YACT: Modded Toyota Prius with SONY LithiumFire Uber Battery runs 55KM on a single charge

[AbsolutDealage]

Originally posted by: cjchaps
We are all you concerned with the 15K price tag. It's a brand new invention and of course it's going to cost a lot. It said in a year the price could drop to $6500. In a few years it will probably be really cheap.

Ok, let's look at this a little more realistically then. We will keep the assumption of constant gas/electric prices, but let's back the gas down to $3.00/gallon.

The plug-in variant gets 2.4l / 100km, which is 98 mpg. So... driving 55km to and from work every day will cost:

(68/98) * $3.00 = $2.08(gas) + $1.20 (electricity) = $3.28 per day (plug-in)
(68/35) * $3.00 = $5.83 per day (regular hybrid)

$5.83 - $3.28 = $2.55 per day

$14,500 / 2.55 = 5686 days / 240 = 23.7 years

Even if the plug in system dips in price to $4500...

$4500 / 2.55 = 1765 days / 240 = 7.4 years

Still not a good investment. Once again, this is not a numbers game for the early adopters, but it will quickly become one if this technology goes mainstream. Heck, it's still not economically smart for most people to buy a regular hybrid (myself included). Adding more cost on top of that makes this car tree-hugger exclusive.

 

[0roo0roo]

not really a financial decision at this point, but i guess it is one solution for using less gas.

 

[BrunoPuntzJones]

Well according to my school of mathematics:

55KM = 55K M

Which means 55,000 miles

That's a hell of a lot of miles on one charge!!

 

[bunnyfubbles]

Originally posted by: mercanucaribe
What happens when the Sony batteries explode?

you hit 88 miles per hour @ 1.21 jiggawatts...of course you're going to have to be careful; exploding batteries of Sony fame aren't going to be easy to come by in the distant past.

 

[Perknose]

Originally posted by: AbsolutDealage

Originally posted by: vi_edit
A $14,500 battery system.

Ok.. let's see. If you are driving the full 55km to and from work every day, and gas gets up to $5.00 / gallon....

Plugin per day = ~$1.20
Regular per day = ~$10.00

$14,500 / $8.80 = 1648 days

1648 / 240 = 6.9 years

7 years to make back the investment on that car in the absolute worst case. How long do you think that battery is going to last?

I know it's not a financial decision by any means, but still...

Errrr, how many millions in 1940's dollars, no less, do you think ENIAC and the huge room it was housed in cost to build, all for computing power so significantly less than is presently in your tier 2 cell phone that it is laughable to contemplate?

Second question: How are you liking your $350, full featured laptop from CC/BB/CrapUSA?

Third question: See any connection, or lesson here?

 

[five40]

I really don't get the hybrid bashing. I don't really see how anyone expects them to come out and be the perfect car. There is no way the first generations of hybrids are going to be any good compared to gas cars as for money value. I mean hell, when computers first came out it was completely not worth using them. Who the hell would want a computer the size of your house that would take 5 minutes to add 4+4. If everyone just bashed the hell out of the idea we would be no where near where we are today. Let's see....build a computer that costs millions or use a piece of paper that costs two cents. Initially you'd look like an idiot for choosing computers based on money.

 

[BD2003]

Sounds retarded. The prius gets what, 40mpg? So $1.40 worth of gas plus 60 cents worth of electricity to travel 55km (~30 mi) = $2.00, which when you add in the extra ten miles comes out to about the same mileage as pure gas. Only you get to add extra weight frmo the batteries, plus the obscene cost of the batteries = net loss.

 

[desy]

The problem with a plug in hybrid is it paves the way for fully electric cars which auto manufacturers HATE
The ability to build a good gasoline engine or diesel is difficult.
Any appliance company can make a good electric motor and pair that with a good battery technology, a huge barrier to the industry is removed and General Electric or any other large company may decided to get in the car buisiness.

