forddeliveryboy Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 If I couldn't source any cheap waste vegoil and could lay my hands on an i3 for fifteen hundred, I might consider saving up to use it as a daily driver, saving £££ on fuel, which I would then put to interesting old motors. But a Leaf doesn't really excite - how are today's yoof going to be interested in motor cars with Leaves and Zoes? A Chinese farmer has managed to convince Sky News journos that he's built a car powered by wind energy - Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dollywobbler Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 The Leaf is far more exciting than you think. Well, I thought so anyway. No doubt future yoof will be modifying their e-Up!!!!s and e-Golfs by slamming them and fitting motors from Teslas so they can out perform an electric Bugatti Veyron, honest. Partridge 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Angrydicky Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 No. Sigmund Fraud 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
forddeliveryboy Posted October 22, 2014 Author Share Posted October 22, 2014 Struggling to work out why the NL's more exciting than I think... People looking to have cheap fun on wheels are already doing things like this instead of fiddling with their Fiesta - Lacquer Peel 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Micrashed Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 The Leaf is far more exciting than you think. Well, I thought so anyway. No doubt future yoof will be modifying their e-Up!!!!s and e-Golfs by slamming them and fitting motors from Teslas so they can out perform an electric Bugatti Veyron, honest.Battery technology has not yet advanced to a point where I find electric cars exciting for anything other than "popping up town and back". Once they get to a reasonable range (ie about 400 miles between charges and recharges within half an hour) for a mid sized car then I'll be "second car excited" but I cant see battery technology ever being at a stage where say they could rival the range and pulling power of the engine and diesel tank in the C8. oman5 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dollywobbler Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 Well, that's a bit short sighted an opinion given that Teslas can already crack 300 miles on a charge. My XM can managed 800 miles on a 'charge,' so there's some way to go, but clearly battery tech is starting to improve drastically. High fuel prices mean it is actually worth investing in alternatives. As for pulling power, a Leaf can accelerate to 60mph in a similar time to my XM turbo diesel - and do it far more gracefully. I know of a taxi company that has a Leaf with 71,000 miles on it, and it still has healthy battery life too. Sadly, in my experience, the Leaf's range of 60-80 miles in rural Welsh territory is still prohibitive (that test was conducted in winter too, so the batteries had plenty of hammer). I'm still very tempted to take a punt on one. If I had £10,000 kicking around and lived in a town, there's a fair chance I would. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
forddeliveryboy Posted October 22, 2014 Author Share Posted October 22, 2014 Still left wondering why a Leaf is exciting, other than playing charge roulette. londonm 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PiperCub Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 It's not just the battery technology, as DW says, it's progressing well and e-cars will get more popular but the issue at present is that the battery pack has a finite life, I recall reading the Leaf's only last about 8 years before needing replacement at a huge (seriously big) cost. While this won't worry the first owner who'll probably only keep it 2-4 years, what will it be worth in 6-7 years with that bill looming, it'll depreciate like a stone. Plus don't one of the makers only lease the battery pack to the owner/car? (Or have I made that up?). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
doobietoo Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 Being old enough to remember milk floats i automatically have no interest in electric cars.... eddyramrod 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Micrashed Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 Well, that's a bit short sighted an opinion given that Teslas can already crack 300 miles on a chargeI dont think so. Ive had this conversation with a NW sales lead for the Nissan Leaf ( because he goes out with me and a group of friends about once a quarter). The Tesla costs in its cheapest form £50K rising to £68K, none of the Tesla are rated for towing. Yes they have the range, yes if you can invest a further £9K in a 120Kw super charger you can recharge it in 30 minutes ( the standard charger costs £5K and will recharge it in 11 hours) Tebbut drives a leaf, its great for town use and he is even more into micro generation and eco gubbins than I am (just had his own house built with air source heat pumps, solar thermal and solar PV) he has a recharge point at work and one at home but he has to use the pool car ( a Murano) if he is going any further afield owing to the limited range. Batteries are hired from Nissan as well ( though of course he doesnt pay for them as its a company car). We had a big discussion only last month about the amount of battery tech needed to haul a people carrier and a caravan on a journey of say 400 miles. Eventually we had batteries in both the MPV and the caravan and using solar PV fitted to the roof of the caravan working via voltage optimisers trying to power the outfit. Teb knows a a lot more about this than me in terms of calculations of power, load, losses and so on and even he said that whilst it was possible the cost would at this point be prohibitive. Nissan also do an e version of the NV200 which was shown at the caravan show last week in campervan format - even that has a range only 106 miles and a top speed of 76mph - the range is reduced further with the load carried. So I stand by what I said, current battery technology will not produce a vehicle which could comfortably replace the family lugabout. And even if you want to utilise the battery tech used in a Tesla for range on a family sized saloon (forget towing ability for now) it is way way more than you would pay for a similar sized fossil fuel car at this time. That isnt to say that it wont improve in the future. I hope it does because I really do dig the micro generation thing and to be able to fuel up my car using power I have generated would be such a buzz, but for now thats not going to happen. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spike60 Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 It still puzzles me how electric cars are touted as zero emissions when in fact they are largely powered by coal. A very large percentage of UK power stations are still coal fired. But to answer the title, no I don't. My lady has a Toyota Yaris hybrid and even she refers to it as an appliance. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Des Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 VW are on the verge of cracking the leccy car, copper and zinc electrodes stuffed into a pineapple and Himmlers your uncle, might even see a return of greengrocers to the high streets. theorganist, Sigmund Fraud, Micrashed and 2 others 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Felly Magic Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 The electric car on batteries is a blind alley, a technological cul de sac. The only real sensible option for the future is the hydrogen fuel cell powered car, but currently the costs are prohibitive to mass produce the cars, and the fuel infrastructure. Once they crack those, well it will be the death knell for both petrol and diesel engines Talbotman, Asimo, oman5 and 2 others 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dollywobbler Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 It still puzzles me how electric cars are touted as zero emissions when in fact they are largely powered by coal. A very large percentage of UK power stations are still coal fired. But to answer the title, no I don't. My lady has a Toyota Yaris hybrid and even she refers to it as an appliance. Petrol is hardly zero emissions either. Not only do you have to dig it out of the ground, you have to transport it, refine it, transport it some more etc etc a lot of which uses electricity. Tailpipe emissions are zero with an electric car and at least some of the power comes from renewables. Also, 80% of the energy you put into an electric car turns into motion. The figure is about 20-25% for a petrol car. FDB - have you driven a Leaf? If you have, you might see where I'm coming from. I really didn't expect to find it as interesting as I did. Comfortable too. I didn't know the Japanese could actually deliver comfort. I'm fascinated to see where cars go next. Electric power really is fun. Hydrogen makes good bombs so maybe that's a blind alley or maybe it's sheer genius. Could we end up with trolley cars picking electricity up as they drive down the road? Will some leap in battery tech render internal combustion engines obsolete? If it does, I'm glad a 2CV is pretty easy to convert. I suspect the XM is less so... As for towing - a few decades ago, electric motors were struggling to move a family sized car. Now they can move one very quickly indeed. Towing will be a challenge for sure, but I'm sure they'll come up with something. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tooSavvy Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 .... so, we are saying this is the 7yold Leaf owners 'dream' fridgemagnet *sarcastic reference to 'minor' niggles [possibly] with this barge..... TS Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PiperCub Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 It still puzzles me how electric cars are touted as zero emissions when in fact they are largely powered by coal. A very large percentage of UK power stations are still coal fired. But to answer the title, no I don't. My lady has a Toyota Yaris hybrid and even she refers to it as an appliance. Certainly for now and the immed. future, I agree, hybrids are the way to go. Charging e-cars - again, agreed, it's just a matter of moving the same pollution to another location I guess. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spike60 Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 Petrol is hardly zero emissions either. Not only do you have to dig it out of the ground, you have to transport it, refine it, transport it some more etc etc a lot of which uses electricity. Tailpipe emissions are zero with an electric car and at least some of the power comes from renewables. Also, 80% of the energy you put into an electric car turns into motion. The figure is about 20-25% for a petrol car. My point was the promotion of electric cars as zero emission when they are likely fossil fuel powered. I don't think anyone has sold their piston engined cars as such, Nissan certainly do the Leaf despite having no control where the energy actually comes from. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DVee8 Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 There will be a new Leaf around 2016 with extended range http://www.autoexpress.co.uk/nissan/leaf/88344/nissan-leaf-to-get-sharp-new-look-and-range-boost I too have driven a Leaf and found it a comfy,quick,refined and good to drive.I have also driven a Peugeot iOn,this was awful to drive,slow with a upright driving position. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cort16 Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 I've a feeling the leaf is already a generation behind the teslas and bmw's. You can get an e nv200 van now that has leaf running gear, which I can see being quite successful. It'll also be interesting to see what effect elon musk open sourcing the tesla patents will have. The idea behind the electric car is to centralise the power source so at some point in time when they get clean power from nuclear fusion or we capture some electric space monkeys we'll be able to run the transport network from this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tayne Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 Hydrogen makes good bombs so maybe that's a blind alley or maybe it's sheer genius. . And nobody has ever made a petrol bomb... Could we end up with trolley cars picking electricity up as they drive down the road? Contactless charging is used in some factories and warehouses for industrial robots and I believe there is a road equipped with it in New York as a trial. brickwall 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pillock Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 I saw a plan to inductively charge some London buses not long ago. Given it takes three hours to put 3Ah at 5v in my phone inductively, I wonder how much of a boost they get... I don't think electric cars will ever be a 100% solution to petrol, but it will suit a lot of people who do less than 50 miles a day and park on their driveway for 12 hours. It won't suit me, I average 2500 miles a month and park on the road.... Some days I can go 500 miles or more at short notice. For me, perhaps there will be hydrogen or something. And I know that you still currently charge your electric car from mostly fossil sources, but the idea is to centralise energy creation so it can be changed wholesale to solar, wind, wave, whatever. You don't need to worry about it at that point, you just need to plug in. forddeliveryboy 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Micrashed Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 Could we end up with trolley cars picking electricity up as they drive down the road? Ive seen the future, and its the past... Something we touched upon in our discussion. Teb seems to think that electricity is the way forward but by thinking outside the current box of self contained units carrying all of their own power. He may have mentioned the US trial, I cant remember - I'll message him on Tw@@ter and see if he can provide some more thoughts. Im rather hoping that cell technology will provide some of the answer, either in better storage capacity or perhaps even a giant leap forward in chemical electrical generation providing a bigger output. Im not hugely convinced about hydrogen fuel cell technology, not because I fear them going bang, but because the amount of power you have to put in in order to generate hydrogen from water is phenomenal still at this time and its not cost effective. rml2345 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tayne Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 http://wheels.