EV cars, would you, wouldn't you?

[NRS]

George111 said:

gangzoom said:

otolith said:

I think hydrogen is a massive dead end. The sole advantage it has is that you can charge a car faster at a fuel station. Otherwise, it's all lose.

Which is a valid advantage if you had to refuel all the time at a fuel station (like a petrol car). But if you can refuel your car at home (providing your house has electricity), than that advantage becomes more like a hindrance.

This is the first autumn/winter I've had my Leaf. Been able to plug the car in at home means no more standing outside in the freezing rain at 6am to fill the car up. Been able to pre-heat the car before I leave the house means, no more time wasted with the car idling, waiting for the screen to demist....Which remind me, the wife's conventional hybrid needs filling up soon with petrol....That's another £60 down the drain....The joys of owning a petrol car

If Tesla charged the true cost of the car they would be prohibitively expensive. Same as hydrogen fuel cell cars. The benefit of hydrogen is that by the time the technology is as advanced as battery tech is now, you will get more power and a better range than you do from diesel currently, so it's of huge benefit. Battery cars will die out, they are dead technology pushed forward by the environmentalists who don't understand technology, a stop gap.

Thing is battery cost is dropping around 10% a year. That means it's not too long that hydrogen has to sort out it's big issues. And car batteries will last longer than consumer ones since they have heat control (without it this kills the life over time). And even when batteries are "dead" for car use they can be recycled or just sold on as they still have a worth when say 50% of the life is gone. If hydrogen was sorted earlier it could have competed, but seems like the main issues for batteries are being sorted quicker than hydrogen and it may just be left behind eventually.

[98elise]

George111 said:

gangzoom said:

otolith said:

I think hydrogen is a massive dead end. The sole advantage it has is that you can charge a car faster at a fuel station. Otherwise, it's all lose.

Which is a valid advantage if you had to refuel all the time at a fuel station (like a petrol car). But if you can refuel your car at home (providing your house has electricity), than that advantage becomes more like a hindrance.

This is the first autumn/winter I've had my Leaf. Been able to plug the car in at home means no more standing outside in the freezing rain at 6am to fill the car up. Been able to pre-heat the car before I leave the house means, no more time wasted with the car idling, waiting for the screen to demist....Which remind me, the wife's conventional hybrid needs filling up soon with petrol....That's another £60 down the drain....The joys of owning a petrol car

If Tesla charged the true cost of the car they would be prohibitively expensive. Same as hydrogen fuel cell cars. The benefit of hydrogen is that by the time the technology is as advanced as battery tech is now, you will get more power and a better range than you do from diesel currently, so it's of huge benefit. Battery cars will die out, they are dead technology pushed forward by the environmentalists who don't understand technology, a stop gap.

Hydrogen is cracked from water by using lots and lost of electricity. Its about 25% efficient from generation to wheel, where as EV's are about 70%.

Hydrogen is just a very very inefficient energy store (battery if you will). It is an utter dead end unless we have massive amounts of excess energy.

What's the true cost of a Tesla model S, and why do you think batteries are dead technology? What do you see other portable battery devices being powered by?

Edited by 98elise on Monday 19th October 13:12

[littleguy]

Don't know if this helps anyone but a Tesla dealership has just opened in Stockport on the A6 (at the Heaton Chapel junction) where the old Jaguar dealer was.

[budfox]

The battery technology in my Leaf may well appease the green lobby, and electric cars may well go the way of the Betamax... but I love the car. I have covered 13k miles in it, and if the charging infrastructure was just a bit better I've one as a second car as well.

[George111]

NRS said:

George111 said:

gangzoom said:

otolith said:

I think hydrogen is a massive dead end. The sole advantage it has is that you can charge a car faster at a fuel station. Otherwise, it's all lose.

Which is a valid advantage if you had to refuel all the time at a fuel station (like a petrol car). But if you can refuel your car at home (providing your house has electricity), than that advantage becomes more like a hindrance.

This is the first autumn/winter I've had my Leaf. Been able to plug the car in at home means no more standing outside in the freezing rain at 6am to fill the car up. Been able to pre-heat the car before I leave the house means, no more time wasted with the car idling, waiting for the screen to demist....Which remind me, the wife's conventional hybrid needs filling up soon with petrol....That's another £60 down the drain....The joys of owning a petrol car

If Tesla charged the true cost of the car they would be prohibitively expensive. Same as hydrogen fuel cell cars. The benefit of hydrogen is that by the time the technology is as advanced as battery tech is now, you will get more power and a better range than you do from diesel currently, so it's of huge benefit. Battery cars will die out, they are dead technology pushed forward by the environmentalists who don't understand technology, a stop gap.

