...or this

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Originally Posted by TB

It was referring to Homestar with his Land Rover Forward Control (“FC”) monstrosity. Hopefully you can be amused rather than offended. :)

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It literally just twigged, after all the FC was one of Holden's most beautiful designs [bigsmile1].

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Originally Posted by TB

It was referring to Homestar with his Land Rover Forward Control (“FC”) monstrosity. Hopefully you can be amused rather than offended. :)

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Yes, I was amused, not offended. :)

... the next Defender will be electric or hybrid. A 2018 Defender is looking very unlikely I reckon. It will 2020...and it will be radical.

see Disco Micks post here: Jaguar Land Rover goes hybrid electric

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Originally Posted by Zeros

... the next Defender will be electric or hybrid. A 2018 Defender is looking very unlikely I reckon. It will 2020...and it will be radical.

see Disco Micks post here: Jaguar Land Rover goes hybrid electric

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I think those will certainly be options, but they'll have to release a petrol model for the USA and a diesel model will still be standard for most other places, but being able to get other power train options would be a good thing.

Yes possibly a choice if power trains initially, but it sounds like a fairly rapid move to electric for JLR.

It will probably be ugly too 😜

I'm still not convinced it will happen like they plan. I posted an article earlier that shows lithium deposits will be exhausted in as little as 7 years if the current expansion of lithium batteries continues at its current speed. I think another leap in battery tech is needed first.

More accurately, known lithium deposits will be exhausted.

Known deposits of lithium are small relative to demand simply because looking for new deposits when existing deposits can supply demand is considered a waste of shareholders' funds. Because of the rapid increase in demand, there is likely to be a temporary shortage, but this will most likely be overcome relatively rapidly. You only need to look at the history of oil shortages to see what is most likely to happen. Despite being at least a decade past the predicted 'peak oil', we now find that producers are trying to limit production to prop up the price, as it seems more and more likely that we may have actually reached peak oil demand not supply.

But I agree with the need for another battery breakthrough - as promising as lithium batteries are, they simply do not have the capacity per dollar nor per kilogram that is needed to see electric vehicles become the dominant type, nor, in my view, is there sufficient potential left for them to gain this, despite all the rhetoric about the economies of scale - they are already being made on such a large scale that most of the economies are already in, although I don't rule out the possibility of improvements in manufacturing technology that will give significant improvements.

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Originally Posted by TB

If we could solve the challenges around electrical energy storage and delivery, I have no doubt that four wheels driven by four independent electric motors would be the absolutely best thing for off-road use. But even though I'm a clean energy advocate and I'm convinced that global warming is a very frickin real and present danger, the criticisms in this thread so far are not at all wrong.

I reckon electric vehicles will become the standard in cities where trips are short and infrastructure is dense. The biggest reason isn't global warming, it's to do with clean air and the advantages of automation.

Until we get some kind of break-through electric storage tech, extra-urban transport is going to be largely powered by liquid fuels which we either burn the same way we do today or perhaps catalyse directly into electricity in a future fuel cell. These vehicles will continue to emit gases.

Whether it's electric vehicles in cities or internal combustion engines in the bush, the real "green" issue is where the energy itself comes from. Fossil fuels are *the* problem, but wind and solar aren't even close to being *the* solution. I want to see modern (fuel efficient, clean, safe, reliable, low cost) nuclear replace the bulk of the world's energy supply, with wind/solar/hydro etc contributing in every place it makes sense for them to do so. Obviously nuclear heat can drive steam turbines to produce electricity. That heat also can be used to synthesise liquid fuels from renewable feedstock including from CO2 captured directly from the atmosphere.

I already own a baby Land Rover and I'm hoping to upgrade to a big one later on for touring our amazing country. My city car is currently a diesel Golf... but I have my eye on a Tesla 3.

Homestar... I LOL'd to see your comment about the ugliness of the electric truck coming from somebody with a pic of an FC in their sig. I'm presuming a dry sense of irony on display [biggrin]

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Nuclear clean energy??? There's a good one......

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Originally Posted by Colmoore

Nuclear clean energy??? There's a good one......

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Fusion?

Ok, that might be a ways off although there was a report in the last week the boffins think they've solved the containment issue.

Just need a bloody big Flux Capacitor!

It worked in an old Delorean.....[bigwhistle]

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Originally Posted by rick130

Fusion?

Ok, that might be a ways off although there was a report in the last week the boffins think they've solved the containment issue.

Just need a bloody big Flux Capacitor!

It worked in an old Delorean.....[bigwhistle]

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There's a really reliable nuclear fusion reactor only 150 million km away, and scientists have developed some clever collectors for the energy from it. Just need to get the storage and distribution finessed and we're good to go with 100% fusion power. [biggrin]