A New Era in vehicles

[FunInTheSun]

I wish our infrastructure allowed for more bike commuting. Its just not plausible most places ive lived unfortunately. For example i used to live in california central valley, and i wanna say more than half the ppl who lived there had to commute 30-60min to work. Thats just not happening without personal vehicles.

People have no real sense of the size of the USA, and the distances involved compared to other countries. The entire country of Japan is about as long as California and a lot narrower. The bullet train can take you from one end of the island to the other in less than a day.

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[Joeiconic]

I guess we dont really need the range of a gas vehicle anymore since we can now visit our families on Zoom.

 

[DeathRanger]

While electric vehicles are compelling, there seems to be an inordinate number of them spontaneously catching fire.

Are Electric Vehicles Safe?

Since there are far fewer EVs, I wonder what the percentage of spontaneous fires in them compared to gas vehicles would be?

The answer to your question is in the article
From 2012 – 2020
1 Tesla vehicle fire every 205 million miles traveled.
1 Gas vehicle fire for every 19 million miles traveled

That means Tesla's are 10 times less likely to catch on fire than a gas car.

Auto manufacturers making this hard push to EV's but will be facing significant challenges moving forward. The charging Infrastructure to support them on a national scale is decades away from remotely being able to support them like gasoline. Then there's the aging power grid to contend with. As we have just recently seen in California when their grid was on the verge of collapse and they were all but begging EV owners to hold off charging when possible. What do they think will happen when there are 50+ million EV's out there and the additional strain they will put on the nation's grid? Unless there is massive updates made to the grid it won't be pretty. What about the environmental impact caused by mining the rare earth minerals needed to produce many of the components in the batteries alone? Oh sure the care produces no carbon itself, but how many additional hundreds of millions of tons of carbon would produced in the mining, refining, distribution, manufacturing, and increased power generation needed to support them on the scale they are wanting? All this for a EV that in most cases cannot make it 200 miles per charge under current battery technology. One of the guys I work with has a Tesla 3 and has the 82Kw battery upgrade and he says he usually gets just over 200 miles per charge. He told me it takes 6-10 hours to charge it it back up daily and that his electric bill has increased on average $70 a month since getting the car.

IC powered vehicles are not going away any time soon, but eventually will be phased out due to state and federal gov. pressures. Even then it will be quite some time before EV's are ready for prime time.

Yes you can slow charge your electric vehicles overnight which is better for battery longevity and slightly cheaper electricity. but not every charge takes 6-8 hours. My Tesla 3 takes 4-6 hours to charge on my level 2 home charger from empty to full which is 90kw or 300 miles. a full charge costs maximum of $9.

Max Monthly costs of charging - $270 for 9000miles.
Same mileage in gas would be close to $700 at 40mpg.

At this point EV's are not the solution.

welp Ford just invested more money in EV's than ICE so if EV's aren't the future, then Ford will be going out of business very quick with that investment burn rate. I'd hate to see that.

I have no problem with EV's. But as usual the government, and manufacturers is getting the cart before the horse. There should be amply charging stations across the country, and vehicles should charge much faster. If you need to be across the country it shouldn't take you 3 days longer, because you can't find a charger or you have to wait to long for the vehicle to charge. And of course the range of the batteries has got to be improved. Having to stop in 300-350 miles is not an optimal range for those that travel for a living. IMHO

BTW, has any of these EV advocates even considered the power grids. I live in the Historic District in our town. If 2/3rd's of the people on my small part of a very old power grid plug their vehicles in the same time, I doubt very seriously with all the other electrical drains, that the grid could handle the load.

And another thing. I have a lot of questions. Is there anywhere these batteries can be recycled when they are done. Or, is it gonna be like those stupid fluorescent squiggly light bulbs brought to us by George Bush the younger?

Driven 1000's of miles in a day going more than 1/2 way across the US. it doesn't add 3 days. Finding a charger is not an issue for every electric vehicle maker. only the ones who have spent $0 investing in charging infrastructure. The Ranger has a 300-350 mile tank which is same range as most EV's. 350 miles at 70mpg is 5 hours of driving. I'd rather stop and get food/drink/bathroom more often than 5 hours.

EV batteries are 100% recyclable. Tesla already 100% recycles their batteries. Gasoline is 0% recyclable bc you burn it and release pollutants into the air for everyone to breath forever.

