I have long been suspicious of Elon Musk's claims, but he has delivered on technologies I thought were ill-conceived and unlikely, or possible. The rocket that would return and land on a target precisely, for example. He did it, but...
The "Million mile battery" that can supply enough energy for nine trips across the United States, a 27,000 mile range on a single charge only taking eight minutes, for example, is absurd.
As a physical scientist I am aware capacitors, commonly called "condensers," can store great amounts of energy, perhaps on this scale, although doubtful, in the unit dimensions claimed for the "super battery," but their output has never been controlled. They dump the whole load in an instant with explosive results. Clouds are natural capacitors and lightning is an example of the way they deliver. It's just "Whamo!"
Theoretically, a gang capacitor system of tiny charging areas that could be accessed in sequence by an elaborate switching system could work. Now that Very Large Scale Integration, VLSI, is real this would be a way to accomplish this task, but the dimensions of scaling and system control are mind and even computer boggling! And, the manufacturing problems approach infinity.
There is an issue that is esoteric but critical and that is the strange recharging problem that affects our current rechargeable cell technology. Today's rechargeable cells have a limit on the number of times they can be recharged and that number can be as low as 20!
If a system has a cost of ten to twenty thousand Dollars and dies in two years it is not marketable. The new superbattery inventors claim their recharge decay curve is flat, as shown here in blue and not the normal recharge life curve here shown in orange, from experimental data.
Independent testing has to be done to confirm these claims even though Tesla is not yet marketing this technology. And, there is another problem:
The equities markets are promoting an "Initial Public Offering," IPO, by the company that claims to have invented this new technology, but I have not been able to see the patent as it has not been published by the US Patent Office which is unusual, disturbing and critical. Plus, bear in mind that a patent is no guarantee the technology works as you do not have to provide a working model. A patent is a legal document of claim, not a scientific filing of function. Some patents have been false as they did not function and wound up in court cases.
I am a US Patent holder and do my own rather than pay a Patent Attorney $70,000 for ten pages of strange language. I learned patent language, inspired by two grandfathers, and an uncle, who were all US Patent holders, basically doing their own, but would have a patent attorney edit them. Attorney's no longer will do that alone they want to do the full job for the money it requires.
Billions of Dollars are going into this IPO. It will likely be the biggest IPO of it's kind in history and Elon Musk could walk away unscathed if it is not what has been claimed as he is not the inventor and may well claim to have been scammed as well as anyone, but if he dumps his shares on the way up this could be a serious problem. That alone is evidence he knew. This is the stuff of hot business novels and movies as we live in a digital jungle and while we have put a paved road through it we have not tamed the beasts within. Stay tuned...
Adrian Vance
How strong of a charging system would people need at home to give his battery a charge to last 27,000 miles? I'm not an electrician but I can't see the normal ones people have already at home being capable of doing that, and I include the public charging places as well as incapable of providing that kind of power-up.
ReplyDeleteThat depends on a long list of variables including size and weight of the vehicle, quality of the roads, tires and their pressure, and on. The greatest range I have heard of for an electric car is 200 miles on an eight hour charge! The electric car/truck aficionados are talking about and 18,000 to 24,000 mile range which optimally with our best cells today would require a rail car sized battery system. I do not think so to say nothing of an eight minute charging time on house current. That alone says "Fraud!"
ReplyDelete1 horsepower is equivalent to 746 watts. Factor the power required to maintain 60MPH on the road with a car and do the math... impossible meet this claim electrically.
ReplyDeleteA fuel cell may be capable of much more, but what preparation required to recharge in 8 minutes?
That leaves nuclear... but impossible to make safely in any reasonably-sized package.
That is really the "killer issue" of the electric vehicle concept. Without a huge investment in nuclear power plants, which now take 30 years to build, we have no hope of supporting the nation with electric cars and trucks, especially trucks. Where are all the "smart fellers" who claim to be "environmental scientists?" Where the Hell did they go to school?
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