ESB seeks 24 ecar Ambassadors to drive an ecar for 4 months

AlbacoreA said:
I don't know why small diesel hybrid aren't more popular.
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I find this puzzling too.

Webasto (for one) make small diesel engines used as pre-heaters and generators in expensive diesel cars. They, or some other form of pre-heating or parking heater are used on cars in Scandanavia where public plug-in points are common-place for decades.
 
Leo said:
... there's still a way to go.
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No issue with any of the points you make Leo.

Just for me, a dyed-in-the-wool ICE-ist, I'm amazed at the strides ecars have made in just a single generation outside the R&D labs.

My head is still back in the days when our milk was delivered by the Merville Dairies man in his "electric" milk-float, like the one featured in the famous Father Ted episode.

I'd love a chance to get behind the wheel of an ESB ecar for a few months to help me appreciate them. Who knows, I might even become an ecar evangelist and help move people away from the devil's fuel that courses (sluggishly) through my veins.
 
Leo said:
Speaking of which...
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Thanks, I'd missed the news item

Looking through EV (electric vehicle) user forums in the US and the UK, the greatest concentration of perceived problems seems to be on battery life and its variability.

Hills, cross-winds, time-of-day, temperature, accessories (audio, phone-chargers, video for back-seat passengers) and rain are the principal additional drains on battery life between charges. These demands are in addition to supplying motive power to the EV and can, reportedly, catch even the most careful driver out.

In places like sunny California, the solution can be as simple as adding a solar panel to the roof to ensure the permanently engaged A/C doesn't gobble up all the available charge. That solution probably isn't ideal in an Irish "summer".

A user-generated problem contributing to short battery life is the apparently irresistible challenge of winning the "traffic-lights Grand Prix". Like diesel-engined cars, EVs have massive torque (turning power) available from low revolutions and can "smoke" a lot of ICEs away from the lights, but the effect on battery life is catastrophic.

Hopefully the excellent work in Limerick can help develop a battery technology that improves on the current (pun intended) state-of-the-art.
 
For what its worth... I had great fun driving a relatives Nissan Leaf in the UK some time ago for a week or two . Can I mention MPG? (Should be miles per Watt or something )

Anyway after a full charge I was lucky to get 60 - 65 miles of mixed driving and if I had the air con on & de-mister with headlamps (normal for our wintry weather... most of the rest of the year as well ) it was like turning an old car battery on its side and pouring out the battery acid with the power. The battery power dropped so fast.

It was a nice hatchback car to drive with lots of torque and reasonably fast very quiet accelleration in the normal speed ranges but a total joke if you had to rely on it for ordinary day to day use. I was seriously caught out one evening as I had the car charging and I ended up having to get a taxi....

If all you do is a handful of miles per day it might be of some expensive use but if you do any mileage its useless.
 
Are the batteries easy to put in and out? or are they huge?

Could you carry a spare charged battery with you?
 
I drove one of these as part of the ESB commercial ambassadors and it was very comfortable, surprisingly fast and the only issue was I kept turning it on twice as you can't hear it once it starts - no noise idling but a slight whine when going fast. Used to constantly be looking around for distant sirens.
 
Brendan Burgess said:
Are the batteries easy to put in and out? or are they huge?

Could you carry a spare charged battery with you?
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Unfortunately, swapping batteries is not currently a "user-accessible option" or DIY job.

Carrying spare batteries based on current technology would have an enormous weight penalty, assuming you could swap them in the first place,

Ideally, in EV Utopia, spare batteries would be easily swapped and would be available at shopping centres, train stations, petrol filling stations, airports, AA rescue vans, etc.

The ultimate would be user-swappable, portable fuel cells capable of being changed / charged in as little (or less) time as it takes to top-up the fuel in your current ICE car.
 
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Brendan Burgess said:
Wow

So it's really a small car mounted on a big battery?

What size are the batteries for the bigger cars?
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The batteries usually make up around 25% of the total car weight. The cost of manufacturing the Leaf battery is 50% that of the entire car.

Another issue for the current lithium ion batteries is that consistently using the fast charge option will reduce the battery life to 3-5 years.

Reports from the US indicate that Leaf users are reporting up to 20-30 degredation in battery capacity after the first year. The only replacement option in the US currently is a monthly rental scheme where you lease the replacement battery for $100 a month. So long as you keep up the $100 a month, they'll replace the batteries once capacity drops to 70%.
 
Brendan Burgess said:
Will Goodbody of RTE has written of his experience with ecars here ...
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A good balanced review I think.

It's a pity the new e-Golf wasn't available to him. This seems to have an advantage over the ESB's list of cars in terms of range / battery life. I haven't managed to find a review yet but VW claims it has a greater range than other cars in its class, 12.7 kwh/100 kms consumption

http://www.greencarcongress.com/2014/02/20140215-egolf.html

"The liquid-cooled lithium-ion battery accounts for 701 pounds (318 kg) of the e-Golf model’s 3,090-pound (1,402 kg) curb weight. It comprises 264 individual prismatic cells, which are integrated into 27 modules (each with six or twelve cells). Collectively, the cells have a nominal rating of 323 volts, with an overall capacity of 24.2 kWh.

Depending on the nature of the route, driving style and load, the range is between 130 and 190 kilometers (81 and 188 miles [should read 118 miles. Thanks Purple]). More specifically, Volkswagen says, under the NEDC cycle, the range is 190 km (188 miles [should read 118 miles. Thanks Purple]); practical range according to Volkswagen is the 130-190 km spread; and in winter operation, the range is expected to be 80-120 km (50-75 miles)."
 
Will Apple help EV / ecar battery shortages?

The world has a limited supply of rechargeable Lithium-Ion batteries, used to power lap-tops and ecars, and is unable to increase production capacity, but might a collaboration between Apple and Tesla alleviate the situation?

All supplies of LiOn batteries destined for automotive use are reportedly being allocated to new car production, leaving dealer requirements for breakdowns and repairs on the back burner, with consequential customer dissatisfaction

In this article there is speculation that Tim Cook, Apple's CEO, Apple's acquisition specialist Adrian Perica and Elon Musk, Tesla's CEO might actually undertake this significant task to their mutual benefit.

Apparently Apple has US$160bn ready to invest in new ventures or in new acquisitions and the ecar / EV market may be one of them.

Any thoughts folks?
 
I wonder about how environmentally friendly all this battery tech is. Are they solving one problem by potentially causing another.
 
According to a Ford/University of Michigan study, there's enough Lithium reserves to meet perceived demand until 2100. Not sure what happens after that...

The most significant lithium reserves are in South America and China, where methods used aren't always very friendly.
 
The charging point that I saw recently is in an out of the way place in our town, I saw it by chance taking the kids to the play park, I would think you could use up valuable energy looking for the charging points
 
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