EV sales in UK in October surged ahead ! - Despite a fall in Car Sales overall

Because the car dealers cannot source enough ICE cars to meet demand as their numbers are being restricted. Also, if you analyse the buyers of evs you will see that it is mainly corporate, not joe public.
 
gman said:
Interesting news:

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We had friends over the other night who are Chinese(as is my wife) and we began discussing cars as we have been searching for what to buy next.

While discussing EV’s the male friend was telling us about how his dad now had an ev that the batteries could be changed on.
He said it was a quoted 500km range per battery and it can be swapped at a max of 6 times per month. But was normaly done once a week.
Said you drive in they have a machine/robot that swaps it out in the time it would take to fully fill a tank.

Obviously everything in china is done in a far more efficient manner and at way lower cost so not sure how it would work here.


Ev uptake is becoming big there also but mainly due to the fact of how cheap the cars are.
Tesla are around half the uk price and are classed as a poor persons ev/car.
Seems like as normal we get shafted on prices.
 
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pmac said:
We had friends over the other night who are Chinese(as is my wife) and we began discussing cars as we have been searching for what to buy next.

While discussing EV’s the male friend was telling us about how his dad now had an ev that the batteries could be changed on.
He said it was a quoted 500km range per battery and it can be swapped at a max of 6 times per month. But was normaly done once a week.
Said you drive in they have a machine/robot that swaps it out in the time it would take to fully fill a tank.

Obviously everything in china is done in a far more efficient manner and at way lower cost so not sure how it would work here.


Ev uptake is becoming big there also but mainly due to the fact of how cheap the cars are.
Tesla are around half the uk price and are classed as a poor persons ev/car.
Seems like as normal we get shafted on prices.
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oh absolutely if the watch some of the Electric Viking You tube stuff you get a much bigger picture of what is going on in China regarding EV and also renewable energy.

In many urban areas EVs are not an option they are mandatory and it has bought down pollution in these areas massively
you can buy a decent small EV with 200mile range in China for about £8k equivalent some basic ones are even cheaper.

Its governments that are shafting us with over the top tariffs to protect legacy ICE car companies
keeping pollution in business

Germany is in massive trouble, watch that space next year some massive large companies are going to make huge shock announcements.


www.youtube.com

The Electric Viking

The Electric Viking is a tech-based YouTube channel in Australia. Bringing you the ev news, stock prices, stock analysis, quality tech tutorials, tips & tricks, how-to videos, and gadget reviews. Subscribe and join the squad.
www.youtube.com www.youtube.com
 
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It's interesting how some early EV adopters were almost angrily opposed to the idea of battery swapping, when it's the obvious way to refuel an EV that is used for traveling distance. Makes far more sense than megawatt hour rate battery chargers trying to recharge in a couple of min.
 
ancient_mariner said:
It's interesting how some early EV adopters were almost angrily opposed to the idea of battery swapping, when it's the obvious way to refuel an EV that is used for traveling distance. Makes far more sense than megawatt hour rate battery chargers trying to recharge in a couple of min.
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Going by the example in Peter's post I'd have to be changing battery at least twice a week. Even for a light user though I cannot see the benefit unless they simply cannot home charge. I do my circa 200 miles a day, get home plug the car in and it's full and ready for the morning.
 
Steep said:
Going by the example in Peter's post I'd have to be changing battery at least twice a week. Even for a light user though I cannot see the benefit unless they simply cannot home charge. I do my circa 200 miles a day, get home plug the car in and it's full and ready for the morning.
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The point is that, just like using a petrol station, you pull in and the battery is swapped in a couple of minutes. In and out. Driving 500 miles? Just get a battery swap at 250miles.

If you're a home charger who drives 30 miles per day then it doesn't matter, right up until you want to go somewhere beyond the comfy driving range, at which point it's suddenly very useful. It means you can use an EV like an ICE car *if you want to*.
 
ancient_mariner said:
It's interesting how some early EV adopters were almost angrily opposed to the idea of battery swapping, when it's the obvious way to refuel an EV that is used for traveling distance. Makes far more sense than megawatt hour rate battery chargers trying to recharge in a couple of min.
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That just got me thinking that the battery swap system could also take pressure off the main grid and also what I would imagine are pretty big infrastructure upgrades, especially in more remote areas compared to a more feasible robotic battery swap setup.

