Farley likes EREV's

[mackinaw]

Sure sounds like Ford will be offering EREV's in the future.

 

https://www.detroitnews.com/story/business/autos/ford/2024/05/30/ford-jim-farley-bernstein-partial-electrification-extended-range-hybrid-transitional/73905508007/

[fordmantpw]

Good!  It gives you the driving pleasure (excitement) of an EV, but the ability to just fill and go if need be.  Plus, for short trips, you never need any gasoline at all!  Hopefully they can make something like that work in the Super Duty.

[akirby]

47 minutes ago, fordmantpw said:

Good!  It gives you the driving pleasure (excitement) of an EV, but the ability to just fill and go if need be.  Plus, for short trips, you never need any gasoline at all!  Hopefully they can make something like that work in the Super Duty.

So…….. a plug in hybrid with a bigger battery.

[mackinaw]

46 minutes ago, akirby said:

So…….. a plug in hybrid with a bigger battery.

 

If I understand the idea behind the EREV correctly, you're always operating 100% EV.  The gas engine kicks in only to charge the battery.  The vehicle is never powered by the ICE.

[twintornados]

Ford invents the Volt??

[SoonerLS]

22 minutes ago, twintornados said:

Ford invents the Volt??

Meh, the concept is far older than the Volt. The Navy’s diesel-electric submarines during (and prior to) WWII were propelled only by electric power with the diesel engines working as generators. The same was true of diesel-electric locomotives, too. 

[Flying68]

17 minutes ago, SoonerLS said:

Meh, the concept is far older than the Volt. The Navy’s diesel-electric submarines during (and prior to) WWII were propelled only by electric power with the diesel engines working as generators. The same was true of diesel-electric locomotives, too. 

Difference being that in ships and locomotives, there is no battery to buffer.  The engines vary their output to produce the power demanded by the drive motors and other systems.  The benefit is that it is easier to package with direct drive electric motors vs having a transmission and driveline components.

[SoonerLS]

13 minutes ago, Flying68 said:

Difference being that in ships and locomotives, there is no battery to buffer.  The engines vary their output to produce the power demanded by the drive motors and other systems.  The benefit is that it is easier to package with direct drive electric motors vs having a transmission and driveline components.

The submarines most assuredly used batteries. They had rather large banks of batteries. 

Edited May 31, 2024 by SoonerLS

[Texasota]

I wonder how the MPG of the EREV compares to a PHEV once the initial charge is exhausted and both are being powered by the ICE. I suspect the PHEV is inherently more efficient but only speculation on my part.

[akirby]

1 hour ago, mackinaw said:

 

If I understand the idea behind the EREV correctly, you're always operating 100% EV.  The gas engine kicks in only to charge the battery.  The vehicle is never powered by the ICE.

I know but it’s really just semantics whether the ICE drives the wheels directly or only charges the batteries.  The concept and use is almost exactly the same.  One difference is it could allow the engine to operate at a co start speed where it’s the most efficient, but with that you also get energy conversion losses that reduce mpg.  See below.

 

6 minutes ago, Texasota said:

I wonder how the MPG of the EREV compares to a PHEV once the initial charge is exhausted and both are being powered by the ICE. I suspect the PHEV is inherently more efficient but only speculation on my part.

 

It is noticeably less efficient to convert mechanical energy from the ICE to electrical energy then back to mechanical at the motor than it is to power the wheels directly from the ICE.  Thats why the Volt was only rated at 37 mpg when using the ICE vs other normal hybrids which were 40+.  That’s also why the Volt needed a special direct connection at high speeds.

[Texasota]

10 minutes ago, akirby said:

It is noticeably less efficient to convert mechanical energy from the ICE to electrical energy then back to mechanical at the motor than it is to power the wheels directly from the ICE.  Thats why the Volt was only rated at 37 mpg when using the ICE vs other normal hybrids which were 40+.  That’s also why the Volt needed a special direct connection at high speeds.

That makes sense and is what I was thinking too. The use case for an EREV is harder for me to get my head around vs the PHEV. Our Escape PHEV satisfies all of our town driving with the 37 miles of EV range and it also gets very good highway MPG on long road trips. Solid state batteries are not far away and I think they will make the PHEV an even more attractive option with the EV range doubling or else cutting the battery pack size/weight by half.

Edited May 31, 2024 by Texasota

[7Mary3]

EV technology and improvements to the infrastructure will eventually make hybrids obsolete.  It won't happen tomorrow, but I have a feeling it will happen sooner than a lot of people think.  This is a good short-term strategy but I hope Ford does not go too far with it.   

[akirby]

12 minutes ago, Texasota said:

That makes sense and is what I was thinking too. The use case for an EREV is harder for me to get my head around vs the PHEV. Our Escape PHEV satisfies all of our town driving with the 37 miles of EV range and it also gets very good highway MPG on long road trips. Solid state batteries are not far away and I think they will make the PHEV an even more attractive option with the EV range doubling or else cutting the battery pack size/weight by half.

Now the game changer which I’ve been pointing out for years is you could use ANY type of generator, not just a typical 4 stroke gas vehicle engine.  It could be smaller and use any type of fuel although as a range extender it would need to be gas or diesel to be practical.  But lots more options if it doesn’t connect to a transmission or directly to the drivetrain.

[mackinaw]

Reading the Detroit News article, an EREV, because of the smaller battery, would be cheaper than a "conventional" EV.  You also never have to pull into an EV charging station.  It seems that EREV's address two of the biggest obstacles to EV adoption.  Unless I'm misinterpreting what I'm reading.

