5 min. charging...could this be a game-changer for EVs?

[rcooled]

"Piëch doubles down on its outrageous sub-5-minute EV charging claims."

"People will stop complaining about EV range the minute fast charging is a reality, and new startup Piëch reckons it's got the goods to deliver an 80 percent charge on a 311-mile (500 km) range battery in four minutes, 40 seconds, which is vastly quicker than anything else on the market."

https://newatlas.com/piech-4-minute-40-ev-charging/59597/?

[MysticLlama]

It seems doable from some of the things I've read. It seems like they are using a dual battery system vs just one bank, so that cuts charging in half from the beginning. Tesla is able to get 145kW for the 10%-50% charge give or take and taper to about 100kW at 80% and then dwindles from there.

Considering a 5%-80% Supercharger session is about 25 minutes with a warm battery, double that from the start and then double it again (new v3 SCs do 250kW) and you're in the ballpark on current technology just by reconfiguring. Something state of the art cuts a bit more and you're there.

I think anything <10 and it's great but starts to get less relevant, I have done a couple of long distance trips with a couple of SC stops in the Tesla and it's not that big of a deal. One 20min stop for a break 3 hours in, and another 45 minutes at a brewery 3 hours later, followed by some more driving and a 440 mile trip is knocked out with an hour of charging, which is likely about what you'd stop anyhow. Gotta hit the same brewery on the way back though, terrible.

Also, I've needed charging that fast exactly twice, so while a big selling point for a heavy road tripper, not super relevant to someone that starts charged fresh every day.

[MysticLlama]

Will add though from what I hear from people tracking their Teslas.. that would be a HUGE game changer if they could get fast chargers at or very near the track.

[sammyg2]

Think about how much energy you are talking about and how much would have to be transferred in such a short period of time.

The cable would be HUGE and your electric meter would be spinning so fast it would fly on it's own.
Not to mention that the batteries might get a tad warm.

[Captain Ahab Jr]

smoke and mirror's, not a chance this will be commercially available technology anytime soon

[GH85Carrera]

Yea, I want to see the numbers on how much amperage and voltage that takes. I can't imaging any normal home in this country had the electrical capacity to do it.

Think how much energy is in a gas tank full of gas. About that much has to get shoved into a battery in under 5 minutes? Wow. And andd in tow or three cars stopping all at once. They may have to go to a electrical substation to find the juice necessary.

It takes my car 5 minutes or so to fill up the 18 to 20 gallons I normally pump in. Gasoline is a very high energy density.

Hey Red Beard, can you whip us up some guess please.

[red-beard]

The issue isn't the charger, it is the battery. IF what they are printing is true, they have made a much more efficient battery which obviates the need for cooling. That will be huge. The charging will just be what ever the batteries can handle.

I see they pick 80%. That is pretty much where you have to back off the maximum current Bulk Charge phase (constant current) and switch to Absorption (constant voltage).

They do not say what the kWh of the system are, but lets assume it is 100kWh battery. 80% = 80kWh. To charge that in 5 minutes will take 80*12 = 960 kW. Call it a Megawatt.

[MysticLlama]

No way it would happen at a house, it'd have to be a dedicated charger.

I charge at 240v/40A at home (10kW) and it gets me about 35-45 miles of range per hour. Multiply that by 5 and use an entire 200A service to a house and you still only get to 175-225 per hour (50kW)

So now, not only are we talking about a dedicated charger, but a dedicated non-home charger, and all of those will need to be built.

[GH85Carrera]

Shoving a megawatt around and into a battery is just gonna make some heat. It has to.

[Shaun @ Tru6]

Do capacitors charge faster than batteries?

[biosurfer1]

This will not happen without some crazy MAJOR upgrades to every electrical grid out there. I've seen what it takes to plan and install a 1 MW customer, and thats for an expected typical commercial load.

1MW spikes at uncertain intervals? Ya right!

[Brando]

5 minutes, maybe if we're talking a battery bank swap.

[Jims5543]

Originally Posted by GH85Carrera

Yea, I want to see the numbers on how much amperage and voltage that takes. I can't imaging any normal home in this country had the electrical capacity to do it.

Think how much energy is in a gas tank full of gas. About that much has to get shoved into a battery in under 5 minutes? Wow. And andd in tow or three cars stopping all at once. They may have to go to a electrical substation to find the juice necessary.

It takes my car 5 minutes or so to fill up the 18 to 20 gallons I normally pump in. Gasoline is a very high energy density.

Hey Red Beard, can you whip us up some guess please.

I used to take a lot of road trips. One of the only things I loved about my Audi A6 was its range, I could drive it 550 miles on a tank. It would get 33 MPG with an 18 Gallon tank.

Why I loved it was because there was NEVER a 5 minute gas stop, EVER.. Even if I could pump 18 gallons in 5 minutes my family that poured out of the car and scattered had other ideas. I used to get annoyed and once timed it, the shortest we ever got back out of a gas station was 15 minute with 20 minutes being more the average. I always just wanted to get the drive over with.

