'23 diesel Ranger

Gasoline and diesel powered vehicles are on the way out. I don't see the point of spending time and money designing a new diesel engine. EV of some sort is the future. Exactly how that ends up working is still up in the air. I'm 63 and don't expect to see fossil fuel powered vehicles completely gone in my lifetime. But I do expect some sort of electrically powered vehicles to approach, or even exceed the number of fossil fuel powered vehicles on the road before I'm gone.

If every vehicle on the road were to magically be electric powered today it wouldn't require any more power to be generated than we are already generating. To keep the power grid intact most of the electricity generated now is not used anyway. Especially at night when most vehicles would be recharged. It would be a more efficient use of the power we are already making.

Most gasoline powered vehicles have a range of about 300-350 miles. I haven't seen any data to support this, but I'd not be surprised to find out that we use just as much electricity to pump gas into a vehicle every 300 miles as we'd use to recharge the batteries every 300 miles.

 

Yeah, I'm pretty sure a several hundred HP motor is used to pump a tank worth of fuel and it pumps for 350 miles worth of time. Pumping gas needs all 600lb/ft tq available!

 

LONG LIVE STUNGUN

 

EVs will probably become common place. Manufacturers might want to market their EV products to a larger audience. It's not like the 70's when everyone wanted a mussel car, even when they couldn't drive one.

 

Anyone ever wonder what the avg IQ/grade-level-completed is around here? It has to be hilariously low.

 

I was all hot to buy an electric vehicle until my neighbor told me what he knew. He’s a fire captain, and he told me that these things often catch fire when you rip the undercarriage in an accident & where the doors jam you were likely to die in a fire.

It reminds me of the early days in aviation: pilots would carry a loaded revolver. It was useless to shoot at the enemy, but you could kill yourself before you die in a fiery plane crash.
Of course it’s illegal to carry a revolver loaded in the car now so you’re pretty much screwed if you have an unextinguishable fire.

He told me you can’t put out a Lithium battery fire, but you can cool it down enough to prevent the whole neighborhood from burning up if you pour 3000 gallons of water on it.

Anyhow, I decided to wait until the technology has advanced a little further. I really don’t feel like sitting on top of 1000 pounds of burning batteries.

And Particularly after I found out that Tesla’s have to have a cooling system for the batteries or else they overheat. Then the car stops running because of safety equipment. Or (hopefully not) the safety equipment fails and it burns up.

When this was found to happen on a particular American electric vehicle the solution given was to park it outside of your house and away from other things that might catch fire. Meanwhile they will work on a repair.

If we come to find out these vehicles are burning up because of the fault in a Chinese manufactured computer chip, I wouldn’t be surprised to see it in the news.

Meanwhile, what do you do if you live in a situation where cars are parked nose to tail and finding a space with 50 feet of space around it would cost you about $10 million a year for parking?

Ultimately the government will figure out that every electric vehicle with lithium batteries has the distinct potential to be an instrument of mass destruction. You can start a fire people simply cannot put out, and it would be Surprisingly easy.

 

I'm pretty sure there is no comparison of the electricity required for pumping fuel vs recharging an EV battery. However, the total energy expenditure of a gas powered vehicle is extremely high when you consider the infrastructure needed to support and supply the gas stations that we use. In the future I'd expect gas stations to wither away as EVs increase in popularity and charging options expand. Rather than having to visit a dedicated charge station you just plug in while at home, while at the grocery store, at work, etc and the huge supply chain required to keep the gas station running is simply not a thing anymore.

Lithium battery fires are much harder to put out but statistically electric cars catch on fire at a much lower rate than gas powered cars. If a car fire isn't something you worry about now it definitely shouldn't be something you worry about when driving an EV.

 

So going into remote areas without charging station you'll be carrying a gas powered generator?...ev have serious limitations!

 

Why is this always a counterpoint?

