mmarshall

Welcome back to Car Chat, Hameed. Haven't seen you post much lately.

bitkahuna

iTrader: (20)

i think bmw says electrification is overhyped because tesla has most likely eaten into a lot of bmw sales.

mmarshall

One big potential problem with pure-electric vehicles, that few seem to be concerned about (or maybe even aware of), is what would happen if a hostile country or organization were to succeed in hacking or shutting down a large part of the nation's electric and/or power-generating systems. Not only would it affect electric-recharging, but (possibly) even operation of conventional gas stations and gas pumps.

bitkahuna

iTrader: (20)

same can be said for communications, transportation in general, water, food, etc. that's one of the things the NSA does... working to harden critical infrastructure.

about electricity specifically, the more solar we can deploy, the better off we'll be. unless hackers turn off the sun.

mmarshall

I potentially agree on the solar-generation, although the traditional problems of clouds, night, varying sun-angles, protection of the solar panels from storms, and inadequate electric-storage in batteries/capacitors will need to be adequately addressed.

Hameed

Thanks! Photography as a hobby took over my life (as opposed to car modding) and that's the main reason. I share my images (mostly landscape and architecture) on Instagram if you're interested in seeing what I've been up to @SilverGS is my account on Insta

winterturb

Many Tesla’s are coal driven cars as it’s coal that generates the power they run on. The efficiency and pollution produced running electric is not even close to what diesel cars are. Dieses are far more environmentally friendly when all things considered. That does not negate the wonderful driving experience and technological marvels Tesla cars are. Green they are not.

LeX2K

A gas pump won't work without electricity so this is not a "big potential problem with pure-electric vehicles" it is a problem in general. On major advantage to a BEV is you can have a home charging solution you're never going to have a petrol refinery in your house. BTW if the entire grid was shut off for even a week society would completely break down not being able to gas up or charge your car would be the tip of the iceberg.
This is the correct answer.

On Diesels, they are a dead market and horribly polluting VW didn't cheat their *** off for the fun of it.

rogerh00

The key sentence in the article to me is...."While internal combustion engines are set to remain at BMW for a while, their portfolio will shrink drastically."

So what fills the gap?

UDel

I believe gas stations have ways of retrieving gas without using electricity/electric pumps, you can use manual pumps to get the gas, the gas can be taken directly from the delivery trucks too if there is a major electrical problem to fuel people's cars, it would be a pain but not the same as a power outage for electric vehicles where they simply won't get recharged unless you use generators for electricity which run on gas and will take forever to charge a electric car.

peteharvey

EV's use much more rare earth metals than conventional ICEV's.

I think EV's are great and certainly the way to the future just like the very first dSLR in the 1999 Nikon D1 digital camera with 2.7 megapixels retailing for US$5,000 at that time.
It wasn't until 2003 that Canon released the world's very first high volume mass production dSLR in the 300D/Digital Rebel at an affordable US$900.

Likewise, we need a good quality EV at an affordable price, before EV's can replace ICEV's, just like the Canon 300D/Digital Rebel replaced the Canon 35 mm Kodak/Fujifilm cameras.

Apart from prices, present issues with EV's include battery range, recharge points, recharge times, battery degradation/longevity, overall weight and its effect on performance/efficiency/braking/handling, plus of course matching a good EV battery-electric motor driveline with a good quality interior and benchmark Toyota Motor Corp long term reliability - the latter two things which a young upstart like Tesla has absolutely no experience with.


Might be only me, but I'm still very sceptical about the degradation/longevity of the batteries.

The battery degradation over mileage is generally favorable, with mileage not heavily affecting degradation - but of course, it is still too early to tell at this point in time, due to the few number of years that Teslas have been on the market.





However, the degradation over time is still a worry.
Presently, the Tesla batteries just haven't been on the market for long enough to prove how quickly they degrade, and how long they will last - as Allen's linked graph shows below.
Only time, and a full 10 years on the market, will show us how a Tesla battery truly degrades over time.
In the graph below, most of the vehicles have only been on the market for 2 years.
Early adopters do so at their own risk.





Below is a graph of how a typical lithium ion 3.6 V battery degrades over time.
Notice how after a certain point in time, the battery's degradation quickly accelerates?
Point being that the Tesla batteries just haven't been on the real world market for long enough to determine how long it really lasts...





Below is a graph of how battery degradation and longevity is affected by high speed charging and high speed discharging.
The more quickly we recharge/discharge a battery, the more quickly the battery degrades, and longevity is diminished...

riredale

I'm trying to think where I read a comment from a VW owner just the past week. He had one of the cheating VW diesels (which he said was a terrific car, by the way) and that after VW updated the computer code to eliminate the cheating the only real effect he noted was a slight reduction in fuel mileage, from 50 to about 45. This is from memory and I was tired late that night but got the distinct impression that fixing the cheating software resulted in a still-pretty-good engine.

mmarshall

Good point. What VW did was clearly wrong (and should answer for it), but, unlike some others here, I never did think that it was a massive-scale crime.....it was actually more of a case of Ferdinand Piech's arrogance, disdain for procedures, and classic mismanagement of the company. Yes, it did have somewhat of an effect (mostly minor) on mileage and emissions, but, in my view, most of us face air pollution from countless different sources every day, and also in my view, one should not own a vehicle if one is going to balk at the cost of filling it up.

GS3Tek

iTrader: (8)

I didn't check the numbers, but i3 and i8 are not doing well?

LeX2K

Tesla uses a unique chemistry, cell arrangement and battery management making degradation a non issue I guess some people have a hard time accepting that. On storage reduction over time/mileage an ICE has the same problem as it wears mileage and power go down. And you have to worry about engine oil changes, transmission failures, exhaust systems rotting out, emissions system issues which can be very costly on some models.