Random Thoughts... [Automotive Edition]

[Matt2000]

Well fuck, it seems that the look of the new Euro Focus is growing on me.

Slowly.

I still don't like the Darth Vader lower front grilles and the shape's a bit wonky but it's getting there.

 

[narf]

Dunno how I did it (faulty range meter?) but in traffic my range went up. I just accelerate gently and ony use the regen brakes to slow down. I never touched the actual brake brakes and I think by doing this the range got a bit of a boost...

In traffic your speed is slower, meaning you waste less energy per distance on aerodynamic drag. In an ICE car this is more than offset by idling and extreme inefficiencies at low speeds (for instance, relatively high rpm compared to speed in low gears, loads of engine friction) and 100% waste of kinetic energy compared to some regenerative braking - see my earlier post about how we have that burnt-in feeling of "slowmoving traffic = baaaad" from ICE cars. That does not apply here.

Additionally, your range meter probably is calculated on the average energy consumption over the past few kilometres, just like the range meter in my ICE car is based on the past 50km of driving. When entering the Autobahn and going really fast it only slowly loses range. When slowing down later it gains range despite still eating up distance. Depending on how well it is programmed and how accurate the various inputs are (easy to measure remaining fuel in a tank) your (remaining) mileage may (literally) vary.

Yep but the thing is that battery capacities have hardly changed. The fact that we can do all those things is a testament to how energy efficient technology is.

Actually, they have.
Lead-acid batteries - mid-1800s.
NiCd batteries - late 1800s.
NiMH batteries - late 1980s.
LiIon batteries - early 1990s.
LiPo batteries - mid-1990s.

Here's how they compare in terms of energy stored per mass and per volume:

https://pic.armedcats.net/n/na/narf/2011/08/31/1000px-Secondary_cell_energy_density.svg.png

Large enough for even Spectre to read

I can remember AA batteries I had in childhood toys, they had 500-800mAh at 1.2V. A quick check at amazon shows NiMH batteries today easily do 2500mAh at 1.2V, a three to five fold increase at the same volume.

There are more things in the pipeline as well, such as nanowire batteries for extremely high energy density, or beltway LiIon batteries for extremely fast charging capabilities... that is, if they can work out all the kinks of course. But that hasn't stopped us in the past, why should it now? Greatest planet on Earth and all that.

 

[prizrak]

Uh, car related... I haven't seen too many electric cars in my town. Maybe I'll find a Tesla one of these days.

I see Tesla fairly regularly around here, seen a Volt a couple of times too, no others though.

LiIon batteries - early 1990s.
LiPo batteries - mid-1990s.

So the two major battery tech that is still being used is now what 20 years old? Compare that to other tech, like the CPUs and even ICE cars...

There are more things in the pipeline as well, such as nanowire batteries for extremely high energy density

I been hearing about nanowire batteries solving all our problems in one fell swoop for at least a decade. It seems that every 5 years some big breakthrough in battery tech is 5 years away and we have yet to see it.

But that hasn't stopped us in the past

Actually it has... Tons of money has been poured in battery research from all kinds of angles and we still have 70 mile BEV's, laptops that last about 3-4 hours on average and cell phones that barely last for a day....

 

[mooglebunny]

Oh nice. Yeah I've seen like awesome other cars like the Maserati Quattroporte and a Ferrari F355 (and a couple of Ducatis, as one of my older neighbors has one that he keeps in his garage). One of my neighbors right down the street even has a 2000-2002 Honda/Acura NSX (I only saw it because the garage was open a couple of times last week). O_O My roommate knows the guy's wife and has been to their house (really nice people who go on vacation a lot and go to Burning Man). It just looks like a normal house for the area on the front, but in the back apparently it's set up to look like a tropical paradise with a great water feature that Clarkson would be proud of. She's been to their house and she was like OH THAT'S WHAT THAT CAR WAS!? When I asked her. o_o

 

[narf]

So the two major battery tech that is still being used is now what 20 years old? Compare that to other tech, like the CPUs and even ICE cars...

ICEs are over 100 years old, what's your point?

 

[prizrak]

ICEs are over 100 years old, what's your point?

Batteries are over 2000 years old....

Point is rate of improvement, in the past 20 years ICE efficiency and power improved vastly more than LiIon/LiPo batteries.

 

[Spectre]

Batteries are over 2000 years old....

Point is rate of improvement, in the past 20 years ICE efficiency and power improved vastly more than LiIon/LiPo batteries.

Not to mention every time there is an 'advance' in battery tech, it seems to come with new serious drawbacks (Lithiums tend to go on fire and explode, for example - not to mention the '500 and done' charging cycle limitation) whereas ICE doesn't have that problem.

