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EV industry should concentrate on commercial / high use vehicles such as 24/7 taxis, police, delivery, .... That reduces overall emissions, brings reliability up, costs down, acceptance up.
IIRC, VW won Pikes Peak in an awd EV a few years ago, (smashing previous records) and Tesla started out with a sport coupe. So either could churn out a sport model if sales volume indicated it was worth it.
Would prefer EV / alternative propulsion would reach for the biggest pollution offenders, (commercial). Rather than the 20 min per day commuter.
Of course California CARB could put a carbon tax on the thousands of hours cars sit in Drive Thru lanes in a state that has perfectly good weather to walk 10 seconds for window / lobby service. CA thinks EV is the only solution. They are wrong.
You are using the JAVA argument and I get why that seems to work, BUT, .....the counter is: millions times a little, is now a lot.
an all day in use commercial vehicle EV will never work until the recharge is in minutes and the range equals or exceeds the ICE it is replacing.
the millions upon millions of non-plague workers sitting for an hour or more for the 20 minute slog is what you want to replace. The smog in LA is not from cars running closed loop at highway speeds, it is from them using idle strategies at 0mph. We knew since a series of tests in the 90s on the NJTP using a chrysler OBD1 LHS that at speed, closed loop, emission stuff was nearly undetectable. All the advances and technology since, have been focused on fast start/warm up etc. We now have it down to where the most HCs emitted lifetime from the car - are at fueling.
Location: We_tside PNW (Columbia Gorge) / CO / SA TX / Thailand
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Commercial Aircraft, rail, ships, tugs, garbage trucks, buses would be where I would place my emission efforts. Consider adding HHV rather than EV to the commercial short run vehicles.
Synthetic diesel fuel / jet-A equivalent would allow ICE workhorses to continue in service.
Conservative and transportation incentives (world average fuel costs) would be the quick solution. (Tomorrow).
For sport driving, I am plenty content with my 50+mpg vintage motorcycles, and 50 mpg GTDs for rainy days. Where I like to sport drive, there is little available charging infrastructure.
While I can't speak for "most people", my own behavior is starkly different. Driving a light and underpowered car, I rarely fill the tank more than 1/4 full, because of fanaticism about minimizing weight. Gasoline is something like 6 pounds per gallon. Considering that I can tell difference in acceleration between an empty trunk and a trunk with 4-5 bags of groceries, every pound counts... literally. My daily driving regimen is short, but even so, there's a visit to the gas station every 2 days or so.
I've never heard of someone so payload conscious. What car do you drive, and how big is the gasoline tank?
You should get a heavy duty scooter with a 352 lbs maximum load capacity and a 25 mph top speed ($1400) . You can outfit it with bags to carry some groceries. It sounds like you go less than 5 miles one way to the grocery store. https://i.shgcdn.com/46b476c8-017f-4...ality/lighter/
A full tank in my 60 liter tank carries ~100 pounds of gasoline. I can't imagine filling it up to only 25%.
Last edited by PacoMartin; 09-11-2021 at 01:35 PM..
No. Sport/sports cars no longer have high sales figures. They also depreciate a brick. Most that do have one, it is there second weekend vehicle. What is selling are mostly SUVs and trucks these days. Even Porsche knows this and thus relatively recently expanded their models to include SUVs.
Its the reason why I would target used small two seater sports cars as my primary commuter vehicle. Good gas mileage, 99% of the time I am the only passenger, leverage the depreciation to my advantage, and generally low mileage since they are only used on weekends.
To me it comes down to two things: Range and infrastructure.
Range: It's not a question of how far I drive to work during the week. It's a question of when I need it, I need it.
Infrastructure: With a gas vehicle I can pretty much go anywhere and stop anywhere to refuel and be back on the road in 15 minutes or less. Sure, someone will say "if you buy a Tesla, and if you plan your stops, and if you are going here, and if..." That's not the flexibility to go anywhere and stop anywhere. Plus if we really had a lot of EV's, then those few charging stations would be backed up for miles waiting to use them.
A good deal of that comes down to price. There are long range EVs that cover a lot of ground and that envelope keeps getting pushed. It would be pretty unsurprising for there to be at least one 500+ mile rated EV within a year of now and maybe 600+. However, those range figures are and will be pretty expensive for several years out.
Quote:
Originally Posted by StealthRabbit
EV industry should concentrate on commercial / high use vehicles such as 24/7 taxis, police, delivery, .... That reduces overall emissions, brings reliability up, costs down, acceptance up.
