L1's Garage

But I don’t HAVE to buy an expensive gasoline car. Plenty are affordable. Can’t say the same about EV’s.

Range loss may be in your mind… minimal but if you are on the border of the range to get where you are going its not minimal. Range loss between cold and degradation over time. Batteries degrade over time, that is a fact whether you like it or not.

Changing all roads to provide power to electric vehicles? Yeah, that’s gonna happen overnight. I mean… a prototype, ohhhh. Yeah, that’s ready for production, right. He’ll start producing the roads tomorrow and droppin em in right now.

Used market has nothing to do with getting EV’s mainstream, hint: they are not. In order for EV’s to actually become mainstream the cost needs to drop. Where I go needs to have charging stations available and in enough supply I can actually charge. Apartment complexes would need to allow installation of charging stations, hint… many won’t. I can top off in 5 minutes from time I stop to time on the road, waiting 30 is not going to endear someone to buy one who actually makes road trips. EV’s are a niche product and will continue to be so for a very long time.

You’re forgetting a few things here. Firstly battery degradation. This is minimal. The reasoning is that you don’t get access to the whole battery from the start. As cells lose their ability to hold a charge, new cells are opened up for replacement use. So you have to get quite a number of recharges before you experience this, and ideally theyll have you replace it sooner.

Secondly, I own a cadilac. 80k$ car. I didnt buy that new. I bought it used b.c that’s how the used market works. So yea, that absolutely has to do with it becoming mainstream. If you purely want to talk new cars, I wager few of us here have ever even bought one new off the lot. (Not to even mention that EV’s start at 25k$ if you look outside of Tesla. That’s honda Civic territory)

I never said that those types of roads are going to be here even in the next ten years. They do exist in SKorea. I’m talking the future here as we both know.

Now on the specific topic of mainstream. Look to 2025. It’s said both volvo and GM (Is the GM one a rumor? Sources?) are going full electric offereing. VW plans to put 22 million cars on the road by 2025. Tesla will still be going strong most likely, Merc and BMW, have been broadening the line. Whether you want it to or not, you may very be stuck buying an EV in the future.

Also quick mention of tax benefits to having an EV in places like cali make them popular just as Kei cars are in Japan.

Even used they still won’t be mainstream. How long is it going to take to make a used market? It’s going to be at least 10 years before decent cars are out in the wild as used in enough numbers to bring down prices.

Your entire projections are based on rumors and roseyness. RUMOR has it Volvo and GM will offer full electric by 2025. VW PLANS on putting 22 million cars on the road by 2025. So 22 million electric cars… that means they are going to be able to make and sell 22 million electric cars over 5 1/2 years. Right. Musk has a prototype he might make of an electric charging road. Everything is minimal, everything is rosy, everything is perfect with electric cars.

Well now. I’d recommend test driving a Chevy Bolt (with an open mind) before being so hard on them. They’re fun and cheap to drive cars.

I own a 2015 Chevy Spark EV that I bought used for $9,988, and with 327 ft-lb of torque it is a blast to dart around in thanks to 100% of the power being available instantly.

I will however say that cold weather it’s self my not affect range too much, but running the heater to stay warm certainly does. At least when you set it to 72° like I do. Also many EVs have thermal controlled batteries (including mine).

Takes my car 15 minutes to charge on level 3 chargers. 10 minutes has always been plenty to get me home with ample juice left.

You can buy a used Nissan Leaf for around $6k. Don’t go older then 2013 though (crap batteries).
Something else to keep in mind is how mind blowingly cheap they are to power. I drive at least 40 miles a day (960 miles a month), and if I only charged at home it would costs me less then $15 a month in electricity, but I charge at work so it’s half that (tops off before leaving work).

Also there’s no, transmission, belts, sparkplugs, engine oil, alternator, ect…
There are fluids, but they need as much attention as diff oil (basically never need to change it).

I personally don’t care if they become mainstream (which they will), but I really hope gas cars stay, and I don’t think all new cars will be electric in my lifetime.

TL;DR if you look into EVs with an open mind you’ll see their benefits over gas are undeniable despite their battery limitations.

Oh, I love all types of cars. I have a Volvo V70 that I engine swap and auto to manual swapped. It’s a 5 cylinder running 16 pounds of boost.

