[HN Gopher] Two-minute battery changes push India's delivery rid... ___________________________________________________________________ Two-minute battery changes push India's delivery riders to switch to e-scooters Author : rustoo Score : 172 points Date : 2022-03-21 19:45 UTC (3 hours ago) (HTM) web link (theprint.in) (TXT) w3m dump (theprint.in) | mulmen wrote: | When I was in Taiwan we saw Gogoro scooters in the wild. The | battery is swapped at a kiosk in a couple of minutes. Riders pay | a subscription for the scooter and access to the battery kiosk. | | Seems like a really great option. I would _love_ to have that in | my city. We have dockless bicycles and scooters but a more | capable and personal option would be awesome. I 'd sign up in a | heartbeat. | | Sadly my city planners do not seem aware of motorcycles as a | transportation option. We have no laws or infrastructure to | encourage them or take advantage of the benefits. At a state | level we at least get to cut ferry lines, but that seems to be | the only perk. | baybal2 wrote: | The engineering company I work briefly passed over few | proposals from South Asian companies deploying them. We worked | on electric bikes, but decided to pass on a real road going | scooter as we have near no vehicle experience besides | individual electronic components. | | Both leading battery swap standards in India are from Taiwan. | One is GoGoRo as you said, and another is Ionex. | | Ionex based scooters usually have more in the roadgoing | department, and GoGoRo more in internet/app features. | | GoGoRo is founded by a Taiwanese guy who worked for a famous | company in America, thus he is using his fame to get big money | from financial funds. Manufacturing is mostly OEM. | | Ionex is made by an established player -- Kymco | (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDNKQ18-QYY,) and has more | firm standing in the industry. They have their own parts, and | share service centres with their petrol scooters. The later is | a very big thing in India, and South Asia in general. | | The biggest impediment for both turned out to be India road. | Taiwanese scooters with tiny wheels don't fare well anywhere | outside of big cities. | | Rural Indians really prefer classic motorcycles -- cheap, | repairable, no exotic parts. The "app" things doesn't sell at | all either. The only useful function for many on smart scooters | is a theft alarm + GPS. | [deleted] | vondur wrote: | In that case, it would be awesome to have some sort of standard | battery for e-bikes, scooters, etc. Then you can just stop by | some battery switching place swap one out on demand. | noahtallen wrote: | The other amazing benefit for this plan is that batteries are | expected to fail and loose capacity after a few years. So | being able to easily swap the most vulnerable component is | awesome for long-term repairability! | asdff wrote: | We have subscription escooters which seem tempting to me, but | the costs never pencil out. They end up being as much as the | scooter within a years time or so, plus you are on the hook if | some major damage or theft happens. Whats the point of that | then? Might as well look for someone who will let you finance | an ebike and put it on your renters or homeowners insurance for | protection at that rate. | codazoda wrote: | My wife and I just rode Lime scooters in San Francisco and I | was shocked by the cost. We rode about 4 miles in 45 minutes. | When we got off, we were charged $60 (about $30 each). We | could have taken Uber or Lyft for less. | | They have 1-hour and 1-day options, but I was told by CS | (after) that the 1-hour pass only includes 30-minutes of | actual riding. Uhg. | | I might buy one, because they are so fun, but I probably | won't rent one again. | | I'm talking stand on scooters vs the sit on motorcycle type | ones. | bduerst wrote: | Lime and other scooters in SF used to have much less | expensive subscription options, but they've all recently | dropped them for much more expensive ones. | | Bay Wheels bike annual subscription is worth it but only if | you use them regularly (like commuting/weekends). | thatfrenchguy wrote: | I think the point of those things, at least for the ebikes, | is to rip off the tourists to compensate for the locals who | have a subscription? | a9h74j wrote: | Bright side for tourists: No windows to break in the | rental. | ceeplusplus wrote: | I think these are intended more for transportation than | riding around (unlike the BayWheels type stuff). I used to | commute to work on my own scooter and it only takes 15 | minutes or less to ride 4 miles on the road. My commute in | the morning was just under 3 miles and downhill so I | usually managed in 8 minutes. | fragmede wrote: | The point of that is that renting confers specific benefits | that make it worthwhile despite the downsides. First off, no | need to charge. Not the worst thing but there's nothing worse | than running out of battery because you forgot to charge it. | Additionally, no maintenance - the company employs mechanics | that are better positioned to fix the scooters. Finally, no | need to have the scooter with you - just use it whenever you | want, in one direction, and then not have to lug a scooter | with you for the rest of the day. Or, if you didn't ride it | in, you can't use it for the rest of the day. If it's raining | in the morning but clear in the evening, you don't have the | scooter to ride home unless you rode it in for your morning | commute. | | Now, you may not find that list enough to offset the | downsides compared to buying your own, but judging from their | seeming success, I'm not the only person that's done the math | and intentionally chooses renting a scooter as-needed. | renewiltord wrote: | Access to credit is not as easy in India. This is just a | straightforward capex to opex transformation that people can | intuitively grasp. Combine that with no minimum commitment | and it's transparent to them what expenses are, what income | is, and what net income is. | | Indian users are very price-sensitive and there are extensive | discussion networks running the numbers on these. They won't | use these services unless it makes financial sense. | thebean11 wrote: | - Quick battery swapping | | - No maintenance or upgrade cost | | - Low upfront cost | | - Low commitment | asdff wrote: | Still cheaper to own. Maintenance with ebikes is not going | to be very much. Throw lube on the chain every once in a | while and have the bike shop do tires and brakes once every | two years. Honestly you could buy a brand new $1200 ebike a | year for the prices the services around me ask for their | most basic plans which have mileage limits, and require a | deposit anyhow. You can also turn around and sell your new | ebike anytime, not much lock in or commitment there whereas | I'm putting my blind faith in the fact that this particular | subscription service will be easy to cancel (history says | otherwise). | thebean11 wrote: | Where is "around you"? The economics in India might be a | lot different (ie relatively more expensive scooters, | cheaper labor) | ipaddr wrote: | You can buy an ebike for 1,000 or less. You can pay | 99/month for typical ebike monthly rental. | [deleted] | ceeplusplus wrote: | You're not getting a high quality ebike for $1200. I had | a $600 e-scooter (Segway