Re:The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter
by tomjakubowski on Sunday December 25, 2022 @03:52AM
(#34125516)
PHEVs really seem like the best of both worlds. What's the downside?
[ Parent
| on HN ]
Re:The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter
by nottorp on Sunday December 25, 2022 @04:42AM
(#34125711)
Costs. Complexity. You have a large battery, a gasoline engine with a transmission and 2+ electric engines in a PHEV. And they all need maintenance in the long run.
This will be hopefully mitigated when all PHEVs only run the gas engine as a generator and get rid of the transmission, but I don't think we're there yet.
Re:The cold hard truth about electric vehicles in winter
by Dylan16807 on Sunday December 25, 2022 @11:57AM
(#34128746)
> This will be hopefully mitigated when all PHEVs only run the gas engine as a generator and get rid of the transmission, but I don't think we're there yet.
If it's cheaper then they'll do it.
More generally, you can remove a chunk of the transmission in a hybrid and use a simpler engine even if it's not a generator. The complexity isn't a big deal. And the moderate cost gets offset by significant fuel savings.