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DeLorean considering all-electric reboot

newdelorean.com

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Re: DeLorean considering all-electric reboot

#181

Post by elihu »

mrfusion wrote: post #66
Armisael16 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They could even do a stickshift EV if they wanted to, though most car companies seem to not think it's worth the complexity/maintenance, and I get the impression that electric motors are hard on transmissions. Electric motors have a wider power band, so there’s less need for gear shifting. They could get more efficiency with multiple gears, but it’s be a smaller benefit than in an ICE vehicle. One of the big early…

Doesn’t the taycan have some kind of gears?

I think so.

Re: DeLorean considering all-electric reboot

#182

Post by f430 »

This is gonna suck for Tesla. More and more competitors are jumping at the EV market with their own unique brands.

The idea that Tesla has an economic moat is laughable. GM also thought they were untouchable. Where are they now?

Re: DeLorean considering all-electric reboot

#183

Post by XorNot »

throwaway0a5e wrote: post #127
Animats wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For anything that isn't a car you're gonna want gears for the same reason electric drills have gears. Think of it like low range. Not with modern motor controls. For the last 20 years or so, most new locomotives have used 3-phase AC servo drive motors. It's striking to see one exerting enormous torque to get a train started, yet the Diesel engine generating the power is barely above idle. Also, no wheel spin. All the…

Locomotives have a very different relationship with weight than road going vehicles do. Of course an economy car will have a single speed transmission but vehicles that need to put out peak power at both low speeds and high speed (e.g. the Taycan, and an F250) are going to benefit greatly from a way to optimize for multiple speed ranges.

I doubt it. There's no reason to bother doing the research to add another mechanical component which can wear and fail early, when you can just put a more powerful electric motor in.

That's the thing: the incentive structure has changed. The better use of time and research dollars is going to be just upgrading that motor till it's adequate. There's a logical cap on the maximum road speed you need to accomodate, so the problem is eventually "solved" in practical terms.

Re: DeLorean considering all-electric reboot

#184

Post by bredren »

GuB-42 wrote: post #68
bredren wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My impression was Cybertruck is heavily influenced by the DeLorean design. It would be great to be able to get a DMC-1200 by Tesla.

From what I've seen, there are technical reasons for the design of the Cybertruck. Tesla wanted to use stiff stainless steel for their "tough" vehicle. The use of stainless steel for the SpaceX BFR (aka Starship) may have also been a factor. Problem is that the usual techniques for making nice curved shapes don't work on such a material, so they used folded metal sheet instead, resulting in that "low poly" look. Cons…

I recall the reasons given as you describe. So my impression is not due to statements from Tesla.

That said, the resemblance is unmistakable. The designers could not have been unaware of the dmc-1200.

As for the reputation of the delorean’s quality and commercial failure, I don’t think this would give Elon pause in the slightest. That guy does whatever he wants.

Re: DeLorean considering all-electric reboot

#185

Post by agumonkey »

elihu wrote: post #119
jandrese wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Electric motors don't need a transmission. Adding a stick shift is just adding complexity for no benefit. It's more stuff to maintain and more parts to break and is going to make the car slower due to parasitic losses and inefficiencies. If you're shooting for 200kph+ speeds there might be a time where a simple high/low transmission may be helpful, but that's supercar territory. Interestingly, Formula E cars have a 5…

> Electric motors don't need a transmission. Adding a stick shift is just adding complexity for no benefit. That isn't true. Having low gears gives you more torque with less current at slow speeds. Most EVs take the philosophy of "it's easier to just use a more powerful motor than deal with a transmission". But that doesn't mean that a transmission wouldn't be helpful (especially if you want good performance out of a…

Honest question, isn't a gearless EV very very sufficient for the average use case ? I liked the idea of near no mechanical intermediate. I also read that Porsche kept a 2 gear for higher max speed. I understand the mechanical advantage in some cases but it seems quite fringe now.