ES4) and by the time I hit 500+ | miles on it the screws were falling off, the external | battery connection was corroding, and the bottom | floorboard light connection had broken. | | I just checked and the Ninebot Max is $949 on Segway's | website and that's got a smaller battery than most | ebikes. And I'd be willing to be that that scooter would | also break down just like mine. | bduerst wrote: | >Still cheaper to own. | | Bay Wheels is $159/year and about $2.00 a ride, meaning | you would need to ride 520 times that year before it | became cheaper to own. Also for regular bikes it's free | each ride. | | That's ignoring that decent e-bikes are more expensive | than $1200, the stress of having to lug around and | securely park your property, the depreciation of the | batteries, as well as any insurance & deductible costs | you'll encounter for when (not if) it gets stolen. | | It's hands down better to be able to hop-on and -off | wherever you want with an ebike than to deal with owning | one in SF. | [deleted] | mkehrt wrote: | The value subscriptions (bikes/ebikes for me in SF) is in not | having to worry about it. I can bike to anywhere in the city | and generally leave the bike there and walk or bus. Or I can | do the reverse. I'm also not on the hook for maintenance. | | It's a very different thing than owning. | | Edit: I want to be clear that this is about the economics and | ease of owning vs renting, not the particular prices. Lyft | bikes have memberships+rental fees or just rental fees, and | they can be pretty expensive, but so can buying an ebike. | bduerst wrote: | The biggest benefit of using the Bay Wheels subscription | over owning is not having to worry about your e-bike being | stolen. It's definitely worth it at the price point it's | currently at. | | The only downside is that as people return to the bay, the | e-bikes (and bikes) are going to become more and more | scarce at docks. | ipaddr wrote: | You can take it anywhere and just leave it? Middle of the | road? Under a bridge? Random backyard? That sounds useful | but how often do you not need transportation back from | where you came? If you leave the bike how easy is it to run | into another bike someone randonly left? | mkehrt wrote: | I can leave an ebike on a random sidewalk, as long as it | is not blocking the way, for a $2 fee, or at a dock, of | which there are many, for free. | | How often do I do this? Probably once a week. Bike out to | the beach, walk or bus back. Bike to the grocery store, | lyft back. Go on a walk after work, not have to worry | about getting home. | | How easy is it too find one? Pretty easy. There are docks | everywhere, and an app that shows me where bikes are | left. | riquito wrote: | It's not really up to discussion, that it works it's | proven, it's a system in use in many cities. If you have | enough bikes/cars, you will tend to have one available in | an acceptable range of time and space. If you go to the | outskirts of the city, you don't "release" the bike/car | and pay more to have the guarantee to be able to go back. | [deleted] | phreeza wrote: | Wait, you are on the hook for theft?? Just while you are | logged in, or for what period of time? | asdff wrote: | You get billed a fee apparently: | | https://old.reddit.com/r/cycling/comments/kon8hr/i_just_had | _... | crate_barre wrote: | You almost need a scooter in these large third world mega | cities. The streets are narrow as hell, they can't really | handle cars. On the flip side. Cars are stuck in traffic all | day and rarely get to cruising speeds without making a left | turn into another traffic jam. Scooters let you move around in | that clusterfuck and no car is moving fast enough to kill you. | Good luck staying safe in scooter in America though. | [deleted] | tomcam wrote: | > large third world mega cities. | | But enough about Los Angeles | Hypocritelefty wrote: | blamazon wrote: | In this 2 minute video demonstrating a Gogoro swap the rider | goes from opening their seat to having a fresh battery and | ready to ride in about 50 seconds: | | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W34k0nrrDQA | agumonkey wrote: | Do you know what causes the slight wait before getting fresh | batteries ? some checks ? | genocidicbunny wrote: | Probably some sort of authentication and status checks of | the inserted batteries. | abraxas wrote: | The batteries don't look all that big. Do you know what the | range is on a fresh pair? | KerrickStaley wrote: | I would typically plan for 60 km between swaps, which | includes a healthy error margin (I owned a Gogoro 2+ when I | lived in Taiwan a year ago). Gogoro advertises 110 km but | that is at 25 kph which is unrealistically slow. | | 60 km actually goes quite far in Taiwan, which isn't a very | big place compared to eg the United States. Gogoro has an | extensive network and you only range limited in rural areas | like the east coast or the central mountains. | 14 wrote: | I wonder how long before someone comes up with a fake battery | pack that looks identical and registers as having a higher | battery power then it actually does and has fewer cells | internally so they can take the real higher power more cells | genuine battery and leave behind a fake on that barely works. | Like fake memory cards you can get from wish.com that state | they have much higher memory then what they actually have. | asdfasgasdgasdg wrote: | You're not going to get much repeat business if you hand | out crappy batteries. It seems like incentives are decently | well-aligned here. | | I guess you might be able to scam the rechargers themselves | if you want to "return" a knock off. But if I were them I | would put tamper resistant asset tags on my batteries and | ensure that whatever battery im taking back is the same as | the one I handed out. | Gigachad wrote: | It's the same as any kind of theft really. You probably get | away with it to start but eventually the loss becomes great | enough that the company pays attention and starts tracking | it down. And if you have been doing this on a large scale | you could be looking at serious criminal theft. | markdown wrote: | About as long as it would take for Gogoro to put a camera | on their battery kiosks. | imhoguy wrote: | And get life ban for the subscription. I think these | batteries are properly sealed and their ROI is pretty | quick. Much more benefit is from that rapid electricity | transfer/exchange. | stingrae wrote: | This is relatively straight forward to prevent with signed | certificates stored on a secure coprocessor. | silvestrov wrote: | Each battery can have a serial number and an embedded ARM | chip and the charger be connected to the internet. | | So the central server will reject the battery if it can't | authenticate with the proper RSA private key, or that key | is already online somewhere else. | | Just like creditcards with chips are validated each time. | phh wrote: | I uh, don't see the point? | | You have the charging electronics which will tell you | very quickly when a battery is dead, and you know which | subscriber gave you the faulty battery. Sure faulty | batteries can happen naturally (and accidentally), two | faulty batteries though should be statistically enough to | trigger an investigation from the company. | munk-a wrote: | I think the idea is that the battery reports voltage like | a