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We Could Have Had Electric Cars from the Beginning

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Re: We Could Have Had Electric Cars from the Beginning

#181

Post by m-i-l »

thrower123 wrote: post #99

I don't think you can discount the military applications as a factor. It is not as extreme as in aviation in terms of raw innovation, but without the demand for millions of engines for trucks, tanks, jeeps, and all the other machinery of war sparked by the warfare of the first part of the 20th century, the internal combustion engine would not be as ubiquitous as it is today. In thirty years armies went from marching…

This aligns to the timings of the switch to ICE, which appears to be between 1914 and 1917 - see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20181692 .

Re: We Could Have Had Electric Cars from the Beginning

#182

Post by lagadu »

chadcmulligan wrote: post #121

Some of the reasons why petrol won: There was no electric grid to speak of - even now there is concern the grid can't support all EV's, once you were outside the cities (and there weren't many back then) the grid was spotty. The miracle of being able to pour some cheap liquid in an engine and drive for miles is a considerable achievement. Lead acid batteries weren't very good and were expensive (and still are) and do…

> Its always been possible to make a small electric commuter car to drive round at 30mph for short distances but even today there are none like this

Hmmm? There are quite a few like that, off the top of my head:

- Peugeot Ion

- Smart electric

- Renault Zoe

- Mitsubishi imiev

- Fiat 500 had an EV version

- Don't remember the name but some citroen too

Re: We Could Have Had Electric Cars from the Beginning

#183

Post by benj111 »

rightbyte wrote: post #159
kozak wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But we would still need batteries to store regenerative braking energy (i.e. it would be a hybrid).

You can have a flywheel for that.

Don't know why you're getting downvotes, this is a thing.

https://www.racecar-engineering.com/articles/f1/williams-f1-...

Re: We Could Have Had Electric Cars from the Beginning

#184

Post by hwillis »

godelski wrote: post #129
chadcmulligan wrote: post #121

Some of the reasons why petrol won: There was no electric grid to speak of - even now there is concern the grid can't support all EV's, once you were outside the cities (and there weren't many back then) the grid was spotty. The miracle of being able to pour some cheap liquid in an engine and drive for miles is a considerable achievement. Lead acid batteries weren't very good and were expensive (and still are) and do…

Another reason: Even today the energy density of batteries is SUBSTANTIALLY smaller than that of fossil fuels. [0] We frequently see this graph [1] showing how far batteries have come (they have! and we need to keep going) but not understanding this is part of the issue too. [0] is why we need to keep researching, but [0] is why electric was never going to win in the beginning. It is taking very advanced materials to…

This is an incredibly myopic take masquerading as "first principles". First, you're flat wrong on the differences between gas and batteries, especially for cars. Second, you need an actual reason energy density is the fundamental metric- cars aren't rockets and weight isn't the end-all.

It's impossible to neglect the efficiency here. Car-scale combustion engines have a real world efficiency of around ten percent compared to electric. A gallon of E10 contains 34.9 kWh and randomly picking a Toyota Avalon you'll get a real world 17 mpg with that[1], which works out to 16.4 mpge.

Compare that to real world measurements of a Tesla Model 3, a car that is MUCH more powerful and heavier, but gets 147.4 mpge[2]. The Avalon gets 11% as many miles per unit of energy stored. E10 is equivalent to 1.32 kWh/kg (4.8 MJ/kg).

Not to mention that graph of battery energy density is significantly out of date. Normal li-ion, is at 300 Wh/kg (1.1 MJ/kg) and li-sulfur is commercially available at 500 Wh/kg[3] (1.8 MJ/kg). Even Tesla's batteries are above 250 Wh/kg.

So the bottom line is the difference is ~5x right now. Is that enough to matter? 15.5 gallons of gas (standard fuel tank) weighs 44 kg, or 2.7% the total weight of the Avalon. The full capacity in batteries at 250 Wh/kg would weigh 232.32 kg, or 11.4% more. As much as 2 people + luggage. That's a totally irrelevant increase in weight; luxury or performance cars in a given class can weigh DOUBLE the lightest cars in the same class.

The energy density of batteries is a red herring for all vehicles except cargo/tanker ships and long-distance airplanes. It's completely irrelevant for vehicles. The charging speed is arguably minorly important but by FAR the most important things are the upfront and lifetime cost. That is related to energy density... the energy density of the power plant's fuel, not the battery. And again, it's incredibly naive to assume the weight is the major factor in cost.

[1]: https://www.fueleconomy.gov/mpg/MPG.do?action=mpgData&vehicl...

[2]: https://www.fueleconomy.gov/mpg/MPG.do?action=mpgData&vehicl...

[3]: https://sionpower.com/

Re: We Could Have Had Electric Cars from the Beginning

#185

Post by esotericn »

forkandwait wrote: post #116
LeoPanthera wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 2019 Tesla model S has a range of 370 miles, and I assume that as time passes, more EVs will have a range approaching that figure. That range is considerably longer than the range of my bladder, so once charging increases in speed, this "problem" simply vanishes. We're already on our way there, the first 250kW charger opened this week, and will add 180 miles of range in 15 minutes. In fact, it's better than an IC…

How long does it take to charge? Granted 350 miles is a long trip, but some 9f us drive from Seattle to San Francisco and we can't do that in 350 burst waiting overnight for the car to charge. Personally I think a hybrid that plugs into 120, with a commuting range 50 miles and a back up gas engine will be the sweet spot

You can get back 120 miles of range in 20 minutes. The M3 I believe is even faster.

