anyone bought hybrid car?

have you guys bought any hybrid vehicles? People like Prius, toyota camry hybrid, honda civic hybrid, they are selling like hot cakes. <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

We have a 2006 Ford Escape Hybrid, plus a 99 Mercedes Turbodiesel. The former consistently gets 27-30 mpg around town, and we really like it. The latter consistently gets 30-33 mpg on the highway (even at over 110,000 miles on the odometer), and can run on veggie oil eventually if we decide to go that way. It's also a great performer with the turbo...accellerates like crazy, doesn't lose power up in the mountains.

We're really happy with both cars. Especially these days...

I have a Harley. It gets 40 MPG.

Hybrids still pose serious difficulties for emergency personnel.

We just got a honda civic hybrid I'm a little disapointed it doesn't get the 53 highway that it bosted. However I guess I can live with 37/43; it did get 50+ once but I think there was a tail wind. Overall I like it alot.

I'd be dissapointed too if a hybrid I bought didn't get a least 50mpg. The Honda CRX-HF was able to do 50MPG with just an ordinary gasoline motor, and that was well over 20 years ago. Today, if I can't get at least 50MPG, I see no great reward for paying that extra premium that gets the newer, and yet to be proven reliable, technology.
***Rant*** Come on, it's been over 20 years already since the arrival of the CRX. Why don't we have more 50MPG+ cars by now, that aren't little sh*tboxes?

I'm not opposed to the hybrid technology, I believe it's a step in the right direction. I just don't want to be the guinea pig. I want at least 5 years of data before I'd consider buying one. I'd like to know if they are capable of aging gracefully; because, I keep my cars until the bitter end. I'd like to know what happens if my drivesystem battery dies outside of warranty. Do I have to shell out the $3000+ to replace it? Geese, for that much money--I could have a brand new motor put in a conventional gasoline car. And even a hybrid still has a gasoline motor that I have to worry about, in addition to the electric motor and the expensive battery.

Not trying to hi-jack this thread with a rant, I'm just voicing why I haven't bought one yet. I do take great interest in reading other peoples experiences with the new technology. And I hope to see more enlightening posts from more actual owners of hybrids.

I have to agree with Ghostbear on this. The hybrid technology has not been proven in long term use. And those of us that don't buy new vehicles, this is a major concern. I do not buy a vehicle until it is at least 4 years old, and then drive it until the wheels fall off. Hybrids don't have a long enough track record for me to consider it.
Twenty years ago i almost bought a brand new CRX that would get nearly 50 mpg, but after looking at the cost of the new vehicle and all that goes with it i went with a used Corvette. For the difference in price i was able to pour alot of money into the gas tank.
When you buy one be sure you post pictures and show off your new ride.

I agree with Ghostbear. I too buy vehicles and hold onto them until they die, or my beloved wife totals them (she's wrecked two; fortunately, each was 10+ yrs old).

The MPG reports appear to be disappointing, but that seems to be true for any vehicle because the EPA (or DOT) tests the vehicles under artificial conditions. I'd like to see how they hold up past their warranty. Also, I'm concerned about the disposal of the battery units. Would there be an extra charge to dispose of them instead of using the local landfill. Also, the Dallas temperature extremes tends to kill batteries at an earlier age.

We get the EPA rating on both ours easily so their test seems to be accurate to me.
I too am disapointed by the small gains from the hybrids, I just sold my old 1988 Chevy S10 4x4 which would hit 27mpg because I needed something with a larger cab to hold a baby seat, why are the vehicles to today not getting 2-3 times the milage as vehilces almost 20 years old. To get that kind of milage I now would have to have a unibody front wheel drive.

If you don't buy a car under four years old, you'll probably never buy a hybrid. They've been out in the US now for six years, the Prius and hybrid Civic both came onto the US market for the 2001 model year, and there are almost none listed in any of the used car guides. The ones that are have salvage histories.

Oh, and both have been available in Japan, Korea and Hong Kong for a a few years longer, figure them to be about 8 or 9. So for the people who want five years of experince, it's there.

I've known three Priuses (Priusi?). Two were from the first year they were in the States, one was bought replace the one that was in accident three years later. In that accident, it ate a lot of gaurdrail after finding black ice on the highway, and the only thing the driver had to show for it was the air bag skinned the tip of his nose. I've seen few other things that are as tough, and most of those have treads.