Thing is battery cost is dropping around 10% a year. That means it's not too long that hydrogen has to sort out it's big issues. And car batteries will last longer than consumer ones since they have heat control (without it this kills the life over time). And even when batteries are "dead" for car use they can be recycled or just sold on as they still have a worth when say 50% of the life is gone. If hydrogen was sorted earlier it could have competed, but seems like the main issues for batteries are being sorted quicker than hydrogen and it may just be left behind eventually.

It's not just the cost of the batteries (still got a huge way to drop though) but the range - it's still not sufficient given the long recharge time and this isn't going to change in the immediate future, the technology hasn't been developed which makes them a convenient replacement for diesel yet. This is why I think they are a dead end for people who need a car for business for example. Hydrogen gives you the range, you could probably have a greater range than you have now with diesel.

What I would like to see is battery buses - they have plenty of space for sufficient batteries to give them a long range - a days use probably, with an overnight recharge. The additional weight isn't an issue and a bus is an ideal vehicle to make best use of electric motors torque delivery.

[J4CKO]

liner33 said:

The "D" is a bit of a gimmick the normal P85 with 0-60 in 4.1 is all the car you'd ever need , I would think the 70 is pretty good as well

Yeah, the "slowest" model S you can buy does sixty in 5.2, I cant imagine any driver finding it lacking in straight line shove, trouble is, with the P90D available thats the one that grabs the headlines and as always, the availability of a faster one downgrades the perception of the slower, but still bloody fast by any measure one.

[saaby93]

rather than lug batteries around whats wrong with the system used by trolley buses where you pick up power from over head wires?

[lostkiwi]

NRS said:

Thing is battery cost is dropping around 10% a year. That means it's not too long that hydrogen has to sort out it's big issues. And car batteries will last longer than consumer ones since they have heat control (without it this kills the life over time). And even when batteries are "dead" for car use they can be recycled or just sold on as they still have a worth when say 50% of the life is gone. If hydrogen was sorted earlier it could have competed, but seems like the main issues for batteries are being sorted quicker than hydrogen and it may just be left behind eventually.

I think ultimately super-capacitors will take over from batteries. With supercaps chrage rates arfe determined by the car and infrastructure's available current capacity hence charge times can be drastically reduced.
Hydrogen is an abundant power source, so long as you are in outer space. On earth there are major issues making it efficiently and then storing it. Hydrogen can leach its way through steel containers with ease making long term storage a major issue. Its one of those great idea in theory but not in practice things.

[98elise]

saaby93 said:

rather than lug batteries around whats wrong with the system used by trolley buses where you pick up power from over head wires?

I assume you mean like trains? If so then it hardly practical to build a huge network of overhead live cables.

If you're going to look at major infrastructure then induction loops in the road would be better, or a linear motor system (like roller coasters).

When you can get 300 miles from a home change then why bother though?

[maffski]

George111 said:

It's not just the cost of the batteries (still got a huge way to drop though) but the range - it's still not sufficient given the long recharge time and this isn't going to change in the immediate future, the technology hasn't been developed which makes them a convenient replacement for diesel yet. This is why I think they are a dead end for people who need a car for business for example. Hydrogen gives you the range, you could probably have a greater range than you have now with diesel.

What I would like to see is battery buses - they have plenty of space for sufficient batteries to give them a long range - a days use probably, with an overnight recharge. The additional weight isn't an issue and a bus is an ideal vehicle to make best use of electric motors torque delivery.

Telsa have been trialling battery swap, which installs a fully charged battery in about 2 minutes.

Barely anyone has tried it, those that have didn't use it again - it seems that, for most people, by the time they need a recharge they also want a break from driving, so as long as a recharge can be achieved in that time it's not an issue.

http://www.theverge.com/2015/6/9/8754667/tesla-elo...

[otolith]

George111 said:

It's not just the cost of the batteries (still got a huge way to drop though) but the range - it's still not sufficient given the long recharge time and this isn't going to change in the immediate future, the technology hasn't been developed which makes them a convenient replacement for diesel yet. This is why I think they are a dead end for people who need a car for business for example. Hydrogen gives you the range, you could probably have a greater range than you have now with diesel.

What makes you think that?

The Toyota hydrogen car has a range under the EPA cycle of 312 miles compared to 270 miles for the Tesla. That's from a 122 litre fuel tank. A diesel with a 122 litre fuel tank and 40mpg would have a range of over 1000 miles. The energy density of hydrogen is rubbish.

