30 replies to this topic

[Vic Patterson]

As Mr. Darn suggests exchange batteries is a great solution, I have read of exchange power modules (but I think they were hydrogen for Vancouver transit) and battery technology is moving along fast.
With regenerative braking and solar power to assist with the travel range it could become feasible, but anything less than 500 km isn't really practicable considering the terrain and weather.

[Mr Darn]

I'm with monsta here...

If i want to travel to london, what better way than to use one of the many car-share schemes?

Park your car at the train station, Bit of a play on the laptop on the way down (and at an average speed much higher than the car!) then hire another electric car with a short range when your down there.

It's on its way! Embrace it!

[mercuryg]

Mr Darn, on 06 June 2010 - 04:05 PM, said:

I'm with monsta here...

If i want to travel to london, what better way than to use one of the many car-share schemes?

Park your car at the train station, Bit of a play on the laptop on the way down (and at an average speed much higher than the car!) then hire another electric car with a short range when your down there.

It's on its way! Embrace it!

Hang on, the two of you have just defeated your own argument; you're openly admitting that the Nissan Leaf, one of the most advanced and modern of the new breed of electric cars, is utterly useless for anyone wanting to travel any distance. In suggesting that it's better to use an alternative you're pointing out its mighty limitations.

besides, I don't want to take the train, because I've just spent £23,000 on a car, and for £23,000 it should be able to do the job without me having to take the train. When i get to my destination I want to be able to get in my car and visit brighton, pop over to Goodwood for some racing, call on relatives in Maidstone, etc; I don't want to be limited by having to use the train.

Battery replacement is, in an ideal world, a great idea, but the same limitations apply - you can only go so far on one set of batteries, and you will have to have these battery replacement centres every few miles as not everybody is starting from the same place and heading for the same destination. Monsta, batteries last 100 miles, but not at a safe and steady 60mph on the motorway they don't, and no matter how much you try to dress it up, battery technology isn't advancing at the rate of 'twofold every couple of months' - as already pointed out in 60 years battery technology, as needed for cars, is simply static.

Furthermore, you again point out the limitations in electric cars design as you state, quite correctly, it is designed for urban transport; it might have passed your notice that all but a very few (the Tesla etc) are designed for urban transport, because - quite simply - of the problems i've highlighted. I've already stated electric cars are great as 'city cars' - but who other than the wealthy looking for a plaything and an 'I'm green, I am' sign is going to pay £23,000 for an urban car? As you said, take the train, or the bus.

I'm interested to see how many Nissan Leaf's are sold in the UK in the next twelve months - i'll bet yo any money its in two figures, no more than a hundred.

[Monsta®]

mercuryg, on 07 June 2010 - 08:05 AM, said:

Hang on, the two of you have just defeated your own argument; you're openly admitting that the Nissan Leaf, one of the most advanced and modern of the new breed of electric cars, is utterly useless for anyone wanting to travel any distance. In suggesting that it's better to use an alternative you're pointing out its mighty limitations.

nobody has said its useless at long distances only put forward alternatives i.e trains and a car share idea!

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besides, I don't want to take the train, because I've just spent £23,000 on a car, and for £23,000 it should be able to do the job without me having to take the train. When i get to my destination I want to be able to get in my car and visit brighton, pop over to Goodwood for some racing, call on relatives in Maidstone, etc; I don't want to be limited by having to use the train.

who in reality drives from northumberland to brighton every day?

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Battery replacement is, in an ideal world, a great idea, but the same limitations apply - you can only go so far on one set of batteries, and you will have to have these battery replacement centres every few miles as not everybody is starting from the same place and heading for the same destination. Monsta, batteries last 100 miles, but not at a safe and steady 60mph on the motorway they don't, and no matter how much you try to dress it up, battery technology isn't advancing at the rate of 'twofold every couple of months' - as already pointed out in 60 years battery technology, as needed for cars, is simply static.

eh i think you'll find it does check out the nissan site it rated for 100miles range doing 90mph!

