being covered by the cost of scheme membership. Although this way of working would cost a bit more than by simply recharging your existing battery, it would save you a lot of time on your journey.

Wouldn't be practical or affordable, any company doing this would have to have a massive stockpile of all the different batteries, all charged up and ready to go, can you imagine the cost of that alone? Then the exchanged batteries would have to be charged, and probably highly staffed too which would bump up the price. You have to be trained and qualified to fit them too, not any Tom, Dick and Harry can do it Legally without this. I did my EV training at Tesla.

 

Drive over charging points will be the norm eventually.

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It's not beyond the wit of man to have  standard battery pack - I mean we have standard AA cells, C cells, D cells etc... IF EV had say two to six standard packs fitted that could be easily detached and they were all the same, then a rechargel would in theory be fairly simple and could be automated. But that involves competing companies agreeing on something that could well be a revenue stream that is lost...

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20 minutes ago, Obelix said:

It's not beyond the wit of man to have  standard battery pack - I mean we have standard AA cells, C cells, D cells etc... IF EV had say two to six standard packs fitted that could be easily detached and they were all the same, then a rechargel would in theory be fairly simple and could be automated. But that involves competing companies agreeing on something that could well be a revenue stream that is lost...

I presume that you have a mobile phone, with a rechargeable battery. So, you’ve already seen the future.

 

There is no chance of motor manufacturers agreeing on a standard battery. Or, at least not a standard interface.

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Well quite. Thats the problem isn't it. There is no technical reason it cannot be done, the reasons that it will never happen are entirely different, and probably unsolvable sadly.

 

I mean there are at least four different incompatible charging systems that I know of, what hope of a standard battery....

Edited by Obelix

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11 hours ago, Obelix said:

It's not beyond the wit of man to have  standard battery pack - I mean we have standard AA cells, C cells, D cells etc... IF EV had say two to six standard packs fitted that could be easily detached and they were all the same, then a rechargel would in theory be fairly simple and could be automated. But that involves competing companies agreeing on something that could well be a revenue stream that is lost...

 

The problem is who's swapping the packs out??  and who even owns the packs?

 

If I buy a brand new EV with a new battery I then don't want to lose that the first time I need to charge.  Swapping my pristine battery for some half buggered piece of junk is not going to happen.

If Joe Public is left to swap out EV batterys you can guarantee the packs will be smashed from pillar to post and physically ruined long before the cells degrade.

 

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When I had a Mitsubishi PHEV I complained to their Service Dept. It seemed I could never get anywhere near the 156 per gallon, advertised, I had it explained to me by the Service Dept:

 

They said the display only had two digits, Such that if you achieved mpg of 156 it would only display two of the digits, either 15 or 56 as they didn't know if it moved right on digit or not!

 

However I was convinced I was doing great mileage with this car as my maximum spend on Petrol was £30-40 per Month, as the rest of the time I was periodically charging using the Plug in Device, which gave you 30 -34 miles without the usage of any petrol.

 

On a long trip to Blackpool - I was a anxious due to EV Power display read Zero, plus Petrol gauge read Zero, flashing fill me. But I never needed recovering from lack of fuel!

 

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So my guess with this is the Petrol tank level gauge Lies!

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15 hours ago, Pettytom said:

I presume that you have a mobile phone, with a rechargeable battery. So, you’ve already seen the future.

 

There is no chance of motor manufacturers agreeing on a standard battery. Or, at least not a standard interface.

I think - but can’t say for sure - ev moped manufacturers have interchangeable batteries, certainly removable ones.

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11 minutes ago, DeZeus said:

So my guess with this is the Petrol tank level gauge Lies!

There's always a little bit more in there when the needle hits the bottom.

 

Everyone likes to chance it from time to time.

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46 minutes ago, tinfoilhat said:

I think - but can’t say for sure - ev moped manufacturers have interchangeable batteries, certainly removable ones.

Yes, I definitely saw that (interchangeable battery) on a 125cc equiv. a couple of months ago at a local event. I can't remember the brand, but they're Spanish IIRC [EDIT: looked it up online and yes, the Silence S01, from Barcelona - the presenter told me at the time that they have a larger cc equiv.in the works]

 

That Ujet I mentioned earlier also has a removable battery, it's the seating unit (which doubles as a bluetooth speaker/boombox) and it's configured with retractable mini-trolley wheels and a telescopic handle for ease of lugging around (so you can charge it e.g. in the office during work).

Edited by L00b

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20 hours ago, Obelix said:

It's not beyond the wit of man to have  standard battery pack - I mean we have standard AA cells, C cells, D cells etc... IF EV had say two to six standard packs fitted that could be easily detached and they were all the same, then a rechargel would in theory be fairly simple and could be automated. But that involves competing companies agreeing on something that could well be a revenue stream that is lost...

Yes, and the only part of the "company specific" car battery could be the packaging around it. And as for replacement batteries being a good revenue stream, by not having replacement batteries for swapping over en route the car companies will be losing much more revenue because people will be put off buying an electric car that runs out of charge on a long journey and takes hours to recharge. It's in their interest to standardise on battery connections and fittings. What on earth are Drive-over charging points? They must be a very long way into the future. And they would also require connection interface, wouldn't they? So how are they different from the issues raised by swapping batteries?

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