• dependencyinjection@discuss.tchncs.de
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    5 months ago

    Is the battery tech that good though? Genuinely don’t know.

    Seems other manufacturers have a huge head start in every other area of manufacturing cars and even if they still lag behind on battery tech, it won’t be long before they catch up on this one metric, whereas Tesla would have to catch up on every other metric.

    • frezik@midwest.social
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      5 months ago

      It was 5 years ago. Other companies are catching up.

      One place they aren’t catching up is non-SUV EVs. There are a few, but if you want an EV that isn’t an SUV with over 250mi range, and cross Tesla off the list, your options become real thin.

      • A7thStone@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        Options were really thin to begin with. Muricans love their huge ugly boxes. The options are getting much better now. With a quick search I found ten sedans shapeable in the states and crossing off Tesla removed three.

        • frezik@midwest.social
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          5 months ago

          But a lot of those sedans have range around 120mi, like the Mini EV or BMW i3. Many of the one’s that remain are luxury brands with luxury prices, like the BMW i7 or Porsche Taycan.

    • Audacious@sh.itjust.works
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      5 months ago

      Most battery tech is just lithium ion batteries wired in series, like 80 laptop batteries. They regulate the temps so that the batteries don’t degrade too fast. Battery tech hasn’t changed much in decades, so you will see the same problems on your phone battery on car batteries. So, no, Tesla battery tech isn’t special.

      I recently heard china is the first to manufacture sodium ion batteries for their consumer EVs. Sodium is supposed to be better, but I forget why.

      • Twista713@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        IIRC, the reason sodium batteries would be better is we have abundant stocks of sodium, whereas the raw materials for most other batteries are limited and require more destructive mining. John Oliver just covered some of this on his show last Sunday. If that tech can be improved, hopefully there won’t be any deep sea mining for more raw materials!

      • ShepherdPie@midwest.social
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        5 months ago

        Sodium batteries are cheaper and less volatile I believe but they’re also much less energy dense meaning you need a heavier pack to get a similar amount of range (which also reduces range from the extra weight). I think they’re better suited for stationary applications like solar banks and other energy storage solutions.

      • MataVatnik@lemmy.world
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        5 months ago

        Really dubious on the sodium ion batteries. Last I saw there were still issues with the technology, primarily battery life. Unless there were some breakthroughs thay went under the radar.

      • dependencyinjection@discuss.tchncs.de
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        5 months ago

        Thanks for providing these details.

        I guess Tesla really has nothing going for them now, other than investors want to get their money back and so the MSM isn’t going to portray the truth.

        • PersnickityPenguin@lemm.ee
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          5 months ago

          That’s not true, Tesla has figured out manufacturing and does so profitably. Unlike any other American based car manufacturer, Tesla is making a profit per unit and they do not rely on legacy ice vehicle sales to prop their balance sheets up.

      • PersnickityPenguin@lemm.ee
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        5 months ago

        EV batteries are actually significantly different than the batteries in your laptop or phone, and are designed to have minimal degradation over many many years of use. The coolant loops also help to moderate the temperature between cells, which eliminates problems of hot spots and the heat stress that a phone battery will experience.

        For instance, my car has over 300 battery cells in it, which results in say a 100 MI Drive will only use each cell draining by about 1/3. The much lower cyclic rate on these cells results in a much longer lifespan, and the battery conditioning using liquid coolant is how they achieve that.

    • madcaesar@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      It is. Their cooling / heating system along with the battery is top notch. Others are catching up though.

      And yes in terms of fit and build quality most actual car manufacturers are ahead.

      Of course you also have Ford an ICE manufacturer that’s been building cars for centuries and still manages to produce shit with awful QA and constant recalls.