Here's a summary of my day at EVS 26.
The good folks from this forum that I met up with were tbleakne, KieJidosha, JPV, Devin, Randy, JeremyW, and Hill and his missus. Nice to see the fellow LEAFers and fun to drive and walk around with them
The Drive and Charge event had the Ford Focus Electric (FFE), LEAF, Volt, Coda, Mitsubishi i, BYD E6, Prius Plug-in. Hydrogen Fuel Cell EVs available to drive were the Toyota Fuel Cell SUV, the Mercedes FCEV and the Honda Clarity. There was also an Arcimoto SRK tandem two-seat three-wheeler. The model available to drive lacked body work and only had a tubular space frame. I drove the FFE, The BYD and the Coda. See the individual threads for the FFE, the Coda and the E6 for drive impressions and pictures.
The queen of the exhibit floor was the Infiniti LE Concept, and a beautiful queen she is. Check the Infiniti LE thread for more pictures than the one below. The car is of a nice size, maybe slightly smaller than an Infiniti G37, but similar in size, and not as large as a Tesla S. With all of the non-Tesla EVs being rather compact, the LE might be a very nice mid-size choice. We weren't allowed to touch the car or even climb over the barrier rails, and while the dash and all lights were on, including the odd light-up grille, the nice woman in charge was not allowed to operate any of the features. And though I asked, she wasn't able to extend the charging ports behind the large Infiniti badge in the grille. Of course, the wireless charging feature was on display, with special lighting to call attention to it.
There was a red LEAF on the floor, and I think it was also locked, though several LEAFs were available to drive at the driving event. Nissan also had some of the fake "gas powered" appliances on display from the popular commercials.
BMW was present with an ActiveE on display, featured along with a VW electric UP Blue Motion at the SAE combination QC exhibit. The ActiveE had been retrofitted with an SAE QC combo port and we were told that the car was actively charging on DC using the proposed SAE standard plug from an ABB quick charger. The BMW had a special piece of hardware sitting in the trunk that was taking the DC feed from the QC unit and sending it to the battery pack.
That SAE QC Combo Plug display was impressive in the number of QC manufacturers that were shown. The most exciting thing that I heard all day was a comment from one of the BMW techs that at least three QC makers have said that they will make a charger with both CHAdeMO and SAE QC plugs. These included ABB, AV and Eaton. If this dual plug solution turns out to be common, we might find that there is a solution for the standards issue. It's not a trivial thing, of course, to include both charging standards in one box. A rep from Fuji told me that the internal component requirements are different for each standard, beyond software and, of course, the plugs and cables.
The QC charger makers that shared the stage with BMW and VW at the SAE area and were showing SAE combo QC capability were ABB, AV, Eaton and EFACEC. Siemens and PhoenixContact were on the same display, but were not showing SAE combo capability.
As for other EVs on the display floor, Honda had the Fit EV (locked) and their Clarity FCEV. Besides the Up Blue Motion, VW also showed their test fleet EV, the E Golf that is in fleets here and in Europe, but not in consumer use. Toyota had the RAV4/Tesla concept along with the PIP and Priuses C and V. I was told that there will be a major press conference at the show at noon Monday, where the production version of the RAV will be unveiled, along with pricing and reservation details.
Wireless charging technology was well represented, with Qualcomm, who are marketing to car makers, Delphi, also an OEM maker, and Plugless Power, who are marketing to consumers as a dealer-installed retrofit for about $3,000 as well as to the OEM market.
Most of the exhibits were aimed toward the automaker industry and included high voltage cabling and connectors, on board chargers, and many other technical systems. Besides the QC charger makers that I mentioned above, there were others including Fuji, Delta, Shneider, PNE and others. FLUX Power was one the battery makers on display, complete with sexy girls in tight short dresses and high heels that seemed weird for something as mundane as battery packs (I guess that was the point :lol:
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