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Cake day: July 2nd, 2023

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  • Skyrmir@lemmy.worldtoCyberstuck@lemmy.caBuilt for comfort
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    19 hours ago

    There’s distinct limits to modularity. Making a standard box size means it’s not really the right size for some things, so it’s wasted space, or bad design choices, to make other things fit. Sometimes it works out better, custom PC parts for instance, other times not so much. Israel tested out a standard battery size with drive through swapping. No waiting for a charge, just drive up a ramp, battery drops out the bottom, new one gets shoved in. It worked, kind of. It turns out the bottom of a car is a harsh environment. There were a bunch of issues that overall didn’t make it better than just plugging into an outlet and waiting. Given the market demands we’re going to end up somewhere between nothing modular, essentially disposable cars, and fully modular replace full systems at the drive through cars. My bet is that batteries will end up fixed, embedded, or otherwise integral part of the vehicle, while charging methods evolve around them. It’s easy enough to drop a mini trailer genset behind an electric car right now. So it’s just a question of when that becomes a real product with more integrated construction. Trucks with a bed make the most obvious early platforms to me. Typical low range usage that needs the bed space, and occasional long distance travel, covers a lot of pick ups use cases. That would be perfect for huge fleets of trucks in the US.












  • Skyrmir@lemmy.worldtoCyberstuck@lemmy.caBuilt for comfort
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    6 days ago

    Pretty much, it’s the most efficient land transport so far. The only issue is scaling, and also most people don’t need an ICE engine of any sort the majority of the time. Thus, making them optional and replacable is the solution to scaling, and fuel variety.