EV Trucks Off-Road, what range do you think we'll see

[melvimbe]

Thats not magic, or variable.

I get that there is math and standard/typical assumptions to make to get there, but by 'feel' I mean to apply that I have not dealt with those sort of measurements frequently enough so that I have all that meaning full of an understanding of it. Really, I don't have a great feel for energy measurements in general, probably as most do, because it's not something I can physically see or touch. Of course, I am comfortable with distance measurements, weight/mass, volume, time... that sort of thing...a bit more than just academically, if that makes sense.

Perhaps as an example a person who has never driven before can academically know how to operate an automobile, but it's not the same as having a bit of experience and actually knowing how to drive. Likewise, you can know that you fire a gun by pulling the trigger, but it's not the same as actually having experience with it. It doesn't mean that you can't have a point of view about these things, but it's foolish to believe you fully understand everything involved when you don't have the hand's on experience.

 

[B E N]

Ok, let me rephrase. A gallon of gas is about equivalent to an EV rating of 10.6 KW. So if an EV is rated at 212 kwh it will have about the same range as a similar size/weight gasoline vehicle with a 20 gallon tank.

The math was intended as a tool, for anyone to use not an attack on an individual.

Its pretty easy to think of something the size of a focus going pretty far on a 20 gallon tank, or something like a raptor doing around 300 miles. And if you have off roaded your raptor you know that you'll get about half that.

 

[GordoJay]

The math was intended as a tool, for anyone to use not an attack on an individual.

Math is a tool and anyone who doesn't understand it will get used like a tool. Pretty much all of politics is misusing math to mislead people who are bad at math.

 

[BenBB]

Math is a tool and anyone who doesn't understand it will get used like a tool. Pretty much all of politics is misusing math to mislead people who are bad at math.

And marketing haha!

 

[B E N]

I'm an industrial designer, not a mathematician, but I did learn enough math to understand that it is just a language. People are scared of it for whatever reason. Numbers are just a part of the alphabet, and it's a really easy way to explain things to someone else who knows a little of the language.

Going through the math line by line was not an attempt to look like a smart guy, or intimidate someone, just wanted to show how you could reason through what the EV ratings mean.

And assumptions are really common, multimillion dollar petroleum drilling operations rely on assumptions. It doesn't invalidate anything, just use what you know to solve a problem. Make the assumptions, do the math, check against real world examples. If it checks you you know the assumption is accurate enough. Assumptions can also be called experience.

 

[Yeldarbraptor]

Just wanted to jump in here and say if you're reading this, listen to Melvimbe and B E N . EV trucks have the potential to be very exciting in many ways, but they're also in their infancy. I think it will be a good 10 years until we have anything that will even come close to the performance of ICE vehicles.

Having owned EVs in the past, IMO the biggest downsides/issues with EVs in their current iterations are: battery capacity/energy density, temperature sensitivity, charging infrastructure, and the issue of the off road environment causing the lowest efficiency possible. Of course there are others, but those are just the biggest in my opinion. (I know that some of these points have been touched on previously, but just throwing in my 2 cents)

Others have talked about efficiency in this thread already - a big thing to note is that EV's are typically three times as efficient at taking a unit of energy and turning it into forward motion when compared to ICE vehicles. I think it's important to remember here that this figure is based on what we're seeing/experiencing currently. ICE vehicles are at their ~33% efficiency after well over 100 years of innovation, racing, etc. EVs are still very very young, so it will be exciting to see if that efficiency figure can go even higher. There's so many parts/systems that will be innovated.

Charging infrastructure is going to be a big achilles heel at first - there just isn't a large enough infrastructure to support more EVs yet, but companies are working on this. Yes, Tesla has a great network, but it's tiny if we think about how few people actually have EVs. Rivian is making notable strides here, pledging to install thousands of charging points in the US and abroad - many of them close to popular outdoors locations, so that will hopefully help owners get a charge at least somewhat close to off road attractions. If you haven't seen it - there's a show called "The long way up" on apple TV - they take two electric harleys from the southern tip of South America 13,000 miles north to California, and they used 2 Rivian prototypes as support vehicles. Super interesting to see how they handled the terrain and temps. Take it with a grain of salt though since the vehicles they used were strictly prototypes. Definitely the toughest terrain EVs have seen yet though, as far as I know.

At any rate - I'm with BenBB - I think that Rivian has probably made the most interesting and innovative strides towards having a viable off road EV. I will say though, that their battery capacity leaves something to be desired. I'm not sure the solution here is to just install a bigger battery, since the weight alone will start to be a big issue. I'd imagine that the companies offering SUV/Truck EVs will learn a LOT in the early years - I bet pulling back on some of the awesome "instant torque" and 3 sec 0-60 power would really help them eek more range out of the batteries. We all love stomping on the skinny pedal, but we rarely NEED to. Aerodynamics will probably start to take much more of a driving role in design as well, allowing us to rethink how the cab of a truck needs to look/funciton.