mostly charged normal battery for just long enough for | you to leave the scene with a good battery. | | Ideally this would be coupled with lax device receipt | keeping so while the company could tell that one of these | thousand customers that used the kiosk that day returned | the faulty battery it'd be hard to pinpoint a specific | wrong doer. | | That said, it feels like the margins on this would be low | enough to make it not worth the effort. | toomuchtodo wrote: | Finally, an edge case where I would support hardware DRM | for cryptographic attestation purposes. | bduerst wrote: | You don't even need to go that far with the on-board | hardware. Just track battery exchange history with | charging pattern data, and identify offenders. | | Bad actors can spoof the battery charge reader, but it's | much harder to spoof the juice out of the charger. | ffhhj wrote: | Battery tracking leads to ads. Ads lead to the dark | patterns of the force. | neurostimulant wrote: | Thankfully someone with such skill will be very unlikely to | commit petty theft like this when there are more profitable | endeavors to pursue with their skill. | cyberbanjo wrote: | No way! Just because you're skillful doesn't mean you're | property utilized, or even (easily) utilizable, due to | other issues. I met plenty handy unemployed without | steady housing. | ankraft wrote: | We have several escooter services in The Netherlands (GO | Sharing, Check, felyx, etc.) which are operating in the larger | city's. It's all subscription based and not that expensive | comparing to owning a scooter with these current gas prices. | | The batteries are swapped at location and transported to and | from the nearest chargestation. You have to take a photo when | entering and leaving the scooter through the app. An | investigation will be started by the issuer when a scooter got | damaged. The last driver will not be responsible if it can't be | proved that the driver did the damage. | scalablenotions wrote: | I've thought for a long time that battery swapping is the only | way to go for all electric vehicles. A subscription or pay-as- | you-go service for battery changing is practical and would make | battery replacements costing tens of thousands of dollars a non- | thing. I know some batteries are heavy, but if stations can | provide petroleum pumps, then they can provide mechanized battery | exchange infrastructure, right? Bring on the ISO standards for | vehicle batteries! | | Does anyone have any reason why this wouldn't work? Perhaps parts | being stolen from the rental batteries before they're returned or | some such? | stetrain wrote: | You add more weight by making the pack easily removable, and | you need battery standardization. | | If every brand or every model has a different pack size, then | swap stations aren't very scalable. | | If you standardize pack sizes, then some cars will have less | range than they could, given that they could fit a larger pack. | | It makes a lot of sense for the relatively small, light, and | inexpensive scooters. The packs can be hand carried, and | different vehicles can just have slots one, two, or three packs | as needed. | | You aren't trying to squeeze 300-400 miles out of a scooter by | packing every inch of the frame with batteries. "Good enough" | is perfectly fine for urban scooters. | | And I think the reality is that it just won't be economically | viable for large cars. We are quickly reaching the point where | the battery packs will last the lifetime of the car, and | roadtrip charging stops are falling under 20 minutes. | EvanAnderson wrote: | Having worked around propane cylinders a standardized battery | pack sure seems like a no-brainer to me. It adds value to the | EV because the useful lifetime is no coupled less closely to | the lifetime of the battery pack. | | Advances in battery chemistry and charging could be rolled-out | across "legacy" fleets of EVs by upgrading the charging | stations and batteries in circulation. The EVs themselves | remain unchanged. | | I feel like planned obsolescence is a "feature" of current | EV's, in part by integrating the battery pack so deeply into | the design. There would weight/efficiency trade-offs in | standardizing on a battery pack but it's not like there isn't | value returned by way of faster "recharges", increased service | lifetime of the EV, and the potential to take advantage of new | battery/charging technology. | | It also seems like rapid battery change stations would be a | great "pivot" for existing gas stations and truck stops, and | something they could move into slowly (convert a portion of | their dispensers over to battery change rigs as the Customer | base shifts from ICE to EV). | lkxijlewlf wrote: | I recall, oh maybe 15 or so years ago, there was an, I believe, | Israeli inventor who proposed doing this for cars. Not sure what | happened to it, but I think that's something that should be | looked into more. I know, most auto OEMs like to build the car | around the battery (for structural soundness), but if I could | just pull in and have my battery swapped while on a road trip, | that would be amazing. | ihumanable wrote: | I believe you are remembering the same thing I'm remembering, | it was called BetterPlace | | Here's a TED Talk about it from 2009 | https://www.ted.com/talks/shai_agassi_a_new_ecosystem_for_el... | | They went bankrupt in 2013 | more_corn wrote: | Do you like how that little thing in the bottom corner flips | constantly? You don't find it distracting at all do you? The | person who did that should be shot. | [deleted] | 0xbadcafebee wrote: | Back when electric vehicles were the most popular automobile, | battery changes were used to keep electric trucks and taxis on | the road longer. Some companies were around 20 years just doing | electric vehicle battery changes and service. This was called | Power-as-a-Service, or PaaS. | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_electric_vehicl... | heavenlyblue wrote: | > Some battery developers are also opposed to standardizing power | packs anytime soon because the technology is evolving rapidly and | India could switch to the more efficient and environmentally | friendly sodium-ion batteries from the lithium-ion ones favored | by e-rickshaw makers. | | I do not think that is true. This is what all of them say | whenever standardisation comes into the argument. However | obviously they use that to lock the customers in. | myself248 wrote: | That makes no sense. With new battery tech, it's typically the | chargers that absorb the complexity, the load is just a load. | | So the scooters should be able to handle the new batteries just | fine, and it would be on the network operator to upgrade the | charging kiosks accordingly. It'd be much easier to rolling- | upgrade batteries in a swappable fleet than to call fixed- | battery scooters into the shop and swap each one out, as well. | L_Rahman wrote: | As the parent says, arguments like these are always a scheme | to lock customers into proprietary standards. It's | frustrating that companies still think they can get away with | this. | manquer wrote: | Standardization is not in chemistry or the tech itself. It is | in voltage/amps and the physical dimensions we already do | this with AA and AAA batteries. | manquer wrote: | That is where the government/standards bodies are