All three have logs for them that were maintained by the drivers, and all three averaged just over 50mpg. Keep in mind, there is a lot of "down" around here, and the recursive breaking that the Prius has gets put to good use. For those who aren't familiar with it, keep in mind that if you turn something with electrity, you have a motor; if you turn the thing, that motor turns into a generator. The Prius' batteries are charging when most of are coasting down a long hill in idle.

The other thing to keep in mind is that a true hybrid, which is not the same as an electric car with an onboard generator, really doesn't have much of an edge in highway driving becuase the engine is running almost always. In urban usage, the engine runs as needed and the electric motors, which are fine under 40, are at their most efficent. If you buy a hybrid and expect to stomp something like a Civic or a motorcycle in highway mpg, you aren't going to.

Hybrids aren't magic. The basic principles are all electromechanical engineering. The real trick has been waiting on the batteries to catch up. (I understand that Honda's aren't as good as that used by Toyota, which supplies them to Ford.)

However, if you have a hybrid that is getting in the low 40s for mpg, you have a problem. It needs to go into a dealship and it needs to be looked at. You might have bad motors (even if your engine is fine), or the battery pack is screwed up. Those are the only humbugs to the hybrids. The batterypack is a fairly green one, but it's expensive, and on the first generation Priusi(?) they were only rated for about ten years. I have no idea about the current ones, they changed the battery pack when they redesigned the frame, nor do I know about the Hondas.

The one really big hesitation to them that I have is the one Malpaso raised. That's why a lot of hybrids around here have stickers in the windows telling emergency crews where the safe-cut spot that isolates the batterypack is. And if an agency doesn't have that info, I'm not terribly sympathetic- if you asked a dealer and they didn't give it to you, they are are deep trouble when you contact the manufacturer for it. There is one Honda dealer that I know of that didn't want to share that information with the local fire departments, so the FDs contacted Honda. Guess which dealer is at the end of the line when it comes to anything in great demand, and is feeling the pinch? *nasty grin*

Picard, as you might have guessed from my previous post, I don't own a Prius, but I know them pretty well.

If you are expecting to have a lot of stop and go, they are great. A little disconcerting though- they "turn off" when you stop in town driving. Or sometimes while you are still going, and you still have power. <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

If you need torque for hauling or need to go off road, they aren't so good. I know that there was a limited number of hybrid Silverados made, or at least planned, back around '03. They were quite a bit heavier- they were designed to be used as part of a fleet, becuase they had an inverter running off the battery pack. The theory was that contractors would buy one, use it as thier power base and to haul low mass-high bulk gear, while using more conventional trucks for most duty. I don't know if anything came of that.

If you need to do a lot of highway driving, they are nice. A/C doesn't phase the milage. But they don't shine outstandingly in compairison to other high milage vehicles in this role. For the cost, the advantages if a hybrid is run almost exclusively at full highway speeds. If your highway looks like the Southern California sterotype, sure, a hybrid will do better, but if you can get out and move on a straight, flat length of road, the advantages are less.

For the cost, flip a coin and call if you are doing 60%+ on a real highway. If you have stop and go for over 60% of your day, and you don't need to leave the blacktop or fill the trunk up with metal, the hybrid is more fuel efficent.

If you are looking at pure, monitary cost savings, in the long run, it works out even, even in the role that hybrids excell in. However, if you want to cut down on the amount of crap you are throwing into the the air and want to use less of a finite resource, hybrids are the have the edge. It all maters what kind of green you want to save. Me, I consider the planet being in good shape to be part of being equipped. But what do I know?

That's all well and good, but if you're to the point where you are going to use the Jaws of Life, the sticker on the window might not be legible any longer. There's also the problem that the electric motor may not shut off in a crash, and you can't hear it like an internal combustion engine. As a first responder, if you try getting someone out of the vehicle that's still running and you don't know it, you might be in for a world of hurt. First rule is your own safety, then your partner, then the patient. You don't want to injure more people. If that means waiting before entering a situation, you wait. If I'm in the accident, I'd rather not give the responders any reason to wait.

Excellent point about the FD's ability to respond to hybrid vehicle accidents. I hadn't realized that it was such an issue (that's why I love this site!). Maybe BioDiesel, E85, and Hydrogen hybrids aren't such a bad idea... hopefully they can get the H2 stabalized so it's not a threat like the batteries. Any ideas if the UltraCapacitors they are working on would be even more of a threat than batteries?

Just curious, what are the top dangers? I assume immediately that battery leak is promininent among them, but if the engine is running, how would that affect retrieval of a victim? Just curious... I don't have much experience in this area (though I'm planning on volunteering with the local Ambulance after I take the course this fall).

