If you’re waiting for breakthrough battery technology before you buy an EV, you probably won’t be driving an electric vehicle anytime soon. Aluminum air. Flow cell. Carbon nanotube. Not that these don’t hold promise. What Tesla is doing with current lithium-ion technology is the right step. Tesla is building a better battery by building a […]
Read more "Why The GiGAFactory Won’t Be a GiGAFlop"UPDATE In the article Faraday Future I wrote about a company that at the time was shrouded in mystery. Now it’s even more so. Based in California, Faraday Future boasts it will create vehicles with “four wheels” and “re-envision everything else.” Thanks to FF’s recent announcement that they’ll be building a billion-dollar factory somewhere, maybe […]
Read more "The Future of the Future?"The twisted tale of the Electra Meccanica SOLO begins in a motorcycle seat maker’s shop in Hollister, California circa 1996. How does Canadian-based Electra Meccanica share history with one of America’s EV pioneers? It starts with a custom motorcycle saddle. If you’ve ever owned a motorcycle, you might have heard of Mike Corbin. Mike’s been […]
Read more "(not) the Sparrow Reborn"I don’t usually pass along a story without “interpreting” it, but there is a first time for everything. Instead of boring you with my blather, I’m simply sending you to an article by Tesla Club of Sweden member Tibor Blomhäll. It’s a fun, if not long, read. Thanks to John Ripper for bringing it to […]
Read more "Test Drive of a Petrol Car"To test the real-world range of AC/DC (my 2012 Nissan Leaf), I decided to drive it from my home in Beaverton, Oregon to Barton Park on the Clackamas River, where my company was shooting a commercial. According to Google Maps, this was 31.5 miles one way, requiring at least 63 miles of range to complete […]
Read more "Barton Park Adventure"Creating electricity with a hydrogen fuel cell is a beautiful concept. Hydrogen and oxygen react in an electrochemical process to produce a flow of electrons, and the only byproduct is a small amount of the combined element: dihydrogen oxide (H2O). It’s very clean. The engineers at Toyota believe this is the future of electric vehicles, […]
Read more "Hydrogen (Bomb?)"FRACTAL: a natural phenomenon or a mathematical set that exhibits a repeating pattern that displays at every scale, such as found in this Romanesco broccoli. FRACTAL: also the name of an electric concept car by Peugeot. In 2019, all electric vehicles in the European Union will be mandated to emit a noise to assure that […]
Read more "LA RéVOLUTION"The 2012 Nissan Leaf SL (above) had an MSRP of $38,415 when it was leased to a local couple in January, 2013. Two years later it came off of lease, and after being driven a few months by a dealer, I purchased it for $11,500 – almost $27,000 less. A virtually new car, with only […]
Read more "A New(ish) Leaf"Now comes FARADAY FUTURE announcing its future entree (2017) into the EV world. No vehicle(s) at this time. Just a company intending to build a vehicle that will have “four wheels.” They are sticking with four wheels. Plenty of articles are questioning almost everything about the venture, because I guess someone has to question everything. […]
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