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So to sum up, the Frankenplug consortium could just do it, and I agree!!! They won't because few of them are really backing EVs, and BMW is the only real wild card from my perspective.

I don't see them having volume of sales to support such a venture like Tesla and Nissan have begun. Oh, yes. I really didn't like my ten years of dreary Fremont!!! After experiencing SoCal weather previously, and the crazy Bay Area traffic of 1980's - 1990's and insane housing prices, yup, I was very exciting to go to San Diego in 1998. I won't likely ever leave here.

I heard they had some new car company come to Fremont?
 
GRA said:
Because most of the 'difficulty' as far as Nissan putting any in themselves was due to when they decided to do it, not technical factors. After all, Tesla has amply demonstrated that it can be done far faster, and with a tiny fraction of the financial resources available to Nissan/Mitsubishi or a single member of the SAE consortium members, let alone a group of them.

wow, this is a great example of a statement that is true if a litany of circumstances prevailed. as we know, Nissan and Tesla couldnt possibly be more different and that includes how they get nearly anything done. Now lets not take my statement to mean that Tesla is doing it right and Nissan is doing it wrong. Both have SOPs in place that are much different.

In Tesla's case. they have no dealers to contend with so all the decisions are made by them. One might not think that is such a big deal but it really makes all the difference. the other thing is placement. no matter who you talk to, there will be plenty on both sides who will think the placement of the chargers is far from ideal or complete.

In Nissan's case. they have to balance their relationship with the dealers along with placement of the chargers. There is a value to having chargers in town where all the people live so arguments that local owners would never use local fast chargers is simply very wrong. Anyone who has local chargers in their area can attest to that.

Now the issue of having chargers in destination areas or outside town is a valid one but Nissan's ability to put one at a remote dealer that has 1/10th the LEAF sales of a much larger one in town is greatly hampered. They simply can t do that no matter how right the decision because they must maintain a relationship with the dealer.

So to say that deploying these chargers is an easy job because Tesla, answering to no one but themselves, has deployed what ??? a half dozen? or maybe its a dozen now? is ridiculous
 
TonyWilliams said:
So to sum up, the Frankenplug consortium could just do it, and I agree!!! They won't because few of them are really backing EVs, and BMW is the only real wild card from my perspective.

I don't see them having volume of sales to support such a venture like Tesla and Nissan have begun. Oh, yes. I really didn't like my ten years of dreary Fremont!!! After experiencing SoCal weather previously, and the crazy Bay Area traffic of 1980's - 1990's and insane housing prices, yup, I was very exciting to go to San Diego in 1998. I won't likely ever leave here.

I heard they had some new car company come to Fremont?
Total agreement on Fremont, although I don't think I ever mentally defined it as dreary. I had friends who used to live there (he worked at OAK Center too, and says he remembers you), and every time I'd go there I felt like I was in one of those endless non-descript L.A. suburbs, where cookie-cutter housing tract is succeeded by cookie-cutter strip mall ad nauseum, and the only way you can tell if you've left one city and entered another is because the city names on the street signs have changed. There's just no sense of uniqueness to it; it needs some funk.
 
DaveinOlyWA said:
GRA said:
Because most of the 'difficulty' as far as Nissan putting any in themselves was due to when they decided to do it, not technical factors. After all, Tesla has amply demonstrated that it can be done far faster, and with a tiny fraction of the financial resources available to Nissan/Mitsubishi or a single member of the SAE consortium members, let alone a group of them.
wow, this is a great example of a statement that is true if a litany of circumstances prevailed. as we know, Nissan and Tesla couldnt possibly be more different and that includes how they get nearly anything done. Now lets not take my statement to mean that Tesla is doing it right and Nissan is doing it wrong. Both have SOPs in place that are much different.

In Tesla's case. they have no dealers to contend with so all the decisions are made by them. One might not think that is such a big deal but it really makes all the difference. the other thing is placement. no matter who you talk to, there will be plenty on both sides who will think the placement of the chargers is far from ideal or complete.

