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An idling gas engine may be annoyingly loud, but that’s the price you pay for having WAY less torque available at a standstill.

7 points
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The motors have never been the problem, it’s always been the battery. See train engines, they are a diesel generator with electric motors.

This is where history pisses me off. We should have been headlong into battery research after the oil embargoes. Could have been 40 years faster.

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1 point

I hope you are not talking about battery locomotives.

With overhead wires the train has a practically unlimited battery capacity.

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0 points

Exactly this. Imagine if gas powered motor could recharge in mere 12 hours and run for up to half the distance. Ah, that would be the dream.

And if you and 5 of your neighbors decide to refuel at the same time during peak hours you have a real chance of overloading your neighborhood grid. And your fuel tank is dead in 5 years, replacing which is more than half of your used cars cost.

Everything non-portable uses electric motors from the time the first wire was invented.

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0 points

Boy it sure is easy to win a debate when you use fictional information

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-1 points

https://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/PowerSearch.do?action=noform&path=1&year1=2023&year2=2025&mclass=Small+Cars&srchtyp=newMarket&pageno=1&rowLimit=50

When you look at fueleconomy.gov you will see that the furthest a compact ev can go is 149 miles while the furthest a ice compact car can go is 594 miles

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/07/01/why-the-ev-boom-could-put-a-major-strain-on-our-power-grid.html You can read cnbcs article on how the grid is already pretty spread thinn with us already increasing our power demand by almost 3,000% in the last decade without even considering ev charging

https://www.motortrend.com/features/how-long-does-it-take-to-charge-an-ev/

According to motor trend DC charging is the fastest way to charge your EV and it still takes just under two hours Couldn’t find a source that studied how long a ice takes to recharge but considering how ices are currently extremely common you can easily test that yourself and probably already know it’s so quick you don’t even think about it

https://www.caranddriver.com/features/a31875141/electric-car-battery-life/

According to car and driver those lithium ion batteries you mentioned while yes they can last a decade most cars typically stay on the road for give or take 30-35 years and lithium ion batteries are inherently expensive and prone to thermal cascading ie catching fire also full charge and depletion wears the battery down over time

https://www.edmunds.com/electric-car/articles/electric-car-battery-replacement-costs.html According to Edmunds.com the average cost of ev battery replacement costs anywhere from 5,000$ to 15,000$ So what point was made up

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0 points

pretty sure most trains are powered by either overhead wires or third rails? considering that urban rail systems are always electrified and those have A LOT of trains.

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1 point

Freight trains are diesel electric.

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0 points

Not in America

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-1 points

okay? i’m talking about the world though, so typical for people to just assume america is all that matters lmao

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3 points

The price. The price is the problem for all us poors.

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1 point

It wouldn’t be so bad if they paired small batteries with backup generators.

But nooo, its 7000lb all electrics or overly complicated ICE-hybrids, nothing in between.

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1 point

7000lb all electrics

This idea overlaps the big truck mentality: most EVs are much lighter. The weight penalty averages only about 20% over an equivalent ICE, so the type of vehicle you get can be a much bigger impact. My EV is a mid sized SUV that may be the biggest car I’ve ever owned and it weighs 4,000 lbs. I’m not claiming it’s light, but it’s much better than you seem to think

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0 points

Wait how is what you’re proposing different from ICE hybrids?

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1 point
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  • An ICE hybrid is a gas car with a little electric motor shoehorned inside.

  • A “plug in” hybrid as they are called is a full electric drivetrain, with a gas generator like you’d buy at Lowes stuck in the boot .

It seems trivial, but the difference is massive. The former is super complicated, heavy, and expensive, as you need all the junk a gas car needs and the electric stuff to go with it.

The later is hilarously efficient. It takes the best part of electric cars, the dead simple drive train, and solves their achilles heel: the massive battery. You can get away with a dirt cheap 3 horsepower generator in such a setup and shrink the battery massively, whereas a ICE hybrid needs a huge car engine and (like I said) all the expensive junk that goes with it.

You don’t see more of the later because:

  • Car manufacturers are geared to produce ICE cars, and reserve the electric drivetrain capacitry for profitable luxury vehicles first.

  • This is just speculation on my part, but a gas range extending generator “taints” a full electric car, making it unpalatable to people who think it ruins the image, eco friendliness or whatever, when it’s actually better for the environment because the battery isn’t so freaking big.

