zlacker

EVs are not complicated.

Modern carmakers might make them complicated, and you're well within your right to avoid those, but in general electronic propulsion is pretty simple. The problem is car manufacturing is a very expensive industry that's extremely difficult to disrupt, so incumbents aren't really worried about staying ahead of hungry competitors.

Go look at small-scale PEVs - ebikes, scooters, unicycles, etc. A huge, huge range of players making every possible variation under the sun, with simple designs and extremely low costs. This is what the car space is missing out on, because of regulations etc owing to their larger size and much higher danger levels that entails. I suspect many places have regulations that largely exclude smaller, simpler cars from being viable as well.

>>Panzer+(OP)
EV is indeed easy. Safe and reliable EV is hard. Vehicle environment is hostile to electric components, where they are exposed to vibration, dirt, and moisture. Even if you get "safe" chemistry in the battery cells of an Alibaba e-bike, it only means the cells themselves are less likely to explode in a chemical fire. It still has enough current to melt metall and set off a regular fire. And in the best case it will just stop working and good luck repairing some random components, which might have been from a short production run and there are no spares in the existence.

>>Panzer+(OP)
> EVs are not complicated.

> Modern carmakers might make them complicated

OP did not say they would not travel on electric trains or unicycles or elevators or electric forklifts or electric container ships. They said they don't want an EV. The things that modern carmakers make complicated.

>>stinkb+id
> They said they don't want an EV. The things that modern carmakers make complicated.

It's probably more of a sign of what's coming in the future. There is no need to make EVs difficult/expensive to repair. The change in technology is just an excuse to lock everything down and rake in more money for repairs/new vehicles. They could do the same for ICE vehicles too.

>>Panzer+(OP)
> electronic propulsion is pretty simple

So simple that it’s usually called electric propulsion.

>>Panzer+(OP)
> EVs are not complicated.

In the well established auto context we're talking about in this thread they are.

> