Will electric cars be reliable in wintery conditions?

Question

I just read up on some exciting new electric cars that will be coming out in the next 3 years that match my budget and will have up to 300 mpg!!!

But I was wondering, how these cars would handle on a street after a ice storm? The car would be great for me, but i live in the midwest and require a car that can get around ice and snow.

The information I would like to have is the typical weight an electric car, front/rear wheel drive, and inside space.

Answer 1

I think traction would be as good as a traditional car. I wonder if cold temperature will affect battery power and range.

Answer 2

No such information is available, because there aren't any production electric cars. The Tesla won this year's Vaporware award for not existing outside of advertisments, and there haven't been any others. There likely won't be any, either: the economy isn't likely to support a lot of experimental vehicles in the next couple of years.

You also might wish to think about the heater. The GM EV1 had a heat pump that really pulled battery power, which is one reason they only leased the car in southern California.

Beyond that, an electric would probably handle as well as any car in icy conditions; the battery would be pretty sluggish below 20 degrees or so but would heat up in use.

Even electrics are better than hydrogen cars, because nobody's determined just where the hydrogen is supposed to come from (there aren't any hydrogen wells.)

While you're counting all your big money savings from electric cars, consider that they need roads, and thus the states are going to have to start assessing road taxes from them. Probably there will be an odometer that can be read with an RFID wand, like that on your water meter. Then you'll get a nice bill in the mail, and it won't be cheap: consider the proportion of the price of gasoline that consists of taxes.

Answer 3

A TRUE electric car does not have an MPG rating because it does NOT use gas. There are NO hybrids that will come anywhere close to 300 MPG. It sounds like you are describing a 'plug in hybrid'. That is a normal hybrid that has a built in charger to recharge the batteries from a home outlet without using the gas engine at all. The '300 MPG' assumes 90% of the energy used will come form this source and IGNORES the cost of electricity AND the emissions of the electrical plant.

Aside from the above, they would handle EXACTLY the same as any ofthe vehicle of similar sive and weight.

Answer 4

There were great electric cars out a few years back.where did they go? The oil money got rid of them, they even came and took all the cars away. See on comcast demand the free movie electric cars ( title I forgot).
My point is this, We have already had great electric cars, but big oil money killed them.You may read about coming cars, but they were up and running, so big oil will kill them to.We had a water powered (power station) the inventor was killed.I saw the U.S. patent office on-line and the invention is there and anyone could make one and power their home, I kid not.A great video on google tells about this, google water power vid, wow.

Again big co. killed the idea and so no one knows of this invention.We hear in the media that we must find alternate power to keep green house gases down ect, yet we have the inventions now and we do not use them, so who wants any clean, non oil power? no one, we would not be at war if this was the case.

This is a hot topic in the media cause the E.U and the U.N. is pushing to cut back on emissions, yet these same people know we have and had alternate power sources for real, hay there would be fewer wars if we used what we already had and know, so as the war continues we see big brother still wants big money from oil.
We must find a way to be independent from foreign oil, this is what we hear on the news, we have the ability, now, today...

But, that would make it so the world would need l;ittle or no oil...think about it and google some of these points, I doubt we will see an electric car again any time sooon.

Answer 5

Electrical devices.. work better when its cold unlike the combustion engine which it hardens oils an other fluids.. electrical things like computers, radios, or even a remote control car work somewhat better in the cold.. the processor/circuit board flows electricity a lot more fluently while it is cold..

in dependability of a electric car, basically the same.. if the car has front wheel drive.. it would just behave just as a regular front wheel drive car would on ice.. it would get better traction cause all the weight of the car is on the front two wheels, allowing better turning control and driving stability...