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Furthermore, you again point out the limitations in electric cars design as you state, quite correctly, it is designed for urban transport; it might have passed your notice that all but a very few (the Tesla etc) are designed for urban transport, because - quite simply - of the problems i've highlighted. I've already stated electric cars are great as 'city cars' - but who other than the wealthy looking for a plaything and an 'I'm green, I am' sign is going to pay £23,000 for an urban car? As you said, take the train, or the bus.

I'm interested to see how many Nissan Leaf's are sold in the UK in the next twelve months - i'll bet yo any money its in two figures, no more than a hundred.

funny two figures! in the U.S theres already a 50,000 long waiting list!

[Mr Darn]

I take it by your statement you will also be driving on holiday to foreign countries such as greece, Austrailia, America etc, as obviously, you just paid 23,000 for a car, why can't you use it?

Ok, ok. the battery wont get us that far, as is just won't last that long.

Scalextric has been around since i was a kid. are you telling me placing a track in the road to boost cars battery is also a non starter?
It wouldn't even have to be in all lanes, you could place it in a slow lane, so you just pull off the main road and drive along that section at a slower speed for half an hour to recharge, before rejoining the main carriageway. (

I find your defeatist attitude on this to be in the same league as Monsta and Bedlington's development.

Instead of pointing out what we can't do... how about pointing out something we can do?

[mercuryg]

Mr Darn, on 07 June 2010 - 09:53 AM, said:

I find your defeatist attitude on this to be in the same league as Monsta and Bedlington's development.

That's an interesting statement, and I'd question why you think I'm being defeatist when I've clearly acknowledged that electric cars are a great idea for what they are being built for - short journeys, city cars, etc. That i'm trying to get it across - and it shouldn't really be that difficult (and has, in actual fact, been acknowledged by yourself and Monsta) that there is absolutely no chance of the electric car replacing the internal combustion engined car for a long time thanks to a vast amount of impracticalities in both the design and the principle isn't defeatist - it's reality.

If i'm expected to bow down because two of you have come up with counter ideas - one of which is not to use a car at all as it wouldn't be able to do the job - then you're missing my point; a £23,000 car that doesn't go very far is not a practical replacement for the current mode of personal transport that is favoured. I fail to see how you can argue otherwise.

You want to know what we can do? I've already told you; the car, in its fossil fuelled and electric form, will eventually die out and we will rely on a greater public transport infrastructure. As you said, we'll all take the train or, more likely, the bus, tram or whatever. This is the only way that we cvan get around the problem of having to generate enough power to charge up 20 million electric cars on a regular basis. Again, that's not defeatist, it's logic.

Here's the rub - currently I don't even own a car; i'd love one, but I don't need one. I use the bus. I can assure, though, that if I had £23000 to spend on a car it wouldn't be a limited range Nissan Leaf or similar - in all honesty, would you buy one?

BTW, Monsta - get the names of the 50,00 on that US waiting list and i'll bet you they can all afford a trendy electric plaything.

[Monsta®]

so all this arguement against electric cars is coming from someone who gets the bus!

[Mr Darn]

Our point was never that there are viable alternatives now, and the key word here is "viable".

Our point is, the technology IS here, its just not in production because of the cost.

As you acknowledged, the technology is here now, but would cost millions of pounds to implement.

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That's right, and the reason it costs that much is not because it isn't mass produced, it's because th technology it uses is bloody expensive,

the whole argument is based on price, and because of that, will never be won by any other power source other than combustible.

Would you have one if the government would swap your car for one of these for free?
(yeah, yeah, i know, you don't own a car! my point stands though.)

[mercuryg]

Mr Darn, on 07 June 2010 - 02:52 PM, said:

Our point was never that there are viable alternatives now, and the key word here is "viable".

On the contrary; early in the discussion Monsta clearly stated that once 'people get a taste for electric cars' sales of diesel and petrol will plummet and the internal combustion will be dead; he is, in fact, wholeheartedly proposing the electric car as a viable replacement for the traditional version; this, as my argument has always been, is not the case now, and won't be for a long time - if at all. It's not an argument, as you claim, based on price but on practicality.

There is no practical use for electric cars as they are able to be produced now other than for short runs. That's been the case for a hundred years, and will likely be so for another.

