If there were hydrogen stations around me as well as a few up and down the east coast, I would totally consider it.

Good info. Here, I thought EVs were given good incentives. :bonk:

The 0-60 of 9.2 seconds kills it for me, even if everything else aligned. Maybe you should wait three years, and you could buy one for $5k or less.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9fQ-eugcpw

and don't forget, a 10 year hard expiration date from the date of manufacture.

There's 2 within 10 miles of where I live. The most appealing part is that it's basically EV without the recharging time penalty. I don't care how fast you can build chargers, having to wait 30+ minutes to get to x% of charge isn't ideal.

Gotta start somewhere...

I wouldn't keep this for 10 years, but depending on my situation in 2020 I might end up getting the car just to take full advantage of the $8k federal tax credit.

I drive upwards of 40-50k miles a year so my hard expiration date is more like whatever amount of driving the fuel card can get me.

If you have a garage and a level 2 charger then you can recharge an EV each night. If you can't recharge at home then an EV wouldn't make sense with your mileage. You are also surrounded by hydrogen stations, so you're in a prime location to have a hydrogen car.

nah, I can't add any more solar to my house so EV will just cost too much. My current solar setup should be 2x the size if I were going EV but I didn't consider this route 6 years ago when I got solar.

I like the Nio design language infinitely more than Tesla's, and they do seem to have thought through alternative battery charging/swapping scenarios a little further. In practice, as mentioned in the video, the battery swapping has to be expensive to maintain, and I would want to see the lease agreement around swapped batteries (to do the swap I believe you have to participate in their lease agreement which is about $150 US).

Have they started selling in the US, or announced when they will? Their nio.com website is relatively useless, containing mostly marketing blurbs and stock photos of beautiful people doing beautiful things.

There is a huge 27.5% tariff on imported cars from China, and these are models that are built there like the Buick Envision and Volvo S90, but are not even Chinese manufactures. I don't know if Nio has plans to sell cars here or invest in a factory, but they would likely need to do that to be competitive.

If Toyota is offering a $15k hydrogen gas card to gain early adopters then offering a battery swap option seems like an equally necessary investment to gain early adopters. In time, batteries will out number vehicles on the road. Tesla has already said that they plan to move much of their material harvesting to in-house battery recycling, but the industry is already buying used batteries for grid storage and home storage. Alternatively, gathering used batteries from old cars to wrecked cars can be done to use for swapping. People are already doing used battery swaps to upgrade their P75D to a P85D. Like selling a used iPhone back to Apple or a third party manufacture, maybe old cars might be sold back to battery reclaimers and vehicle refurbishers. Even if the range on the battery is only 70%, for many people, 175 miles from a once 250 mile battery is still plenty of range until their next swap. Obviously, 70% charge performance from something like a 500 mile battery (350 miles) is definitely enough. There could be a tier pricing system for the swap or a monthly prescription or whatever a company would need to do to incentivize buyers, while recuperating their initial expenses.

.
Attachment 196672

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-g...-idUSKBN29X2AY

GM aims to end sale of gasoline, diesel-powered cars, SUVs, light trucks by 2035

Seems like a sound direction to move the company. Hopefully, they won't all be EVs but seems unlikely they'll back anything else.

Also hope GM continues to make "last hoorah" versions of their cars. For example, I'm convinced the upcoming limited Cadillac CT4/5 Blackwings (reservations start 2/1/2021) with manual transmissions will be the last opportunity to buy an ICE version of those type cars, and they will only sell 250 of each this year.

If ICE is going out, I want it to go out with a bang, not a whimper!

I just hope the upcoming vehicles don't all suck.

From a performance perspective, these cars obviously are fast and have a low COG, but they come off as a one trick pony. I hope they can find a way to incorporate enthusiast cars into the lineup. Either that, or we will all regress to classics.

If you watch some of the GM "Generation E/Zero" promos about their Ultium platform, they at least show the silhouette of what is a muscle/sports car as one of the options. I think there is some hope beyond Tesla's Roadster.

Quick framegrab

Yeah that is entirely a CUV silhouette. It is cartoonishly tall.

And then gas becomes hard to get, and shit breaks with no support, etc.

That's pretty much the height they drew all the silhouettes, don't think it was supposed to be accurate.

You can still buy a new front bumper for a Chevy Bel Air.

There will probably be net zero biofuels. We have a long time. I’m almost 40, and I’ll likely be able to drive an ICE for the rest of my life, assuming a long life.

They don't sell the Mirai in the east coast anyways.

Are you referring to the tank? It's 15 years, not 10.