[fordmantpw]

57 minutes ago, akirby said:

Now the game changer which I’ve been pointing out for years is you could use ANY type of generator, not just a typical 4 stroke gas vehicle engine.  It could be smaller and use any type of fuel although as a range extender it would need to be gas or diesel to be practical.  But lots more options if it doesn’t connect to a transmission or directly to the drivetrain.

 

Precisely.  You run the engine in it's most efficient operating range and just let it generate electricity.  Also, keep in mind, you only have to use that when the batteries are exhausted.  With a 150 mile range, for many people, the engine will never even run.  It also removes a lot of complexity from a vehicle as well.  No transmission.  Everything around the engine is built to work at xxxx RPM, so everything is tuned to work at that specific RPM.

[jpd80]

I’m skeptical about this, I don’t see people suddenly changing their minds about buying electric vehicles

just because Ford starts producing PHEVs with bigger batteries. Driving around with a big battery that

gets recharged on the run isn’t really that efficient either. Is this just a way of saving face?

 

If this is Ford’s plan B, I think they’re still lost on what buyers really want and just throwing spaghetti against the wall…

 

and an ICE that doesn’t directly drive the wheels introduces another point of inefficiency,

the very reason why we had decades of parallel drive hybrids…

 

And there’s also legislation (California?) that stops charge sustain mode for PHEVs,

so the battery must eventually run down with no on the run recharging to top up

the battery permitted.

Edited May 31, 2024 by jpd80

[MadManMoon]

An EREV pickup would be the perfect solution for my wife. She commutes 21 miles per day each way to/from work, but tows her horse trailer to shows sometimes 100+ miles each way on the weekends. With the Lightning's meager towing range, we just couldn't make it work, so we have a PowerBoost F-150 for now. With an EREV, we can plug it in at the house every night and she can commute all week as a pure EV, then get the 300+ miles of towing range needed on the weekends.

 

Once Ford comes out with their Ramcharger-like EREV, we'll be ordering on day one!

[twintornados]

14 hours ago, SoonerLS said:

Meh, the concept is far older than the Volt. The Navy’s diesel-electric submarines during (and prior to) WWII were propelled only by electric power with the diesel engines working as generators. The same was true of diesel-electric locomotives, too. 

 

Oh, I get it ...but Volt was likely the first modern attempt in an automotive application.

[SoonerLS]

4 hours ago, twintornados said:

 

Oh, I get it ...but Volt was likely the first modern attempt in an automotive application.

I'll give them credit for being first to market in the modern era, for sure, I'm just saying that the concept they used was older than a lot of people think. The diesel-/gas-electric hybrid (with electrics doing all of the propulsion) has long seemed like a no-brainer to me, so I'm wondering why the concept hasn't flown yet.

[SoonerLS]

16 hours ago, jpd80 said:

Driving around with a big battery that

gets recharged on the run isn’t really that efficient either. Is this just a way of saving face?

I would consider an EV, but a pure EV flat out won't work in my current situation (no charging at the apartment complex where I'm currently living nor at the office where I work). A true gas-electric hybrid would eliminate that concern. I don't know how many people like me are out there, but I know I'm not the only one, and Ford apparently agrees. 
 

Now, if they'll just make it in a price range that doesn't exceed what my folks paid for the house in which I grew up...

[Sherminator98]

16 hours ago, jpd80 said:

If this is Ford’s plan B, I think they’re still lost on what buyers really want and just throwing spaghetti against the wall…

 

IMO its more about keeping investors happy then anything else. Its like the 20-30 MPG thing with Ford SUVs about 10-15 years ago. 

 

EVs have a perception problem and I think an active, but small minority of people bitching about them on social media, which may or may not be getting aided by bots/fake accounts from industries against them. There is just a lot of noise out there about this. 

I can see this being useful in some cases (larger vehicles that tow like the super duty) but not so much in 80-90% of other products. 

[fordmantpw]

1 hour ago, SoonerLS said:

Now, if they'll just make it in a price range that doesn't exceed what my folks paid for the house in which I grew up...

 

Good luck with that!  My parents built their house in the early 70's...for $19k.

 

Of course, my dad did the work himself, but still.

[fordmantpw]

22 hours ago, akirby said:

So…….. a plug in hybrid with a bigger battery.

 

Yes, but it's much simpler than a typical hybrid vehicle.  Plus you have the driving dynamics of a BEV.

[Texasota]

1 hour ago, SoonerLS said:

I would consider an EV, but a pure EV flat out won't work in my current situation (no charging at the apartment complex where I'm currently living nor at the office where I work). A true gas-electric hybrid would eliminate that concern. I don't know how many people like me are out there, but I know I'm not the only one, and Ford apparently agrees. 
 

Now, if they'll just make it in a price range that doesn't exceed what my folks paid for the house in which I grew up...

In your situation where you can’t plug in at home or the office you will be driving mostly via power generated from the ICE. In this use case wouldn’t a conventional HEV be more efficient and practical? 
 

As I said above, I’m struggling with the use case of an EREV vs HEVs or PHEVs.

[akirby]

2 hours ago, fordmantpw said:

 

Yes, but it's much simpler than a typical hybrid vehicle.  Plus you have the driving dynamics of a BEV.

Somewhat, because of no transmission.  And packaging would be easier.  But you still have intake, exhaust, starter and a cooling system.