yokohama battery switch

[DanielDaniel1]

the only issue is how we could keep women from driving into that hole....

[paronfisk]

I would buy an electric car if this was available.

[arjun0821]

And which is the car model used here? I know its Nissan's. But which model specifically?

[medsa666]

@arjun0821 i do belive its the 2011 nissan qashqai

[arjun0821]

If the whole battery system is designed to be under the car, then don't you think the front hood of the car can be eliminated and used to increase efficiency by better space utilization??

Because usually, the battery in a car is placed in the front or the back, hence needing a front or a back hood.

[cloudburstlenepmhq]

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[XRedShark]

Una cosa del genere esisterà solo quando le multinazionali petrolifere saranno senza oro nero.

[Zaptruder]

The concept is revolutionary. It is proof positive that electric vehicles would not just work, but work far better in today and in the world of the future, if they were subsidized in the same way that gas vehicles were subsidized.

[bwildasi]

Ah. Another Rube Goldberg invention.

[louielamson2000]

YOKOHAMA, JAPAN- Last night at approximately 10:30 PM PST (1:30 AM EST), electric vehicle services provider Better Place will demonstrate key elements of their battery switching station technology. This is the first public exhibition of a battery switching station—which Better Place lauds as the final piece of a total electric vehicle solution. The company was invited by the Japanese Ministry of the Environment to set up an exhibit in Yokohama.

[louielamson2000]

Who make this car-batteries? Still testing on road side?

[nidodson]

Takes less time than filling up a gas tank. With newer battery technology, brake recharging, solar thin film roof/hood/trunk, and other technology, they could get 600 miles a charge too.

I have to say this is way better than gas, and would be cheaper in the long run. With not having to replace the batteries every 7 years like hybrids, the charging companies can replace them instead with their profits.

[wullebulle123]

what about snow, water, dust, dirt and mechanical damage to the underbody?????

[d1oftwins]

@wullebulle123

I don't know but I guess the engineers working on that mechanism made it dustproof and waterproof against water splashes, since you are not going to dive with your car.

And the question of mechanical damage: How often do you damage the underbody of your car? Or how often did friends or relatives told you about such a damage of their car?

And a normal car would have problems with that kind of damage too. It had to be repaired - just like an EV has to be repaired after a damage.

[cag66]

@wullebulle123 What about it? Are existing cars capable of dealing with these problems?

[wullebulle123]

looks very complicated

[marcheseDS]

@wullebulle123 Really, so much more complicated than an automated car wash? I'd prefer to have my batteries because I drive gently, so they would last longer, but on a State point of view it would make sense having changing/recharging stations with smart grid capabilities instead of millions of single peoples recharging at random times (usually after work, not so random in fact...). It is a big challenge to create such an infrastructure of coarse

[peejaa]

And to think of all the power it takes to do something like this. and how many times a day do ya have to change them? everyday? this is silly! dumb and silly!

[Zamonski]

And to think of all the power it takes to take oil from 2 mile underground and than bring it from Arabia refine it send it another 2000 mile and pump it to your car !

[thehumble1]

@Zamonski So instead you just take it to a power plant? Electricity is produced using fossil fuels too. It's not free or renewable just because it's clean at the point of use.

[MrSushan]

Search "Happy Rob Buy" by google ,and you will find amazing.

[rocnet]

I live in Maine where we have snow, slush, sanded and salted roads in the winter... I imaging that one would need a Car Wash bay before the battery bay to clean up and protect the battery bay from getting crudded up and jamming up.... But as a prototype, it looks great. I'd love to be driving an EV now!

[Vejledanseren]

I don´t think the stations will be overcrowded. I mean normally you charge your cars at home or at the parking lot. The stations are only for the longer trips 200+ km.

[Chick6517]

This time not with that wimpy winky of a scarf wiggling in the draft (haha, joke taken from a Baker interview on youtube.

[Arikool]

Waiting for the parodies. It demands it :)

[DanFrederiksen]

even though I support anything EV, there are still some unaddressed concerns with the concept, mainly coverage costs and the potential killer of how you handle spike usage in an area because unlike supermarket supply and demand predictions, the system can't work if a swap station ever is significantly overloaded. a very real scenario could be imagined where hundreds of cars are stranded in an area for days because after you've cycled the precharged packs it will have to recharge them slowly

[bnightm]

I don't see how this is different than with normal gas stations. Those don't have an unlimited supply of fuel in the underground tanks either and sudden bizarre surges in demand will drain them as well. In practice this just doesn't happen very often.