Something I think that will be really interesting to see as more EVs venture off road is the reliability. Having so few moving parts would theoretically be awesome, but we humans are reeeeally good at breaking shit. So I'm sure we'll start to see a whole host of off road EV issues that we didn't anticipate.

I think EV trucks will be crazy cool feats of engineering though, and I can't wait to see what we'll be able to buy in 5-10 years. EV raptors and TRXs? Who knows!

 

[B E N]

Aerodynamics will probably start to take much more of a driving role in design as well, allowing us to rethink how the cab of a truck needs to look/funciton.!

This.

Cars are shaped the way they are because the need an engine and cooling system in the front (economics drive this, not all vehicles but most). Ev do not, when the safety standards update to allow EV to optimize aero while still protecting pedestrians its going to help high speed range a bunch.

The other problem is consumers are accustomed to seeing cars look a certain way. Tesla design language is a good example of this. An EV has fewer design limits, you can pack a battery here and there, put the propulsion in the hubs. It is a wet dream for 4wd vehicles, you no longer have to sit above driveshafts and transmission and transfer case.

 

[melvimbe]

Ok, let me rephrase. A gallon of gas is about equivalent to an EV rating of 10.6 KW. So if an EV is rated at 212 kwh it will have about the same range as a similar size/weight gasoline vehicle with a 20 gallon tank.

The math was intended as a tool, for anyone to use not an attack on an individual.

Its pretty easy to think of something the size of a focus going pretty far on a 20 gallon tank, or something like a raptor doing around 300 miles. And if you have off roaded your raptor you know that you'll get about half that.

I didn't have a problem with your explanation and math, nor did I see it as an attack. My point was more about experience with EVs/ ICE engines, offroading, etc and how it can't be replaced with academic understanding.

I'm an industrial designer, not a mathematician, but I did learn enough math to understand that it is just a language. People are scared of it for whatever reason. Numbers are just a part of the alphabet, and it's a really easy way to explain things to someone else who knows a little of the language.

I got my degree in mechanical engineering and worked in the field for a few years before moving over to IT. There was big difference between me who understood how things worked academic, and the mechanics who had decades of experience with the machines.

And assumptions are really common, multimillion dollar petroleum drilling operations rely on assumptions. It doesn't invalidate anything, just use what you know to solve a problem. Make the assumptions, do the math, check against real world examples. If it checks you you know the assumption is accurate enough. Assumptions can also be called experience.

Agree about the use assumptions....but I've never been too comfortable with them. Part of the reason I switched over to IT...much fewer assumption to make. I am not knocking good assumptions, and there are easier and better assumptions to make as you gain experience and wisdom on a matter, just like hard numbers better.

Math is a tool and anyone who doesn't understand it will get used like a tool. Pretty much all of politics is misusing math to mislead people who are bad at math.

Someone doesn't need to be bad at math to be mislead by it. The person trying to fool you with statistics will often do some by leaving some important information out and convince you to assume the missing information fits the narrative they're selling. For example, someone could tell you the range of an EV, and you're naturally going to assume that range is effected by driving style, conditions, payload, etc in the same way an ICE engine is effected...because you don't know any better. Probably don't even realize your making that assumption. Doesn't need to be bad at math.

IMO, if you're presenting data (formally), an effort should be made to consider natural assumptions that are incorrect and bring those up in order to prevent misinformation from spreading. But that usually doesn't achieve the narrative.

 

[B E N]

My point was more about experience with EVs/ ICE engines, offroading, etc and how it can't be replaced with academic understanding.

When you don't have access to the real world experience, you have no choice but to wonder and apply what you know. If that's "academic" so be it. It's pretty easy to get a good idea of what is going to go on based on what you know. Even though it's a different energy source it is still an energy source, consumption habits will directly correlate, it's easy to convert watts to BTU, it is grade school level stuff. Saying you cant have a clue about energy consumption because it is somehow different to be pulling it from one kind of chemical reaction over another seems a bit black and white.

The whole point of having that chemistry and physics education is to help you make reasonable predictions about the behavior of a system. If it isn't useful for that why would you bother with a Mech E degree in the first place?

I also was in engineering, it is not for everyone, going into design was one of the better life decisions I made

 

[GordoJay]

Someone doesn't need to be bad at math to be mislead by it.

True, but if you're bad at math you can't double check something that looks sketchy. And without being able to do simple math in your head, or without having a bit of mathematical intuition, it's hard to tell when something looks off. So you're down to whether you trust the source or not. Or voodoo, or wishful thinking, random luck, or religion. So like I said, it turns you into a tool.