Why is it important for EV's to find a recycle solution yet gas cars are dragged to an empty lot and left to rot until fully rusted away?

See my post above. Availability is a decade away. Don’t care what they say. It took longer for broadband and that still is insufficient.

Currently only a few companies nationally that can recycle newer battery chemistries. That turns into another Nuclear waste issue or technology comes in to make a profit from it. If no profit we got a new problem to add to the others.

It’s easy to sell this stuff, it’s all together different once it’s lifecycle is over. No foresight, just profit driven

https://www.tesla.com/support/sustainability-recycling
"None of our scrapped lithium-ion batteries go to landfilling, and 100% are recycled."

I have a little different take on this. OEMs like Ford love these because it eases the burden of CAFE standards. If they make more EVs, they can continue to make the gas-guzzlers without going to such extremes about gas mileage. There is a good use case for EVs, but they aren't really proctical for anyone who plans on a trip lasting longer than about 6 or 8 hours. There's no way for the entire world to go EV. It's an environmental disaster. There's not enough lithium, and the electrical infrastructure is not there.

Charging is still problematic. To charge a typical car like a current Tesla, it still takes 8-12 hours to charge up the vehicle. And your electric meter spins REALLY fast when you're charging... If you don't have a level 2 Charger (240 Volt, 60 Amp), you're going to have to manage your charging conscientiously if you plan on driving a lot. It can take 2-3 days to charge from minimum (10% or so?) if you have a big battery (100 kW-h).

Comparing the charge time of a chemical-fueled vehicle, (a couple of minutes) it's obvious if you need to get somewhere far away, the liquid fuel is better. It's also easily storable, and easily distributed or shared with a neighbor.

But taxi companies, local Uber-type services or fleet operators with a reasonably local service area will probably buy up a ton of these. Electric motors are much less trouble to maintain. No gearboxes (usually), and periodic oil changes are a thing of the past. So there is a market for them, but they are not super convenient for the average Joe Blow, which he will probably only realize when it's time to go visit Aunt Margaret three states away, or make a trip to the mountains for a camping / hiking / skiing vacation.

And for those of a certain prepper / bug-out mentality, electric cars are completely out of the question.

So they're not for everybody. I think it's possible the gas cars they still make will be a little nicer, because the pressure for ULTIMATE GaS MiLeAgE!!! is eased up if they sell enough EVs. Probably offer some (optional, of course) engines with REAL power, and some additional driving modes, etc. They will probably run on alcohol (don't get me started on that) and gasoline, which is nice, especially if you can make it yourself (illegal in most states, unless you get a license and pay the revenooers).

Taken my Tesla on multiple long distance trips. one was 40 hours straight. From KC to TX and back to KC then to Colorado and back. 1 week later drove from KC to NY.

You're right level 1 charging can take a long time at 5mph charge.
BUT you can go to a tesla supercharger and get 300 miles in 20mins.

The advantage I see in the bug-out scenario. I can make electricity from any number of things. There is no way to refine your own gasoline.

I guess we dont really need the range of a gas vehicle anymore since we can now visit our families on Zoom.

New Model S has 400 miles range which is more than my Ranger. Even better, you can have a zoom meeting on your Tesla's infotainment screen.

 

[FunInTheSun]

<snip>
Yes you can slow charge your electric vehicles overnight which is better for battery longevity and slightly cheaper electricity. but not every charge takes 6-8 hours. My Tesla 3 takes 4-6 hours to charge on my level 2 home charger from empty to full which is 90kw or 300 miles. a full charge costs maximum of $9.
Max Monthly costs of charging - $270 for 9000miles.
Same mileage in gas would be close to $700 at 40mpg.

<snip>

Driven 1000's of miles in a day going more than 1/2 way across the US. it doesn't add 3 days. Finding a charger is not an issue for every electric vehicle maker. only the ones who have spent $0 investing in charging infrastructure. The Ranger has a 300-350 mile tank which is same range as most EV's. 350 miles at 70mpg is 5 hours of driving. I'd rather stop and get food/drink/bathroom more often than 5 hours.

<snip>

Taken my Tesla on multiple long distance trips. one was 40 hours straight. From KC to TX and back to KC then to Colorado and back. 1 week later drove from KC to NY.

