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Author Topic: Death of the electric car  (Read 27245 times)

sheerline

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Death of the electric car
« on: April 02, 2009, 09:46:06 am »

I caught some of the tv documentary the other night called 'Death of the electric car'. The programme showed how governments, oil companies and car manufacturers have conspired to keep these vehicles OFF our roads. Despite successful development of these vehicles, they have engineered it such that the infrastructure surrounding the manufacture and production of oil driven transport is perpetuated as too much money and jobs is tied up in in the business.
 Most of the big car manufacturers have developed these cars and they were found to be highly successful but politics and big money have stamped down hard to prevent further development and production in favour of the hydrogen fuel cell technology which, the scientists on the documentary have stated is farfrom satisfactory and is years off from being fully workable.
General Motors were highlighted as having developed 80 cars which, having been given thorough road testing by businessmen and families alike, were found to be pefectly technologically sound useable machines, these were withdrawn and sent to the crusher despite strong protests and an offer to buy them.
All this has done is re-inforce my view that the governments of our developed nations are only interested in lining their pockets whilst lying to the populus and ripping them off for green taxes by instilling fear about climate change. No wonder there is a strong body which actually doubts the effects of climate change as caused by human activity, when the very people who want us to believe it and pay up, are actually keeping the technology and hardware to solve the problems from us.
This prog was a real eye opener, if it comes round again, make sure you watch it... I am surprised it wasn't squashed by the powers that be!
I am personally disgusted by the actions of the politicians, despite loving my engines, the smell and the noise, i would have an electric car tomorrow if i could afford one. I am not a tree hugging greeny by any stretch of the imagination but can you imagine the transformation of our quality of life should this technology ever truly come to fruition. It will mean a complete re-structure of lifestyle which I feel sure would be of great benefit to all.
By the way, they would cost a fraction to produce and operate compared to a normal vehicle as well as being clean,almost maintenance free and virtually silent. 
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Rex Hunt

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #1 on: April 02, 2009, 10:12:16 am »

I can see the Governments problem.


How xan they 'Tax' the motorist to fleecing point for using electricity?

It is easy when you add x% at the pumps. If you 'plug in' at hoime to recharge......how can they tell whether you are running your car/PC/ or growing pot?

On a 'green Issue'......how is the chargeing energy produced? Surely not by burning fossil fuels.....or using that nasty Nuclear power by any chance?

Cadmium based batteries?..........think of the toxicity of producing/scrapping those!


Inserting tongue firmly back inside cheek!

PS  What happened to the design for the water injection lean-burn engine developed immediately post WW2 and bought up by the petrol companies?

 %)

Rex
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dreadnought72

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #2 on: April 02, 2009, 10:19:25 am »

The video's on youtube. Part one. Part two.

Andy, tree-huggin' greeny
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nhp651

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #3 on: April 02, 2009, 10:37:48 am »

ALL governments in this sad world of ours are corrupt in one way or another.
I'm just amazed that you are all surprised when such articles finally hit the fan, so to speak. :(( :(( :((
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Damien

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #4 on: April 02, 2009, 11:29:11 am »

I received an online survey  on 31/3/09 on Electric vehicles and how much per month we are prepared to pay to recharge and whether or not i'd like 12mth or 2 year contract.

Do these corporate fool think we're all idiots ?  Where does the idea of contracts and monthly fees come from ?
Fuel producers or perhaps power companies looking to rip of customers.
I doubt any Mayhemers would believe that cars couldn't be charged from the household power outlet.
The Mobility scooters my wife and I ride  put our elec bill up $20 a quarter around 9 pound.

Yet another rip off by the mega rich corporations ?  Why not they get us for everything else.
Damien.
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sheerline

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #5 on: April 02, 2009, 11:44:56 am »

The batteries develped for these vehicles were originally invented by a scientist for precisely that purpose, they are the NiMh variety and are recycleable in a way which inferior ni-cads are not, so no toxic waste products to anything like the same degree. Gm bought the rights to production of the car batteries when they were building their cars, afer scrapping the cars, they sold 61% of the shares in the batteries to..... TEXACO! Now there's a company who really want to make batteries!
As far as power requirements for charging go, unless we see a reduction in world population or a massive drop in demand for power, the nuclear option is apparently (so we are told) the only one we have and if this is the case, there would be plenty of 'freely' available generatiing potential for recharging our transport. If that were dismissed, then another solution would be to switch off most of the uneccessary street lighting at night and use the available surplus to fuel our vehicles for the trip to work thenext day. If the government really wanted to make this work... THEY WOULD.
It doesn't surprise me that they take no action, nor am I amazed by the lack of it, or the manipulation which goes on in boardrooms to perpetuate polluting industries, I just get more angry about it. Is it any wonder we have the demonstrations going on around London right now? Although I don't agree with a lot of what is going on there, there are some very intelligent and enlightened people out there and some may know a lot more about the political manipulation of our lives than we do and thats why they are there.