One of the scenarios that came up in a recent class was going in through a window to do airway control/spine stabilization on a victim and the vehicle, which you thought was disabled, starts moving under power.

The manufacturers of Hybrid have been training FD on rescues from Hybrid cars. They assure FD that the engines shut off electrical power immediately to engine upon a crash. I saw the documentary report on discovery channel.

I saw American Chopper on the Discovery Channel. Doesn't make it real.

I wonder how many employees of hybrid makers have responded to a call on a fire truck or ambulance.

The Teutles aren't real?

Great... Wy don't you crush my dreams about meeting Santa Clause now! <img src="/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" />

Personally, I'm not to sure about these Hybrids, I've read a lot of good, but also a lot of bad. I'm going to wait another 10 years or so before I consider buying one. Right now I've got a few diesels and they keep me quite happy. Excellent mileage, tons of torque, and extremely durable and reliable. I really wish more companies started making diesel vehicles.


By the way, the reason we arn't all driving 30+ MPG cars is emmissions and enviromental technology. If we didn't have that stuff choking our engines mileage and power would improve considerably.

actually, most auto makers (ford, toyota, honda, mercedes, etc) make a diesel version of every model they sell in the US. unfortunately the US is one of the only countries in the world where they're not sold. i love the new diesels but could never afford to import one. oh well.

Can't comment on the Honda, but the material I've read on the Toyota system is that if the air bag deploys, the big electrics cut out. That's backed up by the experinces of one of my best friends. He could get his four ways on when he found the gaurdrails, and that was it, but those are run from the 12V battery. The Toyota system has two distinct and seperate wiring sets.

I also know that the folks at Toyota have been VERY agressive about getting thier people to talk to fire and rescue folks, or so they claim. I've spoken with a guy who does thier training. He was trying to talk me into buying a Prius, so I was pumping him for information. :P

I'm actually waiting to see if the hybrid Escape has a lower probability of rolling, and when I replace my hunk of junk it will either by the Escape or an Outback. If Subaru comes out with a good hybrid Outback, it's a given.

That is becuase we have the nastiest diesel in the world. In Germany, what they call deisel is what we call #2 home heating oil. We put the odifiers into the fuel for tax reasons.

And there isn't a diesel of everything. The GT 500 doesn't have a diesel version. Lousy bug out vehicle, but if you are first in line, the only things you can't outrun are a tornado and a nuke. <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Ultracaps? Oh sweat light. Some of those things are measured in double and triple digit farads, and have discharge times near enough to zero that if you ground one, the cloud of vapor that used to be you will flash into plasma!

Yeah, I'm exagerating a little, but seriously, those things scare me. They make the monsters in a cathode ray display look like a kids toy, and one of those once tossed me a few feet. I dont' try to fix monitors any more. Literally tens of thousands of watts, it is a canned lightening bolt. I'm not sure if I'd rather have those or blasting caps in my car. <img src="/images/graemlins/crazy.gif" alt="" />

Well, they are working on putting them to use as batteries with nano technology (carbon nanotubes increase surface area to the point where they have the same power for size as batteries). The advantages are near instantaneous recharge and incredible lifetimes. I'm no EE, but I thought that it completely depends on how they are built to discharge, but I've been warned before not to touch capacitors unless I wanted to have my heart 30 feet out of my chest. <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Mal, I'm really not trying to be a pain, but would you do that on a conventional vehicle without (a) turning off the ignition switch or (b) pulling the 12V supply, much less (c) chocking/blocking the wheels? Killing power in the 12V circuit kills power to the relay that closes the circuit for the lines that run from the battery, within the battery housing.

The big wires are run under the floor, not through the door or roof, IIRC, and that is across the board. Again, check with a local dealer, but logically speaking, there is absolutely no reason to run wire further than you have to. The most cost effective path is under the floor. I've never heard of situation where you had cut through the underside of a car to extract someone. If it is that bad, you probably don't have a patient.

And if the crash is bad enough to cut the cables of the high voltage system, odds are the air bags have deployed. That kills the power to the relay for the main power. I belive the Toyotas are supposed to have a secondary accelerometer in the relay itself, to open it if there is more than a certain number of Gs.

