SA's brightest spark hits road(Electric car)

[DeathStrike]

Johannesburg - Meet Joule, Africa's soon-to-be brightest spark. It has four wheels and six seats and needs no fuel to perform.

The continent's first electric vehicle will power onto the market at the end of 2010.

Optimal Energy, a privately-owned SA company, unveiled plans to launch the zero emission, six seater multi-purpose vehicle, named Joule, on Wednesday.

It will take about seven hours for Joule, who was designed by a South African, to re-charge its battery before it is set for a 200-kilometre trip.

http://www.news24.com/News24/Technology ... 29,00.html

What you guys think? is it worth it? i like it cos i don't drive 200km a day. so i could easily charge it again at nite. hehehe. but then again like with all cellphones i'm sure the batteries have a max amount of times it can be recharged b4 they must be replaced. how much would that cost. the car goes 4 R200,000.

[SoulBlade]

It doesn't look to bright though. I'd get one if it looks normal and priced at R50k.
How do I recharge it? An extension cord from my flat window out to street?

[Samaya]

I also read that they are taking it to the Paris Auto show. It doesn't look bad either. And for R200000 its actually not badly priced either.

[Anakha56]

Eskom are probably lloking at this and going "Oh FFS! Just when we thought we could get some control on our power grid!" .

[naughty]

Eskom are probably lloking at this and going "Oh FFS! Just when we thought we could get some control on our power grid!" .

that was a "load" of nonsense because Eskom always had the grid under control - they just created an excuse for the price increase - notice how after the price increase there is no more story about power shortages etc - and i havent changed my electricity usage - in fact i now use more - so wheres the frikking shortage - they are a bunch of twats

about the car - its a good idea if it go more than 200km

[Frozenfireside]

I think the title needs work. A lot of work.

[maxxis]

[OT] I saw your kit last night [/OT]

[Frozenfireside]

/OT OMG now your just messing with me. Been hankering for that damn SS for ages now.
*sigh*

[DeathStrike]

the title comes from the article. lol. i always post the original title when i quote a story.

[Frozenfireside]

Yeah I figured but they were very unimaginative. That has been used millions of times.
We need some new clichés!

[Dustman]

I like the idea and does come with some prestige that we are able to design such a car. But I foresee a lot of challenges.

Eskom
...
Limited range before charge -> Fuel Station / Power Station -> Most do not provide the infrastructure required to do this.
...
Eskom
...
Batteries are really bad when you dispose of them e.g. acids; are we really better of that CO2?
...
Eskom
...
The price makes it difficult for the middle class to buy, especially during these hard economic times.
...
Eskom
...
Eskom

[SBSP]

I like the idea and does come with some prestige that we are able to design such a car. But I foresee a lot of challenges.

Eskom
...
Limited range before charge -> Fuel Station / Power Station -> Most do not provide the infrastructure required to do this.
...
Eskom
...
Batteries are really bad when you dispose of them e.g. acids; are we really better of that CO2?
...
Eskom
...
The price makes it difficult for the middle class to buy, especially during these hard economic times.
...
Eskom
...
Eskom

Yip so poor people who cant cope with petrol prices wont be able to afford it.

[Hex_Rated]

A company with zero experience designing an exotic car = trouble. Electric is exotic IMO, there are very few successful examples. Hopefully they pull it off, R200k is a good price for a large commuter vehicle, I wonder if some of that is substituted by the co. I wish them luck but I don't reckon this thing will be successful.

Electric / hybrid cars actually end up using more resources than normal vehicles according to a few sources (there was a conspiracy theory about a Hummer H2 being more eco friendly than the Toyota Prius at the end of the day with our current technology - I think the maintenance and manufacturing take a lot out of our resources). It's good that we are exploring alternate sources but the first few tries normally end up as flops. You have to wait for "SP1" or second/third gen for it to be viable and trouble free.

[Dustman]

I read that solar energy conversion is becoming more and more efficient. Maybe converging the technologies so that solar energy recharges the batteries might result in less load on Eskom and a more viable approach.

I wish the company luck and hope they are successful. Myself will wait until the technology matures a bit, before I make any drastic leaps.