Thread: The New Defender

That’s the kicker, the local servo each morning has vehicles lined up - at 5min per vehicle it can take 20 min to get fuel.

Can not see a promising business model that has a line of people waiting over an hour to plug in and then wait another 30min + to charge up.

Consider above that each vehicle would pull in the realm of 50+ amps whilst charging and you have some serious power requirements to provide.

A hybrid may be ok for urban dwellers, maybe even a full EV. Anyone else will be looking at ICE to be anywhere near practical.

In the next 10-15 years I predict all this is going to do is drive up both Power and Hydrocarbon fuel costs rendering increases to everyone’s Cost of living and lowering living standards.

I’m all for a cleaner footprint and better use of the planet - I’m not yet convinced this is the solution. No need to think it’s all about oil companies either - they can easily switch to Lithium/Graphite/Copper production and shift their business model.

The footprint of all this new infrastructure, generation, transmission, obtaining of resources, processing, reprocessing, recycling, decommissioning is enormous.

The inefficiency of the new tech, inconveniences and delays etc is severe. Home solar won’t keep up with vehicle charging - my vehicles aren’t home when the sun shines - so conversion to batteries and then transfer to another battery in a vehicle or mains supply to charge are the only options. Then how do I maintain charge through the day? I’d be hooked to an umbilical cord for an hour at least.

High capacity, ultra-light, fuel cells are the only tech remotely plausible to run the thousands of vehicles here alone.

I will never contemplate an option that has me sitting in a roadhouse for 30+ minutes, on a run to the city we do 8 hours in the chair. Trips often are done in a single day to meet appointments and then return home. Completely out of the question in an EV at the moment.

Originally Posted by scarry

There are over 100 service stations being built in Aus ATM.
Not one has any infrastructure to charge EV’s.

The comment was until around 15% of vehicles on the road are EV’s,we won’t look at charging outlets.

So we have a long way to go,before numerous charging points appear all over the place.

That is not just a couple here and a couple there,there will need to be thousands of them.

These future charging stations need a huge amount of power,so there will be a huge amount of infrastructure needed,free charging will be a pipe dream.

As they are now making good money from fuel,I can’t see any benefit in providing free power for EV’s.

Businesses aren’t silly,it’s all about $$.

And there is no way food and drink will cover the other costs.

A mate of mine has 13 garages,so I have a fair idea how they operate.

I asked a construction manager of a new service station if they are laying conduits/installing basic infrastructure for future charging points. He said nope...they’ll just dig it up in the future if there is to be a buck gained.

I don’t think your traditional servo will be the way forward for charging.

I believe Britain has solved that problem at a stroke by passing a law that all servos will have to offer EV charging points. It just takes a pro active government to make it happen.
EV banks will be off to the side and not obstruct conventional vehicles from refuelling. Fast chargers will cut the time.
Servo owners will put in more food outlets and supermarket type stores to make money from customers while they recharge.
This stuff is all easy to solve. It just takes initiative. Owners who take the initiative will gain new customers - the others will go broke. That's capitalism.

Originally Posted by scarry

There are over 100 service stations being built in Aus ATM.
Not one has any infrastructure to charge EV’s.

The comment was until around 15% of vehicles on the road are EV’s,we won’t look at charging outlets.

So we have a long way to go,before numerous charging points appear all over the place.

That is not just a couple here and a couple there,there will need to be thousands of them.

These future charging stations need a huge amount of power,so there will be a huge amount of infrastructure needed,free charging will be a pipe dream.

As they are now making good money from fuel,I can’t see any benefit in providing free power for EV’s.

Businesses aren’t silly,it’s all about $$.

And there is no way food and drink will cover the other costs.

A mate of mine has 13 garages,so I have a fair idea how they operate.

They’re mad. EV’s are coming.

Originally Posted by DiscoMick

I believe Britain has solved that problem at a stroke by passing a law that all servos will have to offer EV charging points. It just takes a pro active government to make it happen.
EV banks will be off to the side and not obstruct conventional vehicles from refuelling. Fast chargers will cut the time.
Servo owners will put in more food outlets and supermarket type stores to make money from customers while they recharge.
This stuff is all easy to solve. It just takes initiative. Owners who take the initiative will gain new customers - the others will go broke. That's capitalism.

I agree Mick. Heads in the sand seems to be the default position in this country. If I had the resources I’d open a chain of EV charging restaurants which served excellent food, instead of the odd insulting shrivelled dim sim and coffee milk rubbish we have to put up with at 99% of Oz roadhouses. ...in Italy you can get an excellent 3 course meal at a roadhouse. In the US it’s a diner, in Japan it’s a gourmet banquet. Australian roadhouses are primitive insults to our intelligence.

Originally Posted by SpudHeadTed

I agree Mick. Heads in the sand seems to be the default position in this country. If I had the resources I’d open a chain of EV charging restaurants which served excellent food, instead of the odd insulting shrivelled dim sim and coffee milk rubbish we have to put up with at 99% of Oz roadhouses. ...in Italy you can get an excellent 3 course meal at a roadhouse. In the US it’s a diner, in Japan it’s a gourmet banquet. Australian roadhouses are primitive insults to our intelligence.

Volume of population.

Plenty of population density to justify EV charging points around the East Coast coast. That's why high speed trains around the East Coast are also coming. Most of us huddle in cities on the coast, which justifies intensive infrastructure.

Originally Posted by DiscoMick

That's why high speed trains around the East Coast are also coming.

Yes for the last 50 years and not likely to actually happen in my lifetime or my reincarnated lifetime.