I just raided my brother's bookmarks he left on my dad's computer. (The questionable joys of having to move back home.) Some of this might interest a number of us:
http://www.firehouse.com/extrication/archives/2001/july01.html (general)
http://www.extrication.com/ERG.htm (has links to manufacture's emergency guides)
http://techinfo.toyota.com/public/main/erg.html (toyota eremgency response guides only)
https://www.serviceexpress.honda.com/rjanisis/HYBRID.asp (honda's)
http://www.carsp.ca/hybrids.htm (from our strange sibling to the north)
http://www.hybridcars.com/hybrids-fires-emergencies.html (links at the bottom to everyone ERGs)

He had them organized in the same section as his stuff of HazMat. He carries the lookups on placards and what to do for various forms of odd HazMat in a binder that he keeps in his truck by his turn out bag. I think he's added the appropriate parts of the ERGs for the hybrids to that. As you said, first rule is protect your crew. And if that means you take two minutes, you take two minutes, same as at an unidentified hazmat.

That might not be a horrible idea- if the HazMat centers are willing, the could give a brief on the kills for the hybrids when the are called. Not sure if people would want a placard on thier car, but it's an idea.

Sorry, man, I'm not trying to belittle your concerns. I'm just saying that from what I've learned, the risks are mitigatable with training. If I'm right on the heavy lines being under the floor, then you should be able to do an extraction as normal.

I've given it thought, becuase as I've said, I know guys with them, I know too many (if that's possible) cops, firefighters and EMTs, and I'm big on alterntive fuels.

You want scary- a propane powered car with six 5 pound bottles in what was once the trunk. THAT is an FAE rolling down the road. And there is talk of using LP as an alt fuel in some circles.

I'm just a CE with an unhealthy interst in mechanical and electromech stuff. :P

Discharge time is regulated by the time constant, which in turn is defined by the overall circuit's resistance and capacitance and the nature of the electrolyte. I can't remember the exact formula. But I do know to fear anything that is measures it's max wattage with five or six (or more) figures. I've had lighting strike within a hundred meters of me, that wasn't fun. Having lighting strike within me, NO WAY! <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Yea, I've noticed other countries get all the diesel vehicles. Ford makes a diesel version of the Ranger pickup, Jeep makes a diesel Wrangler, ect.

As to the diesel, we have started getting the good stuff. In the United States there are now two types of diesel for sale at the pumps, LSD (Low Sulfur Diesel) and ULSD (Ultra Low Sulfur Diesel). Soon you will only be able to buy the ULSD variety. ULSD is the equivalent to the Euro spec stuff.

Now, our diesel emissions standards are going to be getting tougher. In 2007 diesels will require an EGR setup and catalytic converters, even on the big rigs. I believe after 2007 we will see more diesels as the new restrictions will be put into effect. I think a lot of companies have been waiting until they go into effect to release their new diesel vehicles. I know Jeep has been waiting to bring out their Grand Cherokee 3.0L Diesel (the engine is a Mercedes designed 50 state legal bluetec diesel).

Or the guy next to you in the Vette Z06, Viper, or Ford Gt. <img src="/images/graemlins/smirk.gif" alt="" />

That being said, I own a 2003 Ford SVT Cobra (Convertible) and it is a great car. Scary fast, handles well, and even has two back seats. The only thing I don't like about it is the insurance......it's a killer. It took my insurance guy two weeks to find a company that would insure me, and another week to find one that would insure me for less than $9,000. I've got a perfect record with a CDL too! I finally found someone who would insure me for $4,000 if I took a $1,000 deductible. I would be scared to see what the insurance would be on the GT500 with the 110hp it has on me (well, when I was stock, now a stock GT500 couldn?t touch me <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> )

Not at all, this is great conversation

My scenario was an immediate need, compromised airway or similar where the responder pokes his head in the drivers window to see what can be done. Time permitting, yes you are absolutely correct, all those precautions should/would be taken.


Great, thanks, I'll take a look at them. I'm sure the manufacturers are doing what they can for education. Just remember, this is brand new technology. People who have been resonding to accidents for decades are now faced with an unknown. Their first reaction will be to wait, rather than chancing adding themselves to the patient count.

Exactly. I wasn't saying that it would preclude aid, just delay it. My point was that I don't want a vehicle (right now) that might delay aiding me if I'm the driver/patient.


Again, absolutely. Trainign for this is no different than training for delivering a baby in the field. The first time you come across that situation, you're going to take a step back. The tenth time, you'll have no hesitation.

I guess what got lost in this is that I was looking at owning a hybrid through the eyes of EMS. I wasn't saying that EMS won't be able to respond, I was saying I don't want to be the hybrid owner that gets a delayed response (how little it might be) because the technology is still new, and the education hasn't run it's course yet.

