Thread: EV Landcruiser

Originally Posted by goingbush

I can tell you have never driven an Electric car , if you had you would say Toyota will give battery tech a real shove, that where the improvements need to new made. Motor and driveline is a no brainer. Bollinger have that sorted.

In wheel motors are not going to happen on anything except bicycles.. too much unsprung weight .

I have driven various electric vehicles especially in underground mines etc not a lot, just a few and have always been impressed. BTW all of the big haul trucks in open cast mines are electric, it's just that they also carry a dirty great big gensets with them. All of these units work with in-wheel motors and planetary gearboxes. Sure the suspension design is not weight dependent but the ability of these systems to offer great traction distribution at all speeds is just glorious.

Have a look at what they are doing with pancake servo motors, the jumps these things have made in the last 20 years with regards to increased torque and weight reduction is thoroughly impressive and while not ready at the moment it won't be long before they will do the job, perhaps not enough for a high speed roadster but certainly for Landcruiser / Defender / GWagon application. If you consider the energy saving of deleting diffs and inherent traction benifits some clever engineering boffin will sort it out.

Cheers Glen

Originally Posted by goingbush

some light reading on the topic, from different viewpoints


Do Gasoline Based Cars Really Use More Electricity than Electric Vehicles Do? | Council on Foreign Relations

The 6 kWh electricity to refine gasoline would drive an electric car the same distance as a gasser?

Refining oil requires more electricity than EVs | PluginCars.com

BTW Im not a Green or a Vegan , far from it , Ive even pulled the EGR / DPF from my Iveco 4x4 .

I converted my LandRover to 100% electric purely as a project & to learn the tech. Its 100% free to run of my solar array, I charge about once every 3 -4 days . 100km of local running about per charge. Its the best driving experience Ive had , 100% torque for zero RPM.

I did not do it for economical reasons either, The $22,000 cost of the conversion will recover itself from petrol savings in about 10 years , sooner if the price of petrol climbs. The batteries are good for up to 3000 charge cycles at 100% Depth of Discharge, = 300,000km or 10,000 charge cycles & 80% DOD = 800,000km absolutely free , 800,000km . At a petrol cost (todays price) $22 per 100km , 300,000km = $66,000

So in no way am I saying that we shouldn't go electric or that it is not inherently better than diesel / petrol, I've also followed your build post on the EV conversion to your land rover and think it's great, wish I have the garage space and time.

However I've read all three of your articles in full and even they admit that the maths is flawed in that it take all of the electricity used by refineries and divides it by the amount of gasoline produced. This doesn't take into account the diesel produced or the jet fuel or the kero or the lube oil or the bitumen etc. On the vehicle side you could get a light weight EV 30 miles on 7KwH but at what speed, up or down hill etc all of these variables consume different amounts of energy.

Apologies for the vegan remark, I've just had a vegan in my life telling me that they only started making cakes with eggs in the 1850's. Perhaps I should have used the term Cafe Math instead of Vegan.
Those of you who didn't followed Hitchers guide to the galaxy Bistromatics | Hitchhikers | FANDOM powered by Wikia

Cheers Glen

Thanks for clearing the air Glen,

a bit off topic but I did some interesting testing yesterday.
results are not what I expected ,

I use more power to drive at 5kmh in low range (7.5 Amps ) than in 3rd gear high range (5 Amps).
on a smooth flat road

to maintain a steady speed staying in 3rd
5 A = 5kmh , 10A = 10kmh 15A = 15kmh 25A=20 kmh 40A=30kmh 100A= 60kmh

In 4th gear you can easily maintain 80kmh at 100 Amps, 100kmh 150 Amps, 125kmh 300 Amps

that might look interesting in a graph but looks like 15kmh in 3rd gear is the most efficient speed , obviously where aerodynamic co-efficient does not come into play.

Thanks for being generous again apologies for the inference.

As for the amps, my guess is that the higher speed of the gear sets in the transfer case are consuming more power as it churns thru the oil.
Don't know what the specs are of your motor are but it would burn a bit more power at higher speeds.