1 Like

I live in an apartment. There are no charging stations, I can’t run a damned extension cord out the front door to charge it. No one is getting this. No one. Until the apartment issue is handled where its not an issue for apartment dwellers these things will not go mainstream… or even close to that.

I wasn’t saying you should get one. I was suggesting for you to give it a try (test drive)… Just for fun!

I recommend against EVs for people in apartments. You would have to charge off level 3 chargers which will generally cost you… At that point just get a gasser, or an electric with a gas generator like the BMW i3 or Chevy Volt.

1 Like

I am talking about engine breaking with loads of 100,000+ lbs. Where you can’t use breaks going downhill.

Evs can do this. Just loook at the tesla semi.

1 Like

How does it engine break though? By friction? That doesn’t sound safe at all.

Not at all. The car is programed to use the motor as a generator when you let off the go pedal, which puts load on the motor. Slows you down, and charges your battery.

I barely use friction to slow my car down.

electro magnetic energy within the engine.
put a load (like a battery charger) on the engine while its turning and it will be harder to turn (thus braking)

1 Like

can we discuss brake vs break?

3 Likes

See, you create a lot of resistance when you try to charge the batteries with the motor (motors and generators are basically electrically the same), so when you want to engine brake, you just tell the motor to charge the battery, rather than drain.

Now, if the battery is at 100%, I’m not sure what the strategery is, but it obviously can’t put the power in the battery, and all those angry electrons have nowhere to go.

Yeah! And while we’re at it, can we discuss engine vs motor? /s

Oh, I thought I made that mistake since it looks like you were quoting me. I have a heck of a time keeping those straight. I still say are when I should have said our more often than I’d like to admit. Lol

EVs never charge their batteries to 100%, so they could charge more, but my Nissan Leaf just didn’t regen (which can catch you off guard) if the battery was “fully charged”. My Chevy Spark will still regen when it’s “fully charged”, but max regen is reduced to something like a 3rd of what it would normally do. It’ll unlock full regen within a mile of driving, vs the Leaf which was very reluctant to unlock regen, seemed like you’d have to drive 3-4 miles to unlock full regen (would gradually allow more as you drove).

3 Likes

From a safety perspective, something like the hydraulic system from the Ford concept Tonka truck would be interesting:

The key is recovering the energy normally lost while braking. The raw torque required to push more than 3 tons up to highway speed is quickly dissipated as heat by the brakes in bringing the same load to a halt. Up to now, most systems that recapture lost braking energy have relied on some kind of electric drive – using energy from a battery pack to assist while accelerating, then using the motor as a generator to recharge while slowing the vehicle. “The problem is that you change energy forms too many times, losing a little efficiency each time,” says Cliff Carlson, senior specialist of advanced technologies at Ford. “Mechanical energy becomes electrical, then electrical becomes chemical (in the battery). And then you reverse it.”

1 Like

Rebuilt RGV250 in foreground. Girlfriend in background :smiley:

  • replacement low km (17k) engine plus
  • Fork rebuild
  • Cougar red power valves
  • New pistons, rings
  • New bearings
  • Ultrasonic carb clean
  • Carb re-jet for the arrow pipes
  • New Bridgestone RS10 tyres
  • a HEAP of other bits and pieces.

Goes hard. Remaining items to fix:

  • rear shock needs a rebuild
  • needs a new fuel tap. only runs properly on reserve, “on” starves it for fuel.
  • either replace the front fender with carbon or paint black to match the rest of the bike
  • maybe tidy up the fuel tank/plastics paint

I hadn’t even got on the bike after picking it up and a guy driving on the opposite side of the road pulled over to ask if it was for sale :smiley:

They really are becoming a bit of a rare classic. Last time i saw another one ON THE ROAD was several years ago.

2 Likes

nice ride

pun intended

1 Like

My two favourite

Getting closer. Got this fan out of a Volvo v70, nearly perfect fit for the radiator.
Its pwm controlled apparently, need to hook it up to an arduino and try it out.

2 Likes

Clearly a salute to my V70! Lol

Holy crap, is the engine in for good‽

Just got one of those last week to learn more about programming.