CCTV's Ginger Vaughn in San Antonio reports on build it yourself electric cars and its environment conscious technology. Electric cars are all about the 'three Es" environment, economy and energy.
People in the comments calling this man a hero I admit it’s inspirational to build a car from scratch and I heavily applaud him for that but all he’s doing is driving and electric car not to mention that statistically it is very likely that most of that electric is generated by less environmentally friendly means such as oil, gas and coal in comparison to solar or wind power
Ah ha, Safepath Solarcars is only one of many solutions to make the EVs conversation more efficient modernized and better with almost monthly improvements. Check around, China has been very generous to start up EV companies to help grow faster, like yesterday. Mostly originally, China's big city pollution & Health is the concern, being factory floor of the world and economy growth is fueling the need too. Yet of course the ideas of being the biggest best producers of EVs as Elon Musk said China now makes more EVs than the world combined. The mini EVs market is actually around 1.75 million units made this past year double the total number produced of regular size EVs. Thank you for your attention to electric vehicles modernization
Why is it that everyone mentions recharging via Nuclear or Fossil fuels. How about Solar or wind generation? Both certainly capable of supplying enough current to recharge the cells. As for recycling the batteries, not sure about the lithium but the Lead Acids are very recyclable.
Lithium is recyclable as well. The term trash is just a way to make money off people. The electric car isn't about saving the planet. It's about efficiency. Sure they both pollute, but the electric car recaptures energy that would otherwise be lost. In my opinion, electricity should eventually cost the same as it does to breath air. Zero. Same with the Internet. However, we like the idea of scarcity...because scarcity makes some people rich.
The county recycling center where I live will recycle all batteries, except for lead acid car batteries. Car batteries are recycled at Walmart or the landfill.
scoter1 in comparison, solar and wind power generates a lot less electricity unfortunately plus they both (particularly wind) kill many animals such as birds so many people see them as ineffective not to mention they have large initial capital investments with very little returns
If you have warm weather all year long, then this could be fun. In colder climate (below freezing point), heating will eat a lot of power. That's where petrol power and extra heat is good.
No complaint in DIY to pay someone to convert for you. I love restoring old cars but others don't have the same knowledge/experience even desire. I love the idea of driving past gas stations. Q: Please describe use of "Ultra-capacitors"? Q: Possibility of dual capacitor banks? I saw an electric car show at the local convention center and learned much. Autos with limited mileage, but one had unlimited mileage due to dual banks of Ultra-capacitors (one running the vehicle while the other charging)
Fantastic - wish I could afford a flyt to pop over and see your cars , big fan of all things electric having been in to my flying hobby for over 30 years designing - building electric aircraft . Well done , Graham Thailand .
Battery prices needs to drop in order for electric vehicles to be economically feasible. The greatest cost for any EV is always the batteries. The rest of the components like electric motors are relatively cheap.
Well so far it's main competitive edge over the "$6800" Elio is that it doesn't yet appear to be a scam. Such a shame because I really wanted the Elio to be a success.
California, look online search Google. I have the guy's shop bookmarked but I have hundreds of webpages bookmarked so it would take me a while to find it again. He converted an old Porsche to electric and other cars.
Big up, CongraCongrats man, am so proud of your job, even the far mile start up with a first step, BIG UP, no matter what don't give up I encourage you to do more and diffrent disgn, but one day one day most of the people they will know how electric car are soo good and make some of their life easier, 🍀🍀🍀🍀
LOL Actually I do, besides I thought you said 4k to 8k in your earlier message I answered, But you still missed the point again. Its the building the car yourself that many people like to do, not let some shop take an existing vehicle and convert, which is all well and good. This gentleman wanted to start from the ground up, not slap something on by some other people. But again there is nothing wrong in it, Just some would rather do it themselves.
That's not bad for those with reasonable needs. How about those of us who just want to hit 55 mph for a 2 mile stretch and only need 40 miles of range? Okay, so there's only one of me but something just for 2-lane highways is much needed. I suppose that's why we have motorcycles. Nobody want to make an enclosed EV that is ideal for just going to work or to the local restaurant and is DOT approved..
LOL True, but you miss the point, they are doing it themselves with their own hands. Where is the fun and pride in you own work if you let someone else do it. Besides, they would want to do it their way following a set pattern. True if you only care about switching over there are hundreds of places to do it, more power to them. But to create something with your own hands and mind, now that is something else completely.