IIRC, VW won Pikes Peak in an awd EV a few years ago, (smashing previous records) and Tesla started out with a sport coupe. So either could churn out a sport model if sales volume indicated it was worth it.
Would prefer EV / alternative propulsion would reach for the biggest pollution offenders, (commercial). Rather than the 20 min per day commuter.
Of course California CARB could put a carbon tax on the thousands of hours cars sit in Drive Thru lanes in a state that has perfectly good weather to walk 10 seconds for window / lobby service. CA thinks EV is the only solution. They are wrong.
I don't think that's necessary or maybe the best way to move forward, because you aren't going to get the same pace of improvements and economies of scale by limiting use cases and there's no particular reason to do so. While raw supply costs for batteries have gone up by weight of the materials, battery improvements have moved far faster and thus have kept dollars per kWh of capacity plummeting even with the immense rise of usage and raw material costs over the last decade. Meanwhile, work continues on multiple heavy duty EV applications such as buses and trucks. Keeping this limited to a niche application for no discernible benefit doesn't make sense to me.
A convertible that will seat 4 adults is great for taking the family and their gear to the beach, park, etc. You may start off with small kids, but they are relentless about growing.
To me it comes down to two things: Range and infrastructure.
Range: It's not a question of how far I drive to work during the week. It's a question of when I need it, I need it.
Infrastructure: With a gas vehicle I can pretty much go anywhere and stop anywhere to refuel and be back on the road in 15 minutes or less. Sure, someone will say "if you buy a Tesla, and if you plan your stops, and if you are going here, and if..." That's not the flexibility to go anywhere and stop anywhere. Plus if we really had a lot of EV's, then those few charging stations would be backed up for miles waiting to use them.
Thank you, this is my sentiments. I am not opposed to EVs but I live out here where fuel stops are few and far between. Having to wait in line for a charge when now it is less than 10 minutes(accounting for potty breaks) is what I have become accustomed to.
While I can't speak for "most people", my own behavior is starkly different. Driving a light and underpowered car, I rarely fill the tank more than 1/4 full, because of fanaticism about minimizing weight. Gasoline is something like 6 pounds per gallon. Considering that I can tell difference in acceleration between an empty trunk and a trunk with 4-5 bags of groceries, every pound counts... literally. My daily driving regimen is short, but even so, there's a visit to the gas station every 2 days or so.
As to the EV topic, if there were ready access to a charger that provided say 30 miles of range from a half-hour of charging-time, then that would be sufficient. My main objection to electric cars is that they're too heavy, first because of large batteries, and second because the type of car that gets electrified is more the family-vehicle sort, rather than the sporting sort. As I've posted repeatedly, I very much miss the original Tesla Roadster, though in all fairness even that car was pretty heavy (around 2800 lbs, whereas the Lotus which loosely inspired it was maybe 1900 pounds). For similar reasons, I am dismayed that electric motorcycle are so heavy. A 50 KW bike with 20 mile range, weighing 250 pounds, would be tremendous fun... but the market doesn't provide such a thing.
I understand what you are trying to say. Your driving is quite different than mine. I drive long distances, and seldom let the fuel in the tank drop to the "1/2-tank" mark, specially during the winter months.
Small and sporty was a 90s thing, and for some reason that just doesn’t sell anymore. Plus people want jacked up things with faux toughness. So that alone almost precludes the premise from being a valid one.
Dig down another level, and you’ll find most enthusiasts just won’t endorse it. One might say they lack some viscerality, but IMHO having spent my youth carving canyons out in California, electric cars lack the aural cues a serious driver needs to judge speed into a turn such as engine sound, and physical ones such as knowing what gear you’re in. Electric power steering can be tuned quite well as Porsche has demonstrated, except they’re basically the only ones doing it...so as of today, the lack of good steering feel is a roadblock which shouldn’t be as insurmountable as the lack of good steering these days makes it seem. It therefore seems like it would be hard to drive an electric car at speed lacking those other cues. It would feel more like trying to hustle a muscle car along, gingerly navigating curves while relying on brute acceleration to make up for it. And that was only fun in muscle cars because of the delightful soundtrack.
No, if anything, electric seems suited to high-end luxury or more technical pursuits like off-roading, where the inherent refinement and ability to control individual wheel slip/grip, respectively, puts electrics ahead of traditional gasoline vehicles. It’s also primed for the sheeple to whom driving is merely a necessary evil, provided we do a re-work of our electrical infrastructure to allow fast charging to be delivered as widely as liquid fuels.
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