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Ford to spend $1.3B to transform Canada factory into EV manufacturing hub

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Re: Ford to spend $1.3B to transform Canada factory into EV manufacturing hub

#71

Post by waiseristy »

itsoktocry wrote: post #58
waiseristy wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only people driving F-150s around job sites are management with a stipend. Half ton trucks are a lot less capable then most people think, and are primarily targeted to the former of the two groups you mention

> Half ton trucks are a lot less capable then most people think What do you think people are doing on job sites that a half-ton can't handle?

Hauling equipment. Hauling water. Hauling any sort of aggregate. The payload of an f150 is ~2500 lbs. you’ll exceed that with four 230lb iron workers and a toolbox or two in the back.

Re: Ford to spend $1.3B to transform Canada factory into EV manufacturing hub

#72

Post by _hypx »

wmeredith wrote: post #42
sbaiddn wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its a regulatory bet, not an engineering one. The West is making a civilizational bet on EVs so it's not Ford that loses the bet, its the entire West. From a technical POV, I disagree with the bet. I think hybridization of ICE while transitioning to CNG+1%NH3 fuel (to have very high compression engines) makes a lot more sense. Afterall, if you can make an ICE match an electrical power plant's carbon emissions, electr…

Even if the carbon emissions match, the drivetrain in an ICE vehicle contains 2,000+ moving parts typically, whereas the drivetrain in an EV contains around 20. The benefits of TVs range beyond direct carbon emissions from the power unit.

I hope people realize that fuel cell cars are also EVs, and have only a handful more moving parts to deal with. People have mislead themselves into thinking the BEV is synonymous with all EVs. This type of thinking could easily lead people into making serious mistakes.

Re: Ford to spend $1.3B to transform Canada factory into EV manufacturing hub

#73

Post by sbaiddn »

wmeredith wrote: post #42
sbaiddn wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its a regulatory bet, not an engineering one. The West is making a civilizational bet on EVs so it's not Ford that loses the bet, its the entire West. From a technical POV, I disagree with the bet. I think hybridization of ICE while transitioning to CNG+1%NH3 fuel (to have very high compression engines) makes a lot more sense. Afterall, if you can make an ICE match an electrical power plant's carbon emissions, electr…

Even if the carbon emissions match, the drivetrain in an ICE vehicle contains 2,000+ moving parts typically, whereas the drivetrain in an EV contains around 20. The benefits of TVs range beyond direct carbon emissions from the power unit.

Look, what follows is my opinion and why Im against EVs for the short to mid term future. Im not a domain expert, but I am a physicist and an engineer whose worked in energy and for the DOE on sustainable energy sources. Again, Im not a car engineer.

Carbon emissions is why we're transitioning. Its why EVs are made mandatory. Its the premise that the EV has to fulfill. Thousands of little ICE parts have little consequence since cars, typically, die for every other reason except engine failure. This has been the case since widespread adoption of automatic transmissions and fuel injection.

The math of EVs is pretty daunting too. Take an EV and ignore its greater sin of creation (ie resources to make one vs an ICE car). Now pretend it runs on pixie dust (ie actually zero emissions).

Now compare that to taking that EV's (electrically) massive battery and, instead hybridizing N number of vehicles. Ive run the numbers, and the EV has (much) greater CO2 emissions.

If you use regulatory power to funnel those batteries to preferentially hybridize contractors' vans and trucks (ie the F-250 and 350, not the wanna be cowboys' 150) the comparison sucks even more.

Note that this analysis uses efficiency numbers from current widespread ICE engines, not rather niche (for the West) CNG cars that can run at very high compression ratios (methane has an octane rating of about 120) and have much higher energy content per gram of CO2.

And you know what the funniest part of all of this is? We could slash transportation CO2 overnight by lowering and imposing lower speed limits.

But again, this is what Ive come to believe with car manufacturer and EPA data in excel. YMMV

Re: Ford to spend $1.3B to transform Canada factory into EV manufacturing hub

#74

Post by giobox »

_hypx wrote: post #72
wmeredith wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if the carbon emissions match, the drivetrain in an ICE vehicle contains 2,000+ moving parts typically, whereas the drivetrain in an EV contains around 20. The benefits of TVs range beyond direct carbon emissions from the power unit.

