The online racing simulator
Electric cars in LFS?
(224 posts, started )
But then, do we need this in LFS? Not really.
Quote from superxp :No, it's because petrol engines are way more restricted than diesel engines at 24h du Mans... So of course, they won...

don't forget, cosmo powered or rotary as a whole are banned due to bently audi & co being shit at what their good at.
I'm talking about energy that can provide something. Electricity is way less powerfull than petrol. btw the only energy source that is more powefull than petrol is nuclear.

Btw there are simple fact to look for :

An electrical car need exactly the same power to do the same way (this is physics so btw every car need the same power, then the engine bring it). A small city car can do 500kms for 30 liter petrol. An electrical car with 300kgs battery can do 150-200 kms (in particular helpful condition ofc). So basically you can do 1/3 as much kilometer with petrol than with electricity. Then you have to take account than a petrol engine enable you to have only 30% of petrol power to the wheel whereas electricity is 80-90%. So finally you have that 9-10 power ratio.

Basically this is why car builder do not have lot of electrical cars in their range of product. Simply because it has a lack of power. I have been working in a compagny that was preparing some Honda K20 engine for some prototyp through Europe. We made a study to attempt to replace that Honda power engine (250 bhp @8200 rpm). Such a prototyp (CN class so 540kgs) can do 2hours stint with 80L fuel at Paul Ricard racetrack, with electrical engine, to have the same engine performance, we needed only 150 kW (200bhp but in fact 2 engines of 100bhp each) but we needed 500kgs battery to make 2 hours with that car ! So stop dreaming guys, at the moment, electrical car is a dream although it would be awesome for car dynamic (possibility to have an engine on each wheel, so something like dynamic full driven differential,...).

More : Diesel power sucks basically, if we enable turbo on petrol engine with the same air restrictor and same turbo pressure as diesel,...hum Pescarolo would have won Le Mans last 4 years ^^. Basically two stupid fact about diesel engine : less rpm, so less engine braking and a smaller range of torque utilisation (that's why diesel engine has turbo). Diesel is mainly used because Diesel has a better efficiency than petrol. In industry like transport, naval,... engine are made for efficiency, a naval engine efficiency can be 0.5 although the best car's one should be around 0.35 (0.32 for petrol).

EDIT : Anyway, why do people love auto-racing? Because of the sound of the engine, of the smell of the burnt tyres, the oil and this atmosphere created by mecanical sports. They love to see these men fighting with their machine, doing some things that human wouldn't think they were able to ! So adding some electrical cars in a sport car game would be non-sense.

btw Lotus system made with an electro-engine and a petrol engine as generator is called hybrid.
Quote from MoMo92i :.... btw the only energy source that is more powefull than petrol is nuclear.

Wrong, Hydrogen is 3 times as volatile as Petrol.

@ the OP - Your already driving an electric car as your PC is powered by electric.
Well Hydrogen is about 2 kWh/L and 1 kWh/kg although petrol is around 9 each...So I don't know where you had these figure, but this is wrong. btw volatile doesn't mean power
Quote :Pound for pound hydrogen is 3 times more volatile than petrol..

Source http://www.magdrive.co.uk/customers.html

I was under the assumption that the more volatile a fuel is, the more power it produces/could produce. My assumption was wrong.
The video one page ago was great, I would personaly love to drive that car in LFS... <trollmode> this car would also make more use of pits ingame, wouldn´t it? </trollmode>.

Electric cars would be great for short tracks(south city?) where they would have advantage because they don´t need gearbox(from what I´ve heard)
Quote from Bigbob1993 :because they don´t need gearbox(from what I´ve heard)

They don't need a gearbox because an electric motor produces its maximum torque at 0 (zero) RPM, whereas a petrol engine produces 0 torque at 0 RPM, and its maximum at 2000-4000 or more RPM.
I think uranium powered cars would be a better addition. Then when you crash there is the possibility of gamma radiation causing mass defects in drivers.
Quote from freddyalek90 :They don't need a gearbox because an electric motor produces its maximum torque at 0 (zero) RPM, whereas a petrol engine produces 0 torque at 0 RPM, and its maximum at 2000-4000 or more RPM.

In fact, torque of electric motor doesn't depends on RPM at all. :P
/thread
in theory yes, in reality it is almost true. Anyway in some powerfull electrical cars, there are some gearbox because car velocity depend on engine rpm and to go from 0 to 300 kph creat a big electric current (possibility to go higher from 600A !) that destroy the controller. Moreover you have to modulate the power because of to much torque for the tyres ^^ So finally you don't have a constant torque with electric cars, your controller made it depend on acceleration, rpm and speed.
Quote from rockclan :/thread

As I see you're on a cruising server.
Why you're so /thread'ing, considering electric cars would be very good improvement to cruising experience?
Quote from E.Reiljans :As I see you're on a cruising server.
Why you're so /thread'ing, considering electric cars would be very good improvement to cruising experience?

Not really
Well, E.Reiljans, one of the good things in a simulator is that it is not real. So there's no pollution, no real petrol, etc. So why put an electric motor, that will never replace petrol engines even in real life, in LFS ? Even put a Diesel engine in LFS has more sense !

Plus you say that electric cars are green ? I'm sure batteries are way more polluting to made and to recycle (not recyclable I guess) than running petrol engines, and I don't talk about Nuclear energy for made the electricity... Plus electric cars aren't that economic, you have to put 7 000€ every five years in new batteries...

