Guildford's buses go electric: Motoring Motoring Discussion forum

Motoring Discussion > Guildford's buses go electric	Miscellaneous
Thread Author: henry k	Replies: 23

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Wed 26 Jun 19 11:29

Guildford's buses go electric - henry k

plus Tesla batteries

www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/business-48764903/guildford-s-buses-go-electric

Battery on the roof for a quick swap if required ?

Last edited by: VxFan on Wed 26 Jun 19 at 12:33

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Wed 26 Jun 19 12:39

Guildford's buses go electric - VxFan

Love the conversation between the two old fuddy duddies at the end of the clip.

One being cynical, the other being smug.

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Wed 26 Jun 19 14:27

Guildford's buses go electric - henry k

A smug owner of such a vehicle :-)

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Wed 26 Jun 19 15:26

Guildford's buses go electric - Manatee

If 9 buses in Guildford strains the grid such that Tesla storage is needed, there isn't much hope for a converting the national bus fleet, let alone the rest of us, to electric!

The other thing I didn't get is why, if they are using storage, they don't suck up night time electricity rather than daytime.

Last edited by: Manatee on Wed 26 Jun 19 at 15:28

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Wed 26 Jun 19 18:44

Guildford's buses go electric - Falkirk Bairn

9 buses puts a strain on the local power grid!

I thought the purpose of battery powered transport was to store energy from overnight electricity.
Charging batteries during the day goes against the idea of using overnight power when it was not required by other users - we do not normally have power shortages overnight - it's during the peaks during daytime that power shortages & cuts are to be expected in winter - especially now that we depend on unreliable wind power.

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Wed 26 Jun 19 19:32

Guildford's buses go electric - sooty123

I wonder if there's some sort of local grid issue? Or possibly misreported ?

It does seem odd from what is widely reported as a 'standard' set up for charging.

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Thu 27 Jun 19 12:59

Guildford's buses go electric - smokie

My Ampera is virtually identical to a Volt, re-badged as Vauxhall for the UK and Opel for Europe. there are some in the States which have been running longer than the cynic's 4 years, still with good battery life. Wouldn't say I feel smug about it, but I do personally prefer it to smelly diesels, and you can't deny it is quiet and smooth!!

The supplier I use, Octopus Energy, has a tariff where you get the next day's electricity costs (on a half hourly basis) the day before, so you can adjust what you do at what time to get the cheapest possible. I have a sample of their tariff and the daytime, if you avoid the peak times, is not massively more expensive than evening. One reason would be that solar will only be generating during the day!! Hence my free fuel at this time of year...

I can't explain why 9 buses take so much power as to drain the grid. Maybe it isn't well developed in Surrey :-)

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Thu 27 Jun 19 14:32

Guildford's buses go electric - bathtub tom

>>I can't explain why 9 buses take so much power as to drain the grid. Maybe it isn't well developed in Surrey :-)

I noticed in the video that there were two charging leads per bus. The claimed range of 150 (or 200, depending on what you believe) miles means they must carry substantial batteries. Assuming they use Tesla technology and batteries, then that's the equivalent of eighteen Teslas being charged overnight. I don't know how many are running at a time and what hours they do, but that's quite a demand on the electrical supply. It would make sense if they were charged with a combination of charging station stored power and electric power supply.

Still on the subject of electric vehicles, I saw an interesting letter (Autocar IIRC) a couple of months ago. It was assuming we lived in an all electric world and the ICE had only just been discovered. It would mean cars would weigh hundreds of kilos less, have a 500 mile range and re-charge in five minutes without the need for massive electric power supplies.

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Thu 27 Jun 19 15:32

Guildford's buses go electric - smokie

Even 18 Teslas would not be enough to knock out the grid, unless you put them all on the same extension lead. But that's not the grid having a problem. Maybe they just need a larger substation or better infrastructure at the bus garage.

You don't have to declare to your energy supplier when you get a PHEV so I doubt they are really seeing them as quite the same problem as the bus company/BBC is.

I would guess that eventually they would charge the batteries in a smart fashion, dependent on the cost of electricity at any particular point in time, suing a tariff like I mentioned above.

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Thu 27 Jun 19 15:40

Guildford's buses go electric - Bromptonaut

Issue with power supply to the bus company depot and it's surrounding area? Would need additional underground or overhead cables to satisfy demand without addition of storage devices.

Certainly not unknown for sections of the railway to need power upgrades when faster and or lardier trains replace legacy kit. Happened on some bits of the old Southern Region and on the Euston line. Seem to recall reading of issues s of Doncaster on ECML too.

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Thu 27 Jun 19 16:23

Guildford's buses go electric - henry k

>>Even 18 Teslas would not be enough to knock out the grid,
>> unless you put them all on the same extension lead.
>> But that's not the grid having a problem.
>> Maybe they just need a larger substation or better infrastructure at the bus garage.
>>
I watched a Youtube re an American guy building a Tesla from a write off.
During the video he recharged it at a Tesla charging site.
Comments were made to the effect that all the charging points could not be used at the same time
It seems it is something else to be wary of stateside.

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Thu 27 Jun 19 16:00

Guildford's buses go electric - Lygonos

>>there are some in the States which have been running longer than the cynic's 4 years, still with good battery life.

Smokie, you frequent speakev.com - the reality of Ampera is that 0.0% have needed a new battery due to degradation. In fact no significant operating degradation has been reported.

