50 lbs is the weight limit for manual handling. My company used to ship in 25kg (~55lb) packages but I had to knock them down to comply with the 50lb limit.

It's been too long - I don't recall if it's an OSHA thing or a union thing or what. I just know you don't want to plan on humans manually handling anything over 50 lbs.

 

Let's just pick the first item mentions -- television. The first broadcast TV signal in the U.S. occurred in 1929. The first standard, NTSC, was adopted in 1941. In the intervening years, to quote from the Wikepedia article, "The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) saw television in the continual flux of development with no consistent technical standards, hence all such stations in the U.S. were granted only experimental and non-commercial licenses, hampering television's economic development."

Perhaps the problem is that neither one of us are making much effort to relate what we mean by "slow" and "rapid". I'm working from the context that people that want standardization in the EV world seem to want it right now. I'm saying it is a process that, more often than not, takes one to two decades.

Even for something like USB, in which one entity controls and defines the standard from the git-go, it generally takes several years for it to establish its place sufficiently in the marketplace in order to become widely adopted (assuming it ever does). And that's if you treat something like USB in isolation and ignore the fact that it had already taken a couple of decades of shifting and competing interfaces before that to get to that point.

Then there's the fact that we are talking about completely different scales here. It's one thing to be willing to take a chance that USB will amount to something and decide to incorporate it into your products since the cost is marginal and the lifespan of the products involved is a few years. It's a very different thing to take a chance on something that is affecting a significant part of a multi-thousand dollar battery pack that needs to last and be supported for a decade or more. How quick would YOU be to hop on board such a train until it has become well-enough established so that you have confidence that it WILL be around?

Sorry, I think standardisation happens very quickly. My experiences with the TV/video/appliance industry show once something becomes common or a market pioneer etc then "standardisation" or copying of plugs and fittings etc takes off like wildfire.

I was watching a half hour TV docco on the Tesla model S last night, they made a point about the recharging adapter plug being a "standardised" fitting as used by other vehicles.

"Standardisation" has already started, and would almost instantly follow any introduction of modular plug-in battery packs.

The E.V. people need to stop thinking like car manufacturers, and think a lot more like appliance manufacturers or remote control (electric) model car enthusiasts. They've got this stuff well sorted out, decades in advance of the E.V. industry!

 

How quick would YOU be to hop on board such a train until it has become well-enough established so that you have confidence that it WILL be around?

Very quickly, if it has become well-enough established that if I don't, I won't be around.

The first practical USB standard was USB 2.0 introduced in 2000. Within just a few years, serial and parallel ports were already being displaced by the new standard. Within 8 years, there were already 6 Billion USB enabled devices sold. It is hard to find a new computer, laptop or mobile device that doesn't have some form of USB. It is equally hard to find any of the legacy ports on any of these devices.

 

Those extra batteries are useful for doing a quick swap recharge at home. You can even throw spare batteries in the back seat or the trunk, maybe even borrow a few more some from your friends or family, and now you can pull over anywhere, swap your batteries and double or triple your range.
.

I don't see me swapping batteries, to much work. I plug in my car every night knowing I will have a full 80 miles the next morning, that's enough to drag my butt around town all day, and it takes less time to plug in than it takes to fill a tank and cost less per mile to drive.

What's the down side again??????

 

You'll find out the first morning you head off to work only to discover you forgot to plug in the night before.

 

You'll find out the first morning you head off to work only to discover you forgot to plug in the night before.

That's why companies are working on large induction chargers for automobiles, similar to the small ones used for cellphones. You just drive over the coil when you park and the charge is automatic.

 

It's a very different thing to take a chance on something that is affecting a significant part of a multi-thousand dollar battery pack that needs to last and be supported for a decade or more. How quick would YOU be to hop on board such a train until it has become well-enough established so that you have confidence that it WILL be around?

Something around 20kg should only be $400 and making it a commodity will bring the price down rapidly.

There would need to be handling gear even for a 44 pound pack. An aging population and accessibility considerations require it.
Robotic Arms at the service station?

 

I don't see me swapping batteries, to much work. I plug in my car every night knowing I will have a full 80 miles the next morning, that's enough to drag my butt around town all day, and it takes less time to plug in than it takes to fill a tank and cost less per mile to drive.

What's the down side again??????

The first time you need to go someplace that is 50 miles away and return the same day.

The first time you want to take the family to the park or attraction that is 100 miles away.

