A new type of charging cable could charge electric cars in 5 minutes

[AzScorpion]

it's a cool idea but overall I'm happy with current state of EV supercharging at 20-30 minutes for a sufficient charge

That works great for overnight or daily charging but not for when you're on a trip. The last thing I want to be doing is sitting around waiting to charge, I want to fuel up and go. We have a "I want it now" society (Amazon same day delivery) and I'm guilty of it too. ?

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[HTX1811]

Ok, but it aint gonna work in your garage.... I guess this if for charging stations?

In honesty, charging stations is the bottle neck here, so if they crack that nut, then it's a game changer.

My solution is have battery changing stations, not charging stations. You pull in, they yank out your dead battery, put it on the charge, and give you a fully charged battery. If engineered correctly, that process should take no longer than a regular gas fill-up. The problem with that is having a standard battery interface with all cars, making the battery a simple pull out process, like a AA battery in most electronics. It's a simple process to remove the old AA batteries and put in new ones. The car batteries as of today are not designed for an easy and simple remove and replace process.

 

[DeathRanger]

That works great for overnight or daily charging but not for when you're on a trip. The last thing I want to be doing is sitting around waiting to charge, I want to fuel up and go. We have a "I want it now" society (Amazon same day delivery) and I'm guilty of it too. ?

Agreed and that's where each person needs are different. If someone truly drives a lot or tows a lot, the current EV's may not work.

For the average driver doing 39 miles per day, and never waiting to fuel up during the week. spending a few extra minutes while on vacation to charge vehicle isn't that bad.

 

[DeathRanger]

My solution is have battery changing stations, not charging stations. You pull in, they yank out your dead battery, put it on the charge, and give you a fully charged battery. If engineered correctly, that process should take no longer than a regular gas fill-up. The problem with that is having a standard battery interface with all cars, making the battery a simple pull out process, like a AA battery in most electronics. It's a simple process to remove the old AA batteries and put in new ones. The car batteries as of today are not designed for an easy and simple remove and replace process.

Nio does battery swaps in China for their vehicles. We'll never see that in US for most vehicles.

 

[outdoorphotog]

For people in areas with cheap electricity i can see the lure of EV. I just dont live in a place where it could be considered as a cheap alternate to fuel.

 

[Texasota]

This is an interesting article but the charging cable is only part of the equation. The last sentence of the article mentions that the car’s battery must also be able to accept charging at that rate. I don’t think there are any EV batteries today that could tolerate being charged at that rate. Maybe in a few years when solid state batteries (e.g. like solid state batteries being developed by Quantumscape) become available.

 

[HTX1811]

That speed to charge has to generate a lot of heat in the battery. Heat is a batteries mortal enemy. Lol.

 

[RANGER_MARC]

This will be huge if/when it comes out. Ford will blow away Tesla charging with these 5 minute quick charging stations.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/type-charging-cable-could-charge-182142021.html

Hey, Dave, thanks for posting this, which reinforces my view that competition and technological advances will eventually solve all of the current problems associated with hybridized and EV vehicles (but I am sticking with ECE until it does)!

 

[Dr. Zaius]

Combine the cable with these batteries and you'd be faster than a typical fill-up, especially if you just need to top off enough to get home where the charging is cheaper.

They even mention the Ford cable in the article.

New Material Allows EV Batteries To Charge 10 Times Faster

 

[wanted33]

The free market will always react to new tech to make it more feasible and hopefully affordable.

I was thinking the same thing Mike. If the Government will stay out of the way things will get done. This is good news as charging times, and lack of charging stations are my biggest problems in buying a fully electric vehicle. If this works out as they hope that's one of my problems out of the way.

 

[AzScorpion]

This is an interesting article but the charging cable is only part of the equation. The last sentence of the article mentions that the car’s battery must also be able to accept charging at that rate. I don’t think there are any EV batteries today that could tolerate being charged at that rate. Maybe in a few years when solid state batteries (e.g. like solid state batteries being developed by Quantumscape) become available.

I'm sure these are already in the works now and it seems like today, technology advances pretty fast. Just look at how much they've advanced so far from where they first started. Take these portable power stations for example. It wasn't to long ago where they would only be able hold enough power for about a day and now you're getting days and some are getting a weeks worth of charges from them. The LifePO4 batteries are great and you can get 2500+ charges out of them before they reach 80% capacity. These will basically last you a lifetime now. I cant wait to see what it's going to be like in the near future for EV's as I think many companies will be fighting to be top dog. There's no way Elon Musk doesn't have something more up his sleeve.

 

[VAMike]

My solution is have battery changing stations, not charging stations. You pull in, they yank out your dead battery, put it on the charge, and give you a fully charged battery. If engineered correctly, that process should take no longer than a regular gas fill-up. The problem with that is having a standard battery interface with all cars, making the battery a simple pull out process, like a AA battery in most electronics. It's a simple process to remove the old AA batteries and put in new ones. The car batteries as of today are not designed for an easy and simple remove and replace process.

Terrible idea. It's too early in the evolution of the technology to try to fix a form factor for something as fundamental as the batteries--the tech is just moving too fast. Beyond that, the best place for the batteries is low in the vehicle, and if you make them easy to access externally you're going to have major potential issues from moisture/salt/etc getting in. It's really hard to engineer a door that can stand up to abuse in a retail service context, is waterproof & easy to access, and isn't massive.

 

[Rp930]

The high speed charging stations at Porsche dealers already have a liquid cooled charging cables. Not new technology. Part of it is to reduce the cable size and weight along with fast charging.

Changing out batteries is not a good solution. In most cases it’s as big as the bottom of the car on full electric cars.

 

[rcairflr]

Changing out batteries is not a good solution. In most cases it’s as big as the bottom of the car on full electric cars.

I agree. The stations would take up too much room and pricey to build. So far it works pretty good for NIO customers but IMO not a good long term solution. Charging stations, similar to gas stations currently, will be the the best long term solution.

 

[HTX1811]

Terrible idea. It's too early in the evolution of the technology to try to fix a form factor for something as fundamental as the batteries--the tech is just moving too fast. Beyond that, the best place for the batteries is low in the vehicle, and if you make them easy to access externally you're going to have major potential issues from moisture/salt/etc getting in. It's really hard to engineer a door that can stand up to abuse in a retail service context, is waterproof & easy to access, and isn't massive.

I agree. The stations would take up too much room and pricey to build. So far it works pretty good for NIO customers but IMO not a good long term solution. Charging stations, similar to gas stations currently, will be the the best long term solution.

That's why I said in the current configuration, it's not feasible but with time and better design, it could be done. The batteries could remain down low, the challenge is making it easy to remove and replace. Another and likely bigger obstacle would be an industry standard. Hell they can't even agree on one standard plug in type.

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