Featured The Problem(s) with Battery Electric Vehicles (BEVs)

I foresee one day that replacing a battery in a BEV will be as simple as replacing them in a flashlight, the 12 volt starting battery in an ICE engine car or your smart phone.

Specific tool manufacturers use specific tool batteries incompatible with other makes, because selling individual specific batteries have a high profit margin. I always buy new tools with batteries and chargers included, even when I already have the particular brand.

 

same for cars. they don't want to 'standardize' batteries.

 

That will keep BEV.s a niche market.

Apple almost failed in the 1980's with their proprietary hardware and operating system.

IBM based PC's clones flooded the market with inexpensive clones using MS-DOS and later Windows. PC computers still dominate the business and home market..

 

bevs will stay niche until they are better and cheaper, or gasoline runs short.
standardized batteries won't help

 

But Apple takes most of the profit, and windows copied the GUI anyway.

 

They also recently crossed north of a trillion dollar valuation, still very much in the business of propietary hardware and operating systems.

I guess there is such a thing as a winning combination in that business. Remains to be seen if that can be repeated in electric auto batteries.

 

the longevity of batteries makes standardization unnecessary.

 

Manufacturers lock down failure/repair data so it's really hard to draw conclusions. The earliest model is a 2010 and they really haven't sold in enough numbers, in enough markets, in enough climates, etc. For most peop


Again, I love my i3, but be prepared to take the bus to work if it's your only car.

I'm not sure what lead you to believe I was making some sort of opinion statment or untested theory regarding failure models-- I wasn't. All of the current mass-market EV models do and have failed in exactly the manner I described.

False. The car goes into limp mode.

Also false.

Yeah. That's the problem.

all true, and very valid points

True. I keep it for the door lock problem 00 I believe this is mostly a problem in Teslas due to the lack of a physical backup, but I keep one just in case in the Beamer because the separation between HV and LV electrical systems is, at best, not fully thought-out.[/QUOTE]

 

Apple dragged for almost 20 years. It wasn't until the early 2000's that Steve Jobs came up with the I Pod and subsequently the iPhone.

 

A modular platform produced over many different manufacturers would bring down production cost in the economy of scale.

The best option would likely be the Tesla-Bolt type of platform, where the battery pack would be slit in on rails in the rocker panel area between the front and rear wheels.

 

I'm familiar with the history, but where are you going with that line of thought?

 

Standardization at this point would do nothing but kill innovation.
Which size/chemistry works best under different climates?
Which has the most longevity, which is the cheapest when produced to scale?

You can standardize outlets, but even there you have different companies that believe they have the better solution. Pick the 'wrong' one and you doom EVs, or at least slow their growth.

 

Then post some links to support your stance.

There is a physical back up for Teslas/

First, those tool battery packs have different cases and chargers, but they are all using standardized cells for the reasons you want a standard EV pack.

Why does an EV battery pack need to be simple to change? Teslas on the road are showing that the battery will last a long time with usable capacity. Shouldn't engines and transmissions be as easy to replace as the 12-volt. Like the battery, they will last the life of the car, but suffer wear along the way, and may fail at some point.

If you are using a lap top, the Model S and X literally use the same batteries as in it. I said before that the cells are pretty much standardized already in terms of format.The insides differ, but the technology is still advancing at this point. In time, all EVs will chose cells from a handful of choices.

I don't see the need for standard packs. Mainly because the packs are big, and they are designed to be part of the car's structure. Standardized packs will put limitations on what car designers can do, like the bulky hydrogen tanks in FCEVs. That could give results like the Prime's cargo area. Then the manufacturers won't go for it, for the same reason they aren't all using the same engine design. We don't even have a single starter battery, but dozens of different sizes and outputs.

 

Not to hijack the thread, but as an owner of a ‘14 PiP and a ‘16 Leaf (both models fully loaded), I have to agree that the Leaf interior is definite inferior to Prius, despite it being 2 model years newer. Not necessarily the design (though omitting telescopic steering is odd for a C$40k car before incentives), but lots of hard touch plastics, and fit and finish that is not as tight as with a Toyota. We have had issues with the upholstery coming undone in a couple places, both driver side doors need alignment, had issues eight ehr heated seats not working (fixed on warranty), and I can’t tell you how many times NISSAN has reminded or offered us oil changes.

As for the original topic of the the thread, I really think this is nothing more than FUD. As someone mentioned earlier, stats show that EV drivers are stranded much less frequently (percentage wise) than ICE drivers, which I have no doubt is related to the type of person shopping EVs; like more educated, responsible, and thoughtful. Also as mentioned, having an emergency truck with a battery to provide a boost does not seem all that complex or difficult, at least no more so than carry around a gas can. That said, in 24 years of driving, I have never once run out of gas, and I find it hard to believe how people can continue to do this, at least in urban areas they are familiar with...

 

I second this, as I experienced a traction battery failure in my 2nd Gen, and while the car was clearly upset and told me something was very very wrong, I could still drive it (painstakingly) for a couple days before I could get it to the garage, where my private mechanic rebuilt it with some used cells. It was slow, but it could get there, and of course you do not want to do this any longer than necessary. However, that experience of having the very heart of the vehicle failing - yet still did not strand the vehicle - left me in complete amazement of the engineering that went into this.

 

You mean like in ICE cars? Are there major assemblies such as engines, transmissions, exhaust systems, cooling systems, etc. in ICE cars that are "standardized and basically a "plug-in" replacement that can be used over a wide variety of makes and models"?

 

What's wrong with optimizing the process of using the mineral commodities we use to make the batteries? What's wrong with working out new chemistry that uses cheaper commodity inputs?

The whole problem with battery cars is that they aren't cheap enough for everyone to play with them and figure out how best to use them in society.

 

Along those lines, the Model S and X use the same batteries and I believe motors. Besides the improved cell type keeping the Model 3 fro using those packs, it is a smaller car. Using systems from a larger ICE car may not be suitable for the smaller one. The RX hybrid's V6 wouldn't fit under the Prius hood for example, along with the loss of efficiency.

This will come in time to all BEVs. There simply too few of them to be done. When it does happen, it will likely be a few standard packs for each manufacturer than for the entire industry. Like engines are now.

I have heard stories from the EV1 days of people getting their failing BEV home, charger, or to the dealer by sitting for a few minutes, and then driving for a short distance, then repeating. Really bad for the battery, but they weren't stranded in case of emergency.

The only limp mode I experienced wasn't really slow, but had really harsh shifting. A diesel out off DEF will eventually refuse to even start after awhile.

Then more cars are going to have electric parking brakes for weight savings. A dead 12 volt could mean any type of car can't be moved without brute force.

 

Good point.

Like solar panels, batteries would came down on the basis of the "economy of scale."

A generic battery would cut advertising and marketing cost. reducing the number of different individual items to carry in inventory would reduce vendor storage space and the stale "old stock" of low demand types.

 

Cut advertising and marketing costs? To my knowledge, no car manufacturer spends one dime on marketing or advertising their batteries.