The first time you want to take a 1000 mile trip halfway across the country.

The first time you need to make five trips to someplace that is 10 miles away to move people, supplies, equipment, whatever for some event or to move or help someone else move.

The list goes on and on.

I don't need a car that is going to meet 70% or 80% or even 90% of my driving needs, I need a car that is going to come damn close to meeting 100% of my driving needs. In the last 20 years I've rented a vehicle because mine was unsuitable twice (and those were within a month of each other) for a total distance of approximately 80 miles. In that same time I've put about 160,000 miles on my vehicles (I haven't own the same vehicle the entire time). So whichever car I had met my needs about 99.95% of the time.

Now, if you say that the solution is to own a second car to meet those needs that the EV can't, that's fine. But that's not what people are pushing. And make no mistake, if you do that then it is the EV that is your second car, not the other one. And owning that other car, even if it is a cheap beater, isn't going to be free. Here the minimum annual registration is nearly $100 and liability insurance is going to tap you for probably $300/yr. Given that my car gets right at 30mpg and I drive about 7500 miles a year, that's roughly $900 in fuel costs annually. Even if an EV didn't cost a penny more and didn't cost anything in energy to operate, just owning a second car would eat up nearly half of my savings. The routine maintenance would take a sizeable chunk out of the rest. If I didn't own a second vehicle and chose to rent something when necessary, I wouldn't be able to do so very many times a year before I was in the hole.

 

I am hoping that people will review and scale back on their expectations. Owning one vehicle that meets 100% of one's needs ought to be reconsidered. It is like having a facility that is running at 20% capacity 80% of the time.

Why not an EV as the primary vehicle and look for alternatives such as a rental or car share when the need arises?

My primary vehicle for the daily commute to work is a bicycle, actually, an ebike. Once or twice a week I use it to get to the centre of town 10k away. I can go for weeks before needing to fire up a gas powered vehicle.

 

I am hoping that people will review and scale back on their expectations. Owning one vehicle that meets 100% of one's needs ought to be reconsidered. It is like having a facility that is running at 20% capacity 80% of the time.

Choosing a multitude of options that meet all of your needs is fine, but be aware of the costs. If you want to save all this money in gas by having an EV, then don't ignore the premium in the purchase cost, the future expenses of replacing the batteries, the cost of covering the needs that the EV won't and that a conventional vehicle would have.

In many cases you wouldn't want a facility that ran at 20% capacity 80% of the time. But all of your needs still need to be met. If you can plan ahead for that other 20% and meet them at a cost (however you choose to measure cost) that is less than the savings gained by only having a facility that can run at near capacity the other 80%, then do it. But in many cases, that isn't a luxury. I remember when I was in the service and realized that all of the shops were well overmanned for the usual workload - frankly, the majority of the time my shop kept us busy between a third and half of the time. The reason was simple. When the alert order goes out you get your birds gen'ed up, fueled, armed, and in the air with the people you have on hand or can get there within an hour or so. You don't do it with the people you can move around over the next week or the people you can bring up from the reserves and get through refresher training over the next few months.

Why not an EV as the primary vehicle and look for alternatives such as a rental or car share when the need arises?

Because the cost (and hassle) will almost certainly put you in the hole.

Besides, thinking about ten years down the road when my daughter is 15, if she calls me up some night saying that she needs me to come get her because she's in an unsafe situation (and my imagination can come up with plenty of possibilities), I don't want to tell her to just sit tight while I find some rental car outfit that will pick me up or while I find someone whose car I can borrow (and have them bring it to me) because my EV is charging and won't have enough of a charge to come get her for a few more hours.

My primary vehicle for the daily commute to work is a bicycle, actually, an ebike. Once or twice a week I use it to get to the centre of town 10k away. I can go for weeks before needing to fire up a gas powered vehicle.

Out of curiosity, how do you deal with things like groceries? Do you make stops at the store on your bike most days so that you can meet your needs within the cargo capability of your bike? Do you have stuff delivered? Do you just use things that can be bought weeks in advance? Genuinely interested.

And that's great that you can do that. People that can, more power to them. From my house it is 20km to the nearest grocery store. Right now (a situation we hope to remedy, but it will likely be another year before we can) it is 100km from my house to work. I drive it once a week (most of the time) and rent a room about 5km away from work.

 

I appreciate differences that locale can make.
Transportation needs in UK or Europe are quite different from that living in North America.

