Electric cars - finally a counter arguement...
Discussion
J4CKO said:
Surely what is thrown into the air by a passing car is more a function of speed and aerodynamics than weight anyway ?
Well, technically, brake dust and tyre dust would be more voluminous for a heavy vehicle.But yes the article is tripe, written by someone with an agenda just trying to justify it. And failing.
"Finally a counter argument?"
For one thing that's a pretty biased starting point.
For another the counter argument against electric cars has been around for nearly a century. It's only now, largely thanks to the efforts of Toyota and Tesla that the counter arguments have been reduced to weak articles like this.
For one thing that's a pretty biased starting point.
For another the counter argument against electric cars has been around for nearly a century. It's only now, largely thanks to the efforts of Toyota and Tesla that the counter arguments have been reduced to weak articles like this.
98elise said:
The same weight as an SUV as you've chosen the 4 wheel drive dual motor version with the biggest battery! The ones with a single motor weigh about the same as a big ICE car, ie about 2000kg.
The model S is huge, so its going to be a heavy as any big car.
That's the point though. The S is the sort of car that competes on range with a conventional car. To do that it needs 750Kg of batteries. You can have a Leaf or whatever with a range of 70 miles and 150 Kg of batteries - which is not far adrift from a tank of petrol (80 Kg) But you can't get away from the fact that to have decent range, you need to haul around 3/4 ton of batteries before you even start building a car. The model S is huge, so its going to be a heavy as any big car.
If you take a Leaf and upgrade it to 300 mile range, it will weigh similar to the Tesla (1450 Kg of Leaf + 600 Kg of additional batteries).
Problem is, driving around in 2000+ Kg cars is not that efficient, whatever the power source.
rxe said:
That's the point though. The S is the sort of car that competes on range with a conventional car. To do that it needs 750Kg of batteries. You can have a Leaf or whatever with a range of 70 miles and 150 Kg of batteries - which is not far adrift from a tank of petrol (80 Kg) But you can't get away from the fact that to have decent range, you need to haul around 3/4 ton of batteries before you even start building a car.
If you take an Leaf and upgrade it to 300 mile range, it will weigh similar to the Tesla (1450 Kg of Leaf + 600 Kg of additional batteries).
Problem is, driving around in 2000+ Kg cars is not that efficient, whatever the power source.
Do you have a source for your battery pack weights? They seem somewhat off.If you take an Leaf and upgrade it to 300 mile range, it will weigh similar to the Tesla (1450 Kg of Leaf + 600 Kg of additional batteries).
Problem is, driving around in 2000+ Kg cars is not that efficient, whatever the power source.
Source is a a quick calculation from Wikipedia. The difference between a 60 kW Tesla and 90 kW is 250 Kg. So 30kW is about 250 kg. 90 kW is therefore about 750 Kg. 90 kW is what you need to go ~ 300 miles.
Looking at it again looks like less than 750 - some of that is probably additional motor in the 85D. Call it 650. That's still a great load of weight.
Looking at it again looks like less than 750 - some of that is probably additional motor in the 85D. Call it 650. That's still a great load of weight.
What an amazing research. It's like they are trying to prove something so hard it almost hurts.
https://youtu.be/epEUvHqf_M0?t=1m44s
https://youtu.be/epEUvHqf_M0?t=1m44s
rxe said:
Source is a a quick calculation from Wikipedia. The difference between a 60 kW Tesla and 90 kW is 250 Kg. So 30kW is about 250 kg. 90 kW is therefore about 750 Kg. 90 kW is what you need to go ~ 300 miles.
Looking at it again looks like less than 750 - some of that is probably additional motor in the 85D. Call it 650. That's still a great load of weight.
I seem to recall figure of 544kg for the 85kWh pack. I wonder how much the battery plus motors weigh compared to the engine, transmission, fuel tank etc. of a similarly powerful petrol or diesel rival? Looking at it again looks like less than 750 - some of that is probably additional motor in the 85D. Call it 650. That's still a great load of weight.
rxe said:
Source is a a quick calculation from Wikipedia. The difference between a 60 kW Tesla and 90 kW is 250 Kg. So 30kW is about 250 kg. 90 kW is therefore about 750 Kg. 90 kW is what you need to go ~ 300 miles.
Looking at it again looks like less than 750 - some of that is probably additional motor in the 85D. Call it 650. That's still a great load of weight.
Your maths is still very suspect The extra weight is 250kg.which you think some of that is "probably" the motor? Its an entire extra motor, gearbox, drive and control system so its a lot of the extra weight.Looking at it again looks like less than 750 - some of that is probably additional motor in the 85D. Call it 650. That's still a great load of weight.
Edited to add....it looks like the extra motor/drive is around 150kg, so the extra battery is about 100kg. Using your example that makes the whole battery around £300kg.
Edited by 98elise on Wednesday 25th May 21:45
pherlopolus said:
only if they don't use the brakes and coast?
Nope: push the brake pedal and the regen facility kicks in, performing a large chunk of the slowing. Also, should the car have the option of variable regen, then you can use that as the brakes to help you slow, using the friction brake to pull you to a stop only. The Outlander PHEV I had last year, with the regen turned to max, would slow surprising hard without the friction brakes.Max_Torque said:
There is also the fact that the best car to be heavy is an EV! (think about where the energy from the fuel (or battery) goes, and when.....)
Agreed, ICE is always lighter is better, but not as significant in EVs. Additional power is needs for acceleration, but of course more is avaiable for regen. The losses are still greater when looking at a heavy EV vs light EV.As you say though, if it has to be a big heavy car its far better to be EV.
Gassing Station | General Gassing | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff