Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly

Re:Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly by GW150914 on Saturday September 01, 2018 @08:55PM (#17894802)

In the case of digital cameras, the driving forces were varied, from governments wanting better means to spy and drop bombs, the film industry looking for a replacement tech, dedicated hobbyists seeing the benefits and getting on board. I can think of two parallels in electric vehicles, namely high performance applications which love the insane torque, low center of gravity, and diminished complexity compared to something like a twin-charged ICE. The other is long haul trucking, which would love to stop paying for diesel. In the former case its still incredibly expensive and often matched with an ICE, and the latter requires much more range and a lower price per unit.

Hopefully you’re right, and those driving forces will parallel the adoption of digital cameras. If so however, it’s going to be gradual barring some kind of miracle breakthrough battery tech.

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Re:Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly by gbear605 on Saturday September 01, 2018 @11:26PM (#17895374)

Another driving force, perhaps the biggest driving force, is ecological. A very significant fraction of people today would, all else equal, choose electric cars over gasoline for the benefit to the environment. And all else is gradually becoming more equal. As you implied, the biggest remaining hurdle is the battery size. But for many people, it’s already good enough, and for many of the rest it will probably be shortly.

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Re:Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly by GW150914 on Sunday September 02, 2018 @03:09AM (#17895992)

We’re not in this position because most people give a real crap about the ecological impact of their actions. They want to make a difference only when it doesn’t entail giving anything up. If you think that enough people will buy into electric cars for high minded reasons to make a difference, just how do you think we got into this situation to begin with? Do you really think the average American, Russian, Chinese or African person cares more about their environmental impact, or a cheap, fast, car? The evidence strongly points one way. People won’t even stop flushing wet wipes because it’s mildly inconvent for fuck’s sake.

Until the average electric car is at least as useful and no more expensive than the average ICE car there is no contest. That might be a good argument for imposing the cost of the externalities of ICE on people, but without that, dream on. “Good enough” isn’t what a “significant” fraction of people today give a shit about, unless they’re paying less for it.

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Re:Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly by leetcrew on Sunday September 02, 2018 @02:46AM (#17895938)

i would consider buying an electric car if it were as fast as my hot hatch, had comparable range, and weighed less than 3000 lbs. i doubt that will happen for quite some time.

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Re:Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly by udfalkso on Sunday September 02, 2018 @07:36AM (#17896624)

Why is the weight of concern to you?

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Re:Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly by sokoloff on Sunday September 02, 2018 @07:49AM (#17896652)

Not prior poster, but mass is detrimental to almost every aspect of the driving experience. Heavy cars accelerate slower, brake longer, turn worse, and wear tires more quickly than an equivalent car that's lighter.

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Re:Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly by ecpottinger on Sunday September 02, 2018 @11:08AM (#17897230)

By that logic the Tesla cars would be losing all the races, but they does not - they win.

Did you consider that your experience with ICE cars does not apply directly to BEV cars?

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Re:Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly by sokoloff on Sunday September 02, 2018 @11:15AM (#17897260)

What are these track events that Teslas are winning? They're horrible track cars. A plain Jane 911 will walk all over them on a road course.

https://www.quora.com/How-does-a-Tesla-perform-on-a-track

https://insideevs.com/expected-tesla-model-s-fails-lap-nurbu...

http://www.thedrive.com/news/5207/this-video-reminds-us-that...

To be clear: I think the Model S is a fine, if overpriced, road car. I daily a LEAF and like it; I am no electric hater.

However, performance of all-battery cars is compromised as compared to lighter cars; it's that pesky physics thing...

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Re:Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly by freehunter on Sunday September 02, 2018 @11:33AM (#17897319)

A "plain Jane" $200,000 purpose-built track car will easily beat a $100,000 electric luxury car, that comes as a huge surprise to absolutely no one.

https://www.motortrend.com/news/tesla-model-s-p85d-drag-race...

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Re:Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly by leetcrew on Sunday September 02, 2018 @12:38PM (#17897548)

no, a base 911 is about $30,000 cheaper than the fastest model s and will easily wreck it on a track. the tesla can certainly beat it in a drag race, though.

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Re:Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly by sokoloff on Sunday September 02, 2018 @11:38AM (#17897342)

> A "plain Jane" $200,000 purpose-built track car will easily beat a $100,000 electric luxury car

A plain Jane 911 is neither $200K nor a purpose-built track car.

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Re:Electric Vehicles’ Day Will Come, and It Might Come Suddenly by leetcrew on Sunday September 02, 2018 @12:44PM (#17897566)

massive acceleration in a straight line gets old really fast, and you can't legally enjoy such a car on public roads. any performance oriented car over $25k already has too much power to fully appreciate this way. once a car is "fast enough", weight is the single most important factor for real world driving enjoyment.

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