In Nissan's case. they have to balance their relationship with the dealers along with placement of the chargers. There is a value to having chargers in town where all the people live so arguments that local owners would never use local fast chargers is simply very wrong. Anyone who has local chargers in their area can attest to that.

Now the issue of having chargers in destination areas or outside town is a valid one but Nissan's ability to put one at a remote dealer that has 1/10th the LEAF sales of a much larger one in town is greatly hampered. They simply can t do that no matter how right the decision because they must maintain a relationship with the dealer.

So to say that deploying these chargers is an easy job because Tesla, answering to no one but themselves, has deployed what ??? a half dozen? or maybe its a dozen now? is ridiculous
Dave, I fail to see how Nissan's relationship with its dealers enters into this at all. Most of the dealers don't want the chargers, so they have no reason to complain if Nissan puts them elsewhere. It's not going to take any business from them; they want to sell cars, not electricity. Quite frankly, I think putting free chargers in at dealers when they're only going to be available during business hours is a huge mistake, and IMO it makes far more sense to locate pay chargers in better locations with 24/7 access, even though the siting costs more. I'm in full agreement with Tony that free QCs are a major error if you want to grow the infrastructure. And for heaven's sake, don't be like Blink and only put in a single charger in each location.

There's nothing other than money stopping Nissan or any/all members of the consortium from either forming a subsidiary to do this, or joining with one of the already existing networks and just paying for the units. It's a matter of choice, not feasibility. We know that the three biggest handicaps to BEV adoption are price, range and infrastructure. The range and price are more or less fixed at any given time, so adding infrastructure is about the only way to immediately enhance the real and perceived utility of BEVs (boosting sales and affecting the price/range through economies of scale). The question is which companies are smart enough to see this. We know Tesla is, Nissan has belatedly reached that conclusion, and we'll see on the SAE companies.
 
http://insideevs.com/2014-chevy-spark-ev-gets-epa-range-rating-of-82-miles-119-mpge-combined/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Peter Savagian
May 1, 2013 at 12:21 pm
I am the general director for Electric Drives and Electrification Systems Engineering at General Motors. I need to disabuse you of the mistaken notion that this motor has less than 400 ftlb of Torque. The Spark EV motor is designed and manufactured by GM.
This motor makes 540 Nm (402 ftlbf) of Torque at stall and out to about 2000 rpm. This is not gear- multiplied axle torque, but actual motor shaft torque.

The very high torque is motor performance that we are very proud of, and customers will notice the difference: (It has a gear reduction of 3.18 to 1, so the axle torque is the product of these two). This is a very low numerical reduction ratio, which has several great benefits – 1) Feels much better to drive. 3.18:1 is less than half of the reduction of all other EVs. This makes for extraordinarly low driveline inertia, less than 1/5 of the driveline inertia of the Nissan Leaf and 1/4 that of the Fiat 500 EV. Their cars feel like you are driving around in second gear all day long; ours feels like fourth gear. 2) Lower gear mesh, spinning losses, and lower high speed electromagnetic losses mean very high drive unit efficiency. The Spark EV efficiency from DC current to delivered Wheel torque is 85% averaged over the city driving schedule and 92% when averaged over the highway schedule. This is the highest in the industry, and that is one of the reasons why the Spark EV sets the benchmark for most efficient car.

Google search turned up:
Peter Savagian (suh vah’ jhin) - General Motors
http://www.sae.org/servlets/techSession?REQUEST_TYPE=AUTHOR_BIO&PROD_CD=13EM-0002&PRESENTATION_TITLE=OEM+Reports%3A+The+Chevrolet+Spark+EV+1ET35+Drive+Unit+-+Performance%2C+Efficiency%2C+and+Drive+Quality" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
OEM Reports: The Chevrolet Spark EV 1ET35 Drive Unit - Performance, Efficiency, and Drive Quality
Pete serves as Engineering Director of GM’s Electrification Architecture and Electric Motor Release Center. For the past 12 years, in various roles, he has managed product development and advanced engineering for GM’s hybrid systems, including hybrid architecture development, electric drive component development, systems engineering, systems analysis, and control algorithm development. Pete has worked on electric vehicle systems since 1990. Prior to his current assignment, Pete was Chief Engineer for GM’s EV1 Electric Vehicle Drive Unit and Power Electronics at General Motors and at Delco Electronics. In the past, he has worked at Hughes Aircraft Company and Sundstrand Aviation in various engineering roles.
Pete holds a BS in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Wisconsin, a MS in Operations Research Engineering from the University of Southern California, and an MBA from Duke University.
gm-electric-motor-plant.jpg
 