That could be a pretty big hurdle overcome. I'm guessing we would need a unified battery solution for all cars though.
 
ancient_mariner said:
The point is that, just like using a petrol station, you pull in and the battery is swapped in a couple of minutes. In and out. Driving 500 miles? Just get a battery swap at 250miles.

If you're a home charger who drives 30 miles per day then it doesn't matter, right up until you want to go somewhere beyond the comfy driving range, at which point it's suddenly very useful. It means you can use an EV like an ICE car *if you want to*.
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I get that but you must know it's never going to be that simple.

Try getting a motor manufacturer to dump their proprietary systems in place of some generic standardised one + software with it's hit in profit margins. They won't do that willingly and you'll be stuck with having to stock umpteen battery types.
Speaking of umpteen, imagine the financial outlay neccessary to carry batteries for an unknown number of cars per day (About 150 cars per day use a petrol station to give an idea.) even if they are eventually standardised.
And the cost of recharging the used ones? Would they be charged on site? that would take a massive amount of power and expense to achieve. Would they be transported elsewhere, and full ones delivered? again an enormouse logistical problem. An EV battery that can do 200 miles (~50kwh) weighs about 380 kilos, the cost of carting them around the country in large numbers would be prohibitive.

It sounds like a decent idea but I think it would be like Betamax to VHS, if they did start it globally, it would struggle on for a few years if some big money was behind it but ultimately die.
 
They can be charged during low peak times. It also overcomes the problem of millions of homes who do not have a driveway.

It would also be possible for a standardisation of connections and size to be forced by the Government and if they are genuinely concerned about the environment, net zero etc, then why not? They certainly don't have a problem forcing plenty of other things on us. I believe OBD is standardised and forced.

However, even if not, all it would take is one manufacturer to offer it and to become successful and plough ahead of the others for solutions to open.
 
Steep said:
Try getting a motor manufacturer to dump their proprietary systems in place of some generic standardised one + software with it's hit in profit margins. They won't do that willingly and you'll be stuck with having to stock umpteen battery types.
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I could imagine European motor manufacturers who are apparently losing the EV battle getting together and asking how they can compete. 1 standard for 2 or 3 sizes, to fit all cars from VAG, Stellantis, perhaps also work with Nissonda if they merge.

Or perhaps governments could put on some long trousers and make legislation like that for phone chargers.

It's got to be better than high speed chargers for load distribution, and if carefully sited, charging stations could also be near solar and wind generation, reducing losses of sending power over distance and again taking a load off the grid.
 
I'm out of date as far as China is concerned, but things are very different there, as well as being far more efficient. The government either owns or has a level of ownership of most large companies, so when they make decisions on infrastructure things happen very quickly and efficiently, so if they decide on an interchangeable battery system there's no room for manufacturers to disagree about that.

Cars are relatively new in China, as far as private ownership is concerned, and the sector has grown massively in just a few years. 15 years ago there were just a handful of Chinese makers and the cars were terrible, nobody wanted to own one.

Japanese cars aren't welcome there, for historical reasons (invasion and atrocities) and the few people who bought Japanese found they they were very unpopular, and their cars were vandalised, so the big German makes dominated, together with Range Rover and Volvo, and most if not all of the big makes are now built in China and at least part-owned by Chinese firms, which means by the Chinese government.

ICE fuels were always expensive there (relative to earnings) so there's wiggle room when it comes to providing power for electric cars.

And home charging is a challenge, because the vast majority of people who can afford cars live in large apartment blocks, only the super-rich have a house and off road parking, so swapping out batteries makes perfect sense there.