 

[sygyzy]

Originally posted by: harrkev
So, this guy paid $14,000 dollars for this.

Let's assume that the car will last for 12 years, which will mean an additional $4,000 battery replacement. This means that he paid $4.10 per day for the honor of plugging it in. If you assume that the car can get 30 miles-per-gallon unmodified, and that gas is $2.50 per gallon, that means that he could ride almost 50 miles per day for the same amount of money as he spent on the modification. Not to mention the additional (although small) cost of the electricity used to plug it in.

Now, if he, like most people, gets rid of the car after five years or so, then things look much worse.

Still, this does give you warm fuzzies for being "green." But those warm fuzzies had better be worth a lot to you.

Hold the presses ladies and gentlemen. We have a resident Nobel Prize winner here, explaining to us the flawed logic of alternative energy slash hybrid card supporters. Don't you guys get it? Buying a hybrid car doesn't save you money.

Oh wait, NO SH*@#. Ask any hybrid car owner if they did purely to save money.

 

[thomsbrain]

so basically i can't even drive one way to work on a full charge. whoopee!

 

[Calin]

Originally posted by: AbsolutDealage

Originally posted by: Calin
That would seem like the best case...

Well, depends on how you are looking at it. It is the best case if you happened to have just dropped 15 large on a battery. For the rest of us, that would be the worst case (you drive 70 miles a day and the gas goes up to $5 a gallon, and you are only getting 35 mpg out of your prius).

The best case if you already have the system installed

 

[dethman]

sony?

lithiumFIRE?

battery?

too easy.

 

[Calin]

Originally posted by: Perknose

Originally posted by: AbsolutDealage

Originally posted by: vi_edit
A $14,500 battery system.

Ok.. let's see. If you are driving the full 55km to and from work every day, and gas gets up to $5.00 / gallon....

Plugin per day = ~$1.20
Regular per day = ~$10.00

$14,500 / $8.80 = 1648 days

1648 / 240 = 6.9 years

7 years to make back the investment on that car in the absolute worst case. How long do you think that battery is going to last?

I know it's not a financial decision by any means, but still...

Errrr, how many millions in 1940's dollars, no less, do you think ENIAC and the huge room it was housed in cost to build, all for computing power so significantly less than is presently in your tier 2 cell phone that it is laughable to contemplate?

Second question: How are you liking your $350, full featured laptop from CC/BB/CrapUSA?

Third question: See any connection, or lesson here?

Answer 1: Yes, if the car industry would have been evolved at the pace of the microelectronics/computer technology, today's RollsRoyce would cost a couple of dollars and be able to go the distance to the Moon and back with a full tank of gas
Answer 2: Yes, and it would be a quarter of an inch long.

 

[Calin]

Originally posted by: desy
The problem with a plug in hybrid is it paves the way for fully electric cars which auto manufacturers HATE
The ability to build a good gasoline engine or diesel is difficult.
Any appliance company can make a good electric motor and pair that with a good battery technology, a huge barrier to the industry is removed and General Electric or any other large company may decided to get in the car buisiness.

The difficulties are mostly in reducing emissions to a small enough value, keeping efficiency high (many MPG for the car using it) and competing with the rest of the engines on the market in power/torque curves.
Building an engine is easy - once you need to have a pretty small displacement (for taxing/insurance purpose), power/torque compared to other engines out there and emission control, you are needing research.

 

[UNCjigga]

If I were Sony, I would never brand any battery product as "LithiumFire". Seriously, who's the genius that came up with that name???

edit: Oh, it was YOU!!! :|

 

[desy]

really ' building an engine is easy' hmmmm I guess thats why Tucker had to resort to an aircraft engine for his production car cause he couldn't build one himself.

So pop quiz how many moving parts in a IC engine and drivetrain compared to a electric motor? computerized iginition timings etc , one that can actually pass emission standards and provide power and smooth shifting reliability and on and on?
Making an electric motor is dead simple