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/05/30/in-italy-electric-buses-wirelessly-pick-up-their-power/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=0 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danthecapriman Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 I dont think plug in electrics/battery jobbies will be a long term solution to fossil fuels. In the short term the answer is efficient hybrids and I would bet good money that over the next decade they will become massively more popular. Neither will suit my needs or wants though, I enjoy the sound and grunt of V8's and the smell of burning petrol (and oil!) The other issue with plug ins though is the fact that there arent enough power stations in this country and more will be closing down due to yet more EU bullshit! As we are now there is just about enough capacity, if everyone went out and replaced their fossil fuel vehicles with a plug in the country would grind to a halt. To do it we need more power generation (but nobody wants to pay for it) and the rest of the power distribution grid is largely a 1960's relic! The grid is very old, out of date and not in the best condition as it is. Increased demand on this sort of scale will overload it and finish it off! Before the government start forcing us into these hideous electric things they need to update and/or replace the countrys power network, and this will cost an absolute fortune and take many years to do. I work on the power distribution system for a living btw! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
londonm Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 Being old enough to remember milk floats i automatically have no interest in electric cars....I'd rather have a milk float than a leaf. scruff, Angrydicky and mercrocker 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Timewaster Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 Could batteries be a universal fit and changeable in minutes so they could be swapped at roadside stations? catsinthewelder, Twiggy and oman5 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
twosmoke300 Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 Tontops raises a great point about changeable batteries. On the subject of batteries , what about the environmental cost of mining , processing and transporting the materials that go into them forddeliveryboy and Angrydicky 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Micrashed Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 The grid is very old, out of date and not in the best condition as it is. Increased demand on this sort of scale will overload it and finish it off! Before the government start forcing us into these hideous electric things they need to update and/or replace the countrys power network, and this will cost an absolute fortune and take many years to do.GR9 for job generation then, a structured renewal of the DN. I love old switchgear, but look at places like Peel substation and its largely unchanged from when it was built. How are you finding the increase in irregular micro gen feed in on the DN? I would have thought that would cause problems with its relative unpredictability and its off peak loading of the grid. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stroller133 Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 not because I fear them going bang, but because the amount of power you have to put in in order to generate hydrogen from water is phenomenal still at this time and its not cost effective.I was going to mention this. There is no such thing in my opinion as "free" energy. I don't have any scientific theory but a bit of me is even sceptical that wind power could in some way be harmful in ways we have not yet considered (I don't meaning blighting the landscape). Energy(and/or Mass) is finite in a system, so any energy we utilise is causing a change to the system - the system in this case being planet earth. forddeliveryboy 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danthecapriman Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 GR9 for job generation then, a structured renewal of the DN. I love old switchgear, but look at places like Peel substation and its largely unchanged from when it was built. How are you finding the increase in irregular micro gen feed in on the DN? I would have thought that would cause problems with its relative unpredictability and its off peak loading of the grid. It can be a real pain in the arse! Theres more and more of them popping up aswell, lots of them are solar farms built on old fields and it can be a real nuissence, especially when arranging and carrying out power shutdowns for maintenance etc. It can make switching the network around hard work. I dont think the actual switchgear itself will necessarily 'need' to be changed, its load sensetive things that will like transformers and cables. Theres certain areas now where its becoming increasingly difficult to backfeed a substation from another thats only a short distance away because of high loads and a low voltage network that is in such a dire state.I would say our area is still running switchgear (and almost everything else for that matter!) from the 1950's, 60's and 70's, probably around the 75 - 80% of it is from this period! We still operate it and continue maintaining it indefinatly. Long & Crawford extensable switchgear (Type J + ETV1/2/3) are still the most common 11kv switchgear we have. Even Primary substations (33KV) are still using predominantly ancient equiptment from manufacturers that are long gone now! It would be a great thing to do, updating and replacing the DN, loads of long term jobs would be created from it too, not just in doing the actual work but in making the new equiptment etc too. And it does need to be done, the problem is that nobody wants to pay for it. Its cheaper to leave things until they have to be fixed or replaced apparently! And now after all that jargon and bollocks we probably look like right nerds! Micrashed and mat_the_cat 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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