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Hagar

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #6 on: April 02, 2009, 01:09:58 pm »

One of the Danish Power companies, DONG, have plans for electric cars, powered by batteries charged by wind generators at night. The plan also includes "filling stations" where you drive in over a pit, the battery is dropped out and a fresh one put in. Battery swapping. You only pay for the charge. (theres a catch some where, but havent foud it yet).
So In a windy land this could actually be a ggod idea, Charge the batteries up overnight when normal consuption is low.

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sheerline

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #7 on: April 02, 2009, 02:11:33 pm »

Hi Ian, that idea is one some friends and I already dreamed up, battery changing and charging could be so simple... and we are no experts! The lead acid battery would become a dinosaur with regard to motive power.... maybe yet another reason why the technology would be resisted.  don't think this kind of alternative automotive technology on the roads could or should be put into practice in an instant, the economy and industry is geared to oil. It should be slowly and steadily drip fed in so industry and society could adapt. It would make oil imports and dependancy on the middle east a thing of the past. 
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Subculture

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #8 on: April 02, 2009, 02:21:05 pm »

Tesla motors are a company doing big things with electric cars. Their roadster is already out, and now they have a Saloon car in the works. Twice as much boot space, with a 45 minute recharge time, and half the price of the roadster.

This is a company with much smaller resources behind it than the big car dinosaurs. I believe it will be the big technology companies that will really push home electric motive power- they have little to lose by leaving behind internal combustion, and plenty of money to invest.

Perhaps in the future we'll see a Google Zephyr on our roads!
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Ghost in the shell

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #9 on: April 02, 2009, 02:41:05 pm »

I can see the Governments problem.


How xan they 'Tax' the motorist to fleecing point for using electricity?

It is easy when you add x% at the pumps. If you 'plug in' at hoime to recharge......how can they tell whether you are running your car/PC/ or growing pot?

On a 'green Issue'......how is the chargeing energy produced? Surely not by burning fossil fuels.....or using that nasty Nuclear power by any chance?

Cadmium based batteries?..........think of the toxicity of producing/scrapping those!


Inserting tongue firmly back inside cheek!

PS  What happened to the design for the water injection lean-burn engine developed immediately post WW2 and bought up by the petrol companies?

 %)

Rex

probably from all of the above, and whats wrong with nuclear power??
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Eric65

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #10 on: April 02, 2009, 02:48:51 pm »

Electric cars really are an evolutionary dead end for the simple fact that they will never be able to run for long distances (anybody fancy driving from one end of the contry to the other in one?) without having very very long recharge intervals between.

The future is Hydrogen cars, the only discharge from them is WATER!
Not to mention the fact that we could not ever run out of the stuff!

Once they have sorted out the (not inconsiderable) issue of safely filling up at the pumps they will be on the road with Hydrogen pumps  appearing up and down the country.

These so-called 'enviromentally clean' dual-fuel cars are a rip off, the milage is nowwhere near as good as they claim and the toxins produced in the manufacture (and I'll bet disposale) of their batteries gives the lie.

Spare batteries at the filling stations???? Can you imagine the sheer size of the stockpile they would need to maintain!?!?
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Bartapuss

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #11 on: April 02, 2009, 03:20:23 pm »

Its politricks, Dude, people are people, in order for some to be the masters thousands of others must be peasants, we're all like sheep now happy in ignorant bliss still buying the rubbish which makes the masters even richer.  What about the countless factories which waste resources and energy churning out every sort of plastic junk you see in every seaside novelty shop and pound shops everywhere these days, those kids toys you see in almost every garden that never get played with and see unloaded at the tip every weekend.

Back to cars, imagine a world of today if you will without the motor car, I come along and propose the following:- every man & woman could have their own personal transportation machine, it would basically be a metal box on wheels powered by a noisy highly complex inefficient chemical reaction device which would use a unstable and highly flammable liquid as a fuel to power it along whilst giving off very poisonous fumes as a bi product. We could cut great swathes out of the country side and food growing areas of our world in order to provide purpose built paved routes for these machines to travel on from one metropolis to another, these transportation ways would be filled with such machines all heading in the same direction. We would have to alter our cities, towns and villages beyond all recognition to accommodate these devices and prvide them with passage and storage.
But what of the noise, the pollution and the chaos these contraptions would cause, Ah, I'd say, Think of the freedom of the open way and convenience to go where you will when you want to.
But what about the vast amount of resources and the manpower needed to implement such a plan not to mention the danger, you'd say.
I would go on to tell you that accidents would inevitably happen, many many people would die because the could not control their metal boxes properly and would crash into each other or some, especially the very young, would be killed by just walking out in front of the metal boxes without taking precautions, Ah, I'd say, Think of the freedom and convenience.

Imagine such a proposal in todays health and safety never mind suing culture, I'd be branded a lunatic, as stupid an idea as flying around in a airship full of hydrogen gas!!.  O0 {-) %%
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Subculture

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #12 on: April 02, 2009, 03:41:43 pm »

Electric cars really are an evolutionary dead end for the simple fact that they will never be able to run for long distances (anybody fancy driving from one end of the contry to the other in one?) without having very very long recharge intervals between.