Range is no longer an issue for modern electric vehicles.

Re: We Could Have Had Electric Cars from the Beginning

#186

Post by gameswithgo »

hwillis wrote: post #184
godelski wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another reason: Even today the energy density of batteries is SUBSTANTIALLY smaller than that of fossil fuels. [0] We frequently see this graph [1] showing how far batteries have come (they have! and we need to keep going) but not understanding this is part of the issue too. [0] is why we need to keep researching, but [0] is why electric was never going to win in the beginning. It is taking very advanced materials to…

This is an incredibly myopic take masquerading as "first principles". First, you're flat wrong on the differences between gas and batteries, especially for cars. Second, you need an actual reason energy density is the fundamental metric- cars aren't rockets and weight isn't the end-all. It's impossible to neglect the efficiency here. Car-scale combustion engines have a real world efficiency of around ten percent comp…

adding mass increase the costs of tires (ongoing) wheels, shocks and other suspension bits that have to be stronger and bigger to support the mass, and it increases wear on roads too. so energy density does affect upfront costs and lifetime costs.

Re: We Could Have Had Electric Cars from the Beginning

#187

Post by sokoloff »

lagadu wrote: post #182
chadcmulligan wrote: post #121

Some of the reasons why petrol won: There was no electric grid to speak of - even now there is concern the grid can't support all EV's, once you were outside the cities (and there weren't many back then) the grid was spotty. The miracle of being able to pour some cheap liquid in an engine and drive for miles is a considerable achievement. Lead acid batteries weren't very good and were expensive (and still are) and do…

> Its always been possible to make a small electric commuter car to drive round at 30mph for short distances but even today there are none like this Hmmm? There are quite a few like that, off the top of my head: - Peugeot Ion - Smart electric - Renault Zoe - Mitsubishi imiev - Fiat 500 had an EV version - Don't remember the name but some citroen too

I think the poster was more thinking of the "neighborhood electric vehicle" type. I don't know all the cars on the list, but the Fiat 500 and smart electric are both normal cars that can hit 65+mph on highways with ease and have ranges over 100km.

Re: We Could Have Had Electric Cars from the Beginning

#188

Post by benj111 »

C1sc0cat wrote: post #152
AstralStorm wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You'd be surprised how much a simple bicycle or scooter cab can accomplish in solving this objection. These are very popular in Asia. The main limit is carrying capacity - maximum power - and you really do not need that much stuff. This works long range too, and could work even longer range should there be proper cargo trains for bikes. But there aren't. The trip time is typically needed to be less than 10h or you ne…

They are popular in Asia because relatively speaking Asia is poor. Just like the flying pigeon bike was massively popular in china back in the 70's, I even saw one being ridden at Cranfield university by a Chinese masters/doctoral student in the late 70's early eighties.

They are popular in the Netherlands also.

The overall point was that bikes can be made to work, Asia is a large scale example, although as you say, not necessarily by choice. The Netherlands, and increasingly other parts of north west Europe are another example.

Re: We Could Have Had Electric Cars from the Beginning

#189

Post by TomMarius »

oblio wrote: post #176
iguy wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Depedns on your definitions of "good" and "mass". UK railways crossed 500 million people a year sometime before 1880, and as many journeys as the population sometime in the 1840s. That's sounds like a lot of metal wheels & rails to me, certainly not space-ship exotic. Although of course things continued to grow from there.

> UK railways The keyword being "UK". We can include the US and a bit of Western Europe plus Japan. For much of the world a train was exotic even far into the 20th century.

Except for China you named most of the world population back then ;-)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_populatio...

Re: We Could Have Had Electric Cars from the Beginning

#190

Post by sokoloff »

hwillis wrote: post #184
godelski wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another reason: Even today the energy density of batteries is SUBSTANTIALLY smaller than that of fossil fuels. [0] We frequently see this graph [1] showing how far batteries have come (they have! and we need to keep going) but not understanding this is part of the issue too. [0] is why we need to keep researching, but [0] is why electric was never going to win in the beginning. It is taking very advanced materials to…

This is an incredibly myopic take masquerading as "first principles". First, you're flat wrong on the differences between gas and batteries, especially for cars. Second, you need an actual reason energy density is the fundamental metric- cars aren't rockets and weight isn't the end-all. It's impossible to neglect the efficiency here. Car-scale combustion engines have a real world efficiency of around ten percent comp…

It seems like you responded only to the gravimetric density part of the chart and not the volumetric part of the chart.

For performance cars, weight is absolutely a factor. (I'm not aware of any performance cars that weigh twice as much as their competition.)

(I do think it is fair to ignore the financial energy density and assume that a century of progress would have addressed substantial fraction of that gap.)

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