time2roll wrote:
KD4UPL wrote:
I wish they would give a realistic range when being used as a truck. I'm guessing 400 miles is empty, no trailer, no tool boxes or ladder racks to mess up the aerodynamics, not in four wheel drive off road, and no heat, AC, lights, wipers, defroster, etc. being used.
What's the range when loaded with 1,500 pounds of tools and supplies while towing a skid loader on a trailer at night in a snow storm. That's how I seem to end up using my trucks.
What about the other 90% that just needs a Home Depot run, commute to the office, groceries, or out to dinner on Friday? Can these be electric? Because there is a lot of them.
Some day there might be an electric for all uses and I think this is good for now.
Honestly, for most users who never do significant towing (the proverbial grocery getter trucks), a battery truck, is quite viable. 400mile range is likely overkill. That's 6hrs at freeway speeds, so even for a road trip (non-towing), that will cover most use.
But yes, a test case utilizing various standardized loadings would be very useful (gas or electric). It could be an industry SAE test rather than a govt mandate. Run it on a test track
- Empty (with driver and full fuel of course)
- 1000lb payload of bricks centered over the rear axle
- Repeat in 500lb increments until max payload is reached
- 500lb payload of bricks centered over the rear axle plus a 2000lb flatbed trailer (loaded with bricks)
- Repeat with 1000lb increments until tow rating is reached
- 500lb payload of bricks centered over the rear axle plus a 25ft box trailer 11ft tall 2000lb load.
- Repeat with 1000lb increments until tow rating is reached.
This would give a very good feel for range under most common loading conditions.
If this is a legitimate 400mile range at freeway speeds empty, it likely is viable for modest towing duty. That will probably drop to somewhere on the order of 200-300mile range towing a travel trailer. For folks who do mostly weekend trips, that's typically going to be enough as long as they can charge somewhere at their destination. Even if they have to do a partial high speed charge (15-20min) for an occasional 350 mile trip, that's not a huge burden.
It's folks who do a 2-3000mile trip over a week or two who will find it limiting. If you expect to do 400-500mile days back to back, you are going to have to carve out time to go sit at a fast charger for a couple hours or pay for an extra site to plug in the truck. If you don't use any power in the RV, a 30amp site is only going to be able to fill about 60kwh over 20hr...this truck is likely on the order of 200-300kwh battery bank.
Probably the biggest issue is payload. 400mile range on a very non-aerodynamic truck likely means a very big battery bank. If you take a truck that would otherwise have a 2000lb payload, swap out the drivetrain adding a net 1000lb...you have a 1000lb payload truck. That's not going to be able to tow much. The other issue is cost. While battery prices have been coming down, they still represent a huge cost and cost largely scales with battery size.
A plug in hybrid with a 40-50mile battery range would be far more viable and for daily commute would be almost 100% under battery power but on longer runs, you just fill up like normal.
