Electric vehicles in Germany - all the ins-and-outs!

[MikeMelga 7,325]

1 minute ago, Krieg said:

But politicians who want the votes from the unions will.

 

Biden tried to fuck Tesla with that "union" clause. It was removed from the law. Even with the clause, EVs will become cheaper and cheaper. It's unavoidable.

[catjones 1,702]

4 hours ago, MikeMelga said:

It's unavoidable.

 

I think you're extrapolating the future from today's industry status without regard for huge R&D in the Tesla competing companies.

Just today I was reading about Stanford students using chatGPT open API to train their Alpaca AI for ~$600.00.  Where did that come from?

There are something like 4 million (voters , excluding family members) workers in the US auto industry.  If you think the US gov will stand by and watch those jobs disappear you are either naive or completely misunderstand American politics.  There are laws against monopolies. 

You have no idea how much states pay in deferred, limited or no taxes to lure companies to their state.  I've read nothing about their preparation for the future you espouse.  Maybe you should offer your services as a consultant and rake in the money for your advice.

 

 

 

[fraufruit 42,482]

I don't understand how EV's can keep becoming cheaper and cheaper with the way inflation is these days.

[slammer 889]

At the beginning of the Automobile age, just a hundred years ago Fossil fuel cars were on the starting line along with electric cars and indeed steam cars. However it seems that the internal combustion auto had the better lobbyists and we got what we have now. It has taken us a century and a bit to burn our way though a planets-worth of fossil fuel and I do wonder how the world would look if electric had taken the place of the ICE back in the day.

I wonder also if steam cars would be a viable option? Howard Hughes had one built that could be started up as fast as a ICE car and showed the same performance of the cars of the day. However the limitations of the technology of that period meant that the whole of the bodywork was one big condenser and in the event of a crash, any occupant would have been boiled alive. So he had it scrapped. Could we build something like that today without the danger?

[MikeMelga 7,325]

7 hours ago, catjones said:

 

I think you're extrapolating the future from today's industry status without regard for huge R&D in the Tesla competing companies.

This is not about car technology any longer. It's about vertical integration, production. Traditional car companies won't be able to achieve this without starting from a clean sheet.

People say traditional OEMs "know how to develop cars and will catch up". I completely disagree. They only know how to develop small iterations! They are completely unable to do a large change like going EV!

 

7 hours ago, catjones said:

There are something like 4 million (voters , excluding family members) workers in the US auto industry.  If you think the US gov will stand by and watch those jobs disappear you are either naive or completely misunderstand American politics.  There are laws against monopolies. 

Who said anything about monopolies??? Which monopolies?? And those 4M workers won't completely disappear, they will just move to the new kids on the block.

I think the main ones will be Tesla, Ford and Chinese companies with US factories. Perhaps VW and Hyundai too. No monopoly. But also don't expect these high efficient factories to employ 4M workers, more likely 25% of that. Future factories will be smaller and with less workers.

 

7 hours ago, catjones said:

You have no idea how much states pay in deferred, limited or no taxes to lure companies to their state.  I've read nothing about their preparation for the future you espouse.  Maybe you should offer your services as a consultant and rake in the money for your advice.

I don't even understand your point. The surviving companies will try to access those tax breaks, same as today. That doesn't change at all.

[MikeMelga 7,325]

1 hour ago, slammer said:

At the beginning of the Automobile age, just a hundred years ago Fossil fuel cars were on the starting line along with electric cars and indeed steam cars. However it seems that the internal combustion auto had the better lobbyists and we got what we have now. It has taken us a century and a bit to burn our way though a planets-worth of fossil fuel and I do wonder how the world would look if electric had taken the place of the ICE back in the day.

The main divergence was when US created a vast highway and road infrastructure, moving people to the suburbs, therefore requiring more range, which EVs couldn't offer at that time. TBH, battery technology would have never developed as fast as ICE at that time. Nor power electronics. Using ICE was unavoidable.

 

1 hour ago, slammer said:

I wonder also if steam cars would be a viable option? Howard Hughes had one built that could be started up as fast as a ICE car and showed the same performance of the cars of the day. However the limitations of the technology of that period meant that the whole of the bodywork was one big condenser and in the event of a crash, any occupant would have been boiled alive. So he had it scrapped. Could we build something like that today without the danger?