The Toyota is a little smaller and lighter than the Tesla, but only seats four - the Tesla seats five or seven with the optional extra seats. The Toyota has 361 litres of luggage space, the Tesla 894 litres. The combination of two large fuel tanks, a fuel cell stack, a substantial battery and an electric drivetrain versus just a battery and drivetrain in the Tesla does the packaging of the Toyota no favours. It's not remotely close on performance either, at 1850kg and only 152bhp, it takes almost ten seconds to sixty.

[qube_TA]

otolith said:

The energy density of hydrogen is rubbish.

Yup, it's why they use it on rockets, they'd be much better using diesel.

[JonnyVTEC]

qube_TA said:

Yup, it's why they use it on rockets, they'd be much better using diesel.

What a crappy response.

[feef]

qube_TA said:

otolith said:

The energy density of hydrogen is rubbish.

Yup, it's why they use it on rockets, they'd be much better using diesel.

No,

Diesel has a much higher molecular weight and in an application where grammes of weight are critical, that's a big deal.

Also, the rockets use liquid hydrogen, not hydrogen gas, which is stored at -252 degrees C, not something that the average family saloon can do.
bear in mind too, that the solid thrusters used on the space shuttle didn't use Hydrogen, but a propellant made up of ammonium perchlorate (oxidizer, 69.6% by weight), aluminium (fuel, 16%), iron oxide (a catalyst, 0.4%), a polymer (PBAN, serving as a binder that held the mixture together and acted as secondary fuel, 12.04%), and an epoxy curing agent (1.96%). This was more powerful than the equivalent hydrogen by volume, but have to be discarded at the end of their burn.

I can't imagine seeing the m25 littered with empty fuel cells

[otolith]

qube_TA said:

otolith said:

The energy density of hydrogen is rubbish.

Yup, it's why they use it on rockets, they'd be much better using diesel.

To a significant extent, rockets do use hydrocarbon fuel, albeit synthetic rubber rather than diesel. And diesel (in the form of JP-4 jet fuel) is used with liquid oxygen as a rocket propellant.

In many cases, they do use liquid hydrogen. Note - liquid. Cryogenically cooled liquid hydrogen, which has a density of about 71kg/cubic metre, which is loaded into the rocket at the last minute. The Mirai, lacking cryogenic storage facilities, holds about 5 kg of gaseous hydrogen in 122 litre tanks, which is about 41kg/cubic metre. Note also that some of the considerations which make hydrogen a particularly good rocket propellant despite relatively poor energy density are irrelevant to use in a fuel cell - small molecules in the exhaust, for example.

[George111]

otolith said:

George111 said:

It's not just the cost of the batteries (still got a huge way to drop though) but the range - it's still not sufficient given the long recharge time and this isn't going to change in the immediate future, the technology hasn't been developed which makes them a convenient replacement for diesel yet. This is why I think they are a dead end for people who need a car for business for example. Hydrogen gives you the range, you could probably have a greater range than you have now with diesel.

What makes you think that?

The Toyota hydrogen car has a range under the EPA cycle of 312 miles compared to 270 miles for the Tesla. That's from a 122 litre fuel tank. A diesel with a 122 litre fuel tank and 40mpg would have a range of over 1000 miles. The energy density of hydrogen is rubbish.

The Toyota is a little smaller and lighter than the Tesla, but only seats four - the Tesla seats five or seven with the optional extra seats. The Toyota has 361 litres of luggage space, the Tesla 894 litres. The combination of two large fuel tanks, a fuel cell stack, a substantial battery and an electric drivetrain versus just a battery and drivetrain in the Tesla does the packaging of the Toyota no favours. It's not remotely close on performance either, at 1850kg and only 152bhp, it takes almost ten seconds to sixty.

As I said previously the drive has been towards batteries not hydrogen - had hydrogen had the vast investment that battery technology has had then we'd see something more competitive.

The Tesla range is very optimistic too.

[liner33]

George111 said:

As I said previously the drive has been towards batteries not hydrogen - had hydrogen had the vast investment that battery technology has had then we'd see something more competitive.

The Tesla range is very optimistic too.

People have gotten over 400 miles out of the Tesla , low 300's seem commonplace rather than the 270 miles posted earlier since that's the base model

Range is a red herring anyway , my Evo would do 160 miles on a tank full and people still seem keen to buy those , range is only an issue if you have no access to recharging

[George111]

liner33 said:

George111 said:

As I said previously the drive has been towards batteries not hydrogen - had hydrogen had the vast investment that battery technology has had then we'd see something more competitive.

The Tesla range is very optimistic too.

