Electric Cars -- anyone own one?

[lb-ft]

I just sold my gen 1 Honda Insight hybrid.. Loved it. Stick shift, all aluminum car (1500 pounds).
Bought it for $700 with 160k on the odometer 8 years ago. Sold it $950 with 315k.
Literally the most reliable car I have ever owned.

 

[muleman69]

I have owned a volt and have family with multiple Tesla’s.

we like them. I sold the volt because it was uncomfortable (seats) but it was economical and reliable.

what do you want to know?

Just a bit of everything ,don't know squat about EV's. Getting a lot of great info from members

 

[muleman69]

If someone’s electric car won’t start, can I get the jumper cables out from behind the seat of my 99 F250 and get them back going again?

Not sure that will work. Might want to check there bumper stickers first....LOL

 

[Dusty Stevens]

I had a volt. Best EV out there but very expensive to own. Luckily mine was a company car. You can use it during its whole life on gas or plug in. Best idea out there for an ev. It would get around 70mpg avg on gas if you had enough hills and curves but cost me $385 the only month i plugged it in

 

[Dusty Stevens]

Being the electric grid kinda guy i am i can assure you 99% of the country cant handle an electric car swapover. They better stop giving all the money away and start rebuilding real infrastructure and nuclear plants. They have no clue how lacking we are and no utility out there is ready nor can afford to get ready

 

[PigButtons]

What if you run out of FUEL????? in an EV. Can the tow truck driver just bring you a can of "electricity" and get you back on the road in a few minutes? I haven't run out of gas in decades, but people do every day.

 

[gdbleb]

Being the electric grid kinda guy i am i can assure you 99% of the country cant handle an electric car swapover. They better stop giving all the money away and start rebuilding real infrastructure and nuclear plants. They have no clue how lacking we are and no utility out there is ready nor can afford to get ready

From all that I read, this is the crux of the issue. However the science guys measure energy, there is no way to replace what sits in our gas tanks and our gas stations with electric current transmitted over the grid and delivered to our homes and our Tesla batteries. Not yet.

 

[rwj]

What if you run out of FUEL????? in an EV. Can the tow truck driver just bring you a can of "electricity" and get you back on the road in a few minutes? I haven't run out of gas in decades, but people do every day.

 

[perazziguy]

I wouldn't even consider any EV with current battery technology. Hybrid Yes. All electric No. The low end of your stated range is close to the maximum of current EV truck ranges, and that's under ideal conditions WITHOUT Trailer.

View attachment 1325891

The solid state batteries may change max ranges ... but we are not there yet.

But hey, it has "crab steer" mode! Some of us in the auto repair industry, especially GM, knows how well the first rear steer trucks went over...

 

[rijndael]

On the plus side, EVs have the potential to be way simpler. No canister vent valves, EGR, purge valves, etc. emissions systems have really upped the complexity.

 

[One Eye Pete]

As far as electric car efficiency overall (and all the BS from the government) consider this:
Hydro-power and Nuclear produce about 27% of the electric power in the US and are tapped out not many new power plants of this type being proposed.
Wind and solar approximately 13% of the US electric generation.
The remainder (fossil fuel) mostly natural gas and coal account for the remaining 60%. Most new large scale electric power in the near future will likely be natural gas.
A fossil fuel generating plant is about 35% efficient (new natural gas plants can hit 40%) but then you have transmission losses (line and transformer losses) about 10% so by the time the energy even gets to the battery of an electric vehicle the overall efficiency is around 25%.
A good commercial diesel truck is about 38-40% efficient a gasoline car about 25%. So if we all had electric cars and trucks the country would probably have to burn even more fuel overall.
Its even worse with certain electric appliances. A high efficiency gas hot water heater is 90+ % efficient. By the time the electric gets to an electric hot water heater you have to burn about three times the amount of fuel. Same thing with electric stoves and cook-tops and I recently heard that the nut-balls in California government were considering a ban on gas appliances.
My numbers could be off slightly but it probably doesn't matter too much because even if 50% of us had electric vehicles with our present electric grid there would be one heck of a blackout!!!!!!!

 

[Sandstorm]

no utility out there is ready nor can afford to get ready

Dusty said it all.....say no more.
Aint goin down that road in my lifetime.

 

[Dusty Stevens]

On the plus side, EVs have the potential to be way simpler. No canister vent valves, EGR, purge valves, etc. emissions systems have really upped the complexity.

Have you seen an electric car fire yet?

 

[jsn]

Can someone explain why they cannot put an alternator or generator in these electric cars to get some real battery recharging?

A guy using "Engineering Explained" on YouTube has owned a Tesla 3 and has put a lot of free info abut ownership online.

 

[Dusty Stevens]

Can someone explain why they cannot put an alternator or generator in these electric cars to get some real battery recharging?

A guy using "Engineering Explained" on YouTube has owned a Tesla 3 and has put a lot of free info abut ownership online.

They have that but due to losses you cant recover what you put out. They even have solar roofs and none have been even close to perpetual yet

 

[Sandstorm]

Lithium batteries burn real hot....and dont want to stop either

 

[JB10]

The power grid can not handle all electric cars. This will be interesting as time goes on. What are all the lovely people in California going to do when they have to decide to charge their car or run the ac in their house since the power company can not handle both at same time from everyone. This is not the waive of the future but the direction shoved at us for other people's profits. I believe there are other directions to take first and come up with better power storage before they push all electric cars. I work for a dealership. We just had some electrical work done for charging stations for the new hummer. Talking to the guys running the wires and they were going arround to some dealers that were so old that the entire dealership had to be redone to handle the juice that will be needed without causing issues. I can imagine this is going to add up to a lot of money for some small shops.

 

[Dusty Stevens]

The power grid can not handle all electric cars. This will be interesting as time goes on. What are all the lovely people in California going to do when they have to decide to charge their car or run the ac in their house since the power company can not handle both at same time from everyone. This is not the waive of the future but the direction shoved at us for other people's profits. I believe there are other directions to take first and come up with better power storage before they push all electric cars. I work for a dealership. We just had some electrical work done for charging stations for the new hummer. Talking to the guys running the wires and they were going arround to some dealers that were so old that the entire dealership had to be redone to handle the juice that will be needed without causing issues. I can imagine this is going to add up to a lot of money for some small shops.

Imagine all these old outdated services on houses. Thats where folks will finally get fed up when they gotta pay $5000 to charge their car at home upgrading their electric service

 

[cheek9075]

I'm out. Electricity doesn't come from fairy dust and unicorn tears. Plus, our forward thinking gov (Pritzker) has planned on phasing out coal.
Jonathan Taylor

We have had 4 mines reopen in the last year. One due to lack of steam coal to a major plant in East TN. Go figure....

 

[Bill Score]

Not an owner but, pictures are worth a thousand words…. Just Sayin..