There were 67 electric cars available between 1895 and 1925

[Ace-Garageguy]

On 4/19/2021 at 5:13 AM, John1955 said:

...I can't hardly believe that Ford's new electric Mustang is a 4 door! OMG...

 

[Xingu]

They could have named this vehicle anything. Calling it a Mustang got them a lot of free press, good and bad.

 

[Richard Bartrop]

People were made when they made the Thunderbird a four seater, but it worked out very well for Ford.

Edited April 22, 2021 by Richard Bartrop

[John1955]

2 hours ago, Richard Bartrop said:

People were made when they made the Thunderbird a four seater, but it worked out very well for Ford.

Yes, that is very true. The '58 T-Bird sales were more than double the sales of '57 T-Birds even though 1958 was a recession year. That decision also saved the Chevy Corvette, GM was thinking about cancelling production of the Corvette. That's hard to imagine today, but true. 

The '53 and '54 Corvettes dates were dismal, GM actually lost money. 1955 brought the new Chevy V-8 to the Corvette, and GM hoped to make big profits, but 1955 also when Ford's T-Bird arrived and the T-Bird demolished Corvette in sales in '55, '56 and '57. But GM did make a tiny profit though. When news came that Ford was ending the 2 seater T-Bird, GM was like, oh okay, we'll have the market to ourselves, we'll keep boosting the HP and see what happens. The rest is history as they say. 

However, I think this is comparing apples to oranges. I truly think Ford is screwing up here. Personally, I think they should bring back an old respected name for this 4 door 'Mustang' -- TORINO. 
 

[John1955]

On 4/21/2021 at 11:34 AM, Brian Austin said:

That sounds like a good way to describe a lot of people who oppose EVs.  They don't realize that technology and production methods are constantly improving to address the "issues" critics throw around in every discussion of EVs in automotive forums.  We can't even have a nice historical discussion with out naysayers railing against their very existence.

https://evannex.com/blogs/news/debunking-electric-car-myths-again

 

Ironically, the tone of this discussion reminds me of those who scoffed at the development of the automobile itself over a century ago.  The cry was "Get a horse!".  Thankfully, inventors pressed ahead and the public eventually came around.

With all due respect, I consider your tone and your remarks offensive. There was no need to start labeling people like that. Your analysis is completely off base and misses the point entirely. I am not a naysayer railing against their very existence and I am not scoffing at anything. 

I was perfectly clear in stating that I am all for electric vehicles, and I have no need to read your link since I was not promoting any "myth" at all, I was merely stating facts. No one is saying "get a horse" either. I will remind you that no one forced people to switch from horses to cars, trucks and farm tractors. People made that choice without coercion from the government. 

If millions of Americans decide that they still prefer internal combustion vehicles, that is their right.
 

[Richard Bartrop]

On 4/20/2021 at 12:29 PM, misterNNL said:

I live in the middle of farm country and will believe the end of the carbon based fuel engine is really here when all of the diesel powered heavy equipment like tractors and harvesters are in museums and junk yards and have been replaced with electric ones.

One of the things people like about electric cars is that electricity costs less than gas, so I imagine that if there was electric farm equipment that could do the job of their diesel equivalents (I know, a big if), it would actually be quite attractive.

[John1955]

8 minutes ago, Richard Bartrop said:

One of the things people like about electric cars is that electricity costs less than gas, so I imagine that if there was electric farm equipment that could do the job of their diesel equivalents (I know, a big if), it would actually be quite attractive.

I also think it would be more attractive, and I also think the day will come when electric powered farm equipment will be made that can do what today's gasoline and diesel powered equipment can. But I also know what will happen once many switch over to electric, the cost of electricity will soar. Profit mongers will be like, "we gotcha now"! 

I don't mean to be cynical, but I do know about corporate greed and human nature. Today (as it has always been), using natural gas appliances in your home costs MUCH LESS than using electric ones. So, in my home, my kitchen stove/oven, furnace, clothes dryer and hot water heater are all natural gas. I know a friend just three blocks away who has all those appliances that are electric, he pays three times more than I do on his utility bills. 