People have gotten over 400 miles out of the Tesla , low 300's seem commonplace rather than the 270 miles posted earlier since that's the base model

Range is a red herring anyway , my Evo would do 160 miles on a tank full and people still seem keen to buy those , range is only an issue if you have no access to recharging

The Evo is a specialist car - most cars will easily do 400-600 miles on a tank and can be refuelled in 5 mins at thousands of stations. If Tesla gave a real range of 600 miles then the lack of charging stations wouldn't be an issue but with the real world range being so low and almost no charging stations, it's not a viable form of transport for the majority of us, a bit like the Evo.

[gangzoom]

liner33 said:

After my recent test drive in a Tesla P85d there is now no question, question is when , I was considering replacing my 370z with a R35 GTR but the 35 would still only ever be a second/weekend car and I would still need a large more practical car for the family stuff. If I buy the Tesla I can replace both the family car AND the weekend toy, sure it still wont "save" me any money, unless the residuals are unbelievable but the Tesla is such an outstanding car, I was really blown away and so was the wife (which helps)

Its a hell of a lot of money to find though

I came to the same conclusion as you about 6 months ago (was saving for a F10 M5). Once I made up my mind I got rid of the 335i as quick as I could, and picked up a Leaf which is costing me not a whole lot to run.

The money needed for a Model S cannot be ignored, but with some carful numbers and persuading the wife to contribute to the T-Fund, I've already managed to max out 2 1-2-3 accounts.

The dilemma when it comes to it, is wither to spend money on a brand new 70D/85S with all the latest autopilot stuff/battery revision, or go for a maxed out 2-3 year old P85+ which will be cheaper, and despite not been the latest/greatest Tesla is still a damn nice car which can be see day-in day-out but still deliver some stupid performance when needed....I have to wait till 2017 for the lease deal on the Leaf to run out - who knows what stuff Tesla will come out with in the ned 18 months

[otolith]

George111 said:

otolith said:

George111 said:

It's not just the cost of the batteries (still got a huge way to drop though) but the range - it's still not sufficient given the long recharge time and this isn't going to change in the immediate future, the technology hasn't been developed which makes them a convenient replacement for diesel yet. This is why I think they are a dead end for people who need a car for business for example. Hydrogen gives you the range, you could probably have a greater range than you have now with diesel.

What makes you think that?

The Toyota hydrogen car has a range under the EPA cycle of 312 miles compared to 270 miles for the Tesla. That's from a 122 litre fuel tank. A diesel with a 122 litre fuel tank and 40mpg would have a range of over 1000 miles. The energy density of hydrogen is rubbish.

The Toyota is a little smaller and lighter than the Tesla, but only seats four - the Tesla seats five or seven with the optional extra seats. The Toyota has 361 litres of luggage space, the Tesla 894 litres. The combination of two large fuel tanks, a fuel cell stack, a substantial battery and an electric drivetrain versus just a battery and drivetrain in the Tesla does the packaging of the Toyota no favours. It's not remotely close on performance either, at 1850kg and only 152bhp, it takes almost ten seconds to sixty.

As I said previously the drive has been towards batteries not hydrogen - had hydrogen had the vast investment that battery technology has had then we'd see something more competitive.

The Tesla range is very optimistic too.

The Tesla and Toyota ranges are actual EPA test cycle figures, so however unrealistic they are, they are comparable.

Perhaps we would have something better if there had been more research into hydrogen, but it's generally a really bad solution - which is why there hasn't been a lot of research. Theoretical maximum efficiency of hydrogen fuel cells is about 83%. The Honda Clarity FCX was claiming 60% efficiency. It seems unlikely that the Toyota is worse. So at most, if it were better developed you are looking at squeezing another third out of the tank, which would get you to a 400 mile range. Lots of diesels will go a lot further than that.

It's a bad solution because it is inconvenient to store, either in the car or in the fuelling station, and because it is inefficient to produce. Instead of plugging your EV into a socket and charging the battery (some waste), you are going to use the electricity to electrolyse water (immediately wasting about 30% of it) and then compress it (more waste), depending on the technology being used, perhaps also cool and liquefy it (more waste) haul it across country from factory to filling station (more waste) and store it on site until it goes into the car where the energy comes back out at less than 83% efficiency.

The energy required to produce 5kg of hydrogen which would take a Mirai about 300 miles (or perhaps 400 miles at theoretical max efficiency) would take a Model S 800 miles.

I just don't see why anyone would think it would have a better range than a diesel. It's just not as good an energy transfer medium as a hydrocarbon fuel. Now if you were synthesising methanol to feed a fuel cell, that would make more sense in terms of ease of storage and transport. You'd be emitting CO2, but that's not an issue if you are extracting it from the air in the first place.