As for 'stuff in the pipeline' - yeah, I'd wait and see if it actually materializes. 15 years ago, zinc-air rechargeable batteries were supposed to be the next big thing, destined to solve all the battery power issues and replace NiMH batteries.

Didn't work out that way at all.

 

[narf]

Batteries are over 2000 years old....

Rechargeable batteries are 152 years old, lead-acid invented in 1859.

Point is rate of improvement, in the past 20 years ICE efficiency and power improved vastly more than LiIon/LiPo batteries.

ICE efficiency has less than doubled in the past twenty years. Many fuel-saving advantages are unrelated to the engine, just think of aerodynamics - for example the original Beetle had a drag coefficient of 0.48 while the New Beetle has 0.38, a Merc 190E had 0.32 while a modern E-Class goes down to 0.24. Yes, the ICE engines have improved. Those improvements are in the a-few-percent-range though, not in the a-few-times-range.

ICE power is similar to battery power, want more power? Get a bigger engine or get more batteries.
If you're thinking of power per displacement you're looking at what, for example 130hp/l in a twincharged 185hp 1.4 (thinking of reasonable roadcar use, not F1)? A 2.5l 280hp Supra of 20 years ago would do 112hp/l, that's less but not a huge difference.

As for battery improvement, I'll go back to my trusted AA batteries. Early NiMH cells were around the 1000mAh range at 1.2V, today they are around 2500mAh at 1.2V - that's more than doubled within the same technology.

 

[Spectre]

And yet they're still short of the alkaline's 2800+ mAH at 1.5V.

As for ICE, yes, ICE efficiency has almost doubled in the past 20 years. In 1983, one of the very hottest bikes you could buy was the CB1100F, which cranked out 108 horsepower from an 1100cc four cylinder. Today, you can get a GSX-R1000 that cranks out an honest 191hp from 100 less cc. The GSX-R has better fuel economy, too.

 

[narf]

And yet they're still short of the alkaline's 2800+ mAH at 1.5V.

Alkaline batteries (larger than AA, obviously) are pointless for BEVs.

As for ICE, yes, ICE efficiency has almost doubled in the past 20 years. In 1983, one of the very hottest bikes you could buy was the CB1100F, which cranked out 108 horsepower from an 1100cc four cylinder. Today, you can get a GSX-R1000 that cranks out an honest 191hp from 100 less cc. The GSX-R has better fuel economy, too.

Rechargeable AA batteries in 1983 had what, 0.6Wh? A modern rechargeable AA battery does about 3Wh, five times as much.

 

[Emarline]

Wow, you all have pathetic battery lives on your phones. My Samsung Alias 2 doesn't have a data plan or anything, just unlimited voice and text (and those were largely put on our plan for my sister -- I'm a fairly light user of my phone), and I use it as a clock a lot (because I can't be bothered to wear a watch), but the battery will usually last me just shy of two weeks. So I don't know what's up with this charging-every-day nonsense.

 

[prizrak]

ICE efficiency has less than doubled in the past twenty years. Many fuel-saving advantages are unrelated to the engine, just think of aerodynamics - for example the original Beetle had a drag coefficient of 0.48 while the New Beetle has 0.38, a Merc 190E had 0.32 while a modern E-Class goes down to 0.24. Yes, the ICE engines have improved. Those improvements are in the a-few-percent-range though, not in the a-few-times-range.

And despite ALL of those improvements electric cars still give you a 70mile range....

Alkaline batteries (larger than AA, obviously) are pointless for BEVs.

So a higher capacity battery cannot be used for an application where higher capacity is necessary?

Rechargeable batteries are 152 years old, lead-acid invented in 1859.

And yet current laptops get about the same battery life as older laptops despite much more efficient design. Hell Apple had to ditch Li-Ion and any kind of mounting hardware to get more life out of their batteries and they are still only an hour or two better than competition (and it uses EVERY trick in the book, including SSD and an EXTREMELY aggressive power saving policy).*

*Don't get me wrong an extra hour is impressive but it's not nearly as big of a difference as extra displacement would do to power of an engine. Hell I turned up my boost from 11psi to 14psi and got extra 40 HP.... (thats almost 25% increase from standard in this car)

Bottom line is that battery technology has been actively developed for as long (even longer really) as ICE technology and it has not progressed nearly enough to be useable as a general replacement for ICE. A ton of money has been poured into electrical propulsion tech (I ride a fully electric train to work every day), batteries (electronics, RC cars, golf karts, go karts, etc..) and we still get less than a 100 miles out of a normal car that one could conceivably buy.