Adding my 2¢. One would suspect that the hybrid car engineers would use the same type of impact sensing relays, currently used to operate electric fuel pumps, to operate the contactors (really big relays) for the electric drive system. DIY electric car building guides strongly using using them (in pairs) so that in the event of an impact, the high current system is disabled. (Just don't use ones from late '80's Fords - they'd cut off when you closed the trunk lid!)

Oh and a fun thing for all you first responders out there, there is an outfit "upgrading" hybrid battery systems from NICad to Lithium Ion. There is a reason the car makers aren't using Li batteries yet, large Li batteries pose a significant exolpsion risk. They are working on ways to better contain the cells to make them safer because Li batteries offer significantly better performance in compairison to NiCAD's..

If it's not one thing it's another...

JimJr

I just wish my friend who'd wrecked his first Prius had been allowed to do what we wanted. The insurance company said no to the propsal of having a dozen geeks decend on the carcass with tools in hand. At least that was what he told us, but since the first time I met it I'd been wanting to talk it apart, so who knows. <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> If they'd been cool with it, I would have been able to send you video of the hybrid autopsy.

As I pointed out, I can't think of a reason why there should be any issues from an electical point of view. Even if the training doesn't work for everyone in your agency, timeframe wise, it might be possible to have one of the techs from the local dealer's garage to a walk through on where the electrical systems are, in terms of "can you cut through the door post" and the like.

And I understand the concern about hybrids and electrics being sneaky at slow speeds. I've been suprised a few times. But if you listen, there is whine to the electic motors. It is very high pitched, if you can hear it, you will be able to remember it once you've heard it. I also forget that most people, unlike me, don't keep blocks in the trunk of the car. (Too many places that seem "flat" really aren't, and block the tires on the other end if I've got a flat.)

I would say it is like working a scene and discovering a firearm, or a powerline. Treat it as dangerous, and do what you feel you need to.

Lion cell retrofits? That would up the ante a little, particularly if thier housing was ruptured or in a fire. I hope they are using good ones.

For those that don't know, most cell phones and PDAs use lithium-ion, at least the higher end and more recent ones. Remember when there was the stuff about the Nokia's bursting into flames about a year ago? That was caused by cheap, bad, scary lithium ions that were aftermarkets to replace dead or lower power batteries, often older NiCads cells.

I was watching the show NOW on PBS last night. There was a segment called "Who killed the electric car?" They interviewed the director of a new documentary film coming out about GM's ill-fated EV1 electric car and why GM mysteriously took them all back and then destroyed all of them despite their rabid popularity with the small number of people who were given the chance to lease one.

I had totally forgotten about the EV1. The director leased one and he, like most who have ever driven the EV1, totally fell in love with them. He said that it really moved and it "just worked".

According to the director, as for why GM pulled the plug, so to speak, on this experiment even though people offered them lot's of money to keep their beloved EV1's, is that all-electric vehicles threaten a whole host of industries--from Big Oil to parts manufacturers to your local Jiffy Lube. It's interesting that companies like Toyota have steadfastly refused to consider building plug-in hybrids even though people have made conversion kits for the Prius for some time now. We could all be driving electric vehicles right now. It's been done. Think about it.

Oh, Minnesota's governor just signed a law that promotes plug-in hybrids for the state's vehicle fleet, the first such law in the country, I believe. A part of the plan is to eventually start building plug-in's at an old auto plant in the state that is slated to be closed down by the company. Boy, that law must annoy a lot of vested interests. If you get a chance to catch the movie later on this summer, it could be interesting.

I'll have to look for the transcript for it.

Did they talk about the fact that when the EV1 came out, the batteries were the reason why it was commercial unviable to manufacture them? And I don't mean some grand industrial conspiracy, I mean that if they tried to sell, rather than rent at a loss, the things they might have sold them to the kinds of people who buy Segways. Ask Dean Kamen sometime how well that's working out for him.

Add in the fact that they had lousy range and low top speed due to thier weight, thier batteries were much more sensative to tempurature fluctuations compaired to what a hybrid uses, the required maintence level (think jet aircraft levels of hanger vs operations time), and that they had about as much room in them as a small pickup, and it just wouldn't not have worked. People would not have bought them. Keep in mind what I mentioned above- GM owned every single one of the EV1s, and they leased them. They took a bath. Great concept. I saw one displayed at the Tour de Sol one year. But concept. Just like GM's hydrogen "skateboard" that they are playing with right now. GM can't get thier designers to stop thinking about a big revolution. As a result, they will loose, beucase they want to make big leaps onto technology that is neither ready for widespread operation nor supportable by existing infrastructure.