important. It | is in everyone's collective benefit to standardize as the whole | market will expand. | | As quoted in the article this piece is what the finance | minister highlighted in her budget speech last month as being | important to get in place. | asdff wrote: | This is the game changer that could turn cities into EV dominated | spaces. Imagine if every convenience store had a rack of these | out front. It would be even faster to get a charged EV than even | to gas up an ICE car at the pump. | | These are the things that start becoming possible if we let our | idea of an EV move beyond a 4000lb automobile to move your maybe | 200lb self. You would have to use a technician to service a car | sized EV and swap out the batteries even if they dropped right | out easily, just due to the to weight of them. An entire | infrastructure that would have to be built just to move around | 3800 unnecessary lbs anytime you wanted to go anywhere at all. | Meanwhile, if people were merely happy with something the size of | an e scooter, converting the population to EVs starts getting a | lot simpler just in terms of the physics of it all, and simple | low hanging fruit innovations like this are possible. | nomel wrote: | > These are the things that start becoming possible if we let | our idea of an EV move beyond a 4000lb automobile to move your | maybe 200lb self. | | I see you live in an area with _significantly_ more days of | good weather than bad! | a9h74j wrote: | The Worldwatch Institute regularly put out 80-page studies in | the 1980s. Disappointingly, they published one on _The Future | of the Bicycle_ which never once mentioned the word 'rain'. | | FWIW, the Aptera three-wheel EV design gets IIRC 10X better | distance/kWhr than most EVs, and has a US classification as a | motorcycle. | oblio wrote: | Agreed! | | It's impossible to use anything but cars in places with bad | weather. Science has proved it! | | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uhx-26GfCBU | thatfrenchguy wrote: | Or we could have, you know, buses and trams and metros? Riding | a scooter in a car designed city sucks :-/ | oblio wrote: | Nah, you'll just get tunnels were autonomous cars can be | stuck in traffic jams, instead. | foolfoolz wrote: | this idea raised $850M and failed | | https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Better_Place_(company) | scythe wrote: | Those aren't scooters, they're cars -- and they showed up | before Panasonic/Tesla attacked the battery-cost problem with | roughly 100x as much capital. | [deleted] | nradov wrote: | Tesla also tried battery swapping several years ago but | seems to have given up. | ryukafalz wrote: | Those are also cars. | bduerst wrote: | That's because Tesla owners have disposable income and | tend to charge in suburban or rural homes. Swapping is | aimed more at lower-income segments or | delivery/maintenance services in urban areas. | hristov wrote: | Unfortunately this is not it. The game changer will be when | they start closing off large parts of cities to cars and | limiting them to small, slow and safe golf cart/scooter/bike | type vehicles. Everything else will fall into place very | quickly afterwards. | | We have the technology, we need the political will. These | scooters are nice but few people will brave riding them in a | busy American street, not to even mention a highway. | rootusrootus wrote: | > the political will | | Which is another way of saying 'willing voters.' Who all own | cars already, for the most part. And rarely vote to reduce | their own quality of life even if there is a possibility that | in the longer run it will be higher. | schnevets wrote: | and are completely oblivious to the costs of their way of | life (and certainly won't listen to a politician who | mentions the existence of such cost) | rootusrootus wrote: | Or they believe the costs are worth it. Trying to | convince people to support extraordinary lifestyle | changes requires extraordinary evidence that the net | result will be positive. | omgitsabird wrote: | How will that ever happen when delivery, moving, | construction, etc are essential parts of the economy for | "large parts of cities"? | wffurr wrote: | None of which requires unrestricted access for personal | cars or motor vehicles. | pjerem wrote: | You can totally ban individual cars while allowing | delivery, moving, construction, emergencies, public | transport ... | | A lot of city centers in Europe have been closed to cars | during the last decades but special trafic is still | allowed. | | It just works and it's better for everybody. | | And now I hope this will be extended outside of city | centers. | omgitsabird wrote: | Sure, but how does this system work? Especially with | newer services, like ride sharing, where people use | personal vehicles to transport people within these areas? | oblio wrote: | It doesn't work, nobody ever thought of it. | | RIP Europe, you will be sorely missed. | | On a more serious note, ride sharing services are | considered as taxis which are considered public transport | and public transport is generally allowed at least on | designated roads. | dghlsakjg wrote: | You could require them to register as commercial | vehicles. You can enforce using physical barriers or | punishing fines/use fees for people that don't enter the | area with a fare. Taxis can only go in certain parts of | airports, rideshares have designated pickup zones, it | seems to work fine. Or you just say that one of the | downsides of being a part time driver that isn't part of | a regulated fleet is that you don't get to congest | downtown areas. | | In Granada Spain I noticed that certain parts of the old | city had physical barriers that could only be passed by a | vehicle with the right NFC pass. Generally taxis, busses, | and a few private cars that seemed to belong to people | with property in the area. It made it very pleasant to | walk around the old streets without having to suck down | exhaust fumes of idling cars. | | As you noted, Uber is a newer service, plenty of people | happily lived their lives before it existed. | bduerst wrote: | Same way you designate loading/passenger zone parking or | bus/taxi only lanes for large parts of cities. | Johnny555 wrote: | The USA already has a NEV standard (25mph top speed, some | look like small cars, others more like golf carts). All it | would take to make them viable is more streets with 25mph | speed limits. | | This makes roads safer for bikes and scooters, but the NEV | gives a car-like option for someone who can't (or won't) ride | a bike. | | Even a NEV-plus standard that allows up to 35mph would be an | improvement, that would already cover almost all of my | commute. | hristov wrote: | The NEV standard would be great if people followed speed | limits. Unfortunately, the fact that it is 25 mph it does | not mean people will drive anywhere close to that. But it | is a good start. | Johnny555 wrote: | There's a pretty easy fix for that... speed cameras. | xmprt wrote: | Even easier fix for that which is much cheaper to | enforce... narrower roads, raised crosswalks, separated | bike lanes. Cars will naturally drive slower on those | roads and they are more friendly to other modalities. | Johnny555 wrote: | The argument against strict traffic calming is always | "How will an emergency vehicle get through?" | | There