Originally Posted by spunkles182

Another problem with the lithium Ion is that they sometimes explode. its a 1/10,000,000 chance but the Telsa car has 7,000 batteries in it and with the cost of the car $100,000 I dont think that the investment will make up for the savings in fuel cost. but companies like Altair Nanotechnologies are projecting to 50% returns on their iinvestment in mid 2009 early 2010 so we'll see what happens.

Lithium-ion battery fires concern auto enthusiasts

People riding around at 60+ mph in cars made of razor sharp metal with tens of gallons of explosive fuel worrying about a battery explosion in a car made largely of composite material and with little to no overall explosive potential seems a bit... I don't know. Odd?

The devil you know I guess.

Originally Posted by CDB

People riding around at 60+ mph in cars made of razor sharp metal with tens of gallons of explosive fuel worrying about a battery explosion in a car made largely of composite material and with little to no overall explosive potential seems a bit... I don't know. Odd?

The devil you know I guess.

The risk of explosion is smaller than the risk of your gas tank exploding in your car. Plus that risk indicator is bogus. It comes from IIRC Sony producing a few batches of faulty batteries that overheated and exploded. That's called faulty production and is not a risk associated inherently with all Lithium ion batteries. Plus as mentioned, a battery exploding isn't going to hurt you badly in a Tesla. Certainly not as bad a fire in an internal combustion vehicle.


As I said, Tesla's plan is a very good one. Plus the R&D they'll be doing is likely going to be mostly centered around lowering their costs. That means cheaper batteries. They are the first big player to invest serious capital and serious interest into the production of electric cars so I'm sure they are going to be the ones making the most significant progress. I see a lot of conceptual designs other companies are groups are coming up with but the Tesla Roadster is a real car, not a concept one. That's a huge difference. High concept cars are to the auto industry what vaporware is to software. A whole lot of great ideas with no execution.

Expect to see Tesla carrying patents for most of the major advances in battery technology in the coming years.

Originally Posted by Tiberius

High concept cars are to the auto industry what vaporware is to software. A whole lot of great ideas with no execution.

Normally yes, but Lutz over at GM has a specific goal of no more BS concept cars that never make it to market. The Solstice was an example, the production car is in line with what was seen and claimed for the concept. The Camaro looks like it will be another much more linear development. So hopefully this new EV-2 will pan out. The main problem as I understand it with series hybrids is they weren't the best on highways. If they found a way to minimize any problems there, the EV is in. I'll definitely get one, and I vowed never to buy American cars again after my experience with Honda. At a projected 80 mpg it'll be worth it.

Originally Posted by Tiberius

The risk of explosion is smaller than the risk of your gas tank exploding in your car. Plus that risk indicator is bogus. It comes from IIRC Sony producing a few batches of faulty batteries that overheated and exploded. That's called faulty production and is not a risk associated inherently with all Lithium ion batteries. Plus as mentioned, a battery exploding isn't going to hurt you badly in a Tesla. Certainly not as bad a fire in an internal combustion vehicle.


As I said, Tesla's plan is a very good one. Plus the R&D they'll be doing is likely going to be mostly centered around lowering their costs. That means cheaper batteries. They are the first big player to invest serious capital and serious interest into the production of electric cars so I'm sure they are going to be the ones making the most significant progress. I see a lot of conceptual designs other companies are groups are coming up with but the Tesla Roadster is a real car, not a concept one. That's a huge difference. High concept cars are to the auto industry what vaporware is to software. A whole lot of great ideas with no execution.

Expect to see Tesla carrying patents for most of the major advances in battery technology in the coming years.

you seem to have stong opinions on this and Telsa. thats cool, im not arguing for it or against it. im not an expert on this by any means but what ive read the lithium ion battery is sensitive to heat.