scottf200 said:
http://insideevs.com/2014-chevy-spark-ev-gets-epa-range-rating-of-82-miles-119-mpge-combined/

Peter Savagian
May 1, 2013 at 12:21 pm
I am the general director for Electric Drives and Electrification Systems Engineering at General Motors. I need to disabuse you of the mistaken notion that this motor has less than 400 ftlb of Torque. The Spark EV motor is designed and manufactured by GM.
This motor makes 540 Nm (402 ftlbf) of Torque at stall and out to about 2000 rpm. This is not gear- multiplied axle torque, but actual motor shaft torque.

The very high torque is motor performance that we are very proud of, and customers will notice the difference: (It has a gear reduction of 3.18 to 1, so the axle torque is the product of these two).
Spark EV - 402FtLb torque thru 3.18:1 drive = 1,278FtLbs axle torque
Fit EV - 189FtLb torque thru 8.05:1 drive = 1,521FtLbs axle torque
LEAF - 207FtLb torque thru 7.94:1 drive – 1,643FtLbs axle torque

Torque is flat to 2,000 rpm which is 41 mph on the Spark EV.
 
KeiJidosha said:
Spark_EV - 402FtLb torque thru 3.18:1 drive = 1,278FtLbs axle torque
Fit_EV - 189FtLb torque thru 8.05:1 drive = 1,521FtLbs axle torque
LEAF - 207FtLb torque thru 7.94:1 drive – 1,643FtLbs axle torque

Torque is flat to 2,000 rpm which is 41 mph on the Spark_EV.
The more interesting piece is the reason they did it that way which he described:
scottf200 said:
Peter Savagian
May 1, 2013 at 12:21 pm
<snip>This is a very low numerical reduction ratio, which has several great benefits – 1) Feels much better to drive. 3.18:1 is less than half of the reduction of all other EVs. This makes for extraordinarly low driveline inertia, less than 1/5 of the driveline inertia of the Nissan Leaf and 1/4 that of the Fiat 500 EV. Their cars feel like you are driving around in second gear all day long; ours feels like fourth gear. 2) Lower gear mesh, spinning losses, and lower high speed electromagnetic losses mean very high drive unit efficiency. The Spark EV efficiency from DC current to delivered Wheel torque is 85% averaged over the city driving schedule and 92% when averaged over the highway schedule. This is the highest in the industry, and that is one of the reasons why the Spark EV sets the benchmark for most efficient car.
 
Honestly, getting into a war over the SAE Frankenplug is so counterproductive -- some makers will pick it (GM) and some will not, at least not initially. (Nissan, Mitsubishi, Tesla).

What the real call for action should be would be for EV owners to demand either equal access (One charger, with two QC plugs mandated -- SAE and Chademo), or owners should be demanding the manufacturers at least provide adaptors.

Tesla has various plug adaptors for its vehicles, including for Chademo stations, so if they can engineer it, then there is no reason that Nissan can't devise a Frankenplug adaptor, or GM devise a Chademo adaptor.

The Spark looks like a great little EV and a good start for GM. Hopefully they will come up with a way it can use existing Chademo chargers.
 
hyperlexis said:
Tesla has various plug adaptors for its vehicles, including for Chademo stations, so if they can engineer it, then there is no reason that Nissan can't devise a Frankenplug adaptor, or GM devise a Chademo adaptor.

The Spark looks like a great little EV and a good start for GM. Hopefully they will come up with a way it can use existing Chademo chargers.

I seriously doubt GM went through all this effort to alienate Nissan as the world leader in EV's to then build an adapter to use the CHAdeMO used by Nissan. Sorry, that's not in the cards.

Tesla does not yet have a CHAdeMO adapter, and so far have only mentioned availability in Japan anyway. Make no mistake, Tesla is an SAE member and were intimately involved with the Frankenplug brains. They just didn't adapt the gigantic plug.

But, yes, folks will build and sell adapters should enough EV's materialize. For the Tesla folks, obviously a Tesla car to Frankenplug adapter is simple, with no electronics needed. The Tesla to CHAdeMO, however, will require a way to decode the PLC from Frankenplug, and encode that into CAN messages for CHAdeMO.

There are currently many 10,000's of Tesla and CHAdeMO cars driving around, so that market is already there. How many Frankenplugs are actually delivered is unknown, but is currently zero.
 
You have to wonder if GM really does have any cohesive strategy. On one hand it looks like all they care about is some meets min compliance play then you have this guy with outstanding credentials leading a team that comes up with this state of the art motor drive thingy. Pretty typical for a large bureaucracy, there are internal factions with different agendas.
 
scottf200 said:
KeiJidosha said:
Spark_EV - 402FtLb torque thru 3.18:1 drive = 1,278FtLbs axle torque
Fit_EV - 189FtLb torque thru 8.05:1 drive = 1,521FtLbs axle torque
LEAF - 207FtLb torque thru 7.94:1 drive – 1,643FtLbs axle torque

Torque is flat to 2,000 rpm which is 41 mph on the Spark_EV.
The more interesting piece is the reason they did it that way which he described:
scottf200 said:
Peter Savagian
May 1, 2013 at 12:21 pm
<snip>This is a very low numerical reduction ratio, which has several great benefits – 1) Feels much better to drive. 3.18:1 is less than half of the reduction of all other EVs. This makes for extraordinarly low driveline inertia, less than 1/5 of the driveline inertia of the Nissan Leaf and 1/4 that of the Fiat 500 EV. Their cars feel like you are driving around in second gear all day long; ours feels like fourth gear. 2) Lower gear mesh, spinning losses, and lower high speed electromagnetic losses mean very high drive unit efficiency. The Spark EV efficiency from DC current to delivered Wheel torque is 85% averaged over the city driving schedule and 92% when averaged over the highway schedule. This is the highest in the industry, and that is one of the reasons why the Spark EV sets the benchmark for most efficient car.


Interesting quote, though I'm not sure that the feeling of driving around in 4th gear is a good thing.. I always perfered the right gear and at a stop sign, that is 1 or maybe 2, never 4.
 
DrInnovation said:
scottf200 said:
The more interesting piece is the reason they did it that way which he described:
scottf200 said:
Peter Savagian
May 1, 2013 at 12:21 pm
quote:<snip>This is a very low numerical reduction ratio, which has several great benefits – 1) Feels much better to drive. 3.18:1 is less than half of the reduction of all other EVs. This makes for extraordinarly low driveline inertia, less than 1/5 of the driveline inertia of the Nissan Leaf and 1/4 that of the Fiat 500 EV. Their cars feel like you are driving around in second gear all day long; ours feels like fourth gear. 2) Lower gear mesh, spinning losses, and lower high speed electromagnetic losses mean very high drive unit efficiency. The Spark EV efficiency from DC current to delivered Wheel torque is 85% averaged over the city driving schedule and 92% when averaged over the highway schedule. This is the highest in the industry, and that is one of the reasons why the Spark EV sets the benchmark for most efficient car.
Interesting quote, though I'm not sure that the feeling of driving around in 4th gear is a good thing.. I always perfered the right gear and at a stop sign, that is 1 or maybe 2, never 4.
Here is a post from the TMC forum where someone made an interesting interpretation which others liked:
fengshui said:
After some research, here's what I've discerned. Please anyone here who sees flaws in this argument, correct me if I'm wrong.