are some solutions that can slow cars but still | allow emergency vehicles through, but they aren't | perfect, and still need sign off from the fire | department. And that signoff can be hard to get, years | ago, my neighborhood wanted to install speed humps to | slow traffic -- the fire department vetoed it since the | road was the main access from the neighhood firestation. | oblio wrote: | You can actually speed over speed bumps, it's just | uncomfortable... | | The main thing is: how bad are speed bumps for vehicle | maintenance, really? Fire trucks, for example, only need | to go full throttle when they leave the fire station. | | When they come back they can just go over the speed bump | slowly, like everyone else. | | Why would going over 1 speed bump every bunch of days be | such a major issue? Does that mean that a fire truck | going over a pothole will do a barrel roll? :-p | jeofken wrote: | Anyone from NL here? How does that work there? | agumonkey wrote: | Another is the complexity of city traffic, the more red | lights, the more people are frustrated and will try to | push faster. When you ensure fluid flow, 25mph is fast | enough to go where you want without noticing it, if | things are smooth the driver might even enjoy the scene | instead of trying to 'get before the green light is | over'. | noveltyaccount wrote: | I don't know where I read this, but narrow streets cause | people to slow down too. Nearby my home is a very roomy | 30mph 5-lane road where the flow of traffic is usually | 45mph. Plenty of room to speed up! | bduerst wrote: | Why can't it be both? Easy-access technology can be a first | step to changing political mindsets. | amazd wrote: | Why hasn't Tesla gotten into this sort of battery swap tech for | their own cars yet? | patall wrote: | I am actually more wondering why we do not see battery | trailers. Imagine a two wheel, 500 lbs trailer that you pull | for the next 30 miles between two 1 minute stops on the highway | that recharges your cars battery within those 30 miles. I know | there are prototypes, but something seems to stop it from | becoming large scale. Inefficient? To much overhead? Can normal | drivers not be trusted with a 500 lbs trailer? I would like to | know... | rootusrootus wrote: | Too much overhead and DC fast charger networks are already | approaching parity with the speed you could make that work. | Trailers add another set of wheels to the ground, too, which | is a failure point. Might as well just put it on the roof or | something instead. | Johnny555 wrote: | I don't think there'd be much actual time savings. Every time | I get off the highway to get gas (which means slowing down to | exit, stopping at the bottom on the exit ramp, driving to the | gas station, pumping gas, getting back on the highway, etc), | it ends up being close to a 15 minute stop. I'd be surprised | if you can pull off, hook up a battery trailer (and pay for | it), then get back on the highway in a few minutes. | | Might as well just stop in for a 20 minute charge at a DC | fast charger, many cars can do an 80% charge in 20 minutes. | JackMcMack wrote: | This actually sounds doable if the battery charging trailer | is self driving (and self docking). You would lose only | minimal time slowing down for the docking/undocking. Easier | to test on select pieces of highway with predictable self | driving conditions. And the highway gives you space and | time for charging, when you need it most for long trips. | cheeze wrote: | Because they would need to announce it first, spend 10 years | talking about how it's right around the corner but never | delivering, and then maybe they could deliver it. | | We'll see these battery swaps right after FSD actually becomes | L3. | skolos wrote: | They did try it in 2013, but abandoned the idea: | https://www.tesla.com/videos/battery-swap-event | kevlened wrote: | According to "Ludicrous: The Unvarnished Story of Tesla | Motors", it may not have been abandoned. Instead, the feature | may have never been planned: | | "In 2013, California revised its Zero Emissions Vehicle | credit system so that long-range ZEVs that were able to | charge 80% in under 15 minutes earned almost twice as many | credits as those that didn't. Overnight, Tesla's 85 kWh Model | S went from earning four credits per vehicle to seven. | Moreover, to earn this dramatic increase in credits, Tesla | needed to prove to CARB that such rapid refueling events were | possible. By demonstrating battery swap on just one vehicle, | Tesla nearly doubled the ZEV credits earned by its entire | fleet even if none of them actually used the swap | capability." | asdff wrote: | The scale. Tesla batteries are like 900 pounds. You now have to | make a machine that can move 900 pounds of electronic hardware | at mass scale. Meanwhile, if your machine only needs maybe | 20lbs of batteries, suddenly that machine can be your user, and | the infrastructure problem got a lot simpler and cheaper to | solve. I have no clue why tesla isn't considering a low cost, | <$500 EV, be it scooter or bike. I think their brand name and a | price point that makes it easy for people currently on the | sidelines to buy in would easily be enough to dominate this | market overnight. At this point is just these companies from | china you get from sketchy amazon sellers. I don't see schwinn | ebikes when I drive around, they are too costly, I just see | these cheapo foldable amazon ones that go by 50 different | names, which I think is telling where the latent demand really | lies (not in the saturated luxury ebike/escooter market which | doesn't seem to move much product). | paxys wrote: | They tried and failed already. Lots of reasons why this | wouldn't work with cars: | | - The battery is expensive and makes up a large chunk of value | of the car itself. Being able to swap out a dying years-old | battery for a fresh new one doesn't make sense. | | - Swapping an electric car's battery is time consuming and | requires specialized equipment and labor. | | - The real utility for battery swaps for cars isn't in the | middle of the city but in remote highway stops, where setting | up such stations isn't feasible. | skolos wrote: | It does work: NIO does it (they have 700 battery swap | stations already). CATL also announced that they will produce | swappable car batteries. | | I, myself, don't see how this can be more competitive than | superchargers. But I do see that some customers would like to | have this option. | jfengel wrote: | Because Tesla knows that the vast majority of people will never | need it. | | Most people use their cars for well under 100 miles per day. | With a battery-electric car, you can charge it at home. You | never go to a station for anything -- not fuel, not fast- | charging, not battery swapping. You come home, plug in, and get | on with your life. | | People will make a few long trips per year, and those cases are | well handled by the supercharger network. It doesn't take long, | and corresponds to down-time that most drivers should be taking | anyway. | | There is nothing for them to gain by a massive redesign that | would gain most users little to nothing. Instead, they take the | stable battery pack and design around it, even making it a | structural part of the vehicle to save weight. | | Replaceable battery packs for cars solve a