How to make electric vehicles audible?

[DiscoMick]

Apparently London's new electric buses are so quiet it is dangerous.

Futuristic sounds to make electric buses safer hit wrong note

https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...y_to_clipboard

[speleomike]

Hi

The bus should be proceeded by a person of British descent, walking in front of the bus, wearing a British Transport uniform with a red flag and loudly but clearly enunciating in an educated voice "Hear ye, hear ye, electric bus approaching. Route 9, Trafalgar Square to Green Park".

This would help provide many jobs to alleviate the unemployment, vision impaired persons would be able to hear and understand what is approaching, and it would attract overseas tourists to view the archaic procession like the guards of the palace.

Mike

[Homestar]

Wonder if those that have been hit or nearly hit were all wearing earbuds, or playing with their phones and not paying attention to the large red object approaching...

Maybe it’s a good way of teaching people to actually pay attention to what’s going on, take responsibility for their actions and stop blaming other things for their shortcomings? Might strengthen the gene pool a bit too if we let Darwinism back in and had that cull a few ****wits.

But we all know that will never happen.

[drivesafe]

The problem of electric vehicles being so quite that they pose a potential danger to pedestrians is not new.

A number of cities in the USA have been looking at this problem and are looking at having some form of warning of the vehicles approaching, when the vehicle is travelling at speeds of 25 MPH ( about 40 KPH ) or slower.

They found that electric vehicles travelling at speeds above 25 MPH had a similar noise level as many new petrol/diesel motored vehicles because of the noise generated by any vehicle’s tyres.

[gromit]

Same problem with AGV's in factories.
I visited a factory in Germany over 35 years ago and they had installed AGV's (early version following a wire set in the concrete floor). They used to 'beep' when they were close to something/someone, if it got too close it stopped.
The beeping quickly became annoying so they started to play music so you could hear it coming and get out of the way.

Maybe the buses need an automatic braking system so that when someone busy on their iphone steps in front the bus suddenly stops and all the passengers fall out of their seats.


Colin

[justinc]

The hissing crackle and popping sound of a Lithium cell thermal runaway ought to give ample warning of the proximity of an EV..😁

[mrs]

We are apparently getting some electric buses in Sydney, don't know if they are doing anything about noise, intetesting to see what they do.

[DiscoMick]

It's a similar problem to bicycles not being heard. I remember in Beijing you had to really watch for bicycles before stepping off the kerb.

[austastar]

Hi,
Years ago there were similar concerns wth the watercooled, shaft drive Velocete motorcycle. Letters to the papers were full of suggestions for bells or similar to warn pedestrians of their approach.
They were also used by the London Metropolitan Police, and acquired the nickname Noddy bikes.
Cheers

[theelms66]

Whats wrong with the clothes peg and playing card in the spokes . Worked a treat on my treadly.