Do not get them wet!

The solution is simple here. Instead of summer tires and winter tires you’ll have to have a summer car and a winter car.

There’s a guy that lives on the other end of the block from me, and he’s out there in his garage welding on a car too.

He works on high tension powerlines here in California. He says that currently the state has no reserve capacity, and when something goes down they are buying more power from other places, where it’s possible.

But you cannot send power thru lines that aren’t big enough or do not exist. Also, powerlines are being condemned and not replaced because the state is trying to put the burden on private parties.

This is just the opposite of what the government tried to do during the years of early rural electrification.

So regardless of this mandated fantasy where we must have electric cars for everybody, The cost of electricity will have to skyrocket to suppress the outrageous demand.

I am planning for a future where I do limited driving, because I do limited driving now. I don’t have to commute, and I am very close to the conveniences of life. My electrics won’t need much range.

They probably won’t need lithium.

I don’t plan to give up all of my ICE vehicles. I am planning to make my own fuel if the government makes gasoline scarce.

I remember when everybody and his dog had to buy a guitar. (I think I’ve had five myself.) Everyone wanted to be a musician.

Now, everyone wants to be an armchair climatologist. No panel of experts here…

I am afraid all these Teslas will have a short life, UNLESS the aftermarket can provide more advanced battery replacements.

Lighter and safer.

If that happens these cars might be on the road a long time. And while it might happen for the millions of Teslas, EV Porsches are too rare for a cheap replacement to exist. Like all Porsche parts they will fly high.

There’s something called a cascade failure. Computers and electronics (and the nationwide power grid as well) will all suffer these failures at one time or another if they are poorly designed.

In structural engineering we call these things a zipper failure. A collapsing building comes down as a zipper, “opening” faster and faster as it pulls itself down/apart.

Here’s a cascade situation where to heat or charge your car in very cold weather, you must first heat the battery that runs the cabin heater with a battery heater.

If everything runs too low, the electronics in the car will not work at all. Dead Teslas were getting towed off the streets because they blocked traffic.

Also: Mguy tells us why Lithium is such hot stuff.



Credit to the #wallstreetjournal for breaking this story:

Under an Energy Department rule, carmakers can arbitrarily multiply the efficiency of electric cars by 6.67.

This means that although a 2022 Tesla Model Y tests at the equivalent of about 65 miles per gallon in a laboratory (roughly the same as a hybrid), it is counted as having an absurdly high compliance value of 430 mpg.

That number has no basis in reality.

DC regulators kept a special EV subsidy related to this, a secret. Regulators could announce what sounded like stringent targets, and carmakers would nod along, knowing they could comply by making electric cars with arbitrarily boosted compliance values. Consumers would unknowingly foot the bill and the headaches.

After environmental groups pointed out the illegality of this charade, the Energy Department proposed eliminating the 6.67 efficiency multiplier for electric cars, recognizing that the number “lacks legal support,” and has “no basis.”

Without the multiplier, the Transportation Department’s proposed rules are completely unattainable. The Journal noted this scandal is buried deep in the Federal Register—on page 36,987 of volume 65.

Since the tax credits “lack legal support,” and have “no basis”, all the beneficiaries should have to return their illegal gains. The biggest beneficiary is Tesla. This is where Tesla makes its profits. They sell the carbon credits to other brands that don’t make and sell enough EVs to meet the EPA standards. All other brands lose money on each electric vehicle. It’s not known who exactly bought the credits and for how much, but they are sold to other car companies that missed out on emissions standards of the #california Air Resources Board.

Just to be clear, this is wrong morally, and likely is illegal if challenged in court. This is a massive scandal reminiscent of the diesel-emissions cheating that rocked #germany automakers. This was the governments way of getting automakers on boards with EVs. Forcing them into compliance.

Now the government is going to remove this EV factor and implode automakers because they will not be able to comply with the EPA's regulations. This inflated figure is not simply a boastful statistic. It serves as a conduit for carmakers to accumulate compliance credits, which can then be traded for cash. This issue remained largely invisible to the public eye until recently, when environmental groups brought its illegality into the spotlight.

Not me!
That was the Wall Street Journal.

I will report that EV sales are still going ok here in California, due to the pervasive car culture, plus various $ incentives and record warm weather.

More people than ever are charging EVs in our neighborhood.

Please chill folks.

I quoted the WSJ because they do soft peddle the politics. Well, as much as anyone in the biz.

The engineering clearly wasn’t up to snuff, manufacturers all have to hustle to market first and to meet tough financial goals, so people fudge the reports to make things smell better.

It happens in every business. It also gets discovered (nearly always). I fully expect more such deviations from good sense to be discovered.

I am seeing another troubling thing in the manufacturing side. Big magnesium castings are now much easier to make than big aluminum ones. This reduces weight too.

But it is usually reserved for aircraft and racers, because magnesium burns just about like lithium does. Nearly impossible to extinguish. It also develops stress cracks easily. It needs regular inspections.

There is another thing that scares me about that business, and that is that the rejection rate will necessarily be higher than with lower technology materials. Also the raw material cost is higher, so there is more pressure to approve borderline parts.

This came to mind because of the current LG refrigeration scandal, in which millions of refrigerators were shipped out with defective compressors, rather than scrap them, shut down a production line, and wait for new replacements.

As Americans we are used to refrigerators that last for 20 years. These things are going out in two to four years.

I was involved in a lot of refrigeration work when I worked at Vendo in the 90s. It’s a well understood business and has been for a century. Vendo was bought by Sanden, they used compressors from Japanese Sanden corporation, and they were first class stuff.

It’s really not rocket science, but someone has to care. If they care about the money first, the quality will come last. And with many products, danger to the public will increase.

“Last” is a relative term. A Tesla battery at even 100k miles is much weaker than a new battery. Recharging is not a 100% reversible process.

When you look at bluebirds that ran 300,000 miles you ignore the average situation. The cells in the batteries do not all last the same. Some die young. They all weaken with age.

Go research how many unhappy folks got stiffed by car companies when batteries died early.

Go read about the millions spent on Australian school busses that can’t do a normal route. They got snookered big time.

Eventually I believe they will get this all-electric life biz worked out. They have talked about it since I was a child in 1960.

They still haven’t quite got it. Maybe another 30-40 years…

But the notion that 100% electric is 100% safe is, so far, very wrong.

MattiThundrrr said:

Think how many lives could be saved by the elimination of tailpipe emissions alone.

Click to expand...

How many lived are affected by flaming batteries? There’s no data on that.

MattiThundrrr said:

How many 100k mile cars are as good as when they were brand new?

Click to expand...

Not enough of them, but many more than when I was young. Poor quality has long been a problem with many manufacturers.

But they do get better in time. Just as Teslas did.

MattiThundrrr said:

I would guess hundreds of millions less than the tailpipe emissions thing. Maybe billions?

Click to expand...

You aren’t judging the same time period.