The Tesla Thread

So.. The car.

I've wanted electric for a while, I know it will suit my driving with long enough range. I've been able to afford a leaf for quite some time, but I can afford a Honda Jazz too, doesn't mean I'd buy one. I have an AUDI S6 now, I want something that puts a big grin on your face. I covet my friend's model S but I cannot afford one of those, even second hand.

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The car had to look pretty for me to order, I don't like the "this is an electric car" look, I think Tesla have it about spot on. The nose is a little weird from some angles, I guess it's hard to design a car to people's tastes that doesn't need a grille. It might grow on me, it might look better with a numberplate in it, maybe I will plastidip a matte black patch there. But I do think it's a pretty car as it is now.

It needs to be quick, the base model is probably going to match my S6.. tick. I'll get the dual motor if I can afford it, but I'd be quite happy with the standard RWD model.

Interior, hmm, not a fan of the LCD panel screwed to the dash. I'm pretty sure the speedo tacked onto the top left of that as an overlay is a cover-up for the event. Elon has tweeted that the steering wheel was nothing like what they have planned and the real one is like a spaceship, so maybe HUD or an LCD in the wheel? It's not going to be self driving only, it wouldn't have those performance stats if that were the case.

The tech, this is where Tesla is whooping the industry IMO, the big screen and OTA updates are great, It might even stop the in car entertainment systems from getting obsolete like they always seem to on regular cars. But there's other attentions to detail they get right, like being able to set the car to any temperature remotely via the app, great to heat or cool the car off the house's power before you get in it. The Leaf has this but for some inexplicable reason you can only set it to 26C, poor execution. I'm aware other high end brand's have this feature done right.

I like Tesla's approach to the throttle/brake with respect to re-gen, having an unpolluted brake pedal is comforting. I really like the thing they put on the screen where you would expect an RPM gauge, I hope that makes it to the '3.

So, that's why I've put a deposit down, and I do intend to buy one when my turn comes up.
 
I suppose when you have no sensible response to counter my arguments, calling me stupid, silly or ignorant is much simpler.

My "extreme example" was just working out the logistics of the proposed "extreme example" of charging a Tesla battery to 80% in 5 minutes. I didn't give the example, I quantified it. But hey, if you can't be bothered to understand that, why should I bother engaging with you?

In fact, in a thread where people have claimed EVs will be powered by batteries that weigh 1.25kg, and that it would be easy for most homes in the UK to get 400v 3 phase power supplies, why have you singled me out as giving extreme examples to support my argument?
 
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I'd love an electric car when my current diesel lump needs replacing.

I currently only commute ~10 miles to work a day but we travel around 150-200 miles every couple of months so the current batch of EV's just don't have the range and the S is way out of my price range.

Something like the Model 3 would be ideal for me, even on our longer runs the range would be fine with a quick motorway top-up to avoid any nervous moments at the end of the journey!
 
Skeeter said:
I suppose when you have no sensible response to counter my arguments, calling me stupid, silly or ignorant is much simpler.

My "extreme example" was just working out the logistics of the proposed "extreme example" of charging a Tesla battery to 80% in 5 minutes. I didn't give the example, I quantified it. But hey, if you can't be bothered to understand that, why should I bother engaging with you?

In fact, in a thread where people have claimed EVs will be powered by batteries that weigh 1.25kg, and that it would be easy for most homes in the UK to get 400v 3 phase power supplies, why have you singled me out as giving extreme examples to support my argument?
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The specific example I was giving relates to your claim that we would need 765,000 super charging points to support EVs replacing ICE vehicles (although there are plenty of other examples as you highlight).

It's a particularly good example because either:
a) You don't understand that most people wouldn't be using super charging points the majority of the time. Therefore, your calculation is meaningless and shows a level of understanding of the topic low enough that your opinions shouldn't be taken seriously.
or
b) You were attempting to use that calculation and figure to purposely mislead, which is close to trolling.
 
Or c) I was doing a worked calculation to quantify a point originally made by Raymond Lin.

Which you have deliberately ignored in order to have a pop at me.

Both Raymond Lin and I did suggest a more accurate level of calculation could be done to see how much "range" people use per day and convert that to charging, but nobody seemed bothered about it, and preferred to just continue blindly making wild claims and calling me an idiot.
 
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Trifid said:
Swapping 500KG of batteries will not be a quick and pain free task.
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Which is why you'd have a machine do it. It's already possible to have a machine do a battery swap on an EV that's designed for it.

Here, for example, is the one from Better Place. It takes ~90s to do the swap.


A small battery on that one...so here's the one from Tesla doing a swap on a Model S.


93 seconds from stopping to driving away, which is comparable to refueling an ICEV.

So it can be a quick and painless task, if it's done right. You don't even need to get out of the car.

In addition, it is likely that at some point in the not too distant future one of the dozen or more battery prototypes will actually work at scale outside of a lab, which will reduce the size and weight of batteries with a given storage capacity. But battery swapping can be done quickly and painlessly with very large batteries weighing hundreds of kilos, as long as it's done by a machine.

The issue isn't being able to do it. The main issue is that either EV batteries will have to be standardised or the machines will have to be able to detect and change different batteries correctly. Also, someone will have to build battery stations - at least a couple of battery swapping machines, battery storage facilities, battery charging facilities and all the connections between them.
 
We have covered the issues with battery swapping and also the issues with the prototype high energy density battery technologies/battery scale previously in this thread.
 
Skeeter said:
The issue with battery swapping, is you still need to charge the batteries.

It takes the charge time issue away from the end user and gives it to the station instead. The capacity is still limited by the electricity feed and charging capabilities of the station.

