Electric cars

[Jocko]

It was reported on this morning's news that the only bright light in worldwide car sales, is that sales of EVs are rising whereas sales of diesel and petrol powered cars are falling.
It was also reported that Tesla has won more than $520 million in loans from Chinese banks to build its first overseas car plant near Shanghai, the first foreign automaker to wholly own a factory in China.
The Giga factory is set for completion in May (only started building in January!), with cars and batteries being produced before the year end. The factory will build Model 3's for the Chinese market.

[madasafish]

Well, if we followed your line of logic and applied it retrospectively, we would still be transporting things and ourselves using the horse and cart,  .

There is some case for the horse and cart. Environmentally friendly and about the same speeds as today. Faster sometimes.

Don't be completely taken in by the environmental benefits of EV. The energy (pollution) has to be produced somewhere just not in the cars. EV is a wonderful way for car manufacturers to meet their environmental targets by shifting the problem elsewhere. And don't forget the environmental consequences of batteries.

This all seems to be a case of robbing Peter to pay Paul.

I do hope EV does not follow the same route as governments enthusiasm for diesel and the disaster that is and obviously was going to be.

Don't get me wrong, I have a lot of time for EV but they are not the universal panacea they might be made out to be.

A horse and cart environmentally friendly?
Well yes IF the owner fits a poop bag and the disposal system for hi nitrogen waste is efficient AND there is enough land to grow hay on for millions of horses..and enough new stabling....which will all have to be city based.
That will prevent vegans living in cities - unless they walk to work.

[guest4871]

It just needs a little effort !

[richardfrost]

What a bunch of 'neigh' sayers!

[guest7494]

When a totally electric car will do 450 miles on a charge with the same use all year round and will recharge with the ease with which I refuel with petrol and will cost the same to buy, then I might consider one.

Vic.

 my sentiments precisely, so on that basis, I do not think I will last long enough to become electrified.

[Jocko]

CEO of Volkswagen was talking from the Geneva Motor Show and he said that anyone satisfied with 500 km range will find it very difficult to choose an ICE over a BEV, by the end of 2020. Running costs will only be a fraction of a conventional car with maintenance costs only a half. He is obviously expecting prices to drop dramatically too.

[culzean]

CEO of Volkswagen was talking from the Geneva Motor Show and he said that anyone satisfied with 500 km range will find it very difficult to choose an ICE over a BEV, by the end of 2020. Running costs will only be a fraction of a conventional car with maintenance costs only a half. He is obviously expecting prices to drop dramatically too.

Running costs will not be lower for long, there is a big hole left in treasury funds by the lack of fuel duty, watch this space for governments clever ideas for making up the shortfall from its favourite milch cows, the motorists...

[Jocko]

Fuel costs will go up but maintenance costs will fall as the work for garages will start to tail off. The way round the fuel costs is solar panels and battery storage, at your house. Could be one of the benefits of global warming!

[culzean]

Fuel costs will go up but maintenance costs will fall as the work for garages will start to tail off. The way round the fuel costs is solar panels and battery storage, at your house. Could be one of the benefits of global warming!

they do say one of the effects of global warming is more cloud cover 

[Jocko]

Maybe, maybe not.

https://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/briefs/delgenio_03/

[RichardA]

Jag i-Pace voted European Car of the Year.

Sent from my Moto G (5) using Tapatalk

[VicW]

How do fully electric cars get power assistance for their brakes?

Vic.

[Jocko]

"Prior to September 2014, the brake boosters in Tesla vehicles used vacuum, as in many other cars. After that, they switched to an electrical design. Since the cars don’t have combustion engines, ultimately even the vacuum was created as a result of electrical activity, so regardless of which brake booster is used, there is electricity used to decrease the force needed on the brake pedal. The electricity is not needed since the car would stop without it, but it makes it easier to drive. Ultimately, more electricity is generated stopping the car than is used to make it possible to stop the car without as much force on the brake pedal."
They also have regenerative braking so pads can be softer and less assist is required.

Your question has intrigued me though, so I will research the subject for my own edification!

[Jocko]

Here is an interesting bit on the Nissan Leaf's brakes.

http://www.electricvehiclewiki.com/wiki/brakes-abs/

[culzean]

One thing I know about induction motors is that you can stop them dead if you put DC on the stator windings instead after AC ( sine wave or square wave AC) - it is called 'plug braking' and is used for safety to stop machine tools if they need to stop very quickly ( like someones hand or hair is caught in a rotating part ).  Mind you if you tried it on an electric cars the drive shafts would probably snap like carrots..

Just for comparison the Nissan Leaf weighs about 1550kg compared to about 1020kg for a Honda Jazz.  So I guess the Leaf needs all the help it can get to stop.