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**dYn4mic** · July 26, 2006, 22:40

Re: Electric Car...

Thats pretty cool. Good name...

Some quick specs for those who don't want to visit the site:
Drivetrain
-Electric motor with 2-speed electric-shift manual transmission with integral differential

Motor
3-phase, 4-pole electric motor, 248hp peak (185kW), redline 13,500 rpm, regenerative "engine braking"

Chassis
-Bonded extruded aluminum with 4-wheel wishbone suspension

Brakes
-4-wheel disc brakes with ABS

Acceleration
-0 to 60 in about 4 seconds

Top Speed
-Over 130 mph

Range
-250 miles EPA highway

Battery Life
-Useful battery life in excess of 100,000 miles

Energy Storage System
-Custom microprocessor-controlled lithium-ion battery pack

Full Charge
-As short as 3.5 hours

**Kai** · July 27, 2006, 05:26

Re: Electric Car...

Thanks for throwin' up the highlights dYn4mic.

Only reason I posted this was because I really had no idea that they could get that kind of acceleration from an electric motor. I was quite surprised. People keep saying fuel cell technology is 20 years out, but rather than wait I wouldn't mind seeing some Toshiba 4S plants dropped all around the country to beef up electrical supply to support an infrastructure for this kind of thing.

**Clp727** · July 27, 2006, 14:37

Re: Electric Car...

I like the car too. I just hope that America's electrical power grids are in better shape when this car is released. Can't really charge the batteries if your electricity is out. But with a solar powered home, we're in business! The range on the Tesla is great because it can compete with a gas powered vehicle in the commute to work.

**dYn4mic** · July 27, 2006, 20:13

Re: Electric Car...

Originally posted by Clp727

I like the car too. I just hope that America's electrical power grids are in better shape when this car is released.

Hah.. Good point.
I had this thought a while back about how shitty the power system is, and how we increasingly rely on it so much... The internet was designed (among other things, maybe this really was an afterthought) to communicate in the event of a nuclear war. The power system was not, and as we've seen, a small outage in one area can cause serious problems in a large large area of the country. (think of NY/East coast a few years back). I've I was head of DHS, i'd be doing some major work on making the power system redundant.

Anyways.. This car is pretty cool. I'm a big car/race fan myself.. I've always looked down on things that arn't loud, fast and or have more than 4 cyl. but... even though this is eletric...its hard not to respect this as a machine of solid enginering and looks to be good fun.

**Kai** · July 27, 2006, 20:43

Re: Electric Car...

As far as power goes, they have been testing miniature nuclear power plants since the 90s, including operatorless designs. If we could get past the "fear" of nuclear energy, we could be rid of our dependence on the ME.

Sorry, don't mean to make this political, but you're right, our current infrastructure could not support this type of transit in mass quantity.

**dYn4mic** · July 28, 2006, 00:16

Re: Electric Car...

Originally posted by Kai

As far as power goes, they have been testing miniature nuclear power plants since the 90s, including operatorless designs. If we could get past the "fear" of nuclear energy, we could be rid of our dependence on the ME.

Sorry, don't mean to make this political, but you're right, our current infrastructure could not support this type of transit in mass quantity.

I wasn't just talking about this kinda transit, but even just preventing blackouts overall. It doesn't seem like it would be THAT hard, but then again...i'm no expert.
People here in california were out of power for almost a week, in 100+ degree heat, 43 people died in the heat wave..

**astcell** · July 28, 2006, 20:25

Re: Electric Car...

No solar panels?

**skroo** · July 29, 2006, 09:34

Re: Electric Car...

Originally posted by dYn4mic

People here in california were out of power for almost a week

Hadn't heard about this (been out of the country the past few days), but there's no evidence here in my part of Los Angeles indicating that we lost power during that time. Then again, we've got private municipal power here, so if this was a SoCal Edison / PG&E problem I wouldn't've seen it.

Having said that, I'm inclined to agree with pretty much all the rest of the comments made so far, particularly that without nuclear power electric cars are not a reasonable proposition - particularly in tree-hugging California where we've had power crises for the past 20 years. So far, though, this is a pretty solid-looking idea: it's something people might actually want to drive (unlike the GM EV-1 and similar), and the engineering behind it is interesting to say the least. I'd like to get behind the wheel of one just to see how it handles.

**dYn4mic** · July 29, 2006, 09:55

Re: Electric Car...

Originally posted by skroo

Hadn't heard about this (been out of the country the past few days), but there's no evidence here in my part of Los Angeles indicating that we lost power during that time. Then again, we've got private municipal power here, so if this was a SoCal Edison / PG&E problem I wouldn't've seen it.

Having said that, I'm inclined to agree with pretty much all the rest of the comments made so far, particularly that without nuclear power electric cars are not a reasonable proposition - particularly in tree-hugging California where we've had power crises for the past 20 years. So far, though, this is a pretty solid-looking idea: it's something people might actually want to drive (unlike the GM EV-1 and similar), and the engineering behind it is interesting to say the least. I'd like to get behind the wheel of one just to see how it handles.