Yes, that's likely because there are no hydrogen stations lol.

what the article fails to mention is that GM's primary reason for this is driven by their number 1 market: China.

China's vehicle market is going electric much faster than the rest of the world, and to not go EV is to lose out on the largest consumer market to other brands.

Keep in mind they have to move the battery pack away from the road to avoid debris, speed bumps, or anything that could puncture it. While it does look a bit exaggerated for demonstration purposes, given that it is a universal platform to serve a great many vehicles, you probably won't see a more dedicated "sports car" EV platform varient for a long time.

Don't expect ZL1 or C8 ground clearance for a long time.

https://cnet1.cbsistatic.com/img/wIh...-zl1-1le-1.jpg

It will probaby be similar to the Mach-E, but a 2 door.

https://smartcdn.prod.postmedia.digi...=100&strip=all

True, but that alone wouldn't stop them from making ICEs; they would still produce ICEs for other markets. They see the writing on the wall. California, China, UK and other parts of Europe, etc are all on board. That doesn't leave a whole lot of major markets left. Still, GM and other companies have subsidiaries in cheaper markets where an ICE could still be used like Malaysia or Thailand, but this sounds like a global decision. It could be profit driven like the article mentions, but I think it could also be entirely possible that GM wants to be apart of the solution to this global problem.

The other thing is that these companies need a new focus. The horsepower wars are getting so ridiculous that there needs to be a new focus to reign in the power, or rather, where do you go from a 700+hp sports coupe? There are engineering limits on cooling, reliability, fuel economy, weight, etc with ICEs. Going EV could reset and restart the bar. At one point in time, Japanese cars had a gentlemen's agreement on 280hp or something, and now, we may see an agreement to move past the latest horsepower wars and move onto something different.

https://www.wired.com/2015/05/porsch...orsepower-war/

The Ford Mach-E has a ground clearance of 5.7'', and the Mustang has a ground clearance of 5.3'', and the Tesla Model S has a ground clearance of 4.6'', so ground clearance isn't the issue.

It depends on the type and configuration of their battery packs. Some manufactures are using larger pouches, so their battery packs are taller, which can raise the seat height. Look at the Model 3 or Model S, and you can see that the vehicle doesn't need to look like a crossover because it has a battery pack, nor does the seating position need to be high in the air.

The Mach-E has a crossover look because that is what they wanted to make because crossovers sell the most.

are you implying that suspending a tank of a flammable liquid underneath a vehicle in a 1/8" thick plastic tub is less problematic to road hazards?

Apparently to seeing how many CUVs you can ram down your customers' throat if you are Ford...

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.wsj...ans-1525369304

Are they ramming CUVs or are we wanting CUVs? Is it a push or pull situation? That is the question.

they did say their cars weren't selling, but then ford has never been known to make the most quality cars anyways. even here, half the guy's considering a mustang have to keep reminding themselves that it's either got a turbo, or a v8 to feel that it's the better purchase.

Yes, infinitely.

If I puncture my gas tank nothing happens except oil spills out over the road and eventually evaporates and we replace the gas tank.

If I puncture a car's battery pack, at best there is no fire but the entire car would be totaled because you can't simply replace the battery pack, and at worst the entire car catches fire.

Ford Fusion was a success on the category. Fiesta also (in Europe). Focus was a bummer, failed in China and got a bad rep.
Not a reason to drop all. The reason may be different, including regulations (e.g. CAFE), profits, cusromwr demand, shifting of CEOs, new direction...

This can happen, but it doesn't really happen at any rate to be a real concern. Like I posted above, ground clearance is fairly low. In fact, many vehicles come from the factory with really low ground clearance. There are cars like the C8 Corvette that will remember your preferences, so when you come to a particular area, it will automatically raise the car.

https://www.cnet.com/roadshow/news/2...nt-lift-video/

Fires are much more common with ICEs than EVs. The incidents typically don't happen from tank punctures, but that is possible. Typically it happens when a fuel line, injector, regulator, etc leaks or breaks, and the gas hits the exhaust pipe and starts a fire. This happens with oil leaks too of course. The GT350 had a recall because several cars caught on fire from the oil filter not sealing well enough. Then there are the physical damages from a crash or catastrophic engine failure that can cause a hole in the crank case or a leak, which can start a fire.

