Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

restofworld.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

251–260 of 271 posts

Re: The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

#251

Post by KozmoNau7 »

zbrozek wrote: post #181
Faaak wrote: post #71

I have a Renault Twizy. It's a tiny 2-seater car (one behind the other). It's so tiny that the battery is only 6kWh and thus you can only go for about 80km before needing a charge (which lasts 2h30). But I love it in fact. In my european city it's the best car to go around because you can park anywhere, it costs nothing to operate, and it's so much fun and quiet. Sadly it didn't take on, but other cars are starting t…

I would love to own one. I mostly use a bicycle, but sometimes I buy groceries and I would prefer not to get wet on rainy days. Time to explore options.

I've gotten a decent system down for shopping and rainy days.

For the shopping, I have basket on the front of my bike, which takes care of most small amounts of groceries. Next I have two pannier bags that fit on the rear luggage rack, and easily attach/detach for carrying around. A large backpack can be added for shorter rides with little discomfort. Beyond that, I do have a bike trailer, but that is only needed for truly large purchases.

For the rain, I've found a common rain poncho to work quite well, by draping the front over the handlebars and sitting on the back part, which keeps it in place.

Obviously this is not the end-all be-all solution, but it does make those shopping trips in the rain a bit easier and a lot less wet.

Re: The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

#252

Post by jgilias »

WorldMaker wrote: post #236
jgilias wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, I was not meaning to digress, I think it's very much on-point. My point all along is that miniature EVs are a solution in need of a problem. I used to live in Oslo for some time, and the ratio between Buddy cars (Norwegian made miniature EVs) and normal-sized EVs was really small. And Buddy manufacturers went out of business. Because it goes something like this: 1. If you live downtown, you walk places, ride a…

Small cars make more sense in other cities. It's a digression because the thread above is more on why they couldn't work in cities where they would be beneficial overall, especially as a transition tool while (re)bootstrapping public transport. While I can mostly only speak to the American experience, obviously China is seeing some niches today, and parts of Europe that aren't quite as well adapted to biking and publ…

Regarding speed limit changes, since September last year all streets in Bilbao have a maximum speed limit of 30km/h (18.5 mph). Now, if you can't legally go faster than 30km/h, then something that can go at 45km/h max starts to make more sense. Yes, that might work!

Re: The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

#253

Post by kleiba »

kiliantics wrote: post #230
kleiba wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Geez, what nonsense. Obviously, smaller cars serve only a specific market segment. There will always be a need for bigger vehicles for various reasons - big families, deliveries, etc. I'd say the red herring is your post.

I grew up in a family of 6 and we never had cars as large as the ones on the market today and we were just fine. These larger cars actually have higher rates of getting into accidents so they're less safe for the people inside the car as well as for the people outside them. And just because there will be a need for bigger vehicles for a small set of use cases doesn't mean the majority of people should be driving in t…

Proof by example. Just because it worked well for your family growing up, that does not mean it does for everyone else. For instance, when I was a kid, there were all kinds of stores in walking distance from our house. All of them are now gone and replaced by much bigger stores on the outskirts of the same town. Also, my grandparents lived close-by, so my parents could drop us off quite easily if necessary. A lot of the things that could be done on foot now require some form of transportation in that area, and PT is too sparse to be a real alternative, especially when you have four children.

If SUVs make up 50% of the market, it is not surprising that they get into accidents more, but of course it's unclear what exactly you mean by "higher rates". But in any event, just because they are involved in more accident does not mean that they're less safe for people inside the car - I would think that the safety features of elaborate cars are an order of magnitude more developed than those of these tiny three-wheelers.

And those 50% of SUVs will not go away over night to be replaced by tiny cars. So that's why the reply to my original post makes little sense: as long as our streets are filled with huge cars, it's without a doubt more dangerous to drive along in a tiny one.

Re: The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

#254

Post by syshum »

Daho0n wrote: post #94
ricardobayes wrote: post #91

How about we start regulating ship engines? There are currently no regulations involving large ships' emissions. But they are extremely dirty, emitting tons of unfiltered sulfur in per voyage. They use different fuel, with much 3.5% sulfur content while road cars' fuel is 0.001%. This all goes in the air. I find it unacceptable that we consumers bend over backwards changing our habits, but the largest emissors don't…

Shipping only count for something like 2% of human caused release of CO2 and the pollution isn't local (cars inside a city is worse for humans). I agree something should be done ASAP but it isn't a low hanging fruit (hard to regulate worldwide shipping) so I doubt it will happen anytime soon.