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1 point

Purchase price, higher maintenance costs (EVs eat tires due to the increased weight and higher torque), installation of charging infrastructure (some us need expense electrical service upgrades and added wiring; we don’t all have 200 amp panels and garages with 30 amp 240v service already wired in)

I’d love an EV, but I won’t be afforded Int one for a bit. And used ones, even if cheaper, will have massive battery degradation cutting range way down.

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0 points

the price gap is slowly closing, esp if you take into account total cost of ownership. It agree that the upfront cost makes it out of reach for many people.

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1 point

Really the biggest part of the price gap now seems to be volume. Not enough new cars to offset the R&D and bring prices down. Not enough new cars for there to be a healthy used car market. And especially not enough non-premium cars

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2 points
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If you read comments on Instagram and the like, people hate electric cars because…

…they don’t do the vroom-vroom noise.

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1 point
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And I don’t get this. I mean I also love the feel of power you get from a large engine turning over, but really? You over there in that mustang making all that noise and effort, really straining to accelerate, while my Tesla effortlessly leaves you in the dust? Do people not understand how much more powerful it feel to be the fastest car with seemingly no effort?

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-1 points

That’s a very real issue that car enthusiasts have a hard time with. There’s just something about a great sounding engine that is the cherry on top of a car you like. My weak spot is a 4 rotor screaming like a banshee from Mazda’s Le Mans car.

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2 points

Car enthusiasts are weird.

The whole notion of loud = fast falls apart with electric engines.

Not many people buy cars just because they sound good. It’s usually the engine that makes it sound good.(+exhaust, etc). Which means tha there’s still the need for speed.

But if you want speed, you need to go electric.

The whole macho V8 rumble and manually shifting gears is now less effective than a one-pedal, one-gear, quiet electeic setup.

This must such a huge disconnect in their heads, that they go about posting “electric = gay” on car videos.

Just like listening to loud music with windows down, the loud fart cans are just for seeking attention.

A loud engine is now an equivalent of a dog that barks, but doesn’t bite.

I agree that there are many cars that sound incredible (four rotor Mazdas, Porche Carerra GTs, Black or Brabus Mercs, you name it), but disliking electric cars because they make a silly quiet noise just makes one a poser, IMO.

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-1 points

Electric cars are fun, and I don’t personally mind they’re basically silent. But nothing will replace the fun of a manual transmission ICE.

I don’t think most people get a loud exhaust for attention either, but because they like it. But windows down blasting music is pointless and toxic, IMO.

Also saying if you want speed to go electric is too generic, IMO. What kind of speed and when you’re going to use it is important. For example, if you want speed from a standstill, then sure electric. Want speed once you’re already moving, like a race track, then ICE is fine since you’ll be high RPMs.

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-1 points

There’s more to speed than just speed

Electric cars are fast, but the boring kind of fast

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2 points

But remember, electric motors also require next to no maintenance and can last for many years of runtime. Pros and cons.

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1 point

And no gearing, so no complex moving part assemblies…

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1 point

Unfortunately, brushless motors are also trivial to waterproof.

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-1 points

Uh, maintenance is one thing where ICE wins (until very recently, thanks fucktards in car industry). Cars have been generally very easy to work on, with anyone with a toolbox being able to do most their repairs in a shed

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1 point

This isn’t a function of the engine though right? Electric engines are inherently simpler and should therefore be easier to maintain (putting aside company fuckery)

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0 points

High voltage is scary as fuck, but also the fact that absolutely everything from doors to gas pedal and chairs are controlled by a computer you need specialized proprietary equipment to investigate.

This is an issue with new ice cars too to be honest

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1 point

That’s a user-hostile feature, not a property of electric engines. An electric car has far simpler mechanical parts, and the circuitry isn’t very complicated either. It could be made incredibly easy to repair, modify, and upgrade, mostly at home even, if they designed them that way

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-1 points

That’s true. But since now it’s all messed up shit that you can’t fix yourself they’re on fairly equal line there.

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1 point

I would absolutely love to have an EV. But they are very expensive, especially compared to the gas-powered car I already own.

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1 point

Maybe in your country. Chinese electric cars are plenty cheap, many of them are cheaper than most ICE cars

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1 point

Well everything’s more expensive than the thing you already own. It’s true, most are available in the higher end markets right now, but the Bolt and Leaf are pretty cheap. In the long run, almost all EVs are cheaper than their gas counterparts.

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