The effective throughput of the station is exactly the same as a station of Super Chargers.
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I disagree. The theoretical maximum throughput is, but that's not the same thing. A setup in which batteries are charged in the car is only in use while a car is in the charger. A setup in which batteries are swapped and charged in the charging station can be charging batteries 24/7 if required.
 
That is what I meant, theoretical throughput. You can't take the 90 second swap time and just extrapolate it.

If you have a Super Charger station with 2 chargers, and a battery swapping station with 2 chargers, at 30 minutes per charge both stations have a maximum throughput of 4 cars per hour.

So to the user it may look like 90 seconds to swap a battery, but thats just because the delay has been pushed lightly further up the chain. Given the complexity and cost of battery swapping, it would be more viable to just put as many Fast/Super Chargers in a station as the electricity feed can supply, rather than go to the effort of setting up a battery swapping station for no overall gain.
 
Skeeter said:
That is what I meant, theoretical throughput. You can't take the 90 second swap time and just extrapolate it.

If you have a Super Charger station with 2 chargers, and a battery swapping station with 2 chargers, at 30 minutes per charge both stations have a maximum throughput of 4 cars per hour.

So to the user it may look like 90 seconds to swap a battery, but thats just because the delay has been pushed lightly further up the chain. Given the complexity and cost of battery swapping, it would be more viable to just put as many Fast/Super Chargers in a station as the electricity feed can supply, rather than go to the effort of setting up a battery swapping station for no overall gain.
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You also can't take the theoretical maximum and apply it to reality.

I'll carry on with the little battery station you've used as an example.

Charge in situ station first:

0800 2 cars come in. Station is now effectively closed for 30 minutes.

0815 Another driver would like to charge here, but can't. Now they have to wait 45 minutes to charge. Hope they don't have anything else they wanted to do. Probably not. It's not as though anyone would ever want to refuel their car if they cared about when they reached their destination.

0830 The waiting driver charges. The other charger is unused.

0930 One charger in use.

1015 Both chargers in use, so station effectively closed again. Of course, there's an app for that. Two drivers who would have used this charging station know from the app that it can't be used at this time. They go somewhere else or cross their fingers about having enough range left.

1100 One charger in use.

1230 Bit of a rush. There are 5 drivers who want to use this charging station. Of course, 3 of them can't. One waits for an hour to get their charging done. The other 2 decide they'll drive to a different charging station that's almost on their way and hope they can use that.

1300 One charger in use for the person waiting. One unused.

1430 One charger in use.

1600 Both chargers in use. The drivers have a coffee and a chat and exchange phone numbers while their cars charge.

1730 4 drivers want to use this charging station. The 2 who can't decide that with care they can reach home and charge overnight.

That's a throughput of 15 cars in the day. 13 drivers waited 30 minutes. 1 driver waited 45 minutes. 1 driver waited 60 minites. 6 drivers who wanted to use the station couldn't and had to find some other solution.

Exactly the same pattern of use with the swapping station:

0800 2 cars come in.

0815 Another driver comes in and swaps their battery. Obviously the station wouldn't only have 2 batteries. That would be silly. It has 4 batteries available.

(by 0830, the station is back to 3 fully charged batteries. By 0900, it's back to 4).

0930 One swapper in use.

(by 1000 the station is back to 4 charged batteries)

1015 Both swappers in use. Two other drivers have to wait 90 seconds to refuel. They don't care.

(by 1045 the station is back to 2 charged batteries)

1100 One swapper in use.

(by 1115 the station is back to 3 charged batteries. By 1145 it's back to 4)

1230 Bit of a rush. There are 5 drivers who want to use this battery station. 2 of them have to wait 90 seconds. The 5th has to wait for 31.5 minutes!

(by 1302 the station is back to 2 batteries. By 1332 it's back to 4)

1430 One swapper in use.

(by 1500 the station is back to 4 batteries).

1600 Both swappers in use. The drivers don't get to have that coffee and a chat. Maybe they'll use Grindr or Tinder or something.

1730 4 drivers want to use this station. 2 have to wait for 90 seconds. They don't care.

That's a thoughout of 21 cars in the day. 16 of the drivers had to wait for 90 seconds. 4 of the drivers had to wait for 3 minutes. 1 had to wait for 31.5 minutes.

Actual throughout is extremely unlikely to be the maximum theoretical throughout and when it isn't the swapping station should have a higher throughput and provide much better service (note the waiting times).

If EVs had comparable convenience and cost to ICEVs, a lot more people would want to use EVs. It does make a difference.
 
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I totally agree with what your saying. If you move the inconvenience away from the drivers then their impressions of EVs dramatically increases.

The point I'm making is that to those people who use battery swapping as a way to try and say that charging drops from 30 minutes to 90 seconds are conveniently forgetting that the issue of charging doesn't go away, it just moves to someone/somewhere else.

As you have shown, while EVs are in low volume and you are not operating Charging or Swapping stations at maximum throughput, using a Swapping system saves time for the majority of users. However, once you get to higher EV usage and start hitting the limit of throughput the savings start to vanish.

There will people people who are lead to believe that battery swapping at 90 seconds means you can do 40 cars an hour throughput (with a single swapper). As you have shown that is not the whole truth. Battery swapping isn't going to allow EVs to break out of being a niche.
 
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What about if the station has two batteries already in stock charged... Sound like that model might be priced to cover the infrastructure and stock which could make it quite expensive but useful to long distance drivers. Drives more sense to the charge at home mentality.
 
There are always issues. A mix of swapping and charging would probably be the best approach, although I agree that EVs will remain a niche unless there are major improvements in all the key areas: generation, distribution, "refueling" (however it's done) and battery charge to weight ratio (in a way that's practical at scale and is safe).
 
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