non-problem. People | who would want them would do better purchasing a gasoline car, | which are readily available and will remain so for quite some | time. | dvirsky wrote: | > you can charge it at home | | Most people in most big cities don't have private parking | they can equip with a charger, and they struggle to even find | parking at all. You'd have to make every single parking space | in a big city a charger to make this approach scale. | jfengel wrote: | Most people in big cities don't have cars. Most of the cars | in a city are commuters, who go home every night to the | burbs. It's the same reason cities have relatively few gas | stations. | | People who insist on having cars in cities will either find | places to charge, continue to own gas cars, or switch to | ride sharing plus public transport. It is not a case for | Tesla to change their entire design. | rootusrootus wrote: | > Most people in most big cities | | ... should use fast chargers, if they have no 'at home' | option. | | Most people in the US live in single family detached homes | and can get enough juice from a 120V outlet to meet their | daily driving needs. | dvirsky wrote: | Most of the world is not the US. And fast charging of ~1 | hour or even 25 minutes is an inconvenience that would | make people choose a non EV. | rootusrootus wrote: | We're not far from 15 minute charge times (and in some | regards already there). That's fast enough. | throw_nbvc1234 wrote: | > It doesn't take long | | Is there public data about how big the network would need to | be if 90-100% of long distance travel is switched from 5 min | gas station stops to super charging; both in terms of | throughput and latency? And/or studies of (probably rare) | mass transit events that may or may not be expected; thinking | natural disasters and large events away from population | centers like burning man or Coachella. | lkbm wrote: | > Because Tesla knows that the vast majority of people will | never need it. | | I don't know what portion of US drivers park either on the | street or in a parking garage, but I'm pretty sure it''s tens | of millions of people. Driveways pretty much don't exist in | my neighborhood. It's all parking garages and street parking. | | Lining every parking garage and neighborhood street with | dozens of chargers may be the optimal solution, but I'm | skeptical. | avianlyric wrote: | I think people overthink how complicated EV chargers are | (specifically slow chargers). At they're core, they're just | a normal 3-pin plug with a fancy computer controlled | switch. All of the heavy lifting is done by the car, it has | the inverter, the battery controller, and all the | monitoring equipment. | | All the charger does is tell the car how much power it's | allowed to use, authenticates the car, and flicks the | switch on at the command of the car. The charger also has a | cheap-as-chips current transformer so it can make sure the | car doesn't consumer more power than it allowed, and will | flick the switch off if the car misbehaves. The car is | responsible for everything else. | | So at the end of the day, and on street slower charger is a | metal post with a plug on the outside, and a Raspberry Pi | and relay inside. They can, and will eventually be, dirt | cheap to manufacture. As for power cables, well, and can | just slice into the cable already powering houses and | lampposts. | aqme28 wrote: | You see this in New York a lot too. The most popular delivery | bikes use a swappable battery. | asdff wrote: | Can you swap them at the store like your empty propane tank | though? | exabrial wrote: | This is why hydrogen, while being less efficient that battery- | electric, stands a chance. Convenience of 'filling up' in a | minute is the killer feature of hydrogen, regardless if it's 50% | as efficient as battery-electric. When said power is coming from | a nuclear reactor, who cares? | TillE wrote: | I remember hydrogen fuel cells getting major hype over 20 years | ago, quite specifically in the year 2001. It probably started | earlier than that. | | Since then, there's been approximately zilch in terms of | commercial applications, despite numerous drawbacks inherent to | lithium ion batteries. I'd bet on some novel alternative | battery technology over hydrogen. | pengaru wrote: | This is the way, but I have serious concerns when it comes to | abuse as surveillance tools. I'd want such vehicles to | incorporate something of a Faraday cage around the battery | module. The thing is inherently always powered and could easily | become a mechanism for tracking locations and travel speeds real- | time. | caymanjim wrote: | This isn't going to happen because almost no one would be | worried about it and there would be a cost that only benefitted | a microscopic fraction of concerned people. It also feels | completely arbitrary; for all you know, there are tracking | devices in everything you own. It's not like you can really | tell. There could be passive tracking devices in every consumer | device. | kingkawn wrote: | Now for cars/trucks and we're in good shape | kujin88 wrote: | Not just delivery drivers, this is essential for everyone in | India that uses a two-wheeler. India has always been known for | its notorious costs of Petroleum and its unaffordability to | anyone other than the rich. | | We need the EV transformation to make sure people are more | economically sustainable. A handsome side-effect of it would be | the dramatic drop in air pollution given the population density | in India | jefurii wrote: | > A lot of drivers in China, the world's biggest EV market, live | in apartment blocks and so don't necessarily have personal | charging outlets. | | As an apartment dweller this makes so much sense. | russellbeattie wrote: | Every single person who's ever put batteries in the back of some | consumer electronics device immediately thinks, "Why don't they | just make it so you can swap batteries in EVs?" I was definitely | no different. | | I now own a few eBikes including a DIY conversion, a Sur Ron dirt | bike and an Onyx emoto. The batteries are just so insanely | compact and heavy, it's surreal. The Onyx has a removable | 72v/48ah extended range battery which weighs 37lbs (17kg) [1], | similar to the weight of the swappable batteries in the article. | Let me tell you, that may not seem like a lot of weight, but it | really is and it's * _just so dense!