I beg to differ- http://www.teslamotors.com/models/index.php
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sheerline

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #13 on: April 02, 2009, 04:08:52 pm »

As you see, it can be done! It's the blasted politics and money which are keeping the oily big boys from getting it into mass production on a grand scale. One day it will come, we adjusted to the internal combustion engine, we can and will have to adjust to the electric car and when we finally do, you will watch with amazement at how fast the technology will accelerate.... as well as the vehicles!!
So much for the scaremongering green issues and fuel taxes they levy to 'prevent' us from polluting the planet by using too much hydrocarbon fuels...the answer is right there! The small companies will kick start this, the big boys will see it begin to take off, then jump aboard.   Naturally, the government will make the taxation stick to it like glue, but they won't be able to use pollution as an excuse to keep jacking it up anymore.

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toesupwa

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #14 on: April 02, 2009, 04:12:03 pm »


On a 'green Issue'......how is the chargeing energy produced? Surely not by burning fossil fuels.....or using that nasty Nuclear power by any chance?


....and whats wrong with nuclear power??

Billions of $$$'s to put one together (NOT in my back yard), Billions of $$$'s to decommision, Billions of $$$'s to store the nasty stuff that comes out of them for hundreds of years afterwards (Not in my back yard)...

Give me an electric car that is charged by FREE wind power and can run around town without any polution... i would have one.  O0
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sheerline

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #15 on: April 02, 2009, 04:43:09 pm »

Toesupwa, whatever the source of your power, be assured it will NOT be free! The government will tax the wind and woe betide you if after the law is passed, you dare extract any energy from it by whatever means or for any purpose! I kid you not.
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Howard Q

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #16 on: April 02, 2009, 05:19:27 pm »

I don't know about the electric car but this year in the TT races on the Isle of Man they are running an electric motorbike in a demonstration race, supposed to be a conventional drive but using specially developed batteries, stories are that it is very quick but has a limited travelling distance, as the TT course is 37 3/4 miles on closed roads  it should be interesting to say the least. It will be like going back to the silent movies. this is not an April fool.  :police: :-))
Howard Q.
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sheerline

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #17 on: April 02, 2009, 05:29:50 pm »

The electric motorbike exists, I remember seeing something about this a while back. I wonder what prompted them to enter it in the Isle o Man, there must be some degree of confidence in there somewhere. Travelling distance may be limited and stops for a fresh battery pack may be frequent but if this operation has been honed to perfection, the stops could result in a lighting quick turnaround as the battery packs may be quick release  simply drop into a bretaining bracket. I do know that bike is pretty quick and it has no gears... just twist an scream!!!  This should prove exceedingly interesting to follow.
The only thing I will miss will be the blood curdling sound of the engines of course.
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Subculture

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #18 on: April 02, 2009, 06:20:48 pm »

Making windmills is all well and good, but what produces the energy to make the windmills in the first place, and would they recoup said energy in their working lifespan.

IMO solar energy is the main viable addition to nuclear power. If implemented in a correct way, it needen't blight the landscape, and the lack of moving parts means they can last a very long time.

Any new property built should have it's roof tiles made from solar panels, instead of conventional clay or slate tiles.

By the same token, a radical change in lighting domestic properties- the switch from incandescent lamps to LED based lighting would release a very large burden from the national grid.

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Umi_Ryuzuki

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #19 on: April 02, 2009, 06:27:38 pm »

Due to the increase use of the Toyota Prius the local government here is
considering adding a surcharge to the registration fee of hybrid and fuel efficient cars.

Apparently they are using the roads without paying the proper amount of fuel tax at the pump.

 %)
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Malcolm Reade

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #20 on: April 02, 2009, 07:03:09 pm »

I'm just glad that I drive a 3.5 Litre 4x4...

Maybe the tree huggers will get clobbered for tax next, instead of me?  {-) {-)

Malc


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sinjon

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #21 on: April 02, 2009, 07:30:58 pm »

I want an electric car with a FLJ Ferrari sound module - please.

Colin
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funtimefrankie

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #22 on: April 02, 2009, 08:45:57 pm »

If only Diana were still here, it would be Oh so different.
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sheerline

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #23 on: April 02, 2009, 08:55:25 pm »

Umi, a normal person couldn't dream it up !! Where shall I send the rope? Sounds like your people around there could put it to good use!
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malcolmfrary

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Re: Death of the electric car
« Reply #24 on: April 02, 2009, 08:59:14 pm »

Electric cars really are an evolutionary dead end for the simple fact that they will never be able to run for long distances (anybody fancy driving from one end of the contry to the other in one?) without having very very long recharge intervals between.

I beg to differ- http://www.teslamotors.com/models/index.php
Following that link I was reminded of the early Sinclair adverts - totally accurate while being as optimistically misleading as possible in the interest of future profit.  The recharge time quoted is for 80% of the shortest range battery.  The range quoted is for a larger, and presumably more expensive battery.  The prices quoted are for the smallest battery, and as for estimated battery life, ROFL.
The world is still full of snake oil salesmen.  Not every journey can be entirely downhill.
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