Electric Vehicles

[Disbelief]

Pretty sure the car would have to be designed ground-up for swappable battery modules.

What I picture is a monocoque “frame” design with a built in “tunnel” or ”tunnels”that the battery pack(s) slid into. The frame/tunnel is what would provide crash protection. Another large advantage is that as battery technology improves, keeping up with that technology would just involve upgrading battery packs. In the future that pack could even involve hybrid super-capacitors or whatever the latest technology is.

But it still may be that battery advances will render this concept moot, as I predict will happen with plug-in hybrids before long.

As to cabling, I’m sure there must be durable, high-voltage solutions, perhaps similar to the interface now with fast DC charging.

I think you may be misunderstanding just how large the batteries are at this point. I think that we may eventually get to swappable when the size is more conducive, but the size makes it much more difficult at this point.

 

[Fast Eddie B]

I think you may be misunderstanding just how large the batteries are at this point. I think that we may eventually get to swappable when the size is more conducive, but the size makes it much more difficult at this point.

Well, I may be wrong, but I thought the “batteries” were individually about the size of AA batteries.

Google turned up this about Tesla battery packs:

The 85 kWh battery pack weighs 1,200 lb (540 kg) and contains 7,104 lithium-ion battery cells in 16 modules wired in series (14 in the flat section and two stacked on the front). Each module contains 6 groups of 74 cells wired in parallel; the 6 groups are then wired in series within the module.

But you’re right - any way you divided up the battery into modules, 1,200 lbs is a lot of weight to handle. Might not be practical for cars, but trucks and buses might be able to handle heavy modules on dollies or whatever.

But I am in the camp that advanced in battery technology may render this solution unneeded.

 

[TurkeysGhost]

As for new versus used cars, some of us just don't like to buy new cars, preferring to let some other sucker eat the depreciation, and some of us like to hold on to old ones for a long long time. Just last year I finally gave my 1972 Mercedes to one of my kids. My truck is a 2002, my "new" Hyundai is a 2013 bought used a few years ago, and I expect to keep it for some years more. I also have a 2006 Jeep, currently in semi-retirement awaiting some work to get it through inspection, and I was stalled in my repair work by a slipped disk and long recovery. Now it's buried under snow and waiting till spring. I certainly would be really peeved if cars, like some other appliances, were to become obsolete and lose support after only a few years.

I was under the impression this was a pretty common tactic for buying cars. New cars are luxury products for either wealthy people who don't mind the depreciation hit or for the financially illiterate.

I bought my 3 year old Corolla with 40,000 miles on it and plan to drive it until a serious enough mechanical failure occurs that repairs are no longer cost-effective. Hopefully this doesn't occur before 250,000 miles with good maintenance habits. I prefer a manual transmission because long-term maintenance is cheaper than an automatic, or at least I hope so. Putting in new clutch plates is much cheaper than swapping an automatic transmission.

acbytesla made this point better than I could articulate. Teslas are largely luxury products and most buyers are of substantial means and are buying them new. These are the kind of people who have no problem dropping a few thousand bucks to fix their fancy car should a problem spring up. More likely, they sell it off while it's still somewhat low mileage in order to trade up to the newer, better models and they never have to experience the maintenance woes of a car getting long in miles.

The jury is out to see how good these are as the everyman's car. It will probably take around a decade to see how these hold up in the long run and as they pass down into the used market.

 

[Andy_Ross]

Jaguar Land Rover say they are going to be all electric by 2025.

 

[bruto]

I agree, time will tell. There is, at least so far, a difference in how older used vehicles fare, because an older conventional car, though it can break down and need repair, has few parts that are guaranteed to have a limited life span, and one can keep an old car going with used parts.

Batteries are somewhat different, as they are pretty likely to expire on schedule, and the supply of recycled or rebuilt ones is limited. It's possible these days to buy a nice used Prius for very small money because the batteries have gone bad, and are so expensive to replace. The subsidies and losses that have made initial purchase so attractive disappear. It's still possible, either through recycled and re-assembled batteries, or simply buying a new one, but from the cost effectiveness point of view it's hard to justify not just buying a new car.

Eventually one can hope that third parties will get into the business of fixing or rebuilding or even making batteries, and that quantity will drive down the cost of replacement, but electric cars will always have a more defined life span, I think, and the market will change.

 

[catsmate]

I have the comparative luxury of a free car park at work. In recent years there's been political pressure around the idea of pushing commuters out of their cars and onto public transport by making employers pay tax on car park provision and perhaps charge their employees a parking fee.

The idea that I and colleagues might persuade my employer to pay to install and maintain charging points so we can charge our cars with their electricity seems far-fetched.

Really? I think you need a better employer.
I work in tech, it's standard with all the larger companies and shared spaces. The new construction is fitted out with changing points for 10-20% of spaces and that'll increase.

 

[MRC_Hans]

Really? I think you need a better employer.
I work in tech, it's standard with all the larger companies and shared spaces. The new construction is fitted out with changing points for 10-20% of spaces and that'll increase.

Some employers will install chargers as a service. That depends on how hungry they are for qualified staff. But there will be companies offering to install them for the privilege of selling the power. At any rate, don't expect to get to charge for free.

Hans

 

[crescent]

Batteries are somewhat different, as they are pretty likely to expire on schedule, and the supply of recycled or rebuilt ones is limited. It's possible these days to buy a nice used Prius for very small money because the batteries have gone bad, and are so expensive to replace. The subsidies and losses that have made initial purchase so attractive disappear. It's still possible, either through recycled and re-assembled batteries, or simply buying a new one, but from the cost effectiveness point of view it's hard to justify not just buying a new car.

Eventually one can hope that third parties will get into the business of fixing or rebuilding or even making batteries, and that quantity will drive down the cost of replacement, but electric cars will always have a more defined life span, I think, and the market will change.

I don't know about the batteries on Priuses, but the work Tesla is doing is showing the the lifetime of the batteries will be well over 250k miles, I think GM is getting similar results with the Bolt. The batteries are going to last longer than most ICE cars ever last. The "defined lifespan" of electric vehicles has not yet been determined because few of them have been around for long, but it is looking more and more like the powertrains (batteries and motors) will be much more durable than that of ICE cars.

 

[bruto]

I don't know about the batteries on Priuses, but the work Tesla is doing is showing the the lifetime of the batteries will be well over 250k miles, I think GM is getting similar results with the Bolt. The batteries are going to last longer than most ICE cars ever last. The "defined lifespan" of electric vehicles has not yet been determined because few of them have been around for long, but it is looking more and more like the powertrains (batteries and motors) will be much more durable than that of ICE cars.

That certainly is encouraging, and I would expect it to get better. I still have my doubts about some of this, especially in nasty climates where battery usage is going to be higher per mile. Of course it's also true that in these climates overall car life is somewhat reduced by rust and other factors, so it's a fair achievement to get over 250K miles anyway. On the plus side, apart from the risk of sudden smoke-release of the electronics, I'd expect the power train and electronic guts of an EV to be very long lived, since there's so little to wear.

I'll probably be dead first, but I kind of look forward to shopping for a nice used EV traded in because someone wanted nicer icons and a new map display. But I'll have to wait a little to see how well such things perform here in Vermont, where the folk saying is that we have 9 months of winter and three months of bad sledding.

 

[Jack by the hedge]

Really? I think you need a better employer.
I work in tech, it's standard with all the larger companies and shared spaces. The new construction is fitted out with changing points for 10-20% of spaces and that'll increase.

You might work for a tech employer which throws up new buildings at the drop of a hat but I work for a tech employer in a small out of the way department squeezed into a basic "crinkly shed" industrial unit on someone else's estate and we spent a year huddled around a domestic ADSL line waiting to get the fibre infrastructure installed because we weren't a high enough priority.

 

[Jack by the hedge]

Jaguar Land Rover say they are going to be all electric by 2025.