*_ It 's the equivalent of | over 4 gallons of milk contained in two shoe boxes. | | Seriously, every time I have to move - or should I say | "manhandle" - the batteries in any of the bikes, I audibly groan | and make sure to lift with my legs. The batteries are all | different shapes, sizes and in various boxes and all shockingly | heavy for their size. The sharp edges of the Onyx battery box is | a true hazard as its momentum will give your thigh a nice bruise | should you swing it, or your car a nice dent. | | Anyways, I'm sharing all this to say: Batteries are heavy af. | Really. As good as a solution this is for scooters, don't expect | it to go much more beyond that. There won't be swappable | batteries on your big Zero or Livewire any time soon. | | 1. | https://www.onyxmotorbikes.com/collections/parts/products/rc... | animal_spirits wrote: | That's a genius idea, and could probably work for any mode of | transportation. Scooters, bicycles, cars, trucks. | sebastianconcpt wrote: | Bureaucrats of countries that basically depend only in selling | gas, are watching in panic or? | supernova87a wrote: | Given that it will still take 30-40 years for the bulk of | gasoline consuming fleets to expire/turnover, this is | ironically a problem that I bet such oil plutocrats are | thinking they'll shift the burden to their business-inheriting | children to deal with. | yodelshady wrote: | More practical zero-emission scooters in India could be, as I | understand it, quite something. I complain enough about exhaust | fumes in Western cities. | endisneigh wrote: | I remember in 2013 electric skateboards were all of the rage. I | felt like a pariah with an electric scooter. I told people they | were the future because skateboards are just too dangerous imo. | | I'm glad to see this happen. | | What I want now is an electric assist scooter, where then battery | is smaller and it simply makes your manual pushes far stronger. | | I'm no electric engineer, but I think there's an opportunity | here. If you can minimize the resistance added by adding an | electric motor you might be able to really decrease the weight of | the scooter if it only propels you on push. | Johnny555 wrote: | Are scooters significantly safer? (I'm assuming you mean the | small 2 wheeled scooter that looks a bit like a skateboard with | a steering post, not a vespa style "mini motorcycle" scooter | which is the scooter referenced in this article). | | I don't know how to clearly differentiate between the two types | of scooter when talking about them. | endisneigh wrote: | I strongly believe the addition of the handlebars makes a | scooter much safer to use for an average person compared to | an electric skate or longboard. I say this as someone who has | owned all three. | | Best example of this is braking. Most electric longboards | accelerate and decelerate as fast or faster than a scooter. | However the laws of motion still apply. Without something to | hold onto you have to actually anticipate your deceleration | and lean back when decelerating - very unintuitive. | | When I had an electric longboard I let several people use it | and saw several people fall over (fortunately they fell on | their feet) | Johnny555 wrote: | It just seems that the narrow 3" wheels commonly seen on | scooters are way too sensitive to road imperfections. I've | seen some with oversized 6" or so wheels that are wider | like a mountain bike tire, those seem safer. | | I miss eBikes, which seem to have been pretty much replaced | by eScooters, at least in my community. | H1Supreme wrote: | Totally agree. Those wheels are way to small at top | speed. You're just asking to get a stone jammed in there. | jayrot wrote: | I suppose you could get away with a slightly smaller motor if | you don't need super torque, but it's the battery that accounts | for a huge amount of weight. | jdjdjdjdjd wrote: | I think you are talking about a different kind of scooter than | the article. | endisneigh wrote: | Haha - I actually read the article but was in reader mode but | didn't see the picture haha. | | Strangely the article could apply to a traditional standing | scooter as well. What a coincidence. | | I did think the 50 mile range was a bit overzealous - shoulda | known. | Melatonic wrote: | What would be really amazing is if we all leased the batteries | but owned our vehicles (whether its scooters, cars, etc) AND | there were super fast quickswap stations built into the road | itself. Imagine if pulled up to a red stop light and the light | knew it was going to be red for the next 30 seconds at least - | your vehicle could communicate with some type of in-road | underground battery swap station and then at the press of a | button it could quickly reach up, remove your existing battery, | and replace it with a fully charged one. | | Larger vehicles could even have multiple batteries - one quick | swap one on the bottom and then another one elsewhere in the | vehicle that was a bit more work to swap - this way you could | mainly use and stress the swap battery and ideally keep swapping | it out as needed on a road trip but worst case you still have a | large energy reserve to fall back to. | ihumanable wrote: | I remember watching a TED Talk in 2009 that had a pretty | similar idea | https://www.ted.com/talks/shai_agassi_a_new_ecosystem_for_el... | | Seems like they went bankrupt though in 2013 | rootusrootus wrote: | That sounds like a huge amount of infrastructure work on | something that even in the best case will be relatively prone | to failure. Meanwhile, we already have grid connections all | over the place and DC fast charging is quickly approaching fast | enough. For those who even have to use it, the rest just charge | at home and none of these contraptions would improve their | experience. | ryukafalz wrote: | Have you lived in a multifamily building in a city? Or even | in a single-family home with only street parking? It's not | like we all have a garage at home to park and charge a | vehicle. Some do, but I would estimate the vast majority in | my city do not. | | I'm not saying we need in-street contraptions like GP | described, but "just charge at home" doesn't cut it for a lot | of people. | | I like the kiosks mentioned in the article, those seem pretty | convenient for city-dwellers. | dghlsakjg wrote: | The flip side of that is that the group you described is | the one most likely to not need to charge every day. My | experience was that 200 miles was a pretty reasonable | amount for a full week. If I'm honest, most weeks I'm well | under 100 miles. | | With fast chargers a weekly grocery trip or a charger near | the office would probably satisfy most needs. Tesla claims | that 15 mins. yields a 200 mile range. My gas hog | Pathfinder gets about 250 miles between fillups that last | about 10 minutes (bathroom and snack breaks when I'm on a | road trip). It seems that range anxiety is kind of | overkill. To be honest I'm surprised that coffee shops, and | fast service restaurants haven't been installing chargers. | rootusrootus wrote: | In the US, more than half of everyone lives in a single | family detached house. So perhaps half the population | doesn't have a major hurdle to at-home charging currently. | | For the rest, a 300 mile EV with once-a-week fast charging | while they grocery shop is entirely viable. Yes we need to | continue building out the infrastructure, but since your | comparison is with a battery swap solution that doesn't | currently exist in _any_ form, we 're already way ahead on | that. | AussieWog93 wrote: | >Imagine if pulled up to a red stop light and the light knew it | was going to be red for the next 30 seconds at least - your | vehicle could communicate with some type of in-road underground | battery swap station and then at the press of a button it could | quickly reach up, remove your existing battery, and replace it | with a fully charged one. | | If we had the technology and logistics to build an entire | underground battery swapping facility at every major | intersection, I'm sure we'd have moved past cars completely! | momirlan wrote: | you live in a country without snow, right ? | kurthr wrote: | Battery wear is a complex thing and it's not trivial to control | or test. You could easily trade in an excellent battery and | receive one that had 