For an EV, one of the energetic costs of acceleration is altering the inertia of the driveline. If you've got a standard electric motor with a single-gear engine spinning at 6000 RPM into a 9:1 gear reduction, the vehicle is travelling at about 45mph. If you want to accelerate to 55mph, the RPM of the engine needs to be increased to 7300 RPM. Disregarding the energy required to move the car and run ancillary services, it takes energy just to bring the engine itself up by 1300 RPM. On the Spark EV, they use a high-torque/low-speed motor. As such, the Spark motor will only be running at 2000 RPM to achieve speeds of 45mph. For the Spark, accelerating to 55mph only requires 450 additional RPM. By reducing the inertial energy contained in the motor, the energy efficiency of the entire system is increased.

Unfortunately, the side affect of the above is that due to the decreased gear reduction, the Spark EV gets less axle torque out of the 400 ft-lbs of engine torque it generates. If the Spark EV motor had a 7-9:1 gear reduction, it would be faster off the line than other EVs, certainly. However, because its reduction is only 3.18:1 each rotation of the engine has to do more movement of the car. That reduces the effective axle torque, and shows why the motor was built with such a high initial torque. Does that fit with other reader's understanding?
 
scottf200 said:
Here is a post from the TMC forum where someone made an interesting interpretation which others liked:
fengshui said:
After some research, here's what I've discerned. Please anyone here who sees flaws in this argument, correct me if I'm wrong.

For an EV, one of the energetic costs of acceleration is altering the inertia of the driveline. If you've got a standard electric motor with a single-gear engine spinning at 6000 RPM into a 9:1 gear reduction, the vehicle is travelling at about 45mph. If you want to accelerate to 55mph, the RPM of the engine needs to be increased to 7300 RPM. Disregarding the energy required to move the car and run ancillary services, it takes energy just to bring the engine itself up by 1300 RPM. On the Spark EV, they use a high-torque/low-speed motor. As such, the Spark motor will only be running at 2000 RPM to achieve speeds of 45mph. For the Spark, accelerating to 55mph only requires 450 additional RPM. By reducing the inertial energy contained in the motor, the energy efficiency of the entire system is increased.

Unfortunately, the side affect of the above is that due to the decreased gear reduction, the Spark EV gets less axle torque out of the 400 ft-lbs of engine torque it generates. If the Spark EV motor had a 7-9:1 gear reduction, it would be faster off the line than other EVs, certainly. However, because its reduction is only 3.18:1 each rotation of the engine has to do more movement of the car. That reduces the effective axle torque, and shows why the motor was built with such a high initial torque. Does that fit with other reader's understanding?
To go along this was an exchange between Ruckus and WopOnTour (proven to have extensive knowledge on these matters - GM tech)
Ruckus said:
May 3, 2013 at 6:41 pm -- Folks are a bit confused about torque and performance.
400 ft lbs of motor torque times 3.18 gear reduction means 1272 ft lbs of axle shaft torque (leaving tires out of it for now).
Another company (Tesla) could have about 200 ft lbs of motor torque and use the 8.28 eGear drive reduction for an axle torque of 1656 ft lbs.
Hmmm… motor torque doesn’t really say anything about performance does it??
Now imagine the Spark had a good ol fashioned transmission with about 3:1 reduction. THEN you would be talking about 3816 ft lbs of axle torque and have the Mustangs and Corvettes ducking for cover.
WopOnTour said:
What you are saying is essentialy correct. But then one would have to examine the speed relationships betwen the drive axles and the motor generator unit, especially at highway and top speeds as these can represent a limiting factor (overspeeding the MGU can be a significant contributng factor to failues).
A typical 15" tire (and axle) rotates at 720 rpm at 60 mph and 1200 rpm at 100 mph. Using your Tesla example this would mean the MGU would need to be spinning 5961 rpm (@60mph) and 9936 rpm (@100mph). As opposed to the Spark which could accomplish these road speeds at 2289 and 3816 rpm respectively. Depending on the torque demand this will also lower the power requirements being supplied by the RESS at these speeds significantly improving overall efficiency.
 