You're right level 1 charging can take a long time at 5mph charge.
BUT you can go to a tesla supercharger and get 300 miles in 20mins.

The advantage I see in the bug-out scenario. I can make electricity from any number of things. There is no way to refine your own gasoline.

New Model S has 400 miles range which is more than my Ranger. Even better, you can have a zoom meeting on your Tesla's infotainment screen.

Good thinking on display here. Bringing facts is always welcome. ?

 

[DeathRanger]

Good thinking on display here. Bringing facts is always welcome. ?

I just can't wait for F150 specs to be revealed. there's some articles claiming 550+ miles range. That will be game changing. Sandy Munro was super impressed with just about every single piece of the new F150 Lightning.

 

[Apples]

Sooner or later, we'll start having issues with our electrical grid's capacity. The "PorkPie" infrastructure bill isn't (or won't) cure the issue. What will cure it is more reliance on nuclear energy. But the very people who want transportation to turn green, are the same ones who are against nuclear power. Makes me think the term "very" should be spelled "vary"!

 

[JJG]

Sooner or later, we'll start having issues with our electrical grid's capacity. The "PorkPie" infrastructure bill isn't (or won't) cure the issue. What will cure it is more reliance on nuclear energy. But the very people who want transportation to turn green, are the same ones who are against nuclear power. Makes me think the term "very" should be spelled "vary"!

Nuclear power plants are too costly to build and nobody wants it in their backyard. How about if the energy providers reinvent their business model and manufacture, distribute, install and service, renewable energy options for all of their customers? Why wouldn't you goto your local power company for these options just like you goto them for your power today? If you could transition customers off of the current grid even if its only 50%, then the capacity issues would resolve themselves. But unfortunately, similar to the coal companies who continue to insist on digging a big hole in the ground instead of learning and retraining their workforce to drill a small hole in the ground for natural gas.

 

[Scooter]

Fracking makes the ground unstable and creates Earth Quakes. Plus a lot of water used.

 

[JJG]

Fracking makes the ground unstable and creates Earth Quakes. Plus a lot of water used.

Its still a better option than coal in the short term. Its hard to compete with a pipe.

 

[ScrappyLaptop]

Fracking makes the ground unstable and creates Earth Quakes. Plus a lot of water used.

And there's the other problem with fracking. Fracking fluid recipes were deemed to be proprietary trade secrets. They are under-regulated & even exempt from many regulations. Nearly all that are known are toxic and can and do poison underground water supplies.
Along the way, enterprising people also figured out they could put the loopholes together and buy old played out fracking & other injection wells and use them to dispose of toxic industrial waste on a massive scale. It's so much cheaper than properly disposing of that waste. Including trillions of gallons of waste from oil drilling itself. It's one of those rarely spoken of byproducts.

 

[Azriq]

Once the Ranger is paid off we will be seriously considering the Mustang Mach-E GT to replace mama's Grand Marquis. Our daughter is all jazzed over the new Maverick Hybrid. Ford has some awesome stuff going on right now.

 

[ScrappyLaptop]

Once the Ranger is paid off we will be seriously considering the Mustang Mach-E GT to replace mama's Grand Marquis. Our daughter is all jazzed over the new Maverick Hybrid. Ford has some awesome stuff going on right now.

It looks like my next Ranger will likely be a hybrid and by then I'm guessing it will be my favorite to date. There are *reasons* giant locomotives went hybrid 70-ish years ago and many of those reasons hold true for pickups, too. And that's assuming I don't feel the Ranger Lightning (or whatever it's called) is ready yet. My wife's next Subaru will likely follow the same timeline.

It's a pretty amazing transition time in automobiles. Powerplants are changing and because so much is computer controlled and accessible to the end user, we can actually change so much of the engineering customer assumptions just by plugging in a laptop or connecting wirelessly. And it's all being held to a pretty rigid baseline of functionality. It still has to be a useable truck & Ford knows it.

 

[Scooter]

Biden administration targets 52 mpg fuel economy regulations by 2026

 

[svogt302]

?

 

[Rocketeer61]

While electric vehicles are compelling, there seems to be an inordinate number of them spontaneously catching fire.

Are Electric Vehicles Safe?

Since there are far fewer EVs, I wonder what the percentage of spontaneous fires in them compared to gas vehicles would be?

Vehicle fires will just be the next CDB.

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