Re: DeLorean considering all-electric reboot

#186

Post by numpad0 »

mc32 wrote: post #130
dogma1138 wrote: post #3

TBH I’m surprised Musk hasn’t bought them out yet and “released” a limited edition Model 3 with a DeLorian body kit for like $500,000... if Cyan can release a Volvo P1800 for 500K and you usually need to provide the 50 year old P1800 for them to convert and tune there clearly is a market for these things.

What makes the Deloreans so appealing? From what I’m told, it wasn’t very well made and on top of that it was underpowered. So I get the iconic aspect from movie lore. And I get the founder was very... idiosyncratic —and an underdog and ultimately spiraled into making very unfortunate choices. But other than that, what’s the appeal?

It’s a Giorgetto Giugiaro aesthetics design with Lotus engineering, basically an automotive G4 Cube or NeXT. Except those were superseded by successors from its original manufacturer whereas DeLorean went bankrupt.

Re: DeLorean considering all-electric reboot

#187

Post by fy20 »

bacon_waffle wrote: post #152
detaro wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't be surprised if at some point some manufacturer made a car with optional "stick shift" - with a stick that's just some switches and the effect on driving behavior/torque/... entirely done in software. (Right now electric is hot and new, so nobody is doing much to make an electric car pretend to be something it's not, but that could switch around when electric is the standard)

> nobody is doing much to make an electric car pretend to be something it's not This is actually one of the aspects of the Leaf that most impressed/surprised me - Nissan put a lot of thought in to making it behave like an ICE car with an automatic/CV transmission. For example, when the car is in D mode, sitting on flat ground, if you take your foot off the brake, it'll roll forward at low power. Similarly, taking you…

The Prius has that too. It doesn't need to, but as you say, they wanted it to feel like a regular car.

Re: DeLorean considering all-electric reboot

#188

Post by viraptor »

fy20 wrote: post #187
bacon_waffle wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> nobody is doing much to make an electric car pretend to be something it's not This is actually one of the aspects of the Leaf that most impressed/surprised me - Nissan put a lot of thought in to making it behave like an ICE car with an automatic/CV transmission. For example, when the car is in D mode, sitting on flat ground, if you take your foot off the brake, it'll roll forward at low power. Similarly, taking you…

The Prius has that too. It doesn't need to, but as you say, they wanted it to feel like a regular car.

It makes more sense to me to be honest. If I want to roll just a little bit to get a better position in a parking box, I don't want my foot to leave the break or be super careful about accelerating. I want to just barely move / not-be-stopped, and this implementation works just fine.

Re: DeLorean considering all-electric reboot

#189

Post by captaincrowbar »

acidburnNSA wrote: post #141

In Back to the Future, Marty asks: "Wait a minute Doc, are you telling me that this sucker is nuclear?!" after hearing that it needs plutonium. Doc answers brilliantly: "Hey hey! keep rolling there! no no no no no this sucker is electrical! But I needed a nuclear reaction to generate the 1.21 gigawatts of electricity I need!" Geez that's how nuclear power advocates should describe their "electrical generating station…

For sale: Slightly used DeLorean. Only driven from time to time.

Re: DeLorean considering all-electric reboot

#190

Post by dehrmann »

Armisael16 wrote: post #17
elihu wrote: post #7

> National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) has completed a regulation permitting low volume motor vehicle manufacturers to begin selling replica cars that resemble vehicles produced at least 25 years ago. Congress enacted a DeLorean Motor Company-backed bill backed by the Specialty Equipment Market Association (SEMA) DeLorean Motor Company, and others into law in 2015, which streamlined requirements for…

> They could even do a stickshift EV if they wanted to, though most car companies seem to not think it's worth the complexity/maintenance, and I get the impression that electric motors are hard on transmissions. Electric motors have a wider power band, so there’s less need for gear shifting. They could get more efficiency with multiple gears, but it’s be a smaller benefit than in an ICE vehicle. One of the big early…

Don't diesel-electric locomotives use transformers for gear shifting? I assume if it's even needed for electric cars, they'd use something like that.
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