All Electric Cars

[Donkmeister]

we had thermodynamics lecturers who lauged at the notion that one day, internal combustion engines would be so efficient that we'd struggle to get enough waste heat out of them to work the heater!

At school in the early 90s I had a Physics textbook that confidently explained that if a petrol engine was more than 25% efficient then it would melt the cylinder block...

Re. the laptop batteries, I am constantly doing all the things you shouldn't do with a laptop and I have not noticed any degradation of performance in the 2-3 years between laptop replacements. I'm talking partial recharges, running it dead, leaving it on the docking station for a week etc. 5 days a week. I've got a 4-year-old Nokia phone that I took out of a drawer to use at a party and found that the lithium battery was still perky.

I think that lithium batteries are as much about luck-of-the-draw as the actual chemistry.

I still want an electric car, but the current crop only make financial sense for company-car users or those who live outside the congestion zone but need to drive in central London (my view, not necessarily correct ). For my 10,000 miles a year, all outside the congestion zone and mostly on motorways then it would only make sense if I could lease one for the savings I would make on petrol, but I doubt they would be leasing a £20-£30K car for ~£100 a month...

 

[birkee]

Sounds Like A Good Idea, but they are not pollution free. The electricity has to be generated somehow and 50% of it is dirty coal.
But more to the point of my posting :-
How do electric cars provide Cabin Heating during the Winter when it a definite must.
Presumably they don't and the poor driver freezes ? Either that or the driver uses electric heating and a driving distance of about two miles!!!!!
Or have I missed something here.

I think you will find, that many of them may use a paraffin fired heater like many commercial vehicles.
No. not a wick and flame! parrafin is fired into a combustion chamber, and the heat is removed via a heat exchanger.
Sounds like a mini jet engine when its running. Bout the same volume as a small electric motor.

 

[birkee]

Having worked on the development of them for MANY years, including vehicles produced on the Bedford and Freight Rover production lines, I can say that when it comes to lead acid batteries, 98% of people are unable to manage them reliably.
Lead / Acid batteries are NOT VIABLE......end of conversation.

When it comes to other forms of battery, I think the lack of "battery empathy" will cause their own problems.
How many of you know about "memory effect" in batteries? How many of you know, that to get the best out of some rechargeable batteries, it's best to discharge them before recharging them?

Unless you take some sort of course about the care of batteries, electric vehicle will never appear on MY agenda. Eve if 'green', they'll cost you an arm and a leg.

p.s. How many of you know, that with extra battery weight, some of them HATE going round corners. Gonna leave em at home when it's icy?

 

[Interrupteur]

If you have a battery powered car which is charged at home then a heater could be run off of the incoming mains supply to pre-heat the car at a higher power level than during battery operation. It could even be set to never let the car get below freezing.