Yes, I can see with recent wildfire hazards in Colorado you want to be able to move out in an hour's notice.

Yes, I can pack a reusable shopping bag full of groceries and transport it on the e-scooter between my legs. We shop at the local grocery store 2km away maybe twice a week. In summer, we buy from the local growers at the market square 1.5km from home. For bulkier stuff, I also have an electric tricycle. I can carry top soil, sand, gravel, plants, etc in the dump trailer on the back. I have been know to bring home the BBQ propane tank in it.

My work is 5km from home.

I have made it a conscious choice to live were I am because of easy access. The town population is 25,000. The nearest metropolitan area of 500,000 is 10km away. I can ride in to meetings and to my sailing club in 20-30 minutes on my ebike.

 

Most US families already own at least two cars, so needing a 2nd car doesn't represent an extra cost. Also, most people in the US don't live 100 miles from work and services. In fact, more typically thay are much like me. I commute about 15 mi one way and rarely do I make any special trips to market, as my commute takes me past several each day. If I traded my car in for an EV, it would satisfy 90-95% of my transportation needs, which would make it my first car, not my second. My other car would do pretty much what it does now, sit in the driveway until a need for it arises, and without costing me anything more than I already pay.

But I would probably get a hybrid before an EV. That way I have my cake and eat it too.

 

If I traded my car in for an EV, it would satisfy 90-95% of my transportation needs, which would make it my first car, not my second.

Pretty much the same here. I could use a small 3-wheeled "car" - not much more than a bicycle - for the majority of my trips. I might actually put more miles on a real car, though, since the trips would be much longer though less frequent.

One huge impediment to everyone scaling down is safety. I really don't want to be in a short, small, 500lb vehicle sharing narrowed construction lanes with a 80,000 lb semi-truck at 60mph. I just don't see how you mix commuters in e-cars with all the other traffic. Infrastructure is surely part of the mix, truck routes and truck-free routes.

 

Most US families already own at least two cars, so needing a 2nd car doesn't represent an extra cost. Also, most people in the US don't live 100 miles from work and services. In fact, more typically thay are much like me. I commute about 15 mi one way and rarely do I make any special trips to market, as my commute takes me past several each day. If I traded my car in for an EV, it would satisfy 90-95% of my transportation needs, which would make it my first car, not my second. My other car would do pretty much what it does now, sit in the driveway until a need for it arises, and without costing me anything more than I already pay.

But I would probably get a hybrid before an EV. That way I have my cake and eat it too.

Just to be clear, what I meant when I said that the EV is the second car is not based on which you use more often, but which one you would have if, for whatever reason, you could only have one for now and ever more. And I realize that some people would, could, and do choose an EV as their sole vehicle, though I don't know how many fall into that category.

 

I believe if some company were to manufacture an EV with a 200-mile (300km) range for under $15,000, sales, demand and public acceptance would take off.

We can expect India, China or some other Asian country to pioneer such efforts.

Something like this was attempted in Canada but government red tape killed it.
The ZENN car did not have that range and price but at least it was a start.

 

The first time you need to go someplace that is 50 miles away and return the same day.

The first time you want to take the family to the park or attraction that is 100 miles away.

The first time you want to take a 1000 mile trip halfway across the country.

.

I may be in a different situation than some people but I think a lot of people are just like me.

I have 2 cars, a Prius and a Leaf. I still work so I use the EV for commuting to work 9 miles one way, and the wife uses the Hybrid to go to the casino and shopping. The EV gets a lot more miles on it than the Hybrid by choice because I hate giving my money to the oil companies. If you think about it my EV runs on American made fuel, good old coal, natural gas, and hydro.

How if I could only have one car I would choose Prieaf. A plug-in Hybrid that has 80 to 100 miles on battery and then gasoline.

Prieaf coming to a dealer near you soon.

 

You could save more money by not driving to the casino.

 

The EV gets a lot more miles on it than the Hybrid by choice because I hate giving my money to the oil companies. If you think about it my EV runs on American made fuel, good old coal, natural gas, and hydro.

My whole point earlier. The EV becomes the "first" car, first being the one getting the most utilization.

 

You could save more money by not driving to the casino.

It's not about the money, I can afford to drive what I want. I chose to give my hard earned money to Nevada power Co. instead of oil companies.

 

Prieaf coming to a dealer near you soon.

Nah, it won't take off until they get the Leius into production.