I've found PBS' quality of source to loosing ground over the past few years; NPR hasn't had that problem. It sounds like they are cooking up a "grassy knole" where there is non.

Oh, and I hate to point this out but "plug-in hybrid" is an oxymoron. Hybrids generate thier own electricity by the burning of a combustable, be it a petrochem distillates, ethanol, methanol, solid biomass (saw one prototype generator once that burned cow chips- eww), methane or hydrogen. A pure electric car needs to be plugged in. That is why a hybrid is, well, a hybrid.

Izzy, what type of driving are we looking at? That is so far out the parameters of the Prius' design that it had to be a bad one. She should have taken her complaints past the dealer to Toyota's regional office, that dealership was playing with fire. And if they told it was covered, they were shooting themselves in the jimmies, becuase the standard warrenty DOES cover the entirity of the power pack, unless that has changed in the past two model years.

It sounds like a bad dealership with something that never should have passed QC, and offering to bring the state in was a good call. I hope she wrote an ugly letter to Nagano or thier US office to, becuase someone should have the hood slammed on thier fingers.

Still, the Matrix a good car, if you have a skinny backside. Sitting in one is a little better than flying coach to me, but I'm not skinny, and they are spiffy cars. And if she isn't doing a lot of stop and go, the Matrix should be comperable over it's life cycle to the Prius.

What do you think of this Hypercar® Concept.
This Hypercar seems a nice answer to our transportation problems ...

Many links on this site about hydrogen, other related subjetcs, etc....

Only two problems with hydrogen.

Support infastructure, and how to produce it at a sane cost without using fossil fuels. By the time we get that second item worked out, we'll have the mass production bugs out of fuel cells and the idea of hydrogen "burning" hybrid will be obsolete.

Anyone interested in watching that NOW segment "Who killed the electric car?" can watch it online in its entirety or download an mp3 or the transcript here .

Here's an interesting article on the current state of hybrid technology and what's coming down the pike as far as battery technology goes.

It sounds like she got a serious lemon with problems beyond the battery & inverter. I know a father & son with three Priuses between them & they are getting 50+ mpg. The one I know better is getting IIRC 55+ in mixed driving.

I agree that the DOT tests are stupid - many of them are based on the hydrocarbins coming out whien it is driving. I don't have problems with the mpg - we average 56mpg each tank(when I am driving - husband averages45mpg). The video game aspect helps more than with othey hybrids I have driven.
The batteries up here in Wisconsin have to be disposed of seperately and recycled anyway. And Toyota has a recycling program in effect for Prii batteries.

Rena

Here's an article talking about potiential safety problems and (a) possible solution. Wired Article

Here's an article about Retrofiting LiIon batteries. It seems the retrofit outfit is using the batteries from the company in the first article. I didn't make that connection until now.

JimJr

The documentary movie I mentioned before, Who Killed the Electric Car?, finally came out and I saw it this weekend. Not surprisingly, there is a pro-electric vehicle slant to the movie, but it still presented a quite comprehensive overview of why GM's EV1 car disappeared and really makes you think about "What could've been..."

As Ironraven mentioned in an earlier post, the first batch of EV1's had a lot of flaws, but from various EV1 fansites I have read and in the movie, GM quickly improved it. By the time the Gen II batch came out, the inadequate lead acid batteries were replaced with NiMH batteries, giving the EV1 up to 140 miles of freeway driving range, according to one EV1 driver's experience and solved the temperature sensitivity problem. With a 0-60 mph time of 8 seconds, it's no slouch, especially when it generates high torque at even low speeds, so it feels very zippy in normal driving. The EV1 was electronically limited to a top speed of 80 mph, but without the limiter, it could go 180 mph on the test track. Not bad.

No one really knows why the EV1 was killed off. The movie examines the possible motivations of various players--General Motors, the California Air Resources Board, Big Oil, battery technology, and yes, even whether the buying public was to blame. It's a tangled web. GM's motivations are particularly complicated and schizophrenic because on the one hand, as the manufacturer of the EV1, you would think that it wanted to heavily promote the EV1, but on the other hand, there was stiff pressure from the top to kill it off through lame or nonexistent advertising, laying off knowledgable sales staff, keeping supplies low, leasing only even though many owners wanted to buy, pressuring CARB to drop its requirement for a certain percentage of zero-emission vehicles in California if GM could prove that there was little demand for all-electric vehicles. That's the kicker, GM tried hard to prove to CARB that there was scant demand for the electric car it was producing so that California would stop requiring that car manufacturers produce a certain percentange of zero emission vehicles.