China still relies heavily on coal, but they are going "green" very rapidly. Just ignore most of the negative comments made by western media.
 
ancient_mariner said:
I could imagine European motor manufacturers who are apparently losing the EV battle getting together and asking how they can compete. 1 standard for 2 or 3 sizes, to fit all cars from VAG, Stellantis, perhaps also work with Nissonda if they merge.

Or perhaps governments could put on some long trousers and make legislation like that for phone chargers.

It's got to be better than high speed chargers for load distribution, and if carefully sited, charging stations could also be near solar and wind generation, reducing losses of sending power over distance and again taking a load off the grid.
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I would also be curious as to how important proprietary battery technology would be with such as system in place because essentially range would no longer be a major concern in most cases. Besides, they could still have additional non-swappable rechargeable proprietary battery to provide extended range to work in parallel with the standardised battery, an EV hybrid type thing. Although weight could be an issue there.

There would still be plenty of scope for manufacture specific tech with aerodynamics, transmission losses, regen etc
 
China is reinventing itself on a week by week basis its climb towards mass EV ownership is staggering but has left quite a few wrecked companies in the mirror
i think at the last count there were over 90 EV companies at one point and all losing money as the big ones like BYD and SAIC just slash prices, As has been said there cars used to be junk but 15 years later they are world leaders in another 5 the planet will be covered in Chinese EVs as they will now just start wiping out legacy car makers. VW are on the brink in Germany at the moment.
 
Garry Edwards said:
I'm out of date as far as China is concerned, but things are very different there, as well as being far more efficient. The government either owns or has a level of ownership of most large companies, so when they make decisions on infrastructure things happen very quickly and efficiently, so if they decide on an interchangeable battery system there's no room for manufacturers to disagree about that.

Cars are relatively new in China, as far as private ownership is concerned, and the sector has grown massively in just a few years. 15 years ago there were just a handful of Chinese makers and the cars were terrible, nobody wanted to own one.

Japanese cars aren't welcome there, for historical reasons (invasion and atrocities) and the few people who bought Japanese found they they were very unpopular, and their cars were vandalised, so the big German makes dominated, together with Range Rover and Volvo, and most if not all of the big makes are now built in China and at least part-owned by Chinese firms, which means by the Chinese government.

ICE fuels were always expensive there (relative to earnings) so there's wiggle room when it comes to providing power for electric cars.

And home charging is a challenge, because the vast majority of people who can afford cars live in large apartment blocks, only the super-rich have a house and off road parking, so swapping out batteries makes perfect sense there.

China still relies heavily on coal, but they are going "green" very rapidly. Just ignore most of the negative comments made by western media.
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It’s exactly this there. Most live in flats while the very rich.. at least in Shanghai where our family are live in houses.
High end German cars have always had an import premium added15/20 of what we pay in the UK but it’s a status symbol more than even the uk.
Yeah the government also has its fingers in every pie and if they push something (EV) then it happens way faster than anything we do( as does everything there)
Mr Bump said:
China is reinventing itself on a week by week basis its climb towards mass EV ownership is staggering but has left quite a few wrecked companies in the mirror
i think at the last count there were over 90 EV companies at one point and all losing money as the big ones like BYD and SAIC just slash prices, As has been said there cars used to be junk but 15 years later they are world leaders in another 5 the planet will be covered in Chinese EVs as they will now just start wiping out legacy car makers. VW are on the brink in Germany at the moment.
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The are pushing everything to be honest, our friend works for a uk car company and works on EV and hydrogen advancement. Even 3/4 years ago he was saying china will be leading the world in this. The uk buys 1-2 hydrogen busses and china buys 100’s . Similar with EV loads of busses have been electric there for years (byd) before EV cars became popular.

There is still a huge issue with cutting corners in Chinese manufacturing.
The xioami being a great example… supposedly having a lot of issues with quality and parts failing. I saw it was having breaking issues at high speed( when tracked)as while it looked to have huge breaks the callipers were huge but the pads under were 1/3 the size.
There’s still a lot of show and not real substance with a lot of these manufacturers.. once they iron out these issues I’m sure all the German manufacturers will be left in the dust though.. Tesla is a great example the Shanghai model’s have been praised as the best build version out of them all and likely costs them a hell of a lot less to produce than US/german ones.
 