You are comparing Apples to Oranges, CO2 is only one of the things contributing to Global Warming, CO2 gets the most headlines because that is what most individuals produce and have a realistic chance of curbing

Shift upstream however and other types of pollution becomes larger, I fear the focus is so much on CO2, that we have lost the plot that CO2 is just one part of the pollution problem

Re: The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

#255

Post by baybal2 »

specialist wrote: post #208
baybal2 wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's very hard to make an electric scooter competitive with 150cc which is a mode of transport for probably a billion people. 150cc will be better, and cheaper no matter what you try. I researched the problem extensively when I worked in a number of companies working in the electric scooter space. Cheapest 150cc scooters sell for $500 — that's the price of a battery pack to make a scooter with comparable range to 150…

> I researched the problem extensively... Just curious: Did your efforts identify the sweet spots, given misc costs. Like the "makes sense" price as carbon costs rise and battery cost per amp fall. Factoring weight, distance, speed, recharge times, etc. Why I ask: The most interesting part of the Tesla origin story, to me, is the recognition that laptop battery cost per amp trends would make full-sized EV automobile…

Are you working in this field by any chance?

Re: The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

#256

Post by JoeAltmaier »

WorldMaker wrote: post #215
JoeAltmaier wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yet every yokel with a garage, builds an ICE car for fun. Not even college educated. Some disconnect here?

It's a bit of a sunk "skill" fallacy isn't it? The world is full of "yokels" that have (for reasons of convenience/necessity) already built the skill base to (re)build an ICE vehicle "for fun" by doing mechanic work on previous vehicles. That lots of people have learned such skills does nothing to diminish the complexity of them. If anything it probably further shows the imbalance (class divide) in society's value of…

But you got the point, right?

And the fact that non-yokels also build cars, does not diminish the point.

Re: The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

#257

Post by kiliantics »

kleiba wrote: post #253
kiliantics wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I grew up in a family of 6 and we never had cars as large as the ones on the market today and we were just fine. These larger cars actually have higher rates of getting into accidents so they're less safe for the people inside the car as well as for the people outside them. And just because there will be a need for bigger vehicles for a small set of use cases doesn't mean the majority of people should be driving in t…

Proof by example. Just because it worked well for your family growing up, that does not mean it does for everyone else. For instance, when I was a kid, there were all kinds of stores in walking distance from our house. All of them are now gone and replaced by much bigger stores on the outskirts of the same town. Also, my grandparents lived close-by, so my parents could drop us off quite easily if necessary. A lot of…

Usually rates like this are calculated "per mile traveled" or using some other normalising factor to make them comparable. And yeah, I don't need to go get your citations for you but you are now using "I would think" rather than looking at numbers and I'm telling you that the numbers say they are less safe.

They could go away pretty quickly if there was the political will. We have made large overhauls of societal infrastructure quickly in the past and we could do it again but people are too comfortable to take these matters seriously.

Re: The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

#258

Post by WorldMaker »

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #256
WorldMaker wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a bit of a sunk "skill" fallacy isn't it? The world is full of "yokels" that have (for reasons of convenience/necessity) already built the skill base to (re)build an ICE vehicle "for fun" by doing mechanic work on previous vehicles. That lots of people have learned such skills does nothing to diminish the complexity of them. If anything it probably further shows the imbalance (class divide) in society's value of…

But you got the point, right? And the fact that non-yokels also build cars, does not diminish the point.

No, I think you entirely missed my point: there is no such thing as an "unskilled" yokel out there building a car from "scratch" or rebuilding an engine, no matter how redneck their garage. You seem to have dismissed the complex, hard learned skills of a large group of people, presumably because those are blue collar skills you don't seem to respect.

Re: The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

#259

Post by elicash »

kiliantics wrote: post #229
elicash wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The picture also shows seven kids! Now, that doesn't mean they're his but lots of kids would still be a pretty good reason for a gigantic car.

People used to transport lots of kids in smaller cars. These new larger SUVs are also more likely to get into accidents so it's probably a bad idea to use one if you want to bring your kids around.

All cars used to be much more dangerous than even the worst ones today.

Re: The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

#260

Post by JoeAltmaier »

WorldMaker wrote: post #258
JoeAltmaier wrote: post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But you got the point, right? And the fact that non-yokels also build cars, does not diminish the point.

No, I think you entirely missed my point: there is no such thing as an "unskilled" yokel out there building a car from "scratch" or rebuilding an engine, no matter how redneck their garage. You seem to have dismissed the complex, hard learned skills of a large group of people, presumably because those are blue collar skills you don't seem to respect.

Sorry. I know some personally. I respect them deeply. I know they're yokels. They know it too. We're not all prideful hipsters here in the midwest. We can actually be proud of our heritage and condition. Its something to do with our independent streak.
Post reply on HN