50% rated capacity. If you plan to wear | them out very quickly, not to need the full capacity, and pay | well above actual cost for the convenience of swapping, then it | could work. | | Otherwise, you will be ripped off by the better informed | charging station that hands out only their worst batteries, and | sells the best trade-ins as new. | jcims wrote: | Yeah, I think it's clear that you would have to buy the cars | off the lot with no battery included. | 2fast4you wrote: | What if we took batteries out of commission after X cycles? | | There would need to be regulation on it. I wouldn't trust my | manufacturer or charging network not to rip me off if they | had the chance. | Waterluvian wrote: | A very ignorant question: in order to charge faster, why can't we | just charge 200 little batteries in parallel and then operate | them in series? | itake wrote: | AFAIK, that is basically how batteries work. A battery is | comprised of "cells". | NathanielK wrote: | Some batteries like deWalts's flexvolt system do allow | rearranging the cells. They go full series so you can run | efficient 60V tools off them, but swith to partly parallel to | charge on a standard 20V charger. | nine_k wrote: | You can! Two limitations. | | (1) Heat dissipation. You're charging the battery with a much | higher current than the discharge current. Even if you can push | a coolant through the battery at the charging time, it adds | serious thermal loads, and associated mechanical loads, to it. | | (2) Power at the charging point. You're pushing dozens or even | hundreds of kilowatts, this takes both high voltage _and_ high | currents. Cables and connectors aside, the particular charging | place just needs a pretty beefy cable from the electric mains. | A typical cable going to a single-family house has a 20-30 kW | limit. Now imagine a station with 10 charging points. | hgomersall wrote: | From my limited understanding, the rate you can get charge into | a battery is proportional to its capacity. You see this in the | size normalised charge rating that batteries have, like 1C | means it takes 1 hour to charge and 4C means it takes 15 | minutes. Adding more batteries in parallel is much the same. | NathanielK wrote: | Batteries have "C" rating which is how many times you can | charge or discharge them in an hour. This magic number is | closely linked to battery chemistry. A "6C" battery can be | charged in 10 minutes as long as you have the power, while a | 10C battery can charge in 6 minutes. You're right that | sometimes charging speed is limited by the available power. | Don't expect to fast charge a 130kWh Tesla at a 45kW charger or | charge a 100Wh laptop on a 18W cellphone charger. In the case | of these scooter batteries, you are mostly limited by the | batteries C rating. Even if you watercooled them to stay at a | happy temperature, you can only push the chemistry so much. | | Maybe if they switched to a different chemistry like Lithium | Titanate they could chaemrge quicker. For now it is easier to | use LiFePo batteries and just swap them out. | avianlyric wrote: | Because the time taken to charge 200 little batteries in | parallel is the same as it is to charge them in series. | | Smaller batteries are capable of delivering less current, but | also only capable at charging at lower currents. So you can't | charge the individual cells in a battery any faster than the | battery as a whole. | | If you tried to take a single little cell, and charge it at | power level of an entire EV battery, all you'll get is a small | explosion and a fire. If you take one of the individual cells | out of a Tesla, it's not much bigger than a AA battery. The | charging cable of a super charger is much thicker than a AA | battery, and made out of a substantial better conductor than a | battery. Just imagine what would happen if you took a battery | the size of a AA cell, and plugged it straight into that cable, | running at 480V and pushing almost a thousand amps. They peak | at 250kW, about 50 households of power usage. Your little | battery won't stand a chance. | [deleted] | rdxm wrote: | unchocked wrote: | Another reminder of how much less overhead human-scaled systems | require. | | In this case, the battery swapping robot is you. | jscott0918 wrote: | I tried to reply to another comment that was since deleted. It | said something along the lines of: >I don't get why Tesla would | kill their battery-swapping while they are tackling other Hard | Problems. | | The practicality of battery swapping decreases exponentially as | size and weight scale. The cost of building a battery swapping | network for western-car-sized battery systems, even once | solving the engineering elements (which are manageable), are | likely a non-starter. Especially if the other principle | technology rival is fast-charging stations. | | How much added convenience is required to justify huge | mechanical systems with many wear components and large | maintenance costs over replacing a few charging cables every X | months? Lots. | jonsen wrote: | The batteri should go in a trailer. Swap the trailer. The car | itself could be smaller. Luggage could go on the trailer. | bduerst wrote: | Trailers are non-starters for most vehicles. | | Better to bring the batteries to charge the cars when they | need it: https://www.sparkcharge.io/ | tppiotrowski wrote: | Would make swapping easy but reversing with a trailer is | not easy. | jonsen wrote: | Self driving trailer shouldn't be difficult. | nine_k wrote: | I suspect that battery hot-swapping will be practical for | electric _trucks_. Charging them is really slow unless you | use a dozen of cables. Parked time costs real money for them. | Normal trucks unload, reload, and go back to the highway | pretty soon, often with a different driver at the wheel. | | Truck yards usually already have equipment for heavy lifting, | and the batteries need not be tailored to the car aesthetics | and space constraints. Also, a narrower industry has a better | chance to come up with a common standard. | toss1 wrote: | I think the trick is not to swap the whole battery | | Instead design in a space for a secondary battery, maybe 40% | the capacity of the main battery. Make those standard and | swap-able. | | Now, you can use the car as ordinary in either the one- | battery or two-battery mode, with the 1B config being more | nimble handling with less range, and the 2B config more | range. In any case, you can then enjoy rapid-swap of the | standard 2nd battery, or maybe just rent one for a long trip. | | This also helps the automakers keep their proprietary designs | on the main battery for differentiation. The 2nd battery | could go in the extra trunk space or something... | stetrain wrote: | But if you are talking about faster partial-capacity | refills during road trip stops, we already have that. | | Current batteries charge way faster from 0-50% than | 50-100%. The curve really starts to fall off above 80%. | | I usually try to plan my stops so that I'm arriving with | 5-10% and charging to 60-65%. With 250kW chargers that | results in a ~15min charging stop. | | I don't think the costs of development, impact to vehicle | design, and infrastructure would make sense for swaps just | to replace what is already a 15min charge. ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2022-03-21 23:00 UTC)