I hope people realize that fuel cell cars are also EVs, and have only a handful more moving parts to deal with. People have mislead themselves into thinking the BEV is synonymous with all EVs. This type of thinking could easily lead people into making serious mistakes.

The history of fuel cell cars doesn't exactly paint a happy picture...

I think its critically important we have managed to profitably make EVs at scale - no one has ever turned a profit on fuel cell cars, and indeed often sold them at enormous losses. See any of the ones Toyota shipped - the Mirai is sold at an incredible loss.

This isn't to say these can't be fixed, but the best fuel cell cars simply haven't been as good as the best EVs to date accross a number of objective/subjective measures.

Re: Ford to spend $1.3B to transform Canada factory into EV manufacturing hub

#75

Post by Teever »

wmeredith wrote: post #42
sbaiddn wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its a regulatory bet, not an engineering one. The West is making a civilizational bet on EVs so it's not Ford that loses the bet, its the entire West. From a technical POV, I disagree with the bet. I think hybridization of ICE while transitioning to CNG+1%NH3 fuel (to have very high compression engines) makes a lot more sense. Afterall, if you can make an ICE match an electrical power plant's carbon emissions, electr…

Even if the carbon emissions match, the drivetrain in an ICE vehicle contains 2,000+ moving parts typically, whereas the drivetrain in an EV contains around 20. The benefits of TVs range beyond direct carbon emissions from the power unit.

Not only that but all the innovations that we see in batteries can trickle down to all kinds of consumer devices.

Re: Ford to spend $1.3B to transform Canada factory into EV manufacturing hub

#76

Post by shagie »

tzs wrote: post #67
sbaiddn wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its a regulatory bet, not an engineering one. The West is making a civilizational bet on EVs so it's not Ford that loses the bet, its the entire West. From a technical POV, I disagree with the bet. I think hybridization of ICE while transitioning to CNG+1%NH3 fuel (to have very high compression engines) makes a lot more sense. Afterall, if you can make an ICE match an electrical power plant's carbon emissions, electr…

> Afterall, if you can make an ICE match an electrical power plant's carbon emissions, electric cars make very little sense in the short to mid term (until the marginal power is guaranteed to be sustainable) Doesn't the need for a car engine to be light enough and small enough to work in the car mean that power plants will almost always be able to be cleaner?

You can make the car engine more efficient by making it be a small generator that is working at optimal RPMs rather than the variable RPMs driving the car itself.

Consider some of the various hybrid approaches.

Honda has the IMA. The insight is an ICE car with an "underpowered" gas motor that has an electric motor to assist it. If it runs out of gas, it's out of gas and doesn't move.

Toyota's Prius is an electric car with a gas motor that switches on when optimal. If you run out of gas in the Prius, the car will go for some further distance until the battery goes dead.

The Chevy volt is an electric car with a gas generator (and a trick that can shunt some power from the gas generator to driving the car). https://www.cnet.com/roadshow/news/chevy-volts-engine-more-t...

> When the battery is depleted, the range extender engine kicks in to generate electricity for the motor, as GM noted in its press materials. But when the battery is depleted and the car is running at 70 mph or above, the planetary gearset transmits additional motive force directly from the engine to the wheels.

... however, this also should take into account the efficiency of the power grid too.

https://www.epa.gov/egrid/power-profiler#/

A hybrid car in part of the grid that is heavily coal can be efficient in terms of CO2 than an electric car because it is burning gas more cleanly than the grid is burning coal.

Re: Ford to spend $1.3B to transform Canada factory into EV manufacturing hub

#77

Post by Scoundreller »

giobox wrote: post #50
wmeredith wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if the carbon emissions match, the drivetrain in an ICE vehicle contains 2,000+ moving parts typically, whereas the drivetrain in an EV contains around 20. The benefits of TVs range beyond direct carbon emissions from the power unit.