Yes, good points. But then there's things like this that make me laugh at the power system.
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercu...s/15111951.htm
"Local PG&E officials also urged conservation to help keep the number of new outages down. Yet another day of heat left 36,000 South Bay PG&E customers without power today, as workers scrambled to fix more than 1,100 separate outages."

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la...,6954972.story
"Southern California was struck with a new round of power outages Monday as demand for electricity stretched the state's supply and the aging system of local lines and transformers continued to fail in the face of a record heat wave."
"Officials were more immediately concerned about the nearly 1,000 transformers atop power poles and in underground vaults that have been overwhelmed in recent days, leaving thousands without electricity."

On july 24th:
"Meanwhile, power companies continued to work to restore electricity to thousands of customers who lost power on Sunday. Some 50,000 customers in Northern California still were without electricity, including 35,000 in the San Jose and East Bay, according to Pacific Gas & Electric."

Today:
"Forecasters are predicting a break in the heat wave that has contributed to the deaths of more than 100 people in California."
http://www.voanews.com/english/2006-07-28-voa51.cfm

If we can't even manage our eletricity enough to prevent long term outages and lots of poeple turning on their A/C... can we ever have mass amount of eletric cars without an overhaul of hte power system? (should it have been overhauled a long time ago?)

**astcell** · July 29, 2006, 18:44

Re: Electric Car...

If you have a car that runs on propane, they hit you with the excise tax when you fill up, unless you are able to sneak your cans into them in small quantities. If this car takes off the state will lose millions in revenue form gas taxes. Expect special meters to tell if you are recharging a car, and you will end up paying just as much as you do now for gasoline.

**Twigman** · July 30, 2006, 03:43

Re: Electric Car...

This is deviating into a new thread, but how can you tell what electricity is being used for?
Currently the only system I know that would be semi-comparable to this is having 2 meters on a timed basis and different tarriffs for what time of day you use most electricity (This happens in the UK so Im sure you get it in the US as well). This works because you just require a timer.

The only way to really tell is by analysing how much current is being used I would guess.
In my brief 5 minutes of thought, the only way they could do this would be to have to car have a specific adapter to plug straight into the meter. Although what would stop you from just cutting that off and fixing a normal plug onto it?

So tax on electricity depending on what you use it for. What else do you think would be taxed? TV and computer use? This is quite an interesting point (to me at least). I would be interested to hear other peoples views on this.

Feel free to split this into a new thread if you think its worthy and people have contributions to make.

**astcell** · July 30, 2006, 04:34

Re: Electric Car...

Well they can make a specific plug and outlet ust for the electric cars and they can have a separate meter, still billed by the power company but taxes would be added on. Or the car can connect to the manufacturer or a third party (On Star?) and report the mileage driven and upload the data to the state.

If we had 5 millon electric cars in Los Angeles you can bet that no roadwork would ever get done, nor would the power grid live too long.

**Kai** · July 30, 2006, 05:48

Re: Electric Car...

Ouch, didn't think about the loss of taxes this might create if adopted in quantity. And just think, right now there giving tax credits FOR buying hybrids and the like! I think the the only way to tax these would have to be ownership based, not usage based. If they were to require special connections to tax the electricity use, I'm sure some fine upstanding user would simply create a "middle-man" than plugs into a basicc 220 outlet, and slowly syphons off and stores a charge. Any outgoing communictions from the vehicle itself could be modified (or simply disabled) pretty easily as well.

The only thing I can see is increasing the sales tax on the front end, increasing the annual poperty tax, or more than likley, both. Until they figure out the taxes, I wouldn't mind getting one and letting everyone else pay for the roads! ;)

As far as infrastructure, something would definitely have to be done in CA and other states very quickly (then again, this should have been done along time ago anyway). In other states, it wouldn't pose much of an issue quite so soon, especially taking into consideration that most charging would occur off-peak in the evenings. I'd bet a lot of homes would need to be updated as well, that or people would have to remember not to charge when the AC in the house is running.

Back to the car, it appears to be heavily computer operated, requiring a pin to enable the motor, and different pre-programmable settings such as "valet" that shortens the speed, acceleration, and distance the car may drive. That could be a lot of fun to play with.

**Clp727** · July 30, 2006, 06:33

Re: Electric Car...

I do think that this vehicle potentially has what it takes to gain market share. I believe that a solar powered home would be a nice addition, just to ensure that it can be charged for the commute to work. We all can endure the brief ( 2 - 4 hour) power outage from a passing storm and still make it to work the next morning. But if your car was left to charge over night, and the power was out, that could be a problem. If they offered a package that included a power storage system (like a UPS for our servers) that would use incoming current to charge the batteries on the vehicle, then in the event of a power outage a battery system would provide the remaining current to finish charging the vehicles battery, the consumers would probably feel that they could depend on a vehicle such as this one. Solar power for the home would be a nice addition to this type of vehicle.

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