100% electric buses

[chessie4905]

.....until you had to spend the big bucks for batteries. Where are you going to install all your conversion components since that Underfloor space is consumed with batteries. A used all electric shell most likely will need those batteries $$$$$$ before you move it off the lot.

[Jeremy]

That's true of the BYD-type buses which I assume use lead-acid batteries, but if you're talking about a long-distance highway bus (the bus equivalent of a Tesla truck) then you'd be talking about li-on battery packs which would be comparatively small in comparison - The amount of space dedicated to batteries in a Tesla truck isn't huge and a bus could handle that amount whilst still having a lot of baggage space left over.

But I completely agree that the cost of replacement batteries would scupper the whole concept, and there needs to be an order-of-magnitude change (and not just building a new Giga-factory) in either the technology or economics of batteries before this type of thing is going to become feasible for the common man.

Jeremy

PS - Interesting thing in the news yesterday saying that Apple has finally admitted that their software does deliberately slow down iPhones as they get older - of course everyone says it's a cynical ploy to get customers to get rid of their old phone and upgrade to the latest model, but apparently it's more to do with managing the gradual loss of performance of the batteries. So in the future perhaps the software in our cars and buses will deliberately slow them down for the same reason.

[chessie4905]

I can imagine the cost of replacement control modules or boards or motors will be unobtanium in short order after busses age and are retired by transportation companies. Also, I would think the battery concept is going to be used in inner city use before it hits intra city use. Inner city busses don't have baggage compartments.

[CrabbyMilton]

I just hope those things will have enough power to make it up the hills in PA and other hilly areas. One of our plants which is built into a hill, so our maintenance dept. often gets around on those CUSHMAN vehicles. Back in the 80's and 90's, they bought some all electric versions. They were great for getting around on the floor but take one of these on a hill, that was one slow climb in contrast to the gasoline versions. Well those are long gone because of that and the charges that took longer and lasted much shorter.
I can picture this..."and here are me and grandpa in PA. We didn't plan to stop at this road side tavern but the bus couldn't make it up that hill so we were waiting for a mobile battery replacement truck since we couldn't flag down an amish buggy to pull us."

[Jeremy]

Certainly the "control boards" inside Tesla cars for example are the only clever thing about them - everything else (including the batteries and motors) is relatively low-tech and widely available stuff. But apparently the electronics in them is space-age stuff, and woe betide anyone who has to replace one of those units

But at the same time - longer term I'm not worried about that. 30 years ago fuel injection was space-age stuff too and yet now you can download open-source fuel injection software (Megasquirt etc), run it on cheap-to-buy generic hardware, and have a system with all the same sophisticated features (and more) that the big manufacturers have. The same thing will happen to electric vehicles systems very soon - indeed it's already happening and there's a huge number of DIY electric vehicle builders out there (just search on Youtube etc). I myself built a electric mountain bike earlier this year using off-the-shelf circuit boards for the li-on battery management

It's all gonna happen, no matter what the blinkered Luddites amongst us say

Jeremy

[CrabbyMilton]

I tend to agree that these things will improve. But until they do, I remain a proud skeptic, curmudgeon, and crabby.

[eagle19952]

Jeremy

PS - Interesting thing in the news yesterday saying that Apple has finally admitted that their software does deliberately slow down iPhones as they get older - of course everyone says it's a cynical ploy to get customers to get rid of their old phone and upgrade to the latest model, but apparently it's more to do with managing the gradual loss of performance of the batteries.

Except, new battery is $11.00 USD and a monkey can install one. Reduces Apple's argument to BS.

[chessie4905]

Yeah, easy to get it somewhere, EXCEPT DDEC computers and readers/ manipulaters. Well it doesn't really matter to me personally since I'm already ancient. Remember how lame battery drills were in the beginning. Norfolk Southern has a couple ll electric units they are experimenting with.Check out Altoona Works on  Facebook. I remember the GE battery lawn tractors called Electrac. When the batteries went bad, they were permanent tly parked. No doubt all electric busses will be perfected, probably especially in high density/ pollution sensitive cities first. Already a big change in our town since they went 100% to natural gas busses about 10 years ago.

[Oonrahnjay]

I could see in a few years having a "kit" where a Diesel engine/transmission would be swapped with an electric motor and battery. Think about it-how many times do you go more than 250 miles in a day of driving your bus? We could continue to have an on board generator to supplement the range on those days we needed to go further than 250 miles. I personally would go for an electric bus conversion. Good Luck, TomC 

     They quote a battery change (i.e cost of battery pack and labor alone) at $100,000.  I'm thinking that diesel is going to be good as long as I am.

[DoubleEagle]

Long live mechanical Detroit Diesel two-strokes: they sound good, smell good, have no rust in the vicinity of the engine, have no computers, and no danger of lithium fires. 

[HB of CJ]

Hot Rod electric golf carts are doable.  Back in 1965 Grandfather nearly got evicted from the trailer park because he hot rodded a golf cart up with some sort of high performance DC motor.  An electric motor out of some surplus torpedo?  Dunno that.

He had 30 some sort of high discharge rated Nickel Cadmium locomotive starting batteries. Small cells.  Lots of them.  For 3 minutes he had a hot rod golf cart.  For 30 minutes the thing went quite well.  Then hours recharging up.  Long ago.  Far away.

[belfert]

I take the bus to work every day.  Today, the destination sign said it was an electric bus.  I was quite interested to find out how quiet an electric bus is, but as soon as I got in the bus and walked to the back I realized it was just a regular diesel bus.  The driver must have picked the wrong information for the destination sign.

[buswarrior]

Beware the unspoken...

Within a year, whole roof tops of batteries were being replaced in brand new hybrid buses.

Anything can appear to work, when unlimited tax dollars have been allocated.

The hidden maintenance costs changes all the evaluations on practicality and economics.

happy coaching!
buswarrior

[Brassman]

New battery technology is truly amazing. That and rare earth magnet motors and SCR motor drives. But for most of us nothing is going to beat burning diesel. If I was twenty I might think different.

[TomC]

Whether you spend money on Diesel fuel, or eventually have to buy new batteries-energy to move the bus has to be bought.