This is the primary reason I wouldn't go back to combustion. The running costs of electric vehicles are absurdly low at times. You can put 50k-100k miles on most EVs on sale today having only bought cabin air filters, tires and wiper blades in addition to the cost of the electricity - thats largely it!

> You can put 50k-100k miles

I get that on my ICE brakes too. My secret? Engine braking and taking my foot off the gas when the light ahead is red: something nobody seems to do sadly.

Are EV suspensions over-built enough to account for the extra weight they’re carrying? Imo that’s the big expense once vehicles start showing their age. Extremely dependent on road conditions though… not great in the salt belt.

Re: Ford to spend $1.3B to transform Canada factory into EV manufacturing hub

#78

Post by _hypx »

giobox wrote: post #74
_hypx wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope people realize that fuel cell cars are also EVs, and have only a handful more moving parts to deal with. People have mislead themselves into thinking the BEV is synonymous with all EVs. This type of thinking could easily lead people into making serious mistakes.

The history of fuel cell cars doesn't exactly paint a happy picture... I think its critically important we have managed to profitably make EVs at scale - no one has ever turned a profit on fuel cell cars, and indeed often sold them at enormous losses. See any of the ones Toyota shipped - the Mirai is sold at an incredible loss. This isn't to say these can't be fixed, but the best fuel cell cars simply haven't been as…

You do realize that BEVs predate internal combustion cars? You could've said the same thing about all EVs just a few years ago.

The problem with BEVs is that they have gigantic resource requirements. It is very much replacing one problematic resource base with another. Fuel cell cars lack this problem. It is not inconceivable that this fundamental problem will force our hand in the future.

Also, like I said, a fuel cell car is an EV. Your story about the Mirai losing money is not different than accusing Tesla of doing the same. Arguably even more absurd, since Mirai should cost less to make.

Re: Ford to spend $1.3B to transform Canada factory into EV manufacturing hub

#79

Post by ch4s3 »

justrealist wrote: post #51
ch4s3 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Money is fungible and government handouts are government handouts. Moreover, many of those subsidies are in the form of bonds, low interest loans, and so on not just tax credits.

If you think even about the etymology of "hand-out", it is not in fact the government handing out money — the company is handing less money to the government. When the federal government gives a tax credit for installing residential solar panels, it is not a "consumer bailout" or "welfare". We have a perfectly good term for this, which is "tax credit", because that is what it is.

Again they're receiving more than just tax credits and rebates. They're also receiving loans, a recent $101 million Critical Industry Program grant, tariff protections, and on and on.

However, if you just want to talk taxes we can. A tax exemption or rebate is an asset given to you by the state. It operates not unlike loan forgiveness. You owed something and now they(the state) are waiving that liability.

> When the federal government gives a tax credit for installing residential solar panels

This is absolutely a handout to the solar industry.

A tax credit is still a handout, and double so when they're given to favored industries and companies.

Re: Ford to spend $1.3B to transform Canada factory into EV manufacturing hub

#80

Post by Scoundreller »

giobox wrote: post #61
brailsafe wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you do after? Are you talking used or new?

From new, you will get to 100k miles with the above on majority of decent EVs on sale. Beyond 100k, there isn't much, but you will likely need to do things like brake disc replacement or some shock work, but the costs are still minimal vs ICE car maintenance at this stage in an ICE car's lifecycle. If you do pads and discs at 100k on an EV, you will generally be good to 200k again. The shock work is no different to w…

> ICE car maintenance at this stage in an ICE car's lifecycle.

What become the big ICE maintenance issues at this point? I know spark plugs can be a royal pain on some vehicles but at least iridium plugs last a very long time.

(I’ll admit, I’m starting to deal with more seal leaks at 15 years. Need to track it down to avoid adding ~2L oil between my 10k mile oil change. And I’ve been neglecting trans/diff flushes)

My biggest groan over the next few years will be suspension parts and not just the struts. All them “sealed” “forever” control arms and such without grease points, ugh.

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