Electric Elio?

[AriLea]

I like all of the responses to the EV Elio. I am not apposed to gas engines, but I think the future is in electric engines. I was thinking about PV along with EV, and making the roof structure a thin membrane of solar panels, this will charge the batteries. What are your thoughts on this?
My house is solar powered and I love it.

Generally, such a panel is so small that it would only be good as trickle charging to keep a charged pack level. That's why Aptera was only using it to keep the interior a little more cool while parked.
The same money is better spent on a bigger array at your house. Or even on a larger roll-out array you deploy when parked (if theft isn't a problem at that location).
I agree that EV is the future. Just can't tell how far, or the exact make-up. A fuel cell vehicle for example is EV drive too, where the storage is maybe zero-carbon sourced hydrogen. Years or decades before wide spread use of EV drives, but still, inevitable IMHO.

But just as true, you won't see ICE go away until it is a lot more expensive than the alternatives. Battery may not ever be, but fuel cell tech seems a stronger case.

 

[Coss]

I like all of the responses to the EV Elio. I am not apposed to gas engines, but I think the future is in electric engines. I was thinking about PV along with EV, and making the roof structure a thin membrane of solar panels, this will charge the batteries. What are your thoughts on this?
My house is solar powered and I love it.

Elio Motors have said that they are considering an all electric or hybrid in future models. So a EV is not out of the question.

 

[Reid3400]

I like all of the responses to the EV Elio. I am not apposed to gas engines, but I think the future is in electric engines. I was thinking about PV along with EV, and making the roof structure a thin membrane of solar panels, this will charge the batteries. What are your thoughts on this?
My house is solar powered and I love it.

Your house probably burns 4KW per day. A vehicle roof panel might produce 40W under optimum conditions. That would take 100 hours or 10 days
Take a look at the current solar powered cars and you will get a better understanding of the power available from a roof panel. You will need to sit 10 days while storing enough energy to go 6 blocks down hill. As a real world example, my e-scooter has 2400W of LiFePo4 and will go @ 25 miles. An Elio will need 10KW of batteries to be useful, to work and back. A roof panel won't give you 1% of what you need.

 

[Rickb]

Elio Motors have said that they are considering an all electric or hybrid in future models. So a EV is not out of the question.

By that time I will have driven my original Elio into the ground and put thousands of fun miles miles on my Electrameccanica EMV17 EV autocycle.

 

[JNR]

I like all of the responses to the EV Elio. I am not apposed to gas engines, but I think the future is in electric engines. I was thinking about PV along with EV, and making the roof structure a thin membrane of solar panels, this will charge the batteries. What are your thoughts on this?
My house is solar powered and I love it.

I know others have responded, but I think I have some numbers that should help you better understand where technology is currently at and why you would probably want to just get the solar power from your home system.

A Tesla gets about 2.6 miles/kwhr and a Nissan Leaf is rated at about 3.3 miles/kwhr. I'd assume the Elio would get at least 5 miles/kwhr when and if it is designed with an all electric drive train.

You live in Arizona where the output of a typical 1 kW of installed solar (on a roof south facing angled towards the sun) will output about 2200 kWh annually.

If you drive 15,000 miles a year in the hypothetical electric Elio, you'd need about 3000 kWh produced annually. The good news is that would take only about a 1.4 kW system for Arizona. (I hope Arizona has net metering laws where you can overproduce and reverse your meter during the day, and then draw from the grid at night, thus your meter would only "read" the net difference, in or out of your home's electrical system.)

However, as Reid 3400 pointed out, a car's roof panel would be tiny and not as efficient as your home roof panels. I'll take his word for it (my quick online search found similar results) that it would be a 40 Watt system (.04 kW) that could fit on the roof of an Elio. Assuming you parked in the sun all day, by the end of the year, you would produce only about 90 kWh's, which would be good for only about 18 miles.

So, if you have the space on your house roof and you love your home solar system, think about expanding your system one KW or two if possible when and if you buy an electric vehicle. I know solar still relies on some subsidies, but solar power is getting close to being a good economic decision on its own, especially in your part of the country.

 

[JEBar]

So, if you have the space on your house roof and you love your home solar system, think about expanding your system one KW or two if possible when and if you buy an electric vehicle. I know solar still relies on some subsidies, but solar power is getting close to being a good economic decision on its own, especially in your part of the country.

I can only hope that proves to be the case .... we just paid to have solar panels and the rest of the system removed from our home .... its been up there since Jimmy Carter was president .... with the tax credit when it was installed, even with it limping along for the last few years, we've gotten our money's worth out of it .... we've owned an street legal electric vehicle .... it was OK, performed as advertised, with the tax credit we actually made money when we sold it .... we are most certainly not anti solar or electric vehicle but until the technology makes some major advances (I mean really major), we've been there, done that .... have no desire to go down those paths again .... if EM was in the process of bringing an EV to market, we wouldn't have spent but a few seconds considering one

 

[John Higgins]

The future is higher mpg and simple design. I think Paul Elio has it right on the mark. No need for solar panels, extra batteries and still have a gas engine. Keep it simple. I get it!

 

[Reid3400]

What year did you buy your 1997? And how old was the first one you purchased?
When I stated my comparison it was for the cost of a NEW Miata, not a used one; that is the comparison we had been doing at the time.
There are a number of used cars around, but for them to be a used car, they were a new car at one point.
With that in mind, give me the ROI of a New Miata vs a New Elio

Going from a failing memory, the first, a 1989 Miata was purchased in 2004 at an auction in Everett, WA. It had just over a 100K on it. The second one, a 1997 was bought in 2009 in Moses Lake, WA, with 92K on it. The only time I purchase new vehicles is when they are trucks and provide revenue. I have often looked at new Miata's when they were $20K to $30K, but one year old with 25K miles and they have lost have their value. A new Elio will be a free vehicle as the fuel savings will pay for it, by doubling the mileage of a Miata. But there is no such thing.

 

[AriLea]

This tech could become something. It's taken a long time before this level of testing was in trials.
http://www.gizmag.com/uk-electric-highways-trial/38897/

Such a vehicle would be exceptionally light and efficient. Just a few batteries, enough to make it from charge lane-to-charge lane.

 

[satx]

Report: Declining Costs Of Lithium-Ion Batteries To Boost Transportation Sector Through 2019

http://cleantechnica.com/2015/08/12...mpaign=Feed:+IM-cleantechnica+(CleanTechnica)