I think it has a 15-16kWh battery of which it only lets you use about 10.5kWh, and it has liquid thermal management - using these protections the battery should easily be good for 5000+ charging cycles (>200,000 miles)

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Thu 27 Jun 19 17:19

Guildford's buses go electric - smokie

Yup, the Ampera has the best of both worlds really, electric to around 40 miles then a petrol engine.

The Americans have OnStar which optionally reports their stats online to this page. www.voltstats.net/ You can see that some have done quite significant mileages - there was one with over 400,000 on but it's gone now. I remember reading at 400k miles he'd had no significant problems.

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Thu 27 Jun 19 17:29

Guildford's buses go electric - Zero

Battery management and hence cell longevity is much better in cars than any other battery appliance. Mostly its due to the ability of being able to provide comprehensive and effective temperature management. (except of course when a tesla catches fire)

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Thu 27 Jun 19 20:12

Guildford's buses go electric - Lygonos

>> Mostly its due to the ability of being able to provide comprehensive and effective temperature management.

Keeping the battery under 40-50°C is vital for longevity but so is avoiding deep discharge and leaving the battery at a high state of charge for long periods.

Saw a test where batteries were repeatedly charge/discharged and the number of cycles til battery degraded to 70% nominal varied from 500 cycles charging 0-100% to over 5000 charging 20-80% cap.

Battery chemistry has a big effect also but is more difficult to quantify.

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Thu 27 Jun 19 20:46

Guildford's buses go electric - zippy

>> Yup, the Ampera has the best of both worlds really, electric to around 40 miles
>> then a petrol engine.
>>
>> The Americans have OnStar which optionally reports their stats online to this page. www.voltstats.net/ You
>> can see that some have done quite significant mileages - there was one with over
>> 400,000 on but it's gone now. I remember reading at 400k miles he'd had no
>> significant problems.
>>

As I understand it, US drivers tend to give their cars oil changes more frequently. This will help with high mileages.

I looked at the stats for the Volt and some of the figures are crazily good! Some are "average" then I remembered a US gallon is about 17% smaller then a UK gallon.

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Thu 27 Jun 19 21:45

Guildford's buses go electric - No FM2R

>>As I understand it, US drivers tend to give their cars oil changes more frequently.

The prevailing view is every 3,000 miles or 3 months. Despite various organizations insisting that for modern vehicles 5,000 miles is acceptable!

There are many drive through oil change places that will do it about as quickly as you will drink a coffee.

I can't remember how much it costs now, but it wasn't much. Not that I indulged, mine gets and oil change when it's washed. May, usually.

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Thu 27 Jun 19 22:16

Guildford's buses go electric - Kevin

3000 miles for 'heavy-duty' which includes taxis, cop cars and cars used in those states where it can be hot and dusty. 6000 miles for 'light-duty' shopping carts. The cost of an oil and filter change in the US is peanuts compared to UK prices. I think an oil and filter change on mine was about $25 to $30 for fully synth.

They also seem to place more emphasis on running the engine in from new. My car was delivered with dino oil from the factory with a switch to fully synth after 1500 miles and instructions to vary the revs, including red lining it now and again.

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Thu 27 Jun 19 22:20

Guildford's buses go electric - No FM2R

Ditto mine, a Pontiac.

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Thu 27 Jun 19 22:22

Guildford's buses go electric - Lygonos

Cars dying from engine wear seems to be a 20th century problem.

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Thu 27 Jun 19 22:46

Guildford's buses go electric - Kevin

20th century engine. Small block Chevy.

The explanation I was given for shipping the car with dino oil before switching to synth was that it allowed the rings and bores to 'bed' themselves in.

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Thu 27 Jun 19 22:48

Guildford's buses go electric - Lygonos

I know why they do that - Subaru used to do it also until recently.

My point is that even in the UK with 12-20k mile oil changes you don't see cars dying from worn engines.

Shagged turbos, injectors, fuel pumps, electronics perhaps.

I think advances in oil technology more than fancy engineering is probably the main reason, although less bore wash with modern fuel injection likely helps.

Last edited by: Lygonos on Thu 27 Jun 19 at 22:53

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Thu 27 Jun 19 23:18

Guildford's buses go electric - Kevin

Yes. I haven't of any big problems since the Nikasil issues.

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Fri 28 Jun 19 00:11

Guildford's buses go electric - smokie

Frequent oil changes won't help on PHEVs. They don't usually use the engine much, if you do then you've bought the wrong kind of car for your needs!! The service schedule for mine says every 2 years. The service schedule for EVs and PHEVs is quite different from ICE cars.

The highest mpg the display will show on mine is 250 mpg - even if you've been running solely on electricity that's what it will show. That display resets when you charge it. And in my case it regularly shows 250 mpg because I don't often go beyond electric range, same as many of the cars in that list.

Many people with Amperas who work have a daily commute within their electric range (or include the ability to recharge at work). I don't think the differing size of a US gallon makes that much difference really. The figures are quite easily achievable if the type of car matches your needs.

To "fill" mine from empty takes, I think, 14 kW. That takes me about 40 miles in the summer, sometimes under 30 in winter. So on my normal tariff that's about £1.80. On my Octopus tariff it's more like 70p. And if he sun is shining long and strong enough ( - it usually doesn't!!) it costs me nothing :-) I guess an ICE is more like £5 or so for 40 miles (fuel cost only).

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