Cheers Glen

Originally Posted by Mick_Marsh

At the moment, brown coal is way cheaper than solar.

That's true, until you have to replace the power station (same issue as with solar panels, they need to be replaced). The governments sold the assets due to this issue. Or get charged for the pollution (same issue with solar panels).

Originally Posted by bsperka

That's true, until you have to replace the power station (same issue as with solar panels, they need to be replaced). The governments sold the assets due to this issue. Or get charged for the pollution (same issue with solar panels).

In the past, it was not necessary to replace power stations. There were rolling refurbishments and upgrades. I (and others on this forum) were involved in them.
It's way cheaper to do this rather than demolish and rebuild. A concept lost on the short sighted.

We are currently demolishing brown coal power plants and trying to exist on inadequate wind and solar. Brown coal is still cheaper, as is reflected in our skyrocketing power bills.

If we are going to replace petrol and diesel with electric technology, we need to fix our electrical grid and, unfortunately, replacing the high capacity coal energy plants with miniscule capacity solar and wind ain't working.

Originally Posted by bee utey

The trouble is that you're shooting at a target with skates on, i.e. what's true today isn't going to be true on another day. Every solar panel and every wind turbine that's made and installed has a payback period at which it has returned the energy spent on construction. After that the device produces essentially zero cost emissions free energy. So every year energy production, transport, retail and manufacturing as a whole gets a bit cleaner. Do you want to analyse each and every individual car/shed/panel/turbine? Was it made on a cool, windy and sunny day or a calm summers night? Or are you happy to know the rate of progress of the system as a whole? Numbers for the latter are pretty easy to find, state by state, country by country.

This is a fascinating series of posts!!
Responding to a few thoughts raised:
* the modified Toyota is a 'mine special' - probably costs a motsa - but serves its purpose.
* the obvious solution to 'range' is PHEV - of which the turbine shown is an interesting development. One would need to look closer at the actual performance; my first guess is there would be turbine whine to be dealt with - but there wouldn't be the reciprocating motor vibration to deal with. I expect some manufacturer will grab this tech and run with it.
* Does it take 5kw (about 20 old-fashioned miles worth for a Tesla S) to generate an (old fashioned US gallon's worth) of fuel? That's debated. One partisan response is the claim is based on 'old data' and in fact refineries use their own fuel to produce fuel.
** I couldn't find a greenhouse or energy equivalent figure for that (!!)
*** wait - does that mean to produce a fuel that becomes a greenhouse gas when used we're already producing greenhouse gases?? Couldn't get any info on that one either.
* The infrastructure thing with EVs is not only 'supercharger network' - it's that once it's in, there's only wires and maintenance. There's no fuel station, underground tanks, tankers on the roads, tankers producing greenhouse gases to deliver fuels which become greenhouse gases ...
But! - when you park your car at home - your home is a fueling station.
* As to where the power comes from - well, my daughter is currently writing up her PHD on 'distributed generation' amongst other things re renewables - so - watch this space. Basically, massive single-point power-stations (coal or nuclear) are finished; cleaner gas-fired generators have a chance but we're selling our natural gas overseas under short-sighted arrangements.
* Finding an EV that can tow a 3T van somewhere remote - well... Ain't been done yet.
** the Jaguar I-Pace initially had no provision for towing; current version has a 750kg possibility (much sought-after in Norway, where Teslas are immensely popular and apparently towbars can be a deal-breaker), this is expected to be upgraded as the motor/batteries get their upgrades. Wading depth of the I-Pace is 50cm.

Upshot?
# EVs are coming (and self-drive, too)
# Off-road EVs - I'm 66 and I think I'll live to see them in ordinary use.
** It's not too hard to imagine our red centre peppered with combined solar/wind/battery off-grid charging points.
# Off-road EVs towing 3T vans? Hmm... I wonder.

I wish we were building EVs in our just-emptied car factories... and had a government that was future-focused, not leg-shackled to the past (and the big end of town). Sigh.

Taking my diesel-powered AWD and human-powered hand-winch for a 3000k trip next week. Oh, goody!

Phideaux.

I’m really looking forward to EV offering from Lucas.