Scrutable

dyqik wrote: Sat Nov 28, 2020 1:44 pm

shpalman wrote: Sat Nov 28, 2020 12:54 pm With the sentence A couple from Kent have described how it took them more than nine hours to drive 130 miles home from Bournemouth as they struggled to find a working charger capable of producing enough power to their electric car the Guardian avoids having to #secondmention by missing words out entirely.

Seems like the biggest issue there was that they weren't prepared to queue anywhere.

Grumble wrote: Sat Nov 28, 2020 3:00 pm They do have a point though, the public charging network is fragmented, unreliable and sparse. Especially outside of London. It’s something that early adopters have often complained about and it is something that needs to improve. I’m happy with the idea of charging at home but it’s not possible for everyone.

FlammableFlower wrote: Sat Nov 28, 2020 5:56 pmI also get a bit miffed with the environs: unlike a petrol station, I've yet to see a charging point with a roof over it. Why not do that and then add in solar panels on top. Utilise the space for something additional.

Martin Y wrote: Sat Nov 28, 2020 5:22 pm A nearly-finished prototype EV bolt-in kit for old MX-5s: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZws7kE3U5k (Which will probably be the basis for kits for a bunch of old MGs, Triumphs etc. Builder's channel with a series of videos is here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqZtga ... k9NazBuaow )

Upside: Looks well made and ideal for me to keep commuting into West London in my 27 year old car without paying £12.50 per day when the ULEZ expands beyond my workplace next year.

Downsides: £20 grand kit. Same price as my paying ULEZ fees upfront right up to retirement age, which puts it in perspective. And no fast charging which means realistically it isn't a car for fun daytrips, it's a car with a 50 mile operating radius.

dyqik wrote: Sat Nov 28, 2020 1:44 pm

shpalman wrote: Sat Nov 28, 2020 12:54 pm With the sentence A couple from Kent have described how it took them more than nine hours to drive 130 miles home from Bournemouth as they struggled to find a working charger capable of producing enough power to their electric car the Guardian avoids having to #secondmention by missing words out entirely.

Seems like the biggest issue there was that they weren't prepared to queue anywhere.

Millennie Al wrote: Sun Nov 29, 2020 1:24 am

dyqik wrote: Sat Nov 28, 2020 1:44 pm

shpalman wrote: Sat Nov 28, 2020 12:54 pm With the sentence A couple from Kent have described how it took them more than nine hours to drive 130 miles home from Bournemouth as they struggled to find a working charger capable of producing enough power to their electric car the Guardian avoids having to #secondmention by missing words out entirely.

Seems like the biggest issue there was that they weren't prepared to queue anywhere.

When a 'fast' charge takes 40 minutes, it's not really reasonable to queue unless it's only the current user and they're part way through. If you pulled up at a petrol pump and found eight people ahead of you who tok five minutes each, you'd be talking for months about the enormous 40 minute wait you had.

In the ariticle the queue was to use a facility that imposed a 45 minute wait. Assuming the limit was needed because people would otherwise take longer, it suggests that a queue there could easily mean hours waiting. That's pretty impractical.

shpalman wrote: Sun Nov 29, 2020 1:04 pm Every two years or so, we would get into the car in Scunthorpe, drive to Dover, take the ferry to Oostende, and then drive from Ostende to Trenčín in Slovakia. Via Austria* it would take 28 hours in total.

Google currently says Scunthorpe-Dover is just over 4 hours, about 400 km (4.5 hours and 440 km if you take the M1 instead of the A1). Oostende-Trenčín is given as 13 hours, 1400 km.

In my car, if I left with a full tank, I would have to refuel three times. Your mileage may vary of course. You could also suggest that doing the whole thing in one go with barely any rest stops let alone an overnight stay somewhere is f.cking stupid, and you'd be right. On the way back we would stop over in Leverkusen.

Anyway my point is that you could probably do at least 800 km in a day with a stop for lunch, which in a petrol or diesel car would require at most a few minutes refuelling at lunchtime. So an electric car could make sense if 400 km of range can be recharged in half an hour or so, or if it had 800 km of range which could be recharged overnight.