Since natural gas is a fossil fuel, some want to eliminate it's use. Watch out, a sudden increase in electric rates would follow. I'm also concerned about the energy grid, in some parts of the country, it's already fragile. 
 

[peteski]

There is an ideal application for an electric vehicle:  that small Postal Service Truck used by the mail carrier to deliver mail to the roadside mailboxes.  Those things drive slowly, don't drive very far, lots of stop/go driving (regenerative braking) and they return back to home base for overnight stay (perfect for recharging).  Also, less maintenance - most of the drive train is sealed, and no oil changes, etc. To me that would be a no-brainer.   Yes, I know, there is the initial expense of acquiring the fleet and ancillary equipment, but still . . .

 

Edited April 23, 2021 by peteski

[Richard Bartrop]

8 hours ago, John1955 said:

I also think it would be more attractive, and I also think the day will come when electric powered farm equipment will be made that can do what today's gasoline and diesel powered equipment can. But I also know what will happen once many switch over to electric, the cost of electricity will soar. Profit mongers will be like, "we gotcha now"! 

I don't mean to be cynical, but I do know about corporate greed and human nature. Today (as it has always been), using natural gas appliances in your home costs MUCH LESS than using electric ones. So, in my home, my kitchen stove/oven, furnace, clothes dryer and hot water heater are all natural gas. I know a friend just three blocks away who has all those appliances that are electric, he pays three times more than I do on his utility bills. 

Since natural gas is a fossil fuel, some want to eliminate it's use. Watch out, a sudden increase in electric rates would follow. I'm also concerned about the energy grid, in some parts of the country, it's already fragile. 
 

Profit in itself is not bad, and more more profit isn't always excessive.  Sometimes it just means the squeeze isn't quite so tight.

Corporate shenanigans are certainly not limited to any one company, or type of company.  Look up the problems farmers have had with John Deere over their internal combustion tractors.

Something also to consider is the growth of the solar industry.  Now, generating enough power to run your equipment over a harvest is not the same as powering a home, and there is the question of whether the area you need for your solar array cuts significantly into the area for growing crops, and of course the cost, but at least the potential exist that if the utilities do squeeze too hard, the farmers have options.

 

[Ace-Garageguy]

[Ace-Garageguy]

[Ace-Garageguy]

[Ace-Garageguy]

[Ace-Garageguy]

[Ace-Garageguy]

[peteski]

LOL!  And it is all true (unless the owner of that electric car charges it from their own solar, wind, or hydro electric plant in their backyard).

[Mark]

Electric is cheaper than gasoline only because those using electricity to power their cars aren't paying their share of highway taxes.  You know, the ones that used to be listed on a sign next to the gas pump, but no longer are...

[Rodent]

In California, 2020 and newer BEVs are charged an extra $100 initially, and all BEVs pay $175-$25 (depending on the value of the car) yearly for the registration. It looks like five other states have similar charges. I like this idea MUCH better than paying by the mile driven.

[Richard Bartrop]

As I've said before, the fashionably eco aware have no monopoly on lazy sound bites.

Your typical fossil fuel power plant converts fuel in to energy with about twice the efficiency of an automotive IC engine, so depending on what the losses are like in transmission and charging, you could still conceivably be ahead of the game. When you factor in that unlike a IC engine,  an electric motor doesn't have to keep drawing power when it isn't moving, yes, you're still using that evil carbon, but you aren't using as much of it.

And the fact that the cartoonists still think electric car owners are still the sort of Flower power era moonbeams who subscribe to Mother Earth Earth News shows how out of touch they really are.  Ever since Elon Musk showed the way, electric car makers have been pushing luxury, style and performance.  Basically all the things people like about cars, but that good, responsible citizens aren't supposed to be interested in.  Ford isn't selling environmental responsibility with its new electric.  It's taking a leaf from Porsche's book, and trying to capture the magic of its most famous performance car in a more practical package.  GM's electric is going to be a monster truck that can out accelerate a Lamborghini.   In fact, I was kind of amused when the supposedly socially aware folks at Jalopnik decided the electric Hummer would be bad for the environment because it would apparently attract the wrong sort sort of people, and it didn't "look" environmentally friendly.

It's not just about environmental awareness or moral superiority anymore.

[Ace-Garageguy]

3 hours ago, Richard Bartrop said:

As I've said before, the fashionably eco aware have no monopoly on lazy sound bites.

Your typical fossil fuel power plant converts fuel in to energy with about twice the efficiency of an automotive IC engine, so depending on what the losses are like in transmission and charging, you could still conceivably be ahead of the game. 

Well, not really, and it depends. Most of the arguments for electric vehicles simply overlook a lot of basic physics, but numbers are apparently just too boring for the vast majority of proponents to bother with.

The BEST gas-fired generating plants can achieve about a 50% conversion efficiency for the transformation of chemical energy (the energy contained in a combustible fuel) to-electrical energy. Oil and coal-fired plants are worse. Transmission losses at high voltage over long distances are about 2%. Lower voltage transmission losses over short distances are around 4%. So let's take a generous 3% transmission-loss-average and say we're at 47% efficiency by the time the electricity is at the plug where you recharge your batteries. That's before you charge your batteries and lose more energy in the process (you're converting the electricity at the plug back to chemical energy in a storage battery), and then there's more loss because the efficiency of transforming the electrical energy drawn from the battery into motion (mechanical) is hardly 100%. REMEMBER: EVERY TIME the FORM of energy changes, there are net losses. When all is said and done, and every erg is accounted for, the total net energy conversion from burning fossil fuel at a generating plant into making an electric car go down the road is going to be something on the order of 40%, or probably less.

On the other hand, the BEST IC engines can currently get about 50% thermal efficiency, but the typical car on the road is only getting 25-30% useful work out of the fuel it burns. HOWEVER...direct-injection (available in cars since 2008) can raise this number to 35%. Add newer tech like engine stop-start, and make a concerted research effort to recover energy normally lost through cooling and exhaust system waste heat, and the potential for roadgoing IC engines to significantly better their electric counterparts in terms of energy efficiency should be obvious. NOTE: The huge MAN S80ME-C7 engine has achieved an overall energy conversion efficiency of 54.4%, which is the highest conversion of fuel into power by any internal-combustion engine to date (that I know of).

Really want to save the planet? Make the fuel of choice hydrogen. It works just dandy in IC engines, and can now achieve thermal efficiencies as good as conventional diesels. Burning hydrogen in air produces nothing but water and relatively easily controlled oxides of nitrogen. It also works just dandy for fuel-cells for those who won't miss their engine noises, and in that case, the only "emissions" is water.

Add in the fact that hydrogen can be easily made from filtered domestic wastewater by rooftop solar cell-powered electrolysis (Honda has already done most of the research long ago), and the optimum long-term zero-carbon transportation solution becomes apparent to anyone sufficiently versed in the REAL science to see the big picture.

PS: In the interim, the carbon dioxide currently being pumped into the atmosphere by coal and natural-gas fired generating plants can be captured, fed to algae, and turned into bio-diesel and bio-jet fuel. This could have a significant impact towards achieving a carbon-neutral position. The tech exists.

PPS: The much-touted "renewable" generating capacity, pure solar and wind, isn't there yet and is currently a pipe-dream. For the most part, "renewable" electricity is only available when the wind blows or the sun is shining, because storage of energy produced this way is difficult. One very expensive solar demo plant in Nevada using liquid sodium never did better than 50% of its design goals, couldn't pay back the costs associated with building it, and has been essentially abandoned.

Edited April 23, 2021 by Ace-Garageguy
CLARITY

[Richard Bartrop]

So by your own numbers, as it stands now,  electric cars charging off a fossil fuel generator are still more efficient than IC cars.   And of course, not all electricity is generated by fossil fuel, so electrics come out even further ahead.   And as I've mentioned a few times already, environmental issues aren't what's driving electric car sales.

Carbon capture is definitely something that we need.   We can't run anything on batteries, and there's only so much we can do to control what happens in other countries.

As for real science and the big picture, I've already gave you numbers showing just how much of a commute you can expect from rooftop generated hydrogen, and it isn't very much, and how in a typical city, there just isn't enough rooftop space to handle everyone's needs.  You've yet to show where my math was wrong.