"Lithium-ion batteries can easily rupture, ignite, or explode when exposed to high temperatures. The mid-2006 recall of 10 million Sony batteries used in Dell, Sony, Apple, Lenovo/IBM, Panasonic, Toshiba, Hitachi, Fujitsu and Sharp laptops was stated to be as a consequence of internal contamination with metal particles. Under some circumstances, these can pierce the separator, rapidly converting all of the energy in the cell to heat. he mid-2006 Sony laptop battery recall wasn't the first of its kind, but it was the largest. During the past decade there have been numerous recalls of lithium-ion batteries in cellular phones and laptops owing to overheating problems. Last December, Dell pulled about 22,000 batteries from the U.S. market. In 2004, Kyocera Wireless recalled about 1 million batteries used in phones.[15] In March 2007, Lenovo recalled another 205,000 9-cell lithium ion batteries because of an explosion risk."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium...ry#Controversy

I dont think Tesla will be a big player, they are a joint-venture private capital company without much capital. The biggest problem with R&D intensive companies is the amount return that the R&D will bring back. but good luck to them.

Originally Posted by CDB

People riding around at 60+ mph in cars made of razor sharp metal with tens of gallons of explosive fuel worrying about a battery explosion in a car made largely of composite material and with little to no overall explosive potential seems a bit... I don't know. Odd?

The devil you know I guess.

good point. i dont know much about it thats just what i read. I think the concern came about from the laptop battery recalls and how they are sensative to heat.

Originally Posted by spunkles182

good point. i dont know much about it thats just what i read. I think the concern came about from the laptop battery recalls and how they are sensative to heat.

The Tesla is cool as hell. Unfortunately even if I could afford one, I couldn't fit my 6'4" fat ass into one. I tried to get into a Lotus when I went out to the west coast last month. Not pretty. You need to be a contortionist just to shift gears in that thing.

Originally Posted by spunkles182

you seem to have stong opinions on this and Telsa. thats cool, im not arguing for it or against it. im not an expert on this by any means but what ive read the lithium ion battery is sensitive to heat.


"Lithium-ion batteries can easily rupture, ignite, or explode when exposed to high temperatures. The mid-2006 recall of 10 million Sony batteries used in Dell, Sony, Apple, Lenovo/IBM, Panasonic, Toshiba, Hitachi, Fujitsu and Sharp laptops was stated to be as a consequence of internal contamination with metal particles. Under some circumstances, these can pierce the separator, rapidly converting all of the energy in the cell to heat. he mid-2006 Sony laptop battery recall wasn't the first of its kind, but it was the largest. During the past decade there have been numerous recalls of lithium-ion batteries in cellular phones and laptops owing to overheating problems. Last December, Dell pulled about 22,000 batteries from the U.S. market. In 2004, Kyocera Wireless recalled about 1 million batteries used in phones.[15] In March 2007, Lenovo recalled another 205,000 9-cell lithium ion batteries because of an explosion risk."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium...ry#Controversy

I dont think Tesla will be a big player, they are a joint-venture private capital company without much capital. The biggest problem with R&D intensive companies is the amount return that the R&D will bring back. but good luck to them.

They use different batteries in electric cars than they do in laptops. It even says it in that Wikipedia article. Lithiated metal phosphate as opposed to lithium cobalt oxide. Lithiated metal phosphate doesn't explode.

Plus if you read the recall of Sony batteries was from contamination with small pieces of metal; i.e. faulty production. Other recalls didn't tell us why. It wasn't because lithium ion is inherently dangerous otherwise problems would happen with all li-ion batteries. It's that li-ion batteries aparently require more strict manufacturing processes. They seem to be more susceptible to manufacture and design flaws.

Originally Posted by Tiberius

They use different batteries in electric cars than they do in laptops. It even says it in that Wikipedia article. Lithiated metal phosphate as opposed to lithium cobalt oxide. Lithiated metal phosphate doesn't explode.

hmmmm... i did not know that. thanks for the info

Originally Posted by CDB

and I vowed never to buy American cars again after my experience with Honda.

I think most people agree with you. of the "bug 3". GM lost 2.5billion dollars last year, ford lost 12.6 billion and Daimler actually paid out $673 million to get rid of chrysler.

Originally Posted by spunkles182

I think most people agree with you. of the "bug 3". GM lost 2.5billion dollars last year, ford lost 12.6 billion and Daimler actually paid out $673 million to get rid of chrysler.

If GM pops out and EV-2 that gets 80 mpg and is a true series hybrid, and it's not a piece of **** which isn't too hard given series hybrids are a lot less complex, they've got my money back and then some.

Thanks for the info guys I had never heard of Tesla Motors.

I was checking out some of their cars features and I love the Tesla coil "anti theft" protection feature!



here's the original Tesla Roadster