Something covert’s going on in Austin, TX that could have EV-car nuts dribbling Spirulina smoothies all over their hemp dickies in anticipation. In a shadowy corner of the city, a company called EEstor – founded by ex-managers at Xerox PARC and IBM – has reportedly developed a battery substitute that could spark a revolution in electric cars. Flush with seed money from tech angels Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, the company’s ceramics-based power storage unit, it’s said, won’t materially degrade, will charge in minutes, provide a range of 500 miles on $9 in electricity and can be used for a range of applications including full-speed EV cars and hybrids. Considering that feature set ostensibly solves every snafu holding electric cars back from broader adoption, a Toronto electric-car company is planning to have an EV based on the battery system roadworthy by 2008. Is the revolution nigh, or will the weak be ripped and torn away. Stay tuned.
Bring 'em on. I just hope that this isn’t one of those technologies that comes out with such great news and gets squashed somewhere down the line. I really like the part about them being cost competitive with the lead acid batteries. That means this half (as opposed to the other half) may actually be able to afford them. Sweeeet news!
[QUOTE=Lectrol;1743]Now we all know the worst part about this breakthrough. If This technology is a real thing (fingers crossed). We will never get our hands on it ):[/QUOTE]
why not? if ZAP will be using it… then i’d say we can easily get our hands on it…
If it’s worth a $hit you can bet you’ll have to pay out the a$$ for it. Product cost used to be relevant to production cost + reasonable profit. Now look at things. It’s all relevant to nothing but corporate greed.
Off Wiki… “a five-minute charge should give the capacitor sufficient energy to drive a small car 300 miles (480 km). However, standard household wiring is not capable of delivering the power required for this”
How about a second set of these “capasitors” charging at home that could be “dumped” into your vehicle and then recharged slowly over time from your house current? $$$ but it’ll work.
Great EEstor will be out an any year now, Maybe not this one or the next either. The longer they delay in getting this technology working the more there competition will get there act together also.
I’m going to go out on a limb here and say “bull****.” I sincerely hope I’m wrong (as this would be really cool), but such tremendous technological advancements in so short a period of time just don’t ring true. For instance, how much does said device cost? Reply
see the first comment in the link first post
ZAP has a new lithium battery system that fits into the same space as the G-31 lead-acid.
this would be the li fe po4 battery and it is powerful and gives all its AH at up to 3c
This looks great - and I fully agree with the updated energy / space results!
I have done some reports that you can look at to see my thoughts: Electricfly - MyElectricfly.com
Essentially - using the Headway 40152S 15ah -screw tab cells found at [B]EV Assemble[/B] and others - you could build a battery that was a 4S2P package - (4 Serial, 2 Parallel) to deliver the same energy as my current 50 Lb, ‘100 Ah’ Lead Acid Battery, at a cost of just $187.12 - and while that might be a bit more expensive than the Lead Acid battery that cost me about $137.00 each - now you have taken the 50 lbs (23 Kg) down to just 3.84 Kg, or 8.448 Lbs! (Still having the ability to deliver 30 Amps for one hour - BUT - also having the ability to deliver 300 Amps for up to 6 minutes!)
Take into consideration that My Electricfly uses 8 Batteries - the difference would be changing the current battery pack from 400 lbs to one of just 67.584 Lbs! (At a Cost of $1496.96 - only a few 100 $ over the cost of the Lead Acid Pack - and - now you have shaved over 332 Lbs off the car, and also - as a bonus - get 4- 5X the running Life. With the Lighter car - you most likely would not need as much current for acceleration, hence would use quite a bit less energy! So Technically having the same available energy would net you a longer EV Driving Range, just switching from Lead Acid to Lithium Iron Phosphate - something you can buy today!!
[B]Generally - [/B]
Gentle Granny Style Driving = 67 - 100 Wh/Km [Watt Hours per Kilometer]
Aggressive - Road Rage Style Driving = 285 wh/Km
Steady state Highway Driving at ~ 60 Mph/100 Kph = ~140 Wh/Km.
(75 Volts at 185 Amps, Lead Acid Batteries - Way to much Voltage Sage - Actually below my limit of 84 Volts bottom end for the 96 Volt Pack!)
75V x 185A = 13,875 Watts at 100 Kilometers per Hour (Kph) = 139 Watt Hours per Km.
Reducing the weight by 332 lbs from the current Curb Weight of 2,000 lbs = a 16% Weight Reduction, and also = a 60% or better improvement in Power (voltage) Stability under Loads like this! (Because the LiFePO4 Headway cells are much Higher load capable than my Trojan SCS150 Battery!)
So - this could = a 23 Wh/Km reduction down to ~ 117 Wh/Km. Now - If I put in the AC-35 Motor at 85 lbs instead of the current 170 Lb Forklift Series DC Motor - I could likely improve efficiency by another 5% or more on Highway applications and maybe 10% in City (due to the addition of the Regeneration Potential)
My Ultimate Goal is to get My Electricfly - down to 100 Wh/Km at a steady 100 Kph!
Envia Systems, the developer of high energy density Li-ion batteries using nano silicon-carbon composite anodes and high capacity layered-layered manganese composite cathodes will announce at the Advanced Research Projects Agency - Energy (ARPA-E) Energy Innovation Summit (EIS) this week that it has produced Li-ion cells offering an energy density of 400 Wh/kg.
