Filmmaker examines demise of beloved electric car

Greeley Tribune ^ | March 27, 2008 | Chris Casey

[Dane]

When electric cars became available in California in the 1990s, he leased the EV1. "Within about 30 days of driving this car for the first time, I became an addict for electric cars. The principal reason was because they were so fast."

Ultimately, the knock against electric cars was that they don't knock, Paine said. While many things factored into the cars' demise -- from corporate and political pressure to tepid consumer demand -- the fact they don't require replacement parts is a major downfall, Paine said.

The combustible engine is revered because of its many moving parts, which keeps the lucrative back-end businesses of repair and replacement parts revving along, he said.

Now, however, with gas prices soaring and demand for fuel economy rising, automakers are returning to electric, he said. Vehicles that mix plug-in energy for the first 60 miles or so then kick into gas power for longer trips are gaining favor. Automakers "like it because it fits their business model" of still requiring repairs and service.

[The Great RJ]

Problem is the California electrical grid due to government meddling in the power business could simply not support the recharging of large numbers of electric cars.

[indianaconservative]

Maybe it was fast compared to one of today’s hybrids. The range on these cars was not very good either. You also had a long recharge time. There is no way anyone could take a trip farther than 300 miles without going longer than a day. I thought it would be good for work transportation but who wants to spend all that money then still need a gasoline car so that you can go on more distant trips.

[Jagman]

Yeah, it would go zero to 60 in 8 seconds — once!

[longtermmemmory]

he was probably driving a Yugo with a broken cylinder...

[khnyny]

Detroit needs to get with the program. Destroying the EV1’s was, imho, a dumb move. Dumb, but not unexpected.

Even if the EV1 had issues, why destroy all the cars?

[DuncanWaring]

...GM’s electric vehicle was powered at first by lead-acid batteries and later by nickle-metal hydride batteries, which did require replacement ...

I don't recall the replacement interval or cost, but at the time it worked out to $0.06 (six cents) per mile.

[rednesss]

I want one of these:

Check out the Tesla Roadster, top speed 125 mph. I only wish I had $100K to buy one.

From the Wiki article:

The Tesla Roadster is a fully electric sports car, and is the first car produced by electric car firm Tesla Motors. The car can travel 221 miles (356 km) on a single charge of its lithium-ion battery pack and accelerate from 0-60 mph (0–97 km/h) in 3.9 seconds with the development transmission. The Roadster's efficiency is reported as 133 W·h/km (4.7 mi/kW·h), equivalent to 135 mpg–U.S. (1.74 L/100 km / 162.1 mpg–imp). [2][3][4][5][6]

[QBFimi]

ping

[lakeman]

http://www.hybridtechnologies.com/

[gunservative]

The EV1 had a top speed of 80 mph, and took at least 9 seconds to accelerate from 0 to 60 mph. Not exactly what I’d categorize as “fast”.

I don't understand this sort of petty nitpicking. 80 mph is fast enough and 0-60 in 9 seconds was considered pretty fast even 25 years ago and is a relatively standard acceleration rate today. I'm sure it felt "faster" due to the quietness, a lack of torque steer, or not feeling a transmission changing gears.

GM didn't expect people to take the EV1 on a highway trip. It was meant as an in-town commuter.

No vehicle is going to please everybody, but gee whiz come on now......

[Bryan24]

Here’s what I don’t get. I’m a fairly technical guy, but I don’t know the answer to this.

Why can’t a car be built with the following features:

- Small, super-efficient gasoline (or diesel) engine designed to operate in a very narrow RPM band. At this RPM band, under load, it is very smooth and balanced.

- This engine turns a DC generator, which is connected to some of the newest Lithium-whatever batteries.

- The car is powered by DC electric motors only. The combustion engine never directly drives the vehicle.

- Add in regenerative braking to capture braking energy and convert it to battery charge.

- Plug-n-charge capability for night charging.

This could be a SUPER clean and efficient car. You only need a top speed of 70 mph or so, with a 4 passenger-max capacity.

Targets:
Curb weight at 2800 lbs
MPG at 60
Cost < than $20,000
Dual front and side airbags

People would line up for miles to buy these.

[Jagman]

Which is well over the 4.5 cents per mile for service AAA says is common for small ICE sedan in 2007.

[frankenMonkey]

I've wondered the exact same thing...
I suppose somebody's working on just that. And add a few solar cells to charge when parked.

[Wonder Warthog]

"Yes I know the filmaker is a leftist, but is his contention correct about the electric car motor?"

Simply put, no. An all electric car simply cannot match the driving range of an IC or hybrid. And no technology in the foreseeable future will allow them to do so.

[khnyny]

People would line up for miles to buy these.

Yes, they would.

I'm not an engineer, so I can't answer your questions, but sometimes it appears that there isn't a totally free market at work in the auto industry.

[DuncanWaring]

But then, depending on what you pay for electricity, the “fuel” cost would be anywhere from a quarter-cent to three cents per mile.

As I recall, a full charge was 13 kwh, and range was around 100 miles.

[Fundamentally Fair]

...combustible engine...

Credibility = 0

[Jagman]

But your point debunks the entire thesis of the movie, which is that the EV1 was pulled because it didn’t generate enough spare parts revenue. It generated MORE!

[Bommer]

If the article’s premise were true, why did Detroit let vehicles get away with 75k between tune-ups?

Probably because no one can afford the $300 to drop the engine just to change the plugs! They make cars impossible to work on now adays. And if I ever find the genius behind the Check Engine light, I'm going to take him out for a scrape!

[Fundamentally Fair]

GMC fired the design engineer of the 283 engine.....why?That's Snopes worthy.