Monsta - i'm not 'against' electric cars at all, and nor am I arguing against them; I maintain they have a purpose, but it's not as a replacement for the traditional powered car. I use the bus because I don't need a car; that, I might add, is about as green as it gets.

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Would you have one if the government would swap your car for one of these for free?
(yeah, yeah, i know, you don't own a car! my point stands though.)

Your point is not relevant though; the government isn't going to give me one for nothing, it costs £23,000. If I buy a car now, and I am - coincidentally - in the process of looking for one - it will be so that I can visit people further afield, go to weekend race meetings at Donington, Oulton, Brands and so on, get in and go whenever I want and take on a bit more freedom than I currently have with the bus and rail network. I certainly won't be buying one that offers me no greater range than the X21 and costs over £20 grand, and neither will anyone who isn't very wealthy and wants a trendy plaything.

[Monsta®]

just want to add a few points.

1) you say its going to be a flopp only the rich will buy one as a play thing! the same was said about the iphone and that has sold millions. i hate iphones but you got to admit they sell like hot cakes. also they said something similar about the toyota prius even after the safety scare they still sell great!

2) you say the petrol engine will live on. sorry engines will live on but only as either alchol or hydrogen as petrol will in the next ten years be skyrocketing in price. in the last few year its gone up 25% to 120p per litre. i can see it hitting 500 to 600p in a decade making my modest mid range car £300 per fill up! sorry but even on a good wage i wont be able to afford that!

[mercuryg]

Monsta®, on 09 June 2010 - 11:33 AM, said:

just want to add a few points.

1) you say its going to be a flopp only the rich will buy one as a play thing! the same was said about the iphone and that has sold millions. i hate iphones but you got to admit they sell like hot cakes. also they said something similar about the toyota prius even after the safety scare they still sell great!

Good points, but hardly comparable, and I don't think many people thought the iPhone would be a flop. As for the Prius, it is hardly a runaway success, is it? In 12 years of worldwide sales just over a million - in the whole world - have been sold. That's a good indication, in fact, of the sort of market that such vehicles are aiming at. Further, i'm not saying electric cars will be 'a flop' - I firmly believe that manufacturers will sell the numbers that they want, as they are not intended for anything other than short runs.As a replacement for the traditionally powered car they are simply not viable, and that's before we consider the cost o teh infrastructure and the extra power needed for them.

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2) you say the petrol engine will live on. sorry engines will live on but only as either alchol or hydrogen as petrol will in the next ten years be skyrocketing in price. in the last few year its gone up 25% to 120p per litre. i can see it hitting 500 to 600p in a decade making my modest mid range car £300 per fill up! sorry but even on a good wage i wont be able to afford that!

These too are very good points, and I can't disagree that strongly with them. Alcohol powered cars are prevalent in South America and other parts of the world, and do the job neatly; the problem, again, is in installing an infrastructure that enables the pumping of alcohol into cars, and in converting the millions of existing models to alcohol based power. Hydrogen suffers from similar problems to electric power in that it has to be produced, and to produce it you need - you guessed - electricity, and lots of it. It is, I would say, a more likely choice to take over from electric batteries when the petrol eventually runs out.

Where you are being a little alarmist is in predicting a £5 a litre petrol price in a decade; despite the scaremongers telling us otherwise (and if you believe those scientists who were estimating when I was at school then there would be no oil left by now) oil reserves are healthy, and the increases we see inpetrol come not from the cost of oil but from taxation. I can see it doubling in price, but a 400% increase in ten years would require something akin to a third world war. Possible, but hardly predictable.

Furthermore, and something that you are missing - not deliberately, I understand - is that if your predictions about oil prices rising were to be correct then we would undoubtedly see a similar rise in the price of electricity - and even without your predictions the cost of electricity is rising very quickly all the time.

Either way, this leads us to your last sentence, and it's one that, again, backs up something you've missed; as i've said, when the internal combustion eventually dies - and it will - any replacement will be too expensive, too impractical and so on, for individuals other than those with a hell of a lot of money to spend; the car, as such, as personal transport, will also die. We will rely on public transport.