If the electrical car is reduced weight, which they might not do cause of the risk factors of lite weight objects going at very fast speeds; If the car was lite weight this creates many problems in secure features, one is going at top speeds the vehicle would/could bounce on turns causeing flips of the vehicle.. even on Ice if the electrical car was to be lite weight you couldn't get no traction what so ever.. just cause the car wouldn't have no way to gain friction cause of its lite/reduced weight, but i doubt they would ever reduce a car weight drasticly like that, just cause it would be a hazard on freeways an collisions the car could literally go bounceing off the side of the street...

it would be about as reliable as any modern car we have today, an for hazardous blizzard coditions.. any car can put chains on the tires

Answer 6

I don't think they will. If everyone converted to an electric car can you imagine the drain on the power grids? Most families have two cars that would all be charging overnight. Or one would always be charging while the other one is running.
I intend on having a gas combustion engine until something better comes along and I don't see that happening too soon. I think the best solution right now is to drill for oil in the Gulf of Mexico and in the ice in the north.
Besides I need to haul my horses with a horse trailer and heavy truck, there's no other way to do it.
If the people driving cars electric or otherwise would show more courtesy on the roads I would ride my horse for local errands but inconsiderate people make it oo dangerous.

Answer 7

You would have to consider three issues.

First, electric motors have a lot of torque. When the streets are dry, that is not a problem but when they are covered in snow or ice, you could easily spin the tires if you are too hard on the "gas."

Second, cold batteries do not have near the power of the warm batteries. If you leave the vehicle outside in the cold it will still be able to move but your power would be quit a bit lower when you first start out until the battery pack warms up. That could be a problem if you try to go right onto a freeway before the batteries warm up to full power.

(They do have battery heaters right now for the standard 12 volt battery in cars right now and the charger for the electric car could also keep those batteries warm but what about when you park the car at work all day long?)

Third, you would have to make sure the batteries are designed for cold weather. A battery that would do great in Florida in the summer may freeze up in Minnesota in the winter. One frozen battery is a mess, a frozen battery pack would be a disaster.

Answer 8

Two fundamental problems will need to be solved before electric cars are reliable in winter.

(1) Motor coils could seize in wintery conditions
(2) The Battery charge will be lower.

I think both these problems could be overcome by providing automatic space heater for both battery system and the motors. Also would need a trickle charger driven by solar cells or hidden wind turbines to improve the battery life and charge.

I think there is no problem which engineers cannot overcome eventually but remember it has taken us a century of development to get to where we are with IC engine so it's bound to take some time.

Answer 9

In fact electric car will be much better that IC engine.Electric car will be needing only Battery to power up the electric motor used as a substitute for IC engine .Rest of the parts could be same like any other car with little bit modification .Actually In the patrol pump charged battery should available instead of patrol.A fully enclosed motor will have no effecf of climate ..there are many motors work in side the water .In fact if you have a aopproprite motor and suitable battery available ,It will be great all the way.Even pollution problem can be controlled. Actually it will be better to have less weight than more as it will be more millage efficient .how ever it should have good stability on speed for which you can adjust the with body building materials.Use metal having approprite weight to build the car in a way to get equilibrium.

Answer 10

I think one major obstacle is the cold effect on the battery itself. Cold is a major hangup with conventional batteries so I am guessing the electric cars will be fine in warm weather.

But there are new technologies that may be overcoming this as well. The fact that the battery/batteries have to be charged before using and there is a bit of heat generated with that process, may be no problem, anyway.

As far as the handling, I would think it would be much the same as conventional cars taking into account that in snow and ice, it is advisable to have the appropriate tires for the season. Stopping is no different obviously, so that isn't much of a factor. Take off shouldn't be a problem either if you exercise reasonable care and no attempting jack rabbit starts.

Answer 11

Many of the electric cars I have read about recently say that they will have a motor at each wheel, so tht would be four wheel drive, and that has to be good for ice and snow. A new technology I just found out about called pyrolysis, may be more likely the resource fr our energy needs creating oil from wood and waste. I think the electric car sounds good but everyone would have to buy a new car an with an alternative source of petrol the car you have will be around for a while and gas would be reduced, because the cost to produce this oil via the pyrolysis technology is extreamly cheap.