They say that on the Reuters and BBC news sites but the ArsTechnica version says they'll stop diesel production by 2026 and stop petrol production by 2036, and they'll have at least a hybrid version of each model available by 2030.

All very laudable but it needs a lot of word-twisting and asterisks to make that look like "all-electric by 2025".

 

[acbytesla]

Eventually one can hope that third parties will get into the business of fixing or rebuilding or even making batteries, and that quantity will drive down the cost of replacement, but electric cars will always have a more defined life span, I think, and the market will change.

This sounds great except Tesla and other vehicle manufacturers are working to make the batteries structural components.

 

[ponderingturtle]

This sounds great except Tesla and other vehicle manufacturers are working to make the batteries structural components.

I wonder when government regulation will get involved in the replaceability of batteries. There are sure to be some interesting consumer rights fights about them, though that is just true of cars in general as well.

 

[bruto]

I wonder when government regulation will get involved in the replaceability of batteries. There are sure to be some interesting consumer rights fights about them, though that is just true of cars in general as well.

My guess here is that there would be a "right to repair" fight, in which it might transpire that physical components like batteries can be replaced, but that Tesla and others will pull out the copyright on software to make it impossible to do exact replacements of many components, and will retain the right to cancel warranties, charge options, and such.

 

[JimOfAllTrades]

Some employers will install chargers as a service. That depends on how hungry they are for qualified staff. But there will be companies offering to install them for the privilege of selling the power. At any rate, don't expect to get to charge for free.

Hans

And it's possible that the free chargers that exist now may be forced to charge.

In the US, the state and federal taxes on gasoline seem to run from 15 to 60 cents per gallon. In theory, those taxes are used to maintain roads and infrastructure.

As gasoline/diesel cars dwindle and electric cars increase that tax is going to have be made up somewhere. One solution would be to make all chargers track kilowatt hours and add a tax on.

 

[SezMe]

My guess here is that there would be a "right to repair" fight, in which it might transpire that physical components like batteries can be replaced, but that Tesla and others will pull out the copyright on software to make it impossible to do exact replacements of many components, and will retain the right to cancel warranties, charge options, and such.

If I understand correctly Big Farm Manufacturers and farmers have joined (in the legal sense) that issue with regard to repair of advanced farm equipment. Hopefully, the courts will at least a rump of established law in the near future.

 

[acbytesla]

Shell corporation going into the charging business.

https://techcrunch.com/2021/02/11/p...est-company-swept-up-in-ev-charging-boom/amp/

 

[acbytesla]

If I understand correctly Big Farm Manufacturers and farmers have joined (in the legal sense) that issue with regard to repair of advanced farm equipment. Hopefully, the courts will at least a rump of established law in the near future.

They've been in it for a long while. Right to repair is a big issue among farmers. This is a great issue for Democrats to push. The tech companies will howl as they see this as a sizable revenue stream. But it will mean a lot towards winning back farm states.

 

[TurkeysGhost]

You might work for a tech employer which throws up new buildings at the drop of a hat but I work for a tech employer in a small out of the way department squeezed into a basic "crinkly shed" industrial unit on someone else's estate and we spent a year huddled around a domestic ADSL line waiting to get the fibre infrastructure installed because we weren't a high enough priority.

Given that large parts of the population work for employers that don't even provide living wages or health benefits in this country, I'm not holding my breath for charging stations to be installed out the kindness of employers hearts.

Yes, professionals in highly competitive fields will continue to receive generous workplace amenities, but this says very little about the broader attitudes of employers.

 

[The Don]

Given that large parts of the populations work for employers that don't even provide living wages or health benefits in this country, I'm not holding my breath for charging stations to be installed out the kindness of employers hearts.

Yes, professionals in highly competitive fields will continue to receive generous workplace amenities, but this says very little about the broader attitudes of employers.

Then again, if the installation costs them nothing and they stand to make some money, maybe the employer (or perhaps more accurately, the owner of the building) would agree to a third party installing charging points.