Steam ships (usually with LNG) are the most efficient ships you can make, from cost perspective. Problem is it doesn't work scaling down.

[yesterday 2,027]

23 hours ago, fraufruit said:

 

 

14 states are considering ICE bans.

Looks good, thanks for that.

 

But because its just a ban on sales of ICE cars, not fuel. I guess you will be able to go to Nevada buy a brand new ICE car and drive it back to California, and just tank there. I suppose California could introduce other laws, like not being able to get a TUV, ( what ever it called in the US ) if you did that.

 

Unless the US makes Federal ( not state laws ), like the EU, then people will be able to dodge this regulation with ease, if they want to, Of course I would urge them not to. and just buy an EV..

 

I guess the states that are not going to ban ICE cars, have major construction sites for ICE cars, within their state, and will be reluctant to harm those jobs by the end of ICE cars.

[Krieg 15,073]

You can't suddenly stop people from using their old ICEs, that would be a catastrophe.   I am all for EVs but you guys thinking they will magically disappear from the whole world on the first of January of 2036 is a pipedream.

[yesterday 2,027]

3 minutes ago, Krieg said:

You can't suddenly stop people from using their old ICEs, that would be a catastrophe.   I am all for EVs but you guys thinking they will magically disappear from the whole world on the first of January of 2036 is a pipedream.

Agree 100 %, ICE cars are way too far integrated to our currently life's, its going to take ages to get rid of them, but I still want rid of them

[keith2011 2,678]

3 hours ago, slammer said:

I wonder also if steam cars would be a viable option? Howard Hughes had one built that could be started up as fast as a ICE car and showed the same performance of the cars of the day. However the limitations of the technology of that period meant that the whole of the bodywork was one big condenser and in the event of a crash, any occupant would have been boiled alive. So he had it scrapped. Could we build something like that today without the danger?

Yes but how would you generate the steam, fossil fuels? Same problem as an ICE but less efficient to burn the fuel externally.

[slammer 889]

2 hours ago, keith2011 said:

Yes but how would you generate the steam, fossil fuels? Same problem as an ICE but less efficient to burn the fuel externally.

There was a thing back in the day called the Quick fire high pressure boiler, basically it could heat up a head of steam in a few minutes, I think that somebody more clever than me could do the math-thingy, but I would imagine a heating element powered by electricity from the batteries available today could work efficiently enough to be a viable option.
Also there is work being done on hydrogen powered steam engines. Now that would be a thing.

[fraufruit 42,482]

35 minutes ago, slammer said:

There was a thing back in the day called the Quick fire high pressure boiler, basically it could heat up a head of steam in a few minutes,

 

Precursor to the induction hob. 

[catjones 1,702]

6 hours ago, slammer said:

steam cars would be a viable option?

 

what do you use to boil the water?

Winter + Water =

 

As for electric cars, it took 100 years of battery, chemical, .sophisticated manufacturing, computer management to get where we are today.  Electricity worked for street cars and trains (basically the same), but to get off the wire killed the car.

[Dembo 525]

2 hours ago, slammer said:

There was a thing back in the day called the Quick fire high pressure boiler, basically it could heat up a head of steam in a few minutes, I think that somebody more clever than me could do the math-thingy, but I would imagine a heating element powered by electricity from the batteries available today could work efficiently enough to be a viable option.
Also there is work being done on hydrogen powered steam engines. Now that would be a thing.

 

I think the fundamental issue will be that anything involving heat gets hot and therefore wastes energy as heat. Maybe with modern technology it could be much finer controlled than was possible in the old days of steam. But if you're starting with electrical power you'll probably be far better off turning a motor with it.

 

 

 

 

[MikeMelga 7,325]

9 hours ago, Krieg said:

You can't suddenly stop people from using their old ICEs, that would be a catastrophe.   I am all for EVs but you guys thinking they will magically disappear from the whole world on the first of January of 2036 is a pipedream.

That's why i'm against a ban.

They won't disappear, but nobody will be buying new ones. And many people will replace them and they will be sent to 3rd world countries.

[dw71111 10]

it'll go like this:

 

https://ourworldindata.org/leaded-gasoline-phase-out

 

slowly, then all at once.