Battery technology is one segment that was particularly eye-opening for me. In this movie, engineer/inventor Stanford Ovshinsky is painted as a hero whose revolutionary NiMH technology is suppressed, first by GM and then his company is bought out by Chevron-Texaco. Actually, there is debate out there whether Ovshinsky actually "sold out" to Big Oil for the money to save his ailing photovoltaic business, and criticism that he has spent more time and effort simply suing every other manufacturer of NiMH batteries rather than trying to promote and sell his own batteries, so it's unclear if he's the victim or a willing participant in holding back battery technology. Actually, this is an interesting taste of the claims that electric motor and battery technology is deliberately being held back. I can't vouch for its sources, but it raises enough questions to make you wonder. According to this webpage's argument, there are powerful forces backed by Big Oil, the military, and others that don't want to see advanced electric motors and batteries becoming commonly available, whether to reduce our demand for oil or to prevent the spread of long-range, ultra-quiet submarines.

Actually, from the movie, you get the impression that although interests like Big Oil are looking 10-20 years down the road, GM killed the EV1 because they could only see ahead to their next quarterly earnings report and the EV1 wasn't immediately profitable for them. How's that for strategic thinking? And to me, maybe confirms why GM is in such dire straits these days with no good alternatives to selling more full-size pickups and SUV's. There's an interesting factoid in the movie, the EV1 program was terminated the same year that GM bought the rights to the Hummer. Coincidence? Hmmm.

You walk away from the movie with the impression that the EV1, although not a perfect replacement for a regular car, was actually a perfectly viable car for many people and that the limitations of the car weren't what really led to its demise. So, who really killed the electric car? I guess it'll be the fodder for heated debate for years to come.

Arney - nice review. It's refreshing to see a report devoid of political slant one way or another and simply trying to lay out facts and observations. Much appreciated (perhaps we'll get a chance to check out the movie here, too).

I realize people like conspiracies, but no one is holding back battery technologies. Developers present their best results, played up in the press, and they dismiss the bad development results because "something" must have gone wrong with that experiment. However, when the process is scaled up, those bad results come to light and kill the technology. Trace impurities in bulk materials, as compared to high purity materials used in research batteries, also cause serious problems. I have been in this business for over twenty-five years; it isn't easy.

To the point of the initial post, I haven't purchased a hybrid because I am concerned about the environment. It takes a lot of energy to create a NiMH battery. Something like a Toytoa Corrola gets 40+ MPG, takes less energy to produce, lasts longer, and most of the vehicle is easily recycled when it dies. Overall life energy cost to the environment appear to me to be less for the Corolla.

Spud

I'll look to see if it's around here. I doubt they'll be unbiased, but it's not likely to be as bad a Moorumentry.

Did they mention only the one GenII EV1, or did it discuss the rest of the G2 prototype fleet? The one that got 140 miles was a quirk, a freak, a mutant, at least from the information I saw when they were withdrawn. Most of them were lower than that, by quite a bit.

Again, there is no conspiracy as to why the EV1 died. There is no grassy knolle this time, there is no second shooter in the crowd, there is no mysterious doctor to visit the healthy inmate who died 18 hours later from a rare germ. The long and the short of it is, even the second generation EV1s (EV2s?) were still maintence intensive and way too expensive. When they were tested, battery costs were a lot higher for cells that size than they are now. The reason why the EV1 died is becuase it was too advanced to be economically viable.

General Motors has never been able to find the will to work on what can be on the road in mass production and at a middle class price tag in three to five years. And until they do that, they better buddy up with Nissan and Renault, or they aren't going to exist in ten years except as a defense contractor. Even then, LockMartNorth or GenDyn will probably by that part of the beast as it dies.

I've Googled in vain to find people who bash the EV1 for being maintenance intensive and have yet to find a single instance. In the movie and on the Internet, I only find praise about how little maintenance is required--basically rotate the tires and fill up the washer fluid every 5,000 miles. There's no complicated internal combustion engine, no transmission or drivetrain, there isn't a whole lot to break, except maybe the lame lead acid batteries in the first batch to be produced, but that's not really a mechanical problem.