Wow, you all have pathetic battery lives on your phones. My Samsung Alias 2 doesn't have a data plan or anything, just unlimited voice and text (and those were largely put on our plan for my sister -- I'm a fairly light user of my phone), and I use it as a clock a lot (because I can't be bothered to wear a watch), but the battery will usually last me just shy of two weeks. So I don't know what's up with this charging-every-day nonsense.

That's because you don't have a smartphone or use it for anything other than standby My phone is my mp3/video player, internet machine and plays games. Today I was listening to music on the way to work while reading my Google Reader, then on the way back playing some Stupid Zombies, reading a site or two and finally watching some YouTube, currently down to 29% of battery

 

[Spectre]

Alkaline batteries (larger than AA, obviously) are pointless for BEVs.

Except that you can recharge certain alkaline chemistry batteries.

Rechargeable AA batteries in 1983 had what, 0.6Wh? A modern rechargeable AA battery does about 3Wh, five times as much.

More than .6. I had some 1000mAH units in the 80s, and NiMH hit 1900 in 1989. However, it's still significant that they're 1.2 instead of 1.5V and that we still haven't hit 4000 in a rechargeable AA yet (we're still stuck at 3K) and yet non-rechargeable AAs are knocking on the door of 4K themselves. In fact, we have yet to double the 1989 1900mAH number for NiMH (or any other rechargable AA battery tech) and it's been, oh, twenty two years. We've barely gotten more than 1.5 times that in the intervening years, as the largest one you can buy now (from a reputable source) is 3000mAH. Essentially, not really going anywhere.

Meanwhile we now have palm sized fuel cells that can do the work of 1000 AA batteries before needing a refuelling, which takes seconds instead of hours. Why are we still dealing with this stupid battery crap for cars, again?

Wow, you all have pathetic battery lives on your phones. My Samsung Alias 2 doesn't have a data plan or anything, just unlimited voice and text (and those were largely put on our plan for my sister -- I'm a fairly light user of my phone), and I use it as a clock a lot (because I can't be bothered to wear a watch), but the battery will usually last me just shy of two weeks. So I don't know what's up with this charging-every-day nonsense.

My latest bill was for a rather slow month and I still had more than 3000 minutes logged.

 

[narf]

Except that you can recharge certain alkaline chemistry batteries.

Not really, charging them to the full capacity / 1.5V is a pain in the ass.

Meanwhile we now have palm sized fuel cells that can do the work of 1000 AA batteries before needing a refuelling. Why are we still dealing with this stupid battery crap for cars, again?

Because your information is, pardon my French, full of shit. By "the work of 1000 AA batteries" you mean contain the same amount of energy, right?
Well, let's see... an alkaline battery might contain 6Wh of energy (1.5*4), a rechargeable one might contain 3.5Wh (1.2*2.9ish). One charge for this fuel cell contains 12Wh of energy. By my maths that's the work of two AA batteries or 3.5 rechargeable ones. I'd say there's your answer why we still are dealing with this stupid battery crap.

https://pic.armedcats.net/n/na/narf/2011/08/31/hydrostik.png

I'm too lazy to resize it for your puny screen, sorry just press Ctrl-+


To put the scale of the wrongness into perspective, 1000 AA batteries at 6Wh each could power a car over dozens of kilometres. If fuel cells were that awesome we'd all be sitting in FC-powered hovercars by now.

 

[Spectre]

Not really, charging them to the full capacity / 1.5V is a pain in the ass.

No more so than waiting on NiMH to properly recharge, though.

Because your information is, pardon my French, full of shit. By "the work of 1000 AA batteries" you mean contain the same amount of energy, right?
Well, let's see... an alkaline battery might contain 6Wh of energy (1.5*4), a rechargeable one might contain 3.5Wh (1.2*2.9ish). One charge for this fuel cell contains 12Wh of energy. By my maths that's the work of two AA batteries or 3.5 rechargeable ones. I'd say there's your answer why we still are dealing with this stupid battery crap.

Not quite. They're actually talking about total lifetime (so I was wrong about the refuelling thing) - but at best you'll get 500 full capacity recharges out of NiMH AAs; they say you can get 1000 cycles out of each rechargeable cell. I know for a fact that I don't get 500 charge cycles out of NiMH AAs.

IMPORTANT CLARIFICATION: 1 HYDROSTIK = 10 disposable AA batteries at 1W continuous power consumption. This is because at 1W power consumption, most AA batteries can only last one hour, while the HYDROSTIK has enough energy to last 10 hours. If 1 HYDROSTIK is thenrefillable 100 times, the same HYDROSTIK can replace 10x100 or 1000 disposable AA batteries over its lifetime E (INCLUDING MULTIPLE REFILLS) - when the required continuous power is 1W.