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ancient_mariner said:
It's interesting how some early EV adopters were almost angrily opposed to the idea of battery swapping, when it's the obvious way to refuel an EV that is used for traveling distance. Makes far more sense than megawatt hour rate battery chargers trying to recharge in a couple of min.
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I wouldn't say I'm angrily against it, but like a lot of things EV, it will work for very specific use cases.

You'd want lots of people all driving the same car (or compatible) who can't charge at home (because that has to be the cheapest way) past a very large "refill station" (I bet you don't want to stack the spare and spent batteries very high). The refill station will also be very expensive to build - regular chargers are pretty expensive but you'll want a large stock of eye wateringly expensive batteries. You'll also need to be able to move them around quickly and easily and charge the empty packs pretty fast. For that you either want large amounts of cheap labour or some pretty expensive robots.

I'm not saying it can't be done (I've seen videos of it happening for real) but I suspect it will be limited to certain places e,g, commuting in China.

It *could* also work very well for fleet use. A bus garage or haulage firm for example could use this tech to refuel their vehicles - but their batteries are very large and expensive. Maybe it's even a good solution for people like Enterprise who could rapidly "refuel" vehicles between hire.

But we're approaching a 5 min recharge for 200 miles. That actually seems a good benchmark for where we need to be for a large number of users. I haven't bought petrol in a while but even if the petrol station is empty and you pay at pump I bet it takes > 5 mins to refuel for around 400 miles.
 
Yup, from empty to full (a touch over 400 miles range) takes around 5 minutes to pump. Plus hand washing (even using gloves, Diesel finds a way in!), paying, the trip to the till/queue and dealing with smelly fuel.

Swappable batteries is a lovely idea but would need far more cooperation between manufacturers than will ever happen. Personally, I'd be thinking along new battery technology speeding up the recharging process and reducing weight.
 
Nod said:
Swappable batteries is a lovely idea but would need far more cooperation between manufacturers than will ever happen. Personally, I'd be thinking along new battery technology speeding up the recharging process and reducing weight.
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yep for sure CATL the big Chinese battery company are breaking new records every week on this
they are already at 1000km on a single charge installing in some models give them a few more years maybe 5 and they will have
small cars with 400miles in the EU and UK at great prices

Passenger Vehicles

Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Limited (CATL) is a global leader in new energy innovative technologies, committed to providing premier solutions and services for new energy applications worldwide.
www.catl.com
 
I do like the battery swap thing because it also covers off a number of other issues

[1] upgrades if a better battery chemistry comes out then you can maybe pay the extra and simply pop down and get an upgrade?
[2] battery faults , no need for a dealer to be involved just have it swapped out and then the network can get it back to the manufacture for repair or recycle
[3]having more batteries in stock allows flexible charging of the stock so more cleaner energy can be involved

but ultimately i do not see this outside of China
EU and UK could never get in the same room and agree a batty standard or any of the agreements that would need to be hammered out.

very clever stuff

CATL Launches Battery Swap Ecosystem with Nearly 100 Partners

On December 18, 2024, CATL unveiled two standardized battery models, #20 and #25, at the Choco-Swap ecosystem conference held in the coastal city of Xiamen. Jointly launched by CATL in collaboration with nearly 100 partners, the Choco-Swap ecosystem marked a historic step toward the...
www.catl.com
 
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JonathanRyan said:
Well, president musk just called for the overthrow of the German government and their replacement with a bunch of racists. So yeah....
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EM being such a see you next day after Monday is one thing putting me of Teslas.

ETA...

ecab2cf580b6d650a5c3ef2c1a79df8c669d481d.jpeg
 
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ancient_mariner said:
I hope they remember that when they have cleared their forest in order to make him wealthier, but somehow I suspect not.
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would the same people be complaining if the German VW group were making space for a new ICE factory?

I think not , this is just the krauts trying to stir up the pot for the possibility there is a better way than ICE they are losing.... badly

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