[OP]
Contributor
Here's my concern
If I don't own a parking spot because I live in an apartment I can't charge my car while I'm home.
Can I use a public charger? Well my car needs a couple hours charge every day or two. I'm not going to sit there and wait. I'm going to work or sleep or otherwise get on with my life. Now that charger is unavailable to anyone else. To install a lot of them in a sizable parking lot is going to be expensive and require a big power feed to the site.
Contributor
Until there are generic easily swappable batteries EVs will continue to be a niche. My vision is a standardized battery that can be replaced in just a few minutes by a robot and is leased from an energy provider. This would solve most of the hurdles to EV.
Contributor
I agree with you, John.Originally Posted by John Lanciani
I read that the new Ford Lightening will have a range of 2-300 miles. Ford has also applied for a patent on a ‘range extender’ that is a generator that will mount in the bed like a toolbox. Two things occur to me:
1. Applying your idea of rapidly replaceable batteries, why not have a smaller battery installed when you don’t need a 200 mile range? If you are just going to work and back, 100 miles is gobs and there’s no need to cart around those heavy batteries.
2. Make the range extender so easily installed and removed that it could be rented. Now, you can go from a short range vehicle to something you can drive long distances.
Contributor
The problem with swappable batteries is us in the north (or more the salt up here in the winter). Lifting/ dropping the battery from the underside would be the easiest but you'll have to deal with corrosion and ice in the wintertime. A door on the side of the car would work but making every door a standard size would be an issue. It can be done but not without working out some of the details.
Contributor
I think another issue with swappable batteries is that it would be a niche market. The vast majority of EVs are driven less than their full range in a typical day and can be charged overnight at home or during the day while the driver is at work. The range limit is just an issue a few times a year when you do a road trip. I'll bet, for everyone out there who drives over 200 miles a day on a regular basis there are a hundred people who drive less than 200 miles a week in their normal commute and thousands of people who drive less than 200 miles a day. The average annual mileage driven, according to the DOT is 13,500 miles or 260 miles a week or 37 miles a day.
I think the range issue will be solved by improvements in battery technology (think how much better today's cell phone batteries or power tool batteries are compared to ten or twenty years ago).
Contributor
Very true, my commute is 20 kilometres and takes an hour.
Range won’t be a problem for most drivers.....Regards, Rod
Contributor
Rather than swappable batteries, I expect we'll see batteries that can be charged faster, especially to 80% of a full charge. So if your vehicle has a stated range of 300 miles, you'll be able to charge it to 240 miles quickly.
There are just too many problems with the concept of swappable batteries.
I really like the Ford Lighting concept of being able to supply electricity to the home during a power failure. Also their concept of putting a generator in the truck bed to give you more range on a long trip.
Really neat, inventive ideas are coming for electric vehicles.
Mike
Last edited by Mike Henderson; 05-23-2021 at 8:46 PM.
Go into the world and do well. But more importantly, go into the world and do good.
Contributor
I keep reading that, and can't help but wonder just how big that widget would need to be to make a meaningful difference in the overall range.
Yoga class makes me feel like a total stud, mostly because I'm about as flexible as a 2x4.
"Design"? Possibly. "Intelligent"? Sure doesn't look like it from this angle.
We used to be hunter gatherers. Now we're shopper borrowers.
The three most important words in the English language: "Front Towards Enemy".
The world makes a lot more sense when you remember that Butthead was the smart one.
You can never be too rich, too thin, or have too much ammo.
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I suppose, technically, that all you need to generate is the amount of energy that the car is using cruising along the highway, plus a bit to put some in the battery for when you have to hill climb. Cruising along a flat road doesn't take a lot of HP - Google says between 10 and 20 HP. Ignoring efficiency, 15 HP is 11.25 kW. So the generator would have to be at least 15 kW and 20 kW would be better.
A 20 kW generator is not a small (or cheap) generator. It would take a lot of the truck bed.
Alternately, you could use a smaller generator and it would make the battery last longer but the battery would be depleted eventually. For example, if you needed 15kW to cruise, you could put in a 5 kW generator and then you'd only draw 10 kW from the battery, which would give you more range. A 5 kW generator is not that big. There are portables that are bigger than 5 kW. A 7 kW generator could essentially double your range.
Mike
[I did some more Googling and got higher HP results for cruising at 70 MPH. But the idea is the same. Whatever the generator supplies will extend the range of your battery.]
Last edited by Mike Henderson; 05-23-2021 at 11:45 PM.
Go into the world and do well. But more importantly, go into the world and do good.
Contributor
A generator in the bed will be fine for 90% pf pickup truck users (witness the popularity of micro-beds in trucks), but a few of us use our trucks to actually move things around. Not so good for us.
There are already much better designs for plug-in hybrids than this. I suspect that this is an idea that sounds good at first hearing, but will go nowhere.
Member
And let's not forget the generator in the bed needs to be fueled by something, so you'd need a canister for that fuel.
<sarcasm on>
Gee, maybe they could permanently mount this generator and fuel canister somewhere in the truck so that you wouldn't need to be putting it in and out of the bed.
<sarcasm off>
To me, this sounds about like the pitch for attaching a solar panel to the roof. On first blush - brilliant! But the devil is in the details...
Contributor
Kinda what I expected. A quick look at the Harbor Freight catalog shows ~200lbs for a 10KW "portable" generator, which makes it a 2+ person job (or an engine hoist) to get it in or out of the bed.
Yoga class makes me feel like a total stud, mostly because I'm about as flexible as a 2x4.
"Design"? Possibly. "Intelligent"? Sure doesn't look like it from this angle.
We used to be hunter gatherers. Now we're shopper borrowers.
The three most important words in the English language: "Front Towards Enemy".
The world makes a lot more sense when you remember that Butthead was the smart one.
You can never be too rich, too thin, or have too much ammo.
Contributor
Once you put a generator in the truck bed, you've (in a way) converted the truck to a Chevy Volt
Mike
Go into the world and do well. But more importantly, go into the world and do good.
Member
Is this your living situation, or just a hypothetical concern? 80% in 54 minutes from a DC charger.
https://www.chargepoint.com/
Buggy whip makers said much the same.
Contributor
So to put some perspective on that; I work for an electric utility in MA and we are working on securing a grant to install a level 3 DC fast charger. Just the cost of the charger from charge point is in excess of $50,000. On top of that is the infrastructure and installation cost. That's a lot of buggy whips...
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