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Old 11-11-2016, 11:31 AM   #152 (permalink)
Isaac Zackary
Full sized hybrid.
 
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Join Date: Apr 2015
Location: Colorado
Posts: 602

Suzy - '13 Toyota Avalon Hybrid XLE
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Quote:
Originally Posted by LittleBlackDuck View Post
I don't know why you would bother with all this crap on a new vehicle that is totally emission free. Sounds to me like you are trying to ram a square peg into a triangular hole. What about a larger battery pack made from another leaf (or two) that loads into the luggage area for longer trips? More efficient, still zero emissions and does not look totally ridiculous.

Simon
For the trips I need to take I'll need to charge at least 2, maybe 3 times (perhaps more) to get to the places I need to go. So that would require adding a couple of leaf battery packs (or more, or around 1,700lbs (or more) of weight. Otherwise I'm basically on the same boat. With a larger battery pack I might make it from charging station to charging station, but I'd have to wait longer at each station for a complete charge. Only if I had a 1,700lb battery trailer I might make it clear to any destination, then let it charge up there (with a 6.6kW charger at 12 hours?!)

At that price (and waiting time to charge) I might as well as A) just drive it with the battery it has and carry along a small generator for emergencies and make 3 hour trips turn into 12 hour trips. Or B) buy or rent a newer ICE car. Or C) just keep driving my mosquito fogger (my 1985 diesel), in which case it would cause worse for emissions than what I'm striving after.

A pusher trailer can be used temporarily like I said, maybe 10 or 12 days out of the year (the other 353-355 days would still be all electric). I can still opt to wait at charging stations and drive mostly, if not all electric on long trips whenever I want. I can use propane, a low carbon fuel, instead of being stuck with gasoline or diesel as my only other options. I wouldn't have a whole ICE car just sitting in the drive way 353 days out of the year. I wouldn't have to hassle with the towns only car rental that's oddly vacant every time I stop in there.
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