I've seen real-world quotes from different drivers using the NiMH batteries in the 100-140 mile range on a number of different websites, so it doesn't seem freakishly abnormal. Current electric vehicles, like from Tesla Motors claim double that range already. Besides, one of the side effects of the zero emission mandate in California was the proliferation of state-subsidized charging stations at parking garages, shopping centers, etc. (at least in Northern Cal) so you could actually top off your batteries as you went about your daily business. Some people criticize the car for how long it takes for a full recharge (one website said 15 hours), but hardly anyone would drain the battery almost empty every day anyway, so it's unlikely that you would ever need to wait for a full recharge. In the movie, they quote an average daily commute of 23(?) miles, which means recharging each night would be quite quick even if you didn't have a recharging station at work.

In my Googling today, I ran across the interesting fact that the Smithsonian Museum had one of the few EV1's that escaped the shredder, but they removed it from display last month, just before this movie came out. The museum's transportation exhibition hall is named after General Motors, which donated $10 million in 2001 towards its construction. Coincidence? <shrug>

I probably shouldn't have mentioned that other "witholding battery technology conspiracy" webpage--that's just something I stumbled on. The movie is not necessarily saying that there was a conspiracy or secret outside forces involved with the EV1--just that there was a deliberate decision to kill off a car whose customers loved it, and then exploring reasons why GM would do that. However, facts like Chevron-Texaco buying the supplier of NiMH batteries for the EV1, Ovonics, from GM does make me scratch my head.

And yes, EV1's were expensive and the movie raises that point, too, but so were VCR's, DVD players, flat-screen TV's etc. when they first came out and revolutionized their particular industries. Unlike other EV's like the RAV4 or Ford Ranger EV, the EV1 was designed from scratch and GM apparently was practically handmaking all their EV1's, so there were no economies of scale or recycling of car parts involved. And Ovonics apparently wasn't churning out many of its batteries either. If both GM and Ovonics had actually gone into mass production, I can only assume that the cost would have come down significantly.

And maybe all-electrics aren't dead yet. Who knows, maybe this this cute (but 4-seater) all-electric Subaru will hit American shores someday in the near future. Maybe when the average price of gas hits $4 a gallon?

When I was in college the first time, I was part of the school's alternative energy club. We got to take a very close look at the EV1 that the state was leasing. That last word is key- none of the people who drove an EV1 was a private owner of the vehicle. It cost almost nothing becuase GM underwrote the maintence past tires.

The one we got to see needed to have a new battery every 18 months, and had corrosion issues. They didn't like salted roads, and sucked on hills. Guess what Vermont has half the year, and what Vermont has all the year. Maybe the state's toy car (sorry, that's just how it felt to me) was the only one that needed a lot of maintence, but for some reason I doubt that.

As for going 140 miles on NiMH, no doubt it can be done. In fact, I saw better with some Tour de Sol rigs. But they had larger batteries than the the EV1. Most G2 EV1s, as I recall, were getting closer to 120 miles on a charge. That doesn't sound like much, but it is 16% difference. You see the same kind of variability with infernal combustion engines- a car model that is rated for X amount of mpg may have quite a bit of difference between exact specimines. The reason I ask is because I've heard the 140 mile claim, and it is misleading. Anything over, say, 5% probably should be discarded from those kinds of numbers for the sake of honesty.

As a Firefighter we just recently underwent training specificaly for hybrid vehicles. Structurealy (sp?) they are no different than their traditional counterparts. The only real difference is that there is a high powered electrical source onboard. Awareness and education is key! In that spirit I offer up the following link that has emergency response guides for most all of the Hybrids out on the market currently.
http://www.sceneoftheaccident.com/wst_page16.html All of the guides are on pdf and are availble to be downloaded and refered to as needed. Enjoy.

Matt 26,

We in Holland are busy introducing the 'Crash Recovery System'.
It's a program that can be accessed from the fire-engine and gives specific info about the location of airbags, powerlines, etc with every brand and type of vehicle.

Do you have something similair in the US?

Yes and no. Most reference information is kept at the station or dispatch center. The information that we keep in the truck are in binders and is limited to hazmat and a street directory with hydrant locations and some preplans for the few commercial structures we have in town. Our rescue truck does carry more detailed info including all of the new information from the website that I mentioned. Some of the larger departments in the US may use a similar system to yours but my department is small, 7 peices of apparatus. Check it out at www.mallettsbayfire.com