The large majority of drivers are never so remote they need extra fuel or electricity. Gas will be around a long time yet for those that need the range and the ease of refueling.

My wife's truck is never further than 40km from a gas station.

 

It is a limitation but nowhere near what people make it out to be. There are few areas in the US that are so remote that a 300 mile range EV can't survive. You might not have a high power DC charger but you can almost always find a regular 110v plug-in or even a 30amp RV plug for some juice. It takes a little more planning and effort but not undoable by any means.

 

I'm happy for you, I'm up in Canuckland where distances are vast...not every small town has a charge station...some never will!, I'm up in Alberta if that tells you anything, we are oil country!

 

we should have trucks that run on hydrogen from water by now. you could use a regen system at the wheels to power electrolysis.

 

Lol....You didn't see I'm in Manitoba? I'm also from Alberta.

"Some never will." And some will for sure.

All I'm saying is I see that counterpoint all the time as some sort of "gotcha" like no one has ever thought of it before. Just because you need a gas vehicle today doesn't mean that no one else does. Or that EV tech, stations, support, etc, won't expand.

At this point I still need a gas vehicle. I agree with you that some distances are just too far. But we don't need two. One could easily be an EV with no issues.

 

The Global Ranger won't be sold here (obviously) but they will adapt a US version for it just like they already have. We won't get a diesel but it's likely to get some form of V6 ecoboost and a hybrid in the mix. The Tacoma will probably be king for a while given it's reputation and name plate but the midsize segment is becoming very formidable and competition is stiff. I can see the new Ranger stealing sales, I know I'm interested in one. I hope Toyota steps it up big time with the 4th gen Tacoma because the 3rd gen while sales King is kind of hit and miss.

 

I like the idea of an e/v Tacoma, plug in every night at home, and have a full charge. I remember all the nay sayers when cordless power tools started coming out. When was the last time you bought a tool with a cord?

 

Highly doubtful that some never will. Solar keeps dropping in price and is ideal for towns that need an independent grid in the middle of where. Easy enough to connect that to EV chargers. I don’t think it’s near term but we’ll get to a point where it’s just not economical to keep gas vehicles around. Once cities are all or mostly EVs the cost of fueling infrastructure will rest solely on those small towns and new gas vehicles will be a very niche product. That’s outside of the fact that you can be completely off the grid with an EV vehicle. Not having to go into town for gas ever will be a reasonable savings for rural folks who already have solar.

 

Not sure about my IQ. Hold a Master's degree. The wife holds 3 Master's degrees. Daughter working on her second ( paid for with salary ).
Son working on his first ( paid for with salary ) with a promise for a free PHD ( computer science ).

Not sure what your point is.
I trust some of my Low IQ and Less Educated friends over a lot of my high-IQ and very educated acquaintances.

People here yap, discuss issues, discuss ideas.
Actually talk and communicate the good-bad-ugly of a lot of things ( mostly Tacoma related ).

That's a good thing.

 

EV sounds great; however, I do not believe a single country has the infrastructure to support a large influx of EVs. I honestly do not see a solid infrastructure for another 15-plus years. Perhaps a hybrid will be smarter for the next decade. Solar is not efficient; technology is simply not there. Perhaps when solar becomes efficient and EV chargers would not have to run on diesel/gas/coal. Furthermore, it takes petroleum to build just about everything. Ideally EV sounds good on the surface. Lastly, I agree with most of you on the fire dangers with EV batteries. I rather run gas/diesel and keep my family and others safe. Once an EV gets on fire, they just let it burn. The temps are intensely dangerous for both the drivers and rescue teams. Just my two cents.

 

Sure, solar will need to be way more efficient that what is is today. Infrastructure has to be able to support it. What is interesting how no one is looking at the ecological disaster that lithium mining does...

 

I remember reading about some Tesla cars that got into accidents flames erupted, fire was out then they reignited...maybe it's all bs but I'm not ready for an ev, not yet.