Still, in a package that looks to be about the size of four or five AA batteries (exclusive of the light) it holds the energy of 10. Not seeing the downside here - instant recharging, more power in a smaller package, what's not to like? Again, why are we still messing around with the stagnant tech that is batteries to power cars?

 

[prizrak]

Still, in a package that looks to be about the size of four or five AA batteries (exclusive of the light) it holds the energy of 10. Not seeing the downside here - instant recharging, more power in a smaller package, what's not to like? Again, why are we still messing around with the stagnant tech that is batteries to power cars?

Better question is, why is it not in our laptops???? There is certainly enough room in there...

Because your information is, pardon my French, full of shit. By "the work of 1000 AA batteries" you mean contain the same amount of energy, right?
Well, let's see... an alkaline battery might contain 6Wh of energy (1.5*4), a rechargeable one might contain 3.5Wh (1.2*2.9ish). One charge for this fuel cell contains 12Wh of energy. By my maths that's the work of two AA batteries or 3.5 rechargeable ones. I'd say there's your answer why we still are dealing with this stupid battery crap.

OK so if you can get roughly same amount of power in a similar sized package that is extremely easy to recharge and lasts longer on a charge, then WHY in the world would you still use batteries?

See my ENTIRE problem with batteries in cars is the fact that there are no tangible benefits to using batteries instead of fuel cells.
Advantages of batteries:
- Can be recharged at home (somewhat dubious as not everyone has a parking lot/garage they can use)
- Regenerative braking
- No fossil fuels used (though it largely depends on the power plant)
- Potential infrastructure available now (if we can get quick charge times down to say 10 minutes or so we could install chargers at all the gas stations)

Disadvantages of batteries:
- Take a long time to recharge (even quick charge is 30 minutes or so right now)
- Additional weight (we also how Tesla was driving around TG's track, and that's a sports car based on a Lotus)
- Limited life (especially with quick charge they last what about 3 years or so?)
- Susceptible to environmental conditions (less power in the winter because cold)
- Difficulty in proper range estimation (things like HVAC, infotainment systems, lights, etc... make a much bigger difference in range for a BEV than ICE for instance)
- Power loss over time (leave the car for a week and you will lose a decent amount of charge, hell a friend of mine couldn't even start her car after it was sitting for 2 weeks because her battery went flat)
- Technology not quite there yet as far as range and speed of refuel is concerned

Advantages of Fuel Cells:
- Quick refill (basically works same as ICE as far as refill goes)
- Less weight
- No power loss over time? (not sure about this one but AFAIK it works similar to ICE where the fuel is in a tank and is only fed to the FC when being used)
- Potential infrastructure in place (easy enough to convert gas stations to pump hydrogen instead of petrol/diesel)
- No fossil fuel use (again highly depends on how hydrogen is being produced)
- Can utilize excess power of nuclear power plants (since nukes always make power they can hydrocrack at night)
- Easier range estimation, since FC's have a fuel tank you can keep an eye on actual fuel level
- Technology is already proven (navy uses it) and can easily replace ICE given availability of refueling infrastructure

Disadvantages of Fuel Cells:
- No regenerative braking (can be easily overcome by using a small battery as an auxiliary power source for say HVAC, Infotainment, etc... or a KERS like system)
- Cannot be refueled at home


Common:
- Lack of infrastructure
- Requirement to redesign current vehicles

And now for the party piece:
The MAIN reason to go for Fuel Cells over Batteries is the fact that FC tech is already here and available while battery tech is always "5 years away". However if the battery tech actually DOES make some sort of a breakthrough retrofitting FCEV to be a BEV would be TRIVIAL as you would not need to do anything but hook up a battery to the +/- terminals of the motor instead of an FC. So again WHY bother with batteries?

 

[Spectre]

Better question is, why is it not in our laptops???? There is certainly enough room in there...

They're working on that now. Best part is that you can refuel them at home or work; check out the site link in my last post above for the home charger those little hydrosticks work with.

More importantly, fuel cells do not require the mass terrestrial destruction that nickel and lithium mining do. And water's just a wee bit easier to come by than lithium.

 

[narf]

Not quite. They're actually talking about total lifetime (so I was wrong about the refuelling thing) - but at best you'll get 500 full capacity recharges out of NiMH AAs; they say you can get 1000 cycles out of each rechargeable cell. I know for a fact that I don't get 500 charge cycles out of NiMH AAs.

