Account Options

  1. Sign in
The old Google Groups will be going away soon, but your browser is incompatible with the new version.
Google Groups Home
« Groups Home
rec.arts.sf.fandom
+ new post
About this group
Subscribe to this group
This is a Usenet group - learn more
Message from discussion "Who Killed the Electric Car?" opens July 14th
The group you are posting to is a Usenet group. Messages posted to this group will make your email address visible to anyone on the Internet.
Your reply message has not been sent.
Your post was successful
 
From:
To:
Cc:
Followup To:
Add Cc | Add Followup-to | Edit Subject
Subject:
Validation:
For verification purposes please type the characters you see in the picture below or the numbers you hear by clicking the accessibility icon. Listen and type the numbers you hear
 
Doug Wickstrom  
View profile  
 More options Jun 14 2006, 12:58 pm
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.fandom
From: Doug Wickstrom <nimshu...@comcast.net>
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2006 11:58:01 -0500
Local: Wed, Jun 14 2006 12:58 pm
Subject: Re: "Who Killed the Electric Car?" opens July 14th
Print | View thread | Show original | Report this message | Find messages by this author
On Wed, 14 Jun 2006 07:26:53 +0000 (UTC), nos...@nospam.com (Paul

Ciszek) wrote:
>In the 90's GM produced a line of electric cars called the EV1
>that had a following of hard core fans in California, Tom
>Hanks and Mel Gibson among them.  These cars had no trouble
>accelerating and keeping up in California traffic, and once
>they went from lead-acid to NiMH batteries, the range between
>charging was 130 miles.  None of these cars were sold, however,
>only leased.  Once US Automakers managed to defeat California's
>"zero emissions" requirement, GM quit renewing leases, repossessed
>the cars, and destroyed them.  A bunch of fans of the cars offered
>GM $1.9 million for the last 78 used EV1's that were sitting in a
>lot, but they were taken away and crushed.  GM kept insisting
>that no one wanted to buy the cars.

Some facts about the EV1, the research and development of which
was produced by _my_ division of GM, Hughes Electronics:

General Motors lost two billion dollars on the project, and lost
money on every single EV1 produced.  The leases didn't even cover
the costs of servicing them.

The range of 130 miles is bogus.  None of them ever achieved that
under normal driving conditions.  Running the air conditioning or
heater could halve that range.  Even running the headlights
reduced it by 10%.

Minimum recharge time was two hours using special charging
stations that except for fleet use didn't exist.  The effective
recharge time, using the equipment that could be installed in a
lessee's garage, was eight hours.  Home electrical systems simply
couldn't handle the necessary current draw for "fast" charging.

NiMH batteries that had lasted up to three years in testing were
failing after six months in service.  There was no way to keep
them from overheating without doubling the size of the battery
pack.  Lead-acid batteries were superior to NiMH in actual daily
use.

Battery replacement was a task performed by skilled technicians
taking the sorts of precautions that electricians do when working
on live circuits, because that's what they were doing -- working
on live circuits.  You cannot turn batteries "off."  This is the
reason the vehicles were leased, rather than sold.  As long as
the terms of the lease prohibited maintenance by other than a
Hughes technician, GM's liability in the event of a screw-up was
much reduced.  Technicians can encounter high voltages in hybrid
vehicles.  In the EV1, there were _really_ high voltages present.

Lessees were complaining that their electric bills had increased
to the point that they'd rather be using gasoline.

One of the guys I worked with transferred to the EV1 program
after what was by then a division of Raytheon lost the C-130 ATS
contract.  He's now back working for us.  He has some interesting
stories, none of them good, though he did like the
company-subsidized apartment in Malibu.  He said the car was a
dream to drive, if you didn't mind being stranded between
Bakersfield and Barstow on a hot July afternoon when a battery
blew up from the combined heat of the day and the current draw.


 
You must Sign in before you can post messages.
To post a message you must first join this group.
Please update your nickname on the subscription settings page before posting.
You do not have the permission required to post.
Create a group - Google Groups - Google Home - Terms of Service - Privacy Policy
©2013 Google