If I had a Tesla and needed to stop for 25 minutes to get from 20% to 100% on the batteries it would only change my stopped time by 10 minutes and if you just drove 300+ Miles trust me, no one wants to get back in the car.

When I had my vacation home in NC the drive was 730 miles one way, I made that trip so many time I cannot even count how many. I can only remember one trip where I beat the estimated 10.5 hour drive the GPS tells me it should take. On that trip I was in my 911 and I was alone and I was flying.

[gordner]

Fast charging usually shortens overall battery life, I wonder what repeated 5 min charges do to a battery like that? As I understand they are pretty costly to replace.

[Sooner or later]

On Nova last night they went through how we ended up with cars. The episode was interesting.

At the end of the show they mentioned graphene batteries. Thoughts?

[GH85Carrera]

Originally Posted by Jims5543

I used to take a lot of road trips. One of the only things I loved about my Audi A6 was its range, I could drive it 550 miles on a tank. It would get 33 MPG with an 18 Gallon tank.

Why I loved it was because there was NEVER a 5 minute gas stop, EVER.. Even if I could pump 18 gallons in 5 minutes my family that poured out of the car and scattered had other ideas. I used to get annoyed and once timed it, the shortest we ever got back out of a gas station was 15 minute with 20 minutes being more the average. I always just wanted to get the drive over with.

If I had a Tesla and needed to stop for 25 minutes to get from 20% to 100% on the batteries it would only change my stopped time by 10 minutes and if you just drove 300+ Miles trust me, no one wants to get back in the car.

When I had my vacation home in NC the drive was 730 miles one way, I made that trip so many time I cannot even count how many. I can only remember one trip where I beat the estimated 10.5 hour drive the GPS tells me it should take. On that trip I was in my 911 and I was alone and I was flying.

Yea, my 5 minute fill up was at my local gas station, and just me getting gas and leaving.

On a road trip for sure finding a open pump, and pumping gas then go in to pee, and maybe get a snack or a drink will take a bit longer if it is just me. If my wife is with me it takes longer for sure.

I was really saying the pumping of a tank of gas is about 5 minutes.

[David]

The Tesla website allows you to map out a trip to see where you'd need to charge. Pretty fun to play with if you're considering electric. I can only see needing super quick charging on a road trip or for a commercial local driver, otherwise you'd want to charge at home where the rates are good and not bother with public charging (unless it's free or offers good parking).

If they could ever get capacitors to work, that would be a real game changer. They would charge really quick especially under braking. Imagine a car that would only need brake pads for emergency or track situations.

[Jims5543]

Originally Posted by GH85Carrera

Yea, my 5 minute fill up was at my local gas station, and just me getting gas and leaving.

On a road trip for sure finding a open pump, and pumping gas then go in to pee, and maybe get a snack or a drink will take a bit longer if it is just me. If my wife is with me it takes longer for sure.

I was really saying the pumping of a tank of gas is about 5 minutes.

My wife drives our Hybrid EV 500+ miles a week and buys 2.3 gallons a week. The rest of the time it is on the charger in our garage doing its thing in the middle of the night while we sleep.

The only time I can see using a charging station is on a road trip.


I stand corrected, we use one downtown every Sunday. We go downtown to the green market and then chill under the trees in a park while a free concert takes place from 1-4 every Sunday afternoon. The Charging station we park at is solar powered and free of charge. We typically hook up with our battery at 30% (we run it down on purpose), when we leave it is usually charged to 100%. We get a free fill up every Sunday.

[beepbeep]

Originally Posted by biosurfer1

This will not happen without some crazy MAJOR upgrades to every electrical grid out there. I've seen what it takes to plan and install a 1 MW customer, and thats for an expected typical commercial load.

1MW spikes at uncertain intervals? Ya right!

Flywheels.

[sammyg2]

Originally Posted by red-beard

The issue isn't the charger, it is the battery. IF what they are printing is true, they have made a much more efficient battery which obviates the need for cooling. That will be huge. The charging will just be what ever the batteries can handle.

I see they pick 80%. That is pretty much where you have to back off the maximum current Bulk Charge phase (constant current) and switch to Absorption (constant voltage).

They do not say what the kWh of the system are, but lets assume it is 100kWh battery. 80% = 80kWh. To charge that in 5 minutes will take 80*12 = 960 kW. Call it a Megawatt.

a megawatt is a whole bunch of energy.
1 megawatt = 1,341.02 horsepower

The 1 MW photovoltaic solar installation by Gap Inc's WesternDistribution Center in Fresno, CA takes up five acres, cost $7million, and took 6 months to build.




1 MW is in the range of output of an older locomotive, such as the U18B GE Locomotive shown here, built in 1973-76, which puts out1.3 MW of power.