You are correct that a serious impact to the bottom of the car will likely result in more expensive damage, but this is very rare. The battery area under an EV is also bigger than say the area under an ICE vehicle where an object could puncture the oil pan that could cause engine failure, so there is a greater chance of an impact with an EV. Yet, the under trays of EVs are very thick. Some EVs like Ford's Mach-E has individual sections that can be changed out if one got damaged.

https://www.macheforum.com/site/atta...8405-jpg.1702/

On the newest Teslas, the batteries will be integrated into the floor like how some engines in motorbikes or race cars become integral components of the chassis, so removing the battery may not be as easy or possible. Initially they planned to design the car, so the batteries could be swapped, and while other companies like Nio are providing that service, Tesla is moving away from that model because it seems less necessary. But, previously, Teslas could have their battery packs removed and replaced, which was very common, and like a broken engine, they could be recycled and harvested for parts and materials. Most wrecked Teslas showed little to no major damage to the battery packs. Nio has performed over 500,000 battery swaps so far using these swapping stations:

Tesla battery pack:

https://057tech.com/pimages/packsolar.jpg

Nio swapping station:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTXptUuKGrc

Speaking of Tesla, they were just forced to recall 135,000 vehicles because the center tablet may fail. Tesla refused to voluntarily recall them because they didn't think the failure was a safety issue, even though some systems, like the backup camera and the window defrost systems are controlled by it.

Good video breakdown:

https://youtu.be/7dfyG6FXsUU

Agreed, good video. I like his balanced approach to the whole subject.

Of course, I may like him because he sounds like a Muppet.

Only thing, I think he missed the point that it's not quite that straight forward. Charging at night also makes use of electricity production that is now "lost". That is why, for example, my EMC (electric co-op) let's you charge a car for free if you do it between certain hours (up to 400kWh per month).

The video itself is a bit weird though. This would have been better done in the studio similar to his video on the CT5-V Blackwing. The driving and random shots of Hummer EVs, Mach-Es, etc were distracting.CT5-V Blackwing

I’m missing your point when you say lost.

I'm not an electrical engineer, but I've read that there is a certain amount of power required to keep the grid active. At night the consumption of that power can fall below that minimum and is somehow dumped. If the power isn't being consumed by a consumer, it is consumed by the grid, and effectively "lost" as in it doesn't power anything else. Since I'm no expert though I could be completely off in my understanding.

There are examples of this in the production of electricity, although not exactly the same thing. For example, in some cases of hydroelectric power, the generators required to provide electricity during the day to the grid may not be needed at night. Rather than turn the generators off, they are used for another purpose. For example, in Georgia, Lake Oconee is a power generating lake and Lake Sinclair (downstream) is basically "battery storage". Each night, the excess power generation is used to pump water from Lake Sinclair back into Lake Oconee, then that water is reused to power the turbines during peak times. Lake Sinclair, as result, has a low and high "tide" every day as the water is pumped out then flowed back in.

I don’t know if this is done with green/renewable energy only like wind, nuclear, solar and geothermal. All plants are designed to stop, so I don’t think there is a minimum. Some plants just run continuously to meet a basic need and other plants fine tune their output to meet fluctuations in energy supply and demand, so coal and nuclear might provide a continuous base, and as solar and wind comes online, hydro and natural gas turn down supply. Like the video details, incentivizing power usage at night helps to flatten the curve, so there are natural price reductions in utility costs at night from supply and demand, but there may also be tariffs or government incentives to use power at night, not because of waste or to avoid loses, but rather, to ease the burden on the system and possibly avoid the use of the more-expensive, on-demand utilities.

On a separate note, the US is one of the most wasteful countries in how we use energy—in terms of absolute amounts and per capita, so we have the capacity to improve on that metric to get more energy by not wasting more energy. For example, many homes could be much more efficient. New homes are being designed with smart cooling/heating and zone climate control, better insulation, etc.

Capacity (amount of electricity a grid can generate) vs supply are two different things.

Plants can run continuously but whether they generate power or not is a different story, depending on how they generate power.

Wind is pretty much based on forecast and location, so it is variable. Hydroelectric usually are at dams, so they can turn it on/off as long as the dam is not at capacity. etc etc...

Other plants like coal/oil/gas/nuclear usually are always "on", so the only variable is whether they are running at 25% or 100% based on demand.

This real time graph shows the overall US electrical grid at any time with info on supply and demand. The only real concern is what the forecast electrical need is vs what is actually available, and whether or not excess capacity can be provided in case of spikes.

https://www.eia.gov/realtime_grid/#/...nd=20210211T12

My point was around the minimum amount of energy required to energize the grid (basically keeping the supply line hot). Perhaps I misinterpreted the explanation from my EMC on why they could provide free charging at night, and it had to do with some other factor around what they had to pay for, as you mention.