Spark EV Charging Out of Chevy Showrooms for $19,995
Press release: http://media.gm.com/content/media/us/en/gm/news.detail.html/content/Pages/news/us/en/2013/May/0523-spark-ev-pricing.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

DETROIT. – Chevrolet announced today a low mileage lease on the new 2014 Spark EV 1LT for as low as $199 per month* for 36 months, with $999 due at lease signing including security deposit (tax, title, license dealer fees extra), making the vehicle one of the most affordable EVs on the market.
Spark EV’s Manufacturer’s Suggested Retail Price starts at $27,495 [LEAF S $28,800] – as low as $19,995 net of the full federal tax credit which ranges from $0 to $7,500 – and includes $810 destination freight charge.
Depending on their tax situation, California Spark EV owners may also qualify for other state and local tax credits and incentives ranging from $0 to $2,500, potentially reducing the price to $17,495. Spark EV owners in California are also eligible for High-Occupancy Vehicle, or carpool lane, access.
<snip>
 
Thought this was significant enough to make it it's own thread. Various people ignore/get lost in the long long spark thread as a few post push it to previous pages.

Spark-EV Charging Out of Chevy Showrooms for $19,995
Press release: http://media.gm.com/content/media/us/en/gm/news.detail.html/content/Pages/news/us/en/2013/May/0523-spark-ev-pricing.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
DETROIT. – Chevrolet announced today a low mileage lease on the new 2014 Spark-EV 1LT for as low as $199 per month* for 36 months, with $999 due at lease signing including security deposit (tax, title, license dealer fees extra), making the vehicle one of the most affordable EVs on the market.
Spark-EV’s Manufacturer’s Suggested Retail Price starts at $27,495 [LEAF S $28,800] – as low as $19,995 net of the full federal tax credit which ranges from $0 to $7,500 – and includes $810 destination freight charge. Depending on their tax situation, California Spark-EV owners may also qualify for other state and local tax credits and incentives ranging from $0 to $2,500, potentially reducing the price to $17,495. Spark-EV owners in California are also eligible for High-Occupancy Vehicle, or carpool lane, access. <snip>
7.[9]** seconds (or less per articles) that is ~second faster than Volt and LEAF !! (400 lb-ft actual motor shaft torque per - http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=288400#p288400" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;)

[** I typed this initially from memory at 7.6 but it is 7.9 or less. See this quote:
Chuck Russell, vehicle chief engineer for the Spark-EV and the Chevy Volt, went one better, telling Edmunds: “We’ve said ‘under 8 seconds’ zero to 60 for the Spark-EV — and it won’t be 7.9.”
via article: General Motors Begins First U.S. Production of Electric Motors for 2014 Spark-EV
http://www.edmunds.com/car-news/general-motors-begins-first-us-production-of-electric-motors-for-2014-spark-ev.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; ]
 
We'll see if they "charge" out of showrooms or not. Tiny car, 3 kW charger, nonexistent quick charge network.

GM buyers may be a different group than Nissan buyers, though, and Chevy might tap into another market, like Volt owners who want a BEV. The more EVs out on the roads the better, so the best of luck to them. I hope to see a lot of them out there.
 
scottf200 said:
Boomer23 said:
Tiny car, 3 kW charger
Commuter to work car that easily charges overnight for $199 lease.
Boomer23 said:
nonexistent quick charge network.
Most LEAF owners have never used their L3/DC quick charger (if they have one - smkettner above doesn't have one)

7.6 seconds (or less per articles) that is ~full second faster than Volt and LEAF !! (400 lb-ft actual motor shaft torque - http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=288400#p288400" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;)

That performance is interesting. I certainly want to drive one.
 
smkettner said:
I have already seen one in my area. Had no idea Spark was actually selling.
Looks to be everything I thought the Volt was going to be. :|
You probably saw the ICEV version. The OP's linked press release says "The Spark EV will be available at select Chevrolet dealers throughout California and Oregon beginning mid-June 2013."
 
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