[DanFrederiksen]

it is much different. gas is cheap enough for a station to have fuel available for thousands of refills. and gas cars have 500-1000km range so even if one should run dry there are oceans of others they could use. it would be quite expensive to have a thousand batteries at each station and because the car's range is so relatively low they don't have enough spare range to try other stations unless there are many. it doesn't take bizarre surges to strain this idea.

[ratryu]

Yeah, bizarre surges. Just like oil, there are high prices, low amounts, etc.

But with the swap battery, it helps support the country it is in. It keeps money following in the country's economy. There are so any benefits to using EVs with swap batteries.

[DanFrederiksen]

it helps the power plants and the chinese factories that make the batteries yes :)

or in this case maybe japanese. I think they use the semi crappy toshiba batteries but not sure

[ratryu]

We can build our own batteries. That is what is going to happen. Detroit will start building batteries factories or California. Why are you so against Swap Battery EVs? There are so many benefits. How can you not see them?

[DanFrederiksen]

I do see the benefits, the biggest one being that it will help the introduction of the EV even if the concept doesn't last forever. I just see that the concept will have some limitations at least at first but the more I think about it the more I actually think it could work despite those limitations. Initially it doesn't quite offer the complete freedom a plugin hybrid would but there is something to be said for pure electric and as the net grows it becomes better. I am increasingly optimistic

[A1Huxley]

In some parts of the world their is no where to drive to.

To or from work, a short trip to a friends.

When the rockets fall, you go to a bunker. The rest of your trip is mapped out by the software. The software looks after you, suggesting the best route and low number of swaps. A full charge in the morning or after work is the ideal. If you need to drive around during the day, you can swap out mid journey. Provided your country is small and tax payers fund the new stations. Profit/risk

[ratryu]

Why would tax payers need to fund the new stations? In Israel, they are funded by companies and investors. That is how Better Place does business. They get investors.

[DanFrederiksen]

inspiring to see but I can't help feel they're not being entirely honest and that this is a very preliminary that wouldn't work outside a very choreagraphed setting. what happens if the car is not perfectly aligned, is there a system to immobilize the car during the procedure, what if the battery is dirty, what if the pack is frozen to the car, will this be the final speed etc.

but if it's just a teaster trailer then it's fair enough and interesting to see.

[AllowExpression]

I think the idea portrayed in the vid will be made redundant by improvements in battery tech. Smaller batteries with higher capacity would change much. If it gets to the point where we can carry them physically we'll have pretty much reached the fuel cell idea of Star Wars. : p

[DanFrederiksen]

better batteries wouldn't really void the concept unless they can be blitz charged. it doesn't really matter how long your range is, there will always be a trip where you run out and then you're dead in the water. if for instance you have 300km range and can recharge in 15 minutes then it's true PBP should gradually change concept to recharge stations instead. but 100km range and 30 minute recharge is something else.

[ytbjv]

Awesome!

[Drakensoul87]

I hope someone comes up with a fast charging e-motorcycle that can use the Better Place charging stations. I realize they won't be stocking swap batteries for bikes, but I would still like to be able to long distance ride and not have to wait an hour or 2 for a recharge.

[tipratikon]

my concern is the size of batteries. the size of the storage - recharging area, will it be fast enough to recharge to keep up with demand? or will we need huge storage places with hundreds of batteries?

[LunchAnderson]

This seems like a great idea. I really doubt that battery technology will develop fast enough for swapping stations to become obsolete in the foreseeable future, which some people seem to think.

[crowdedcranium]

very , very , slick , so what's all the fuss about ?

[stopcrazypp]

The fuss is this essentially eliminates the argument that EVs will never work for long distant travel. This kind of system can swap under 2 minutes which means it's faster than filling a gas tank. Add this to 300+mile batteries coming up in the horizon (Tesla's Model S) and the EV really can replace the typical automobile even in long distance travel. Of course another technology is rapid charging, but that's still much slower than battery swapping.

[crowdedcranium]

I think you mis- understood my comment , what I meant was this solves the problem , the problem that has stopped the big auto companies from marketing electric cars the problem of range !

[karlperron]

Very impressive Shai, very impressive. Exactly as you described years ago.

[ericmarseille2]

L'HISTOIRE EN MARCHE!

(and I'm the first one to leave a comment! WOW!)