[Krieg 15,073]

That would be more realistic.  Some guys posting here that there won't be gas stations or garages anymore I don't know what they are thinking.  How is it supposed to operate an ICE or Hybrid bought in 2030? They should trash them in 2036? That would be a disaster.  Garages will continue to exist, independent garages will learn to work with EVs just like in the UK there are already plenty of them that work on Leafs and Zoes.  Because when a car is old and becomes a beater people do not take them to dealers anymore because it is too expensive.  Beaters dying soon because there is no financial viable option to maintain them woukd be another disaster.  Probably governments will force car makers to release maintenance "confidential" information.  Maybe the Right to Repair movement will help.

 

Some guys here think the whole world is rich and are a bit out of touch with reality.

[MikeMelga 7,325]

46 minutes ago, Krieg said:

That would be more realistic.  Some guys posting here that there won't be gas stations or garages anymore I don't know what they are thinking.  How is it supposed to operate an ICE or Hybrid bought in 2030?

Check what is happening in Norway. Gas stations started closing or converting to EV charging in 2019!

Many auto manufacturers already stopped selling ICE cars in Norway because they don't want to provide the 10 year parts availability warranty any further!

Repair shops will collapse in large numbers. Not only EVs are more reliable, when they break, in most cases it's stuff the repair shops won't be able to fix!

Norway is 5-7 years ahead of the rest of 1st world countries. So if you want to see how 2030 looks like, watch out for Norway in the next 2 years.

 

To answer your question: it will become harder and harder to operate an ICE. And when people realize this in big numbers, it will just accelerate the transition.

 

Quote

They should trash them in 2036? That would be a disaster. 

I think they will be offloaded to 3rd world in large numbers, and yes, it will be an environmental disaster. 

 

Quote

Some guys here think the whole world is rich and are a bit out of touch with reality.

Some guys here think things remain the same forever and can't understand disruptive technologies. They sound like the guy that owned a horse in late 19th century, and couldn't understand what would happen to the 1 million transport horses available at the time. And that manure pickers would always have a job.

Guess what? Horses were replaced very quickly and manure pickers (just made that up) changed jobs.

[scook17 292]

On 4/1/2023, 9:28:32, fraufruit said:

I don't understand how EV's can keep becoming cheaper and cheaper with the way inflation is these days.

 

Mass production. If I make one car a month, I can do it by hand with a dozen expensive experts. Once I need to produce large numbers, it makes sense to invest in the technology which makes it cheaper to produce. Out goes manual assembly and incomes robots, the investment cost of which is only justified by the need to produce a lot of vehicles.

 

If the company makes a few hundred, or a few thousand, this is vastly different to 100K plus vehicles. As soon as they have to make huge numbers, they would need to throw out the old combusion plant systems and completely replace it. An EV has no gearbox, petrol tank, engine is now a motor mounted to the wheel, doesn't need anything like to cooling of a conventional engine. Battery is typically under the floor panels, so seats are higher, middle consule for gear stick is not needed or can be replaced with a simple electronic knob/paddle etc.

 

The major cost of EVs is the battery technology. Why did Elon build a battery factory in Europe? More than likely because importing them, after all the taxes paid on such imports, made the price of Telsa uncompetitive. Having the key component produce locally also shields you from currency movements, as you produce and sell in the same currency. Likely he saw VW go in this direction, and had to match this so as not to be seen as the American outsider, whilst at the same time being close to the European market.

 

Saw some very interesting graphics where they predicted same cost for EV as ICE in 2025. After that EV's continued to become cheaper. So even without the 2035 ban, once the 'rush' to EV's is over, they will just make ICE cars an obsolete dinosaur, at least for most people.

[scook17 292]

3 hours ago, MikeMelga said:

I think they will be offloaded to 3rd world in large numbers, and yes, it will be an environmental disaster. 

 

Just look at what happens to 'old' German cars today. A large number just get exported. Before the was, this was often to the former soviet states. Cars once produced don't magically dissapear unless someone pays the residual value to crush them. Alternatively they go to someone who can't afford the new price and driven until they stop working. I would guess many cars last 30+ years and make perfectly usable vehicles. The issue is more one of switching over to EV's sooner, rather than waiting until 2030/35.

 

The UK offered a scrapage scheme back in 2009 where they offered up to £2000 off a new car if you traded in any old car with a MOT. Nearly 400,000 cars went to the crusher, including many 'classic' cars.

https://www.change.org/p/patrick-mcloughlin-save-the-classic-cars-from-he-scrappage-scheme