Jon A
Member
Gas stations do not need an actual pipeline direct from the refinery in order to keep them supplied with energy. Replace a row of gas pumps with 1-2 MEGAWATT! chargers, and the station does need a "pipeline of copper" directly to it. That will be obscenely expensive to do in even a small percentage of locations where gas is currently available. If you think that's going to happen any time soon then somebody here is clearly in "Magic and Dream land."
You must be joking. "Magic Batteries" have been talked about among the EV crowd for as long as EVs have existed. It's one of the most common subjects on any EV board.
EREVs? Gas truck owners generally have never heard the term, don't know that they are or don't care. And as this very thread (and others on this board) illustrates so definitively, most BEV truck owners despise the very idea of them with a passion. Not the actual trucks based upon actual performance (because they don't exist yet), but the very idea that they might exist someday.
I agree with you there. That EREV will certainly work much better than your Trabant, but it's bad enough for me to cross it off my list. It really looks like it was a complete afterthought thrown out there at the last minute. If they change their minds, put a decent sized engine under the hood (so tow rating doesn't need to be cut in half) it would be back on my list. It looks like a fantastic truck otherwise.
Remember, they aren't using Trabant-sized 16.5 kWh battery. A 92 kWh battery (in the case of the RAM) in an EREV will be less "taxed" than a 98 kWh battery in a BEV (by a long way for some use cases). Also consider never charging it to 100% (because you really don't need to), never draining it to below 17% (because you really don't need to).... And on really long trips/hard long distance towing, it's mostly just along for the ride. Battery life with any vehicle that has one is a concern, but given the above conditions of operation, there's no reason it shouldn't fair pretty well compared with batteries modestly larger in a BEV. Exact details will take real data and vary from owner to owner so bold proclamations one way or the other are silly speculation at this point.
The Ram (we don't know what Ford will use yet) at least, is not using a lawn mower engine like your Trabant. The specs for the RAM have been out there for a long time now. If it's so important to you to argue how terrible it will be, maybe spending a few minutes and looking at them may be in order?
Again, look at the specs. It will be able to put a net positive into the battery almost all of the time. Have you ever looked at your average power consumption of a towing trip? Up a mountain pass? Do you think maybe, just maybe, using actual data to form an opinion might ever be wise?
Of course you haven't. You have "decided" these powertrains will suck based upon your emotions, your feelings.
I, on the other hand, didn't become so optimistic that these powertrains could be really good, until Ram release the specs on theirs. I then ran the numbers using actual data and it looked really, really good.
EVs are a candy store for Engineers--they provide so much data for us to geek out over. It's really fun! Lots of towing tests are done online providing lots of data. Often, if you can do some math, you can extract the data you need from what is given. Some pertinent examples:
While lots of people have done them, the guys at TFL have done gobs of towing tests on EVs that often provide good data.
Of all their EV towing tests with a large profile trailer at highway speeds, the highest average power consumption I found was just under 80 kW. The Ram generator can produce 130 kW steady state, all day long. That means in those specific tests, the generator would have been able to maintain the SOC of the battery with a whopping 60+% margin of safety.
If you extrapolate a larger trailer, big headwind, higher speeds, etc, you will eat into that and at some point you can hit a limit where power consumption exceeds 130 kW. Is that something that any user will ever experience? With a headwind that big is anybody going to try to keep going that fast?
Those are the questions that need to be answered. Contrary to popular belief, this is the type of case that will be the proof test for an EREV (not hills/mountains). A headwind can last all day long, mountain passes are quite short in comparison, and then you regen down the other side. A high load from wind/aero that lasts for hours is the case that will stress the generator the most.
But from the initial math, it looks like it will be a very strong performer for 99.9% (estimated
) of towing situations a 1/2 ton will ever run into. If you can find any tests that document higher average power use, please do post them up as they would be great info!So now let's consider mountain passes. We have some good data points from TFL in that regard as well. They towed a specific 9K trailer up the Ike with several EVs.
The Lightning used an average of 180.75 kW on the way up, burning 24.1 kWh of the battery. The Ram's generator is capable of 202 kW max power. So if it held that for 8 minutes, it could pass that test without losing any battery SOC at all. It will be a calibration choice, but I'm guessing they wouldn't even bother running the generator in "max power" mode unless the battery SOC gets dangerously low (because it would be a bit obnoxious), which shouldn't happen if you're using tow/haul mode.
With the generator only running at its quiet, lazy 130 kW, you'd be consuming 50.75 kW from the battery on the way up and burn 6.77 kWh from it. The Lightning gained 8 kWh regening down the hill...so think about that for a few seconds and it becomes quite clear the Ram should be able to go up and down mountains like that all day long fairly easily.
I didn't jump to any conclusions based upon my emotions. I used real world towing data to determine what was required from a truck to do a thing. With Rams specs published, I was able to compare those specs to what was required for the task.
I came to the conclusion these powertrains have the potential to be very good at doing "truck things." And with the obvious benefits/savings for daily use, they're pretty compelling option.
If you want links to specific videos and for me to show you how to do the math, I'd be happy to provide it.
OK, let's deal with "all that extra weight...."
Ford's 131 kWh battery weighs about 1800 lbs. The battery for the RAM weighs about 1200 lbs, so you're starting with a 600 lb battery advantage. My educated estimate (with a Sandy Munro assist) is the genset and all the crap that goes with it will run about 800 lbs. So, you're at a whopping 200 lbs weight increase due to the different powertrain.
That's going to have any noticable affect on efficiency, handling, the BEV experience? Really? I think you're exaggerating a bit.
Compared with the best towing BEV, that thing has a battery that weighs about 2800 lbs. So now the EREV weighs 800 lbs less.... But hauling that around every day isn't a problem, because we all know a pound of battery weighs much less than a pound of that icky ICE stuff....
When Ford comes out with specs for theirs, we can re-do all the math above where specs differ significantly.
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