The ID.3 is listed as having a range of 420 km in standard configuration with a 58 kWh battery, which is enough for the former case, and can be upgraded to 540 km with a 77 kWh battery for only about £10,000 more than the base model. At the rated 7 kW of that low-power charging point for which there was a queue, it's about 8 hours of charging to do 400 km. You'd need to find a 50 kW charger at lunchtime.

tl;dr there isn't an electric car yet which has enough range for a day's travel if you actually intend to travel all day.

* - Actually the worst time was when we had to go the whole length of Czechia** since my uncles had previously driven to visit us in the UK and they didn't have a visa for travelling through Austria; that trip took 32 hours.

** - this was at a time when Czechoslovakia was still a thing.

Grumble wrote: Sun Nov 29, 2020 10:50 am Lithium mining in Cornwall could be a goer. I really hope this proves viable, it depends on how easy it is to separate the lithium out of the brine I think.

AMS wrote: Sun Nov 29, 2020 4:08 pm

Grumble wrote: Sun Nov 29, 2020 10:50 am Lithium mining in Cornwall could be a goer. I really hope this proves viable, it depends on how easy it is to separate the lithium out of the brine I think.

That would be cool, and apart from anything else, the old mining districts around Redruth could do with the income.

Grumble wrote: Sun Nov 29, 2020 12:19 pm As long as you have enough range for a day’s travel and can therefore charge overnight batteries are clear winners over fuel cells - and the driver spends less time doing that than they would do refuelling with diesel. Multi-day journeys, such as by ships, are where fuel cells win out.

Bird on a Fire wrote: Sun Nov 29, 2020 12:30 pm Swapping batteries instead of charging them would work too, especially if manufacturers limited themselves to a few standard models (lol). Probably even quicker than pumping a tank full of fuel.

Millennie Al wrote: Mon Nov 30, 2020 3:43 am

Bird on a Fire wrote: Sun Nov 29, 2020 12:30 pm Swapping batteries instead of charging them would work too, especially if manufacturers limited themselves to a few standard models (lol). Probably even quicker than pumping a tank full of fuel.

Given the value of a battery pack, how do you resolve the inevitable arguments over why one is damaged - was that before it got swapped or after? And given that batteries wear out, how do you prevent unscrupulous drivers from swapping a worn-out or defective battery for a relatively new one? Some people would probably pull the same trick that dishonest battery suppliers have been found to do - pretend that a battery was much higher spec than it is. Only after you try charging it do you find that it won't hold the charge.

Grumble wrote: Mon Nov 30, 2020 6:48 am https://youtu.be/hTsrDpsYHrw
Battery swapping Nio

Grumble wrote: Sun Nov 29, 2020 12:19 pm As long as you have enough range for a day’s travel and can therefore charge overnight batteries are clear winners over fuel cells - and the driver spends less time doing that than they would do refuelling with diesel. Multi-day journeys, such as by ships, are where fuel cells win out.

bjn wrote: Mon Nov 30, 2020 9:43 am

Grumble wrote: Sun Nov 29, 2020 12:19 pm As long as you have enough range for a day’s travel and can therefore charge overnight batteries are clear winners over fuel cells - and the driver spends less time doing that than they would do refuelling with diesel. Multi-day journeys, such as by ships, are where fuel cells win out.

Provided there is a decent charging network, the only advantage that a renewables derived liquid/gas fuel vehicle has over a battery vehicle is the ability to refuel rapidly. If you absolutely have to be moving again in a matter of minutes after doing a number of hours driving, great. Beyond that I can't think of a single thing where they win, they are way more inefficient to generate, need a whole new distribution network and are more complex and dangerous to handle.

So for most miles driven by most vehicles, batteries win. I'd trade never having to fill up my car on a regular basis with the odd longer stop at a motorway services for the extended trips I do a few times a year.

The devil in the detail is the "decent charging network", this requires ubiquitous chargers, at home, on the street, at work, at hotels, at Sainsbury's, at church etc.... The degree of ubiquity can be low to start with, but as more BEVs roll out more will be needed. It's also one of Tesla's USPs, they recognised that if charging was a pain, they wouldn't sell any cars, so they spent a tonne of money on their super charger network. They also maintain them better than other networks.

Note that this also goes for fuel cell vehicles, they need a decent refuelling network for them as well, at the moment there is none. They are also more painful to roll out, a H2 or ammonia pump along with tanks, generation systems, distribution systems is going to cost one helluva lot more than a BEV charger attached to the existing grid.