Battery Electric Vehicle News / Enjoying the Transportation Revolution

Hexane

JKenH said:

Already some good advice has been provided by Eric, such as avoid MSAs (the chance of finding a rapid charger available are slim). Stop long before your battery gets down to 20% (ie. don’t expect to be able to use the full range of your EV so you make more stops). Avoid the quickest/most direct route on major roads that Google maps might suggest and instead meander through market towns like Bourne. It’s only going to add around 20 minutes to your journey. 

This would completely change the way I make long distance journeys, and I would have to think long and hard about whether I wanted to make such a substantial change in how I travel. Even if "in theory" the total journey time is only 20 minutes longer for a journey of this nature, for me it's a great deal more stressful to be driving on random A roads through unfamiliar towns (with all manner of traffic lights, zebra crossings, pelican crossings, weirdly laid out roundabouts, different styles of traffic calming measures etc) than it is to be just cruising along the motorway or a proper dual carriageway, knowing that there is going to be a service area well signposted within a set distance.

Or to put it another way, I don't like meandering!

Hexane

Solarchaser said:

I could give you plenty of tips, especially as you seem to have the same issues over the years Ken.😉

His main issue seems to be not being wealthy enough to afford (or want to pay for) a Tesla. That would greatly increase his EV range, and also resolve almost all of his charging problems, at a stroke.

Unfortunately, those of us who aren't filthy rich, generally don't find that situation changing from one year to the next. So yes, Ken will probably carry on having the same issues over several more years.

The very cheapest Tesla it's possible to order right now appears to cost £48,490 and presumably comes with a long waiting time too.

Hexane

1961Nick said:

The only way you’re going to stop discussion on a forum is to lock the thread to everything but the news feed or the member feeding the news.

Calling someone who swapped his Mercedes coupe for a Nissan Leaf a “dissenter” is a ridiculously high bar… certainly too high for me anyway. What some call “negativity” I see as pragmatism & I can’t see why that should be such a problem?

Absolutely agreed.

I find it bizarre for there to be a suggestion that permissible material on the forum should be dictated by "those who've been here from the start" or "those who've been here longest". Exactly how many years' forum membership is required to have a say? More than ten years? More than fifteen?

I think those who are so desperate to suppress any kind of dissent would be better served by setting up their own forum. They could then have their own rules, as narrowly focused as they felt necessary to suppress dissent.

Grumpy_chap

Hexane said:

The very cheapest Tesla it's possible to order right now appears to cost £48,490 and presumably comes with a long waiting time too.

Gee whizz

You seem to be correct which is quite shocking.
Is this price now set in or will it correct when supply capacity normalises?

Martyn1981

Possibly some good progress on the solid state battery side with much higher energy density than the current figures of around 250Wh/kg (just a generalised figure).

SVolt Energy Readies Solid-State Battery With 400 Wh/Kg Energy Density For Production

Svolt Energy, a division of China’s Great Wall Motors, has been hard at work creating true solid-state batteries for several years now. In its rush to get there, it may (or may not) have enticed some employees of CATL to join its research department. In any event, CATL sued Svolt and that suit has now been settled — amicably, we presume.

This week, CnEVPost is reporting that Svolt Energy is the first company to create prototype 20 Ah solid-state sulfide battery cells with an energy density of 350 to 400 Wh/kg. Those prototype cells have successfully passed nail puncture and thermal runaway tests at temperatures of up to 200° C. Once those cells are commercially available, they could make it possible for electric vehicles to drive 1,000 kilometers or more on a single charge, according to the company.

Martyn1981

80t BEV logging truck being assessed. It does 6x 30km round trips per day, so a known range requirement then. 

European Logging & Forest Management Company Unveils Electric Timber Truck

SCA, a manager of forestry operations in 2.6 million hectares of forest land in northern Sweden and 60,000 hectares in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, recently unveiled a new logging truck for its wood business.

This is the world’s first electric timber truck, and has a capacity of 80 tonnes. It was designed in a collaborative project between Scania and SCA as part of SCA’s objective to create a fossil-free value chain. the vehicle will be used to transport wood from Scania’s timber terminal in Gimonäs to the paper mill in Obbola outside Ume.

“The 80-tonne battery-powered timber truck shows that even really heavy transport can be electrified. The partnership with SCA is a early show of what is possible, is a clear signal that it is possible to electrify even heavy transport. A change of pace is needed to make Sweden fossil-free in time and meet the goal of the Paris Agreement,” says Fredrik Allard, Head of E-mobility at Scania.

Solarchaser

Hexane said:

Solarchaser said:

I could give you plenty of tips, especially as you seem to have the same issues over the years Ken.😉

His main issue seems to be not being wealthy enough to afford (or want to pay for) a Tesla. That would greatly increase his EV range, and also resolve almost all of his charging problems, at a stroke.

Unfortunately, those of us who aren't filthy rich, generally don't find that situation changing from one year to the next. So yes, Ken will probably carry on having the same issues over several more years.

The very cheapest Tesla it's possible to order right now appears to cost £48,490 and presumably comes with a long waiting time too.

Ooh that bites deep.
And totally relevant too as I NOW have a Tesla, but I also have a 24kwh Leaf which I took all over England including Kens neck of the woods with its (at best) 80 mile range 3 years ago when the charger network was much less mature than it is now.

So no, not having a Tesla is definitely not the issue.

Nice try though 👍

Solarchaser

Grumpy_chap said:

Hexane said:

The very cheapest Tesla it's possible to order right now appears to cost £48,490 and presumably comes with a long waiting time too.

Gee whizz

You seem to be correct which is quite shocking.
Is this price now set in or will it correct when supply capacity normalises?

A cynical person would suggest that Billionaire Musk is trying to make even more money in a supply constrained market.

It will correct when there is proper competition so he has to pull the prices down

shinytop

Solarchaser said:

Hexane said:

Solarchaser said:

I could give you plenty of tips, especially as you seem to have the same issues over the years Ken.😉

His main issue seems to be not being wealthy enough to afford (or want to pay for) a Tesla. That would greatly increase his EV range, and also resolve almost all of his charging problems, at a stroke.

Unfortunately, those of us who aren't filthy rich, generally don't find that situation changing from one year to the next. So yes, Ken will probably carry on having the same issues over several more years.

The very cheapest Tesla it's possible to order right now appears to cost £48,490 and presumably comes with a long waiting time too.

Ooh that bites deep.
And totally relevant too as I NOW have a Tesla, but I also have a 24kwh Leaf which I took all over England including Kens neck of the woods with its (at best) 80 mile range 3 years ago when the charger network was much less mature than it is now.

So no, not having a Tesla is definitely not the issue.

Nice try though 👍

At the risk of contributing to a discussion, an 80 mile range EV is a totally impractical means to travel 'all over England'. But I think you know that.  I think what you're saying is anyone who can't afford the thick end of £50k is pretty much stuffed if they want convenient long distance personal transport at the moment.  I agree; they are.      

Solarchaser

Erm, no.
I think if you read that from my reply, you are needing a lie down.

There are now quite a few battery cars that will do 200 miles on a charge, no need to give Musk 50k