interesting:- electric cars

**Krypton** · 26th February, 2009, 05:32 PM

Land speed record - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

the first land speed records from 13/12/1898 to 29/04/1899 ranged from 39 mph to 65 mph.

65 mph in 1899? thats good going surely..
even better when this car and all before it were electrically driven.

an electric car capable of 65 mph about 110 years ago?

fast forward to today... no viable all electric vehicles..

makes you wonder about the fuel companies suppressing it....

**Mjolinor** · 26th February, 2009, 06:08 PM

Originally Posted by Krypton

Land speed record - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

the first land speed records from 13/12/1898 to 29/04/1899 ranged from 39 mph to 65 mph.

65 mph in 1899? thats good going surely..
even better when this car and all before it were electrically driven.

an electric car capable of 65 mph about 110 years ago?

fast forward to today... no viable all electric vehicles..

makes you wonder about the fuel companies suppressing it....

There are lots of viable all electric vehicles and hybrids.

**Krypton** · 27th February, 2009, 11:14 AM

Originally Posted by Mjolinor

There are lots of viable all electric vehicles and hybrids.

on the road?

**Mjolinor** · 27th February, 2009, 02:19 PM

Originally Posted by Krypton

on the road?

Well where else would you want to use them?

The best is probably the Tesla at the moment but there are others, there are electric Minis, Toyota Rav 4, General Motors made some a few years ago, lots of Chinese manufacturers sell them. They are making an electric RR at the moment, not released yet. Most hybrids can have plug in electric conversions done on them, the Toyota Prius for example.

It really is a pretty long list.

**Mjolinor** · 27th February, 2009, 02:28 PM

One of the main reasons is that NiMh batteries are covered by a patent and the patent owner will not release licenses for manufacture of big batteries, only small (torch size) cells.

LiFePO4 batteries should change that though they are currently a pretty new technology. Lead acid paste is reasonable but they are heavy. I have a scooter that uses lead acid with a range of about 50 miles and a top speed of about 35 MPH. It's perfect for town and back.

The killacycle, KillaCycle - World’s Quickest Electric Motorcycle is a hell of a machine, that uses A123 cells which are the best (and most expensive) batteries in the world. The Vectrix electric bike is pretty damn good if you want a road going proper bike.

It really is an endless list.

**Krypton** · 27th February, 2009, 05:57 PM

Originally Posted by Mjolinor

Well where else would you want to use them?

The best is probably the Tesla at the moment but there are others, there are electric Minis, Toyota Rav 4, General Motors made some a few years ago, lots of Chinese manufacturers sell them. They are making an electric RR at the moment, not released yet. Most hybrids can have plug in electric conversions done on them, the Toyota Prius for example.

It really is a pretty long list.

i think you miss my point. my point is; yes there are lots of viable electric cars in factoies or on the dreawing board. they are NOT on the road.. the general motors ev1 is probably the best example.
however. general motors wouldnt sell the cars, they would only lease them. the leasing costs were so astronomical that only the mega rich could afford to do so. at the end of the lease agreement, general motors would not then sell the car, they would take it back and keep it no matter how much they were offered.
the commercials for the ev1 were designed as if gm were trying to stop people getting excited about the car.. why?
why didnt they sell it? in the time it was leased, it was proven to be an ideal town/commuting car, going for up to 150 miles between charges.
again, i return to the fact of the land speed records. 65 mph with an electric car in 1899!
with the rate of technological evolution, why dont we all have them now?
look at the aeroplane, from propeller to jet in about 40 years.
what was stopping them in over 100 years building on the proven technology of 1899?

**Mjolinor** · 28th February, 2009, 06:56 AM

Zhejiang Xingyu Industry & Trade Co., Ltd.
I have one of these. It is on the road. It is a viable electric vehicle, in fact it is more viable than a petrol vehicle for my purpose.

The G-wiz is a viable electric vehicle, it is on the road, you can go and buy one.
The Tesla is a viable electric vehicle, you can order one but there is a waiting list.

Some electric cars that you can buy
Electric car Manufacturers & Suppliers

In the mid 90s while working in Stockholm with an electricity utility all the driving round was done using electric VW Golfs.

The Renault Clio is (or was) available as electric only.

My Prius does about 2 miles on electricity, does that make it a viable electric car? In my mind it does and if you thought about the number of journeys you do by car that are less than 2 miles then you must also agree.

The Rav 4 is on the road.

The EV1 is an ugly monster, I suspect that GM discovered something nasty could happen in a crash or something, it's conspiracy stuff definitely.

Electric cars have steadily improved since the first ones were built, that is over 100 years of constant development. Necessity is the mother of invention, the need has not been there, now it is. Within 5 years they will be common place.

I think that maybe you are asking why they are not common and I think that this is because people perceive that their need for a car cannot be satisfied with something that will only do a finite number of miles between charges, I think this is what Toyota thought to, that's why they sell the Prius and the other hybrids. There is also a perceived problem with charge time though big developments in this area are happening right now. The A123 cell, as fitted to the electric dragster I mentioned, will charge in less than 5 minutes provided you can get a big enough cable to charge it with.

To support mass electric cars there needs to be an infrastructure put in place to support the charging that is similar to the one we have now for petrol cars, "charge" points every so often all over the country. This will happen but it will take time and it will start in big cities then spread outwards from there. Already there are several cities around the world trialling this and I am involved in it in Athens, Greece.

**krazylegz** · 28th February, 2009, 07:03 AM

IMO no hybrid or car that needs to plugged in is the way forward...i totally agree with james may from top gear on this.....whats the point in having a car that takes about 18 hours to charge up for a few hours driving especially when electric cars should be used to help the enviroment....but the power still just comes from the power station.

i was very impressed with the tesla on top gear like when it caned that lotus elise.

but yeah Mjolinor is right there is viable cars available now but i just dont see the point.......

.........hydrogen cars are the way forward

gmb45 · 28th February, 2009, 07:06 AM

Originally Posted by krazylegz

IMO no hybrid or car that needs to plugged in is the way forward...i totally agree with james may from top gear on this.....whats the point in having a car that takes about 18 hours to charge up for a few hours driving especially when electric cars should be used to help the enviroment....but the power still just comes from the power station.

i was very impressed with the tesla on top gear like when it caned that lotus elise.

but yeah Mjolinor is right there is viable cars available now but i just dont see the point.......

.........hydrogen cars are the way forward

hydrogen cars defo m8 but that wont happen till the oil has nearly run out

**krazylegz** · 28th February, 2009, 07:11 AM

dont know m8 it could be sooner as they're already available in california

**Mjolinor** · 28th February, 2009, 07:19 AM

Originally Posted by krazylegz

IMO no hybrid or car that needs to plugged in is the way forward...i totally agree with james may from top gear on this.....whats the point in having a car that takes about 18 hours to charge up for a few hours driving especially when electric cars should be used to help the enviroment....but the power still just comes from the power station.

Stuff the environment, it will look after itself.

But if you do care about CO2 then what is the problem with plugging in to charge, that power is as clean as you can get. Changes are needed to the way power is made but nuclear is where we should head or renewable, both will be clean and cheap once the development stage is finished.

If you look at grams of CO2 per mile then electricity from plugging in is orders of magnitude better than an ICE even now.

**mikissimke** · 18th July, 2010, 10:34 PM

totally agree with your assertion

**pelister** · 28th July, 2010, 10:58 AM

Originally Posted by Mjolinor

There are lots of viable all electric vehicles and hybrids.

If you want to have an idea about what has currently been achieved so far, check out this list of all the electric cars:
Overview of electric cars | OliNo

The page is updated regularly.