P.S : I've just seen weight of the new Electric Raceabout : 1700kg and chassis is made with carbon fiber. '05 Raceabout's weight was 795kg and made with aluminium, much cheaper and heavier than carbon fiber...
Quote from superxp :Well, E.Reiljans, one of the good things in a simulator is that it is not real. So there's no pollution, no real petrol, etc. So why put an electric motor, that will never replace petrol engines even in real life, in LFS ? Even put a Diesel engine in LFS has more sense ! Plus you say that electric cars are green ? I'm sure batteries are way more polluting to made and to recycle (not recyclable I guess) than running petrol engines, and I don't talk about Nuclear energy for made the electricity... And electric cars aren't that economic, you have to put 7 000€ every five years for new batteries...

P.S : I've just seen weight of the new Electric Raceabout : 1700kg and chassis is made with carbon fiber. '05 Raceabout's weight was 795kg and made with aluminium, much cheaper and heavier than carbon fiber...

1. They will, just give them 20-50 years.
2. No, not really. LiFePO4 (best battery type for cars) batteries last 10+ years. Check site of A123Systems, they have some really promising technologies, compared to classic Li-Ion / NiMH elements :P
Quote from E.Reiljans :1. They will, just give them 20-50 years.
2. No, not really. LiFePO4 (best battery type for cars) batteries last 10+ years. Check site of A123Systems, they have some really promising technologies, compared to classic Li-Ion / NiMH elements :P

So, ok for the batteries (but well, aren't they expensive, polluting, and the weight is still a problem, isn't it ?).

You know, there's other "green" technologies than electric engines... (Hydrogen combustion engines by example, like the BMW Hydrogen 7. Just rejects some water vapor, nothing polluting)...
Quote from E.Reiljans :1. They will, just give them 20-50 years.

They won't. At least as they are now. Electric cars ARE the future, batteries aren't.
With batteries, even the best ones, you have to recharge them. With my petrol Fiesta (not very polluting and quite economical - 5.7l/100km or 41.3mpg) I go to a petrol station, put petrol in, pay and go away. Total time: 5ish minutes.
With an electric car it takes AT LEAST 3 times that, with high power outputs and very good batteries. In real life, it will take some half-hours. People can't afford to stay still that much.
With fuel cells, you use hydrogen (at a pump it takes as long as the petrol to fill up) and you are using an electric car with no batteries (= less "fuel") and virtually unlimited range (with small times to fill up), and it produces only water.

What's better? What's REALLY the future? :P
Quote from rediske :http://youtu.be/t9GR9EVsk-g

weird...

More tyre squeal than all of the Gran Turismo games put together....

It also sounds awful. So this gets a -1 from me. Needs more fuel hungry turbo super nos charged Daewoo Matiz's imo...
Quote from freddyalek90 :With an electric car it takes AT LEAST 3 times that, with high power outputs and very good batteries. In real life, it will take some half-hours. People can't afford to stay still that much.

Yes they can, when all they need car for is to go to work and back home, occasionally doing some shopping.
Quote from E.Reiljans :Yes they can, when all they need car for is to go to work and back home, occasionally doing some shopping.

Let's say I work 8 hours a day 5 days a week. Will I want to stay at least a quarter of an hour, more likely half an hour to "fill up" my car? No, I'd prefer to use 5 minutes of that time to fill up the hydrogen and use the rest of that time to go home and relax.

Now we have understood that more fuel efficency can be achieved by cutting weight (my Fiesta is 60kg lighter than the previous model, even by being bigger). Using batteries ADDS a lot of weight. Using a fuel cell keeps the weight roughly as it is now. What's the future?
Electric cars and hybrids are shite now, and sorry for the French. Too much weight, too little range, price a lot higher than petrol cars (31,000£/36.000€ for a small Peugeot that has to be recharged every 100/150km? I mean, WTF?). And they aren't what people will drive in 10, 20 or even 50 years, cause they will still be shite (again, sorry!) and not interesting.
If there were hydrogen pumps, I would have liked to buy a fuel cell car, even now.
Quote from azasmith14 :More tyre squeal than all of the Gran Turismo games put together....

It also sounds awful. So this gets a -1 from me. Needs more fuel hungry turbo super nos charged Daewoo Matiz's imo...

I had a Matiz, and it sounded great! Like a Porsche with a cough
heh its always fun to see people who dont have any understanding of physics and get their oppinions from top gear discussing a subject like this
Quote from Shotglass :heh its always fun to see people who dont have any understanding of physics and get their oppinions from top gear discussing a subject like this

That might be true, but freddyalek's opinions sound kinda reasonable to me. Electric cars powered by batteries will always be impractical as you need ridiculously high power to charge batteries at a reasonable rate and even then their range is nowhere near the ranges of a chemically powered cars.
Quote from freddyalek90 :Let's say I work 8 hours a day 5 days a week. Will I want to stay at least a quarter of an hour, more likely half an hour to "fill up" my car? No, I'd prefer to use 5 minutes of that time to fill up the hydrogen and use the rest of that time to go home and relax.

Do you understand that those 30 mins can be part of your work time or part of your sleeping time?

Electric cars in LFS?
(224 posts, started )
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