After watching the video of shifting the clutchless transmission, I've had a few people ask me why I bother shifting to neutral to coast an EV. One would expect a complete lack of "engine" braking with an electric motor where the engine used to be. No?
Well, I've noticed that there does seem to be some drag from the motor (its brushes & bearings and drive end cooling fan being the culprits). It's not a lot, but I never tried to quantify it... until today.
So this afternoon I went out and did a very simple, and not entirely thorough test:
Coastdown from 20 km/h (indicated) in 1st gear vs. neutral.
First gear
- 58.8 m / 193 ft (average of 2 runs)
Neutral
- 70.4 m / 231 ft (average of 2 runs)
Difference
- 11.6 m / 38 ft, or 20%, or slightly more than 3 car lengths
Conditions: 1 degree C, cold car, calm winds, snow tires @ 55 psi, level road (to my eye). Oh, and the right front wheel bearing is toast. It's the source of most of the "road" noise you hear in the video in 2nd gear and higher. :-D
So I figure I'll keep popping it into neutral when I'm coasting up to stops & turns.