I want to have an electric car I just need to know how to deal with the transmission part of the car. I have been looking at all kinds of electric cars My Idea is to use a smart car body,
electric cars period don't need a transmission. If you decide to convert a car over to electric you can steal keep the transmission if you want. just more maintenance.
When the reporter introduces you as an "EV fanatic" and not just an enthusiast, we know the reporter felt pretty uneasy when she had finished the interview.
Brandon Miller 3K for batteries on a vehicle that costs cents to charge. I spend 3K a year on gas for my truck. In 10 years when China is full spin they will be demanding gas as well so my gas bill will be more like 4-5k a year. Sounds like a good deal. 3K for 5-10 years of driving vs 15-50k in gas costs. I can't make oil at home but I can make electricity. Sounds like if you don't want to a debate machine for polluting corporations , then this is the way to go.
Then you have no idea who a good shop is, the new DC systems are 9k USD and will give a lot of miles to a car with the right kind and amount of Lithium batteries, newer ones dont use Ion but other metals.
The guy is an engineer who builds electric cars. I am so relieved because his shop or garage is full of more clutter and crap than mine is and I just like playing around with the old cars of the 60's. We're never going to see an electric Greyhound bus or ocean liner. I don't believe in global warming as a problem for anyone. John Coleman the man who introduced the Weather Channel says global warming is just a bunch of crap. I do believe that the earth changes as time goes by but humans have nothing to do with it. Look up the late great George Carlin on RU-vid and global warming. He explains it the best
electric will be there soon with the new batterys comming with graphene :) between 1 and 5 years from now,maybe sooner..They will charge in a minute en the range and power is bigger and its better for nature to recycle
if only we could drive an electric car with a single 12volt, 50pound lead acid battery and get 120mile range out of it, wishful thoughts close to perpetuum mobile..
Indeed. They left out the "and then put about 10 more in here." I've done that, btw, with 85lb batteries. It's a colossal pain in the ass. (esp, when the car only gets a few dozen miles out of 850lbs of Pb, and it takes half a day to fully recharge them) It would've been a much bigger pain with (20) 65lb 6v golf cart batteries the car was designed to use -- those don't have handles.
When the cost is reasonable, batteries are under 200 Lbs. and can buy new batteries without selling one of the kids, and can drive for 400 miles at 60, then I'll buy one, otherwise I'll stick with gas. I'm not against electric, I just feel the technology and cost just does not make sense to run out and get one. In addition the marketing industry has made it so impossible to buy one on my retired beer-bottle budget.
Soon you regressive folks won't have any come backs.. You say 400miles. How often do you drive 400miles per day? And how about tesla model 3 with a huge supercharger network. Reasonably priced. Free charging. Sure most people could find time to stop for 30 mins every few hundred miles to top up the charge and grab a bite to eat
+Sam Richards regressive? not hardly. its not a matter of 400 miles a day but when you eant or need mileage. In addition the cpst does not justify the need. Futhermore battery recycle life is limitted and charging will never be free. someone will put a meter on it. hydrogen is far more practable. Sorry if you feel im regressive, electrics is not the way to in long term.
+Joe Smuck I think we will find electric cars will dominate for the next 20 years so might as well embrace the clean change compared with gas guzzlers. No doubt hydrogen technologies will continue to improve but I would guess in 10 years time electric sales overtake ICE. Coupled with solar charging along with supercharge networks it sure will be a huge improvement and costs will continue to fall with mass production.
Gene, why on earth do you spout that charging not being free is one of the disadvantages when it is leagues cheaper than both gas and hydrogen?? How does $5 for a full tank cost? Hydrogen has no existing infrastructure, and the infrastructure it requires is far more expensive than for EV's ie millions vs thousands per charging station. Also hydrogen is only about 25% efficient which is terrible compared to electric cars 90% efficiency. Battery technology is improving by about 8% per year and by about 2030 (certainly by 2035) the cheapest car in the US you can buy that does 200 miles will be electric...which also has about 1/8th the running cost...You smell like the recruit of an oil company...