 

[Ace-Garageguy]

13 hours ago, Richard Bartrop said:

...As for real science and the big picture, I've already gave you numbers showing just how much of a commute you can expect from rooftop generated hydrogen, and it isn't very much, and how in a typical city, there just isn't enough rooftop space to handle everyone's needs.  You've yet to show where my math was wrong...

Hmmm. I just read through your posts in this thread and didn't see those numbers...but I can tell you for a fact that in the late 1990s Honda did a practical study using commercially available solar panels of a size compatible with the "average" suburban American residence, and they were able to produce enough hydrogen daily to fuel an efficient 4-passenger car for an "average" daily commute.

NOTE: I don't have the study readily available as I'm in the process of moving my home, office, studio and shop 2000 miles west, but at the time my engineering consulting company was a dues-paying corporate member of the Natural Gas Vehicle Coalition. I was heavily involved, and stayed current on every facet of alt-fuels, alternative and "green" energy, the power distribution grid and infrastructure, adsorptive onboard storage of both compressed natural gas and hydrogen, etc. At the time I was appalled at the amount of hot air expended in the field versus the amount of constructive action...one of the reasons I withdrew my support from the group. Nothing much has changed. The rebleaters rebleat, politicians posture and pontificate, and the major corporations and the media get most everything wrong.

Solar panels have become significantly more efficient since then, and optimization of IC engines to burn hydrogen has also made significant improvements in mileage/power output, which is fuel efficiency. So I'll go with Honda's results, thanks.

And from my perspective and experience, I'd say that in a "typical city", a dense urban environment (like, ummm, NYC...where a lot of residents don't own vehicles anyway, and rely on public or hired transport), the amount of space for rooftop-hydrogen is a non-issue anyway.

EDIT: But don't get me wrong. I'm not opposed to electric vehicles in principle. There's plenty of room for a rational mix of technologies to provide transportation. What I AM opposed to, however, is the ignorant insistence that electrics will solve everything and make the world all puppies and rainbows and unicorns.

Edited April 24, 2021 by Ace-Garageguy
CLARITY and ACCURACY

[Richard Bartrop]

12 minutes ago, Ace-Garageguy said:

Hmmm. I just read through your posts in this thread and didn't see those numbers...but I can tell you for a fact that in the late 1990s Honda did a practical study using commercially available solar panels of a size compatible with the "average" suburban American residence, and they were able to produce enough hydrogen daily to fuel an efficient 4-passenger car for an "average" daily commute.

 

This thread right here.

 

[Ace-Garageguy]

18 minutes ago, Richard Bartrop said:

This thread right here.

 

I'll have to look up all the conversion factors, do the math, and check yours. It won't be any time soon.

But suffice it to say for now...IC engines can be powered from rooftop-solar-powered hydrogen plants, adsorptive onboard storage makes for longer range at lower pressures, and the IC engine sound and feel doesn't need to be a thing of the past. Frankly, that's all I really care about at this point as far as the energy debate goes. 

This is from 2010, all that I could easily find that was closely related to Honda's late 1990's work...

https://www.alternative-energy-news.info/honda-solar-hydrogen-station/

As of 2014, Honda also had a demo home with a solar array directly charging a DC-powered Fit, while running the rest of the house, with some power left over to dump on to the grid...

https://newatlas.com/honda-smart-home-energy-producing/31380/

 

[John1955]

On 4/23/2021 at 12:13 AM, peteski said:

There is an ideal application for an electric vehicle:  that small Postal Service Truck used by the mail carrier to deliver mail to the roadside mailboxes.  Those things drive slowly, don't drive very far, lots of stop/go driving (regenerative braking) and they return back to home base for overnight stay (perfect for recharging).  Also, less maintenance - most of the drive train is sealed, and no oil changes, etc. To me that would be a no-brainer.   Yes, I know, there is the initial expense of acquiring the fleet and ancillary equipment, but still . . .

 

I completely agree. In fact, there have already been several electric vehicles deliver packages to my home, not USPS though, but Amazon delivery vans. I assume that Amazon has charging stations at their hub which is near me.