Here's what your article says:

it only costs $100 for a unit with two refillable fuel cartridges, each containing the same amount of energy as 1,000 disposable AA batteries.

If you need to refill it to get more than two times the energy of one AA battery then it does not contain "the same amount of energy as 1000 disposable AA batteries". Your link, no point in wiggling out.

Let's look at the new link you posted and quoted:

1 HYDROSTIK is thenrefillable 100 times

How do you arrive at 1000 refill cycles? Your own link and quote says 100.

They further say one cartridge fill can replace 10 disposable batteries... that's expecting 1.1Wh per battery, quite pathetic really. Didn't you yourself talk about 4000mAh at 1.5V? Surely not 100% of that is usable, but 1.1Wh would be less than 20%.
Replacing 10 is very far on the optimistic side, maybe three or four rather than the theoretical two? One cartridge is $10, how much are three or four disposable batteries? Less.

Still, in a package that looks to be about the size of four or five AA batteries (exclusive of the light) it holds the energy of 10.

They say this thing is 176cm?. One AA battery projected as a cuboid (ie measured without using the space between two) is about 9.8cm?, hence this thing is as large as eighteen AA batteries packed badly, you could space space by interlacing them at half-battery offsets but I'm too lazy to do the maths, maybe twenty.

Not seeing the downside here - instant recharging, more power in a smaller package, what's not to like? Again, why are we still messing around with the stagnant tech that is batteries to power cars?

Charging it with the $500 station takes one hour at 60W, or 60Wh. With that energy you could charge loads of NiMH or Lithium batteries storing much more than just 20% of the energy you put in. Without hydrogen storage you don't have instant recharging.
It doesn't have more power than a battery - this thing produces only 2.5W of power. A battery of the same weight would give you dozens of Watts of power.

Better question is, why is it not in our laptops???? There is certainly enough room in there...

Because it doesn't provide enough power. To sufficiently run a laptop you need what, 30W? Probably more if you crank up your display or do computation-intensive stuff, but let's go with 30W for now. That's twelve times the output of this thing. Twelve of these are huge and would currently cost $1200. At 30W they will together last for roughly four hours, roughly what your current battery can do. To recharge these twelve cartridges you need to draw 720Wh from the grid, much much more than you need to draw recharging your battery. If you only have one $500 refilling station recharging twelve cartridges takes twelve hours, hence you need at least another set of cartridges at $120.

All this money and hassle for the same "range" as your current battery. One day this may work, as of now small-scale fuel cells aren't viable.
Additionally, you would have to run a hybrid system together with a battery because you have higher peak power draws when the C/GPU are busy that the FC simply can't deliver. That'll drive up price and weight and hassle even more.

 

[prizrak]

One day this may work, as of now small-scale fuel cells aren't viable.

Point taken, but then it seems that batteries make the most sense in compact applications while FCs make most sense in large scale applications (say cars for instance).

 

[narf]

Point taken, but then it seems that batteries make the most sense in compact applications while FCs make most sense in large scale applications (say cars for instance).

A car-sized FC does make sense if you have a source of hydrogen that is viable.

This contraption suggested by Spectre makes hydrogen from the grid and water at 60Wh per 11Wh charge and takes an hour to fill. That's roughly the same time as a battery charger at much higher energy use. Same drawback (time) with two more drawbacks added (energy use and cost, $500 for the station and whatever for the extra electricity).
On top of that it isn't able to power many compact applications at all. I consider my 14" notebook compact, but I'd need a backpack full of these to sufficiently power it. It would work as a power source for my cell phone, however it is three times as large as my cell phone including its Lithium battery.

My point is, Spectre's contraption is a nice gadget but has little real-world use. Better buy a solar cell or a little dynamo to re-charge your cellphone in the wild. Heck, they will sell you a 30W solar cell to power their filling station. Those 30W would be enough to power the laptop instead of the twelve FCs


PS: Spectre's contraption only provides 2W of power, not 2.5W as I thought earlier. Hence the elusive 30W laptop needs fifteen FCs, not twelve. $1500 for the FCs, $150 for a second set of cartridges, 900Wh to recharge them, 15 hours on a single station. The upside is, 15 FCs will probably run your laptop for roughly five hours instead of roughly four
One station constantly recharging will give you eight hours of laptoping per 24h, provided you invent a robot to change your cartridges in the station for you at night. Looks like you might need a second $500 station, huh?

more power in a smaller package, what's not to like?

This thing is 155g and provides 2W of power, that's 13W per kg. A rechargeable battery can do up to over 1000W per kg. That's at least seventy-seven times more power for the same package weight. What's not to like?