the Israelis have a battery that gets 1500 miles and there is such thing as a nano flow cell . invented by NASA. you fill it up like gasoline five minutes. to charge the batteries. technology already here now
+Mike Warren Not really :) there are lots of cars with better mpg than on normal engines _without all the over-engineered obsolete bs & Huge expense... Here's one (1990s Honda Civic $950) stlouis.craigslist.org/cto/5210939030.html another (85 vw deiso Golf $1850) stlouis.craigslist.org/cto/5210939030.html - like I said LOTS. All with a lower cost of ownership, cheaper repairs and insurance, even better overall mpg than Toyota's shitty production lie :)
Where does the electricity come from? Coal fired electric plants, natural gas plants, nuclear power plants? How is that any cheaper or better for the environment? At least the way we are currently producing electricity. Solar is not powerful enough yet to power the car for long distances, unless it is ultra super light. I just don't see how electricity is a better idea for a car, I think it's a terrible waste of time and antiquated power source. What about hydrogen or them new bloom box thingies?
Modern power plants are up to 60% efficient, whereas ICE has only 30% efficiency. It was calculated that EV is about 30% better in oil well-to-wheel efficiency than ICE car. It's not a revolution as Tesla CEO is boasting, still considering zero carbon dioxide emission it's better than nothing.
Thanks for the info. I just watched the documentary about Tesla Mtrs. The whole undercarriage is filled with batteries. I'm sure they will cost a whole lot when you need new ones. Either burn fuel driving the car or burn fuel by making batteries and electric.
Roger Nalan Actually the beauty of Tesla's battery array is that if one cell dies, that single cell can easily be replaced. Some of Tesla's supercharging stations allow you to do a fast battery swap. The hidden wisdom of this is that a technician at the station can easily replace the failed cells after the pack has been exchanged and its good as new again. As for power, Tesla offsets the power their charging stations take out of the grid with a solar array and wind farm they operate that puts the power back into the grid. Which means I'll be able to drive all across this country, for free, and not pollute One Iota.
***** I wanna see how it is easy to find and replace a failed cell in array of hundreds which weighs about a tonne. So it shouldn't fail in first place. As for out of grid charging stations, where is calculations of their economical viability during entire service life? Low energy flux from sun and wind makes windmills and PV arrays very big (thus easy to damage/destroy) and expensive. In technology, an idea, beautiful as a baby, oft doesn't survive quantitative analysis into maturity of mass production.
I like that 3 E's thing but plug in electric isn't completely clean for the environment at all, the batteries are so filthy to make and dispose of, and the range is shit with them, and even the ones that can be "rapid" charged, that ruins the life of batteries so much more. Those problems needs sorting first. Pros and cons with everything, with Hydrogen, it's the infrastructure, 'chicken and the egg' sort of thing. Everywhere needs to have those filling stations and the hydrogen being created and stored using renewables, California does this quite well so it can be done, it's just the lazy shits dragging out oil and getting on board way too slowly.
The manufacturer of batteries is not clean. New Porsche gasoline car the air coming out is cleaner than going into the engine. But how long do the batteries have a service life. Some batteries it’s a but 500 to 1000 chargers. And my aunt her cars batteries went out it was cheaper to buy a new car than replace the batteries. H2 in a car engine with retiming is cleaner for the earth. And remember recycling of e waste it not as clean look it up.
Actually these batteries are 96% recycycled, if not just thrown away. People like the Tasla company are doing that now. Maybe in the old days, but not so much now.
The time has come for Electric cars for certain applications (and folks of certain life status) but don't expect them to even put a dent in our air pollution and the ecological impacts that are even now affecting GW / GCC. Well researched anthropomorphic climate change "Rants" are well represented here on You Tube. If you want an Electric car...buy one because you like the way it drives, looks, or it's quality but not because you are doing very much good for the next generation's air / environment or GW / GCC. Here's one reason why (there are many)...Bunker Fuel used in the 50 to 80 thousand commercial and cargo ships out on our oceans? Link: www.tested.com/science/weird/462947-10-dirty-secrets-big-cruise-ships/item/dirty-bunker-fuel/
1. Nobody is forcing it on anybody. 2. A car is a car, as long as it's core functionality which driving and performance don't get negatively effected then what difference does it make for you if it is run by electric or by gas. 3. Gas is not unlimited, sooner or later the shit will be used up, but before that it will be more and more expensive the less there is. 4. Electric vehicle is more quite, less maintenance(no motor oil, radiator, etc...) and more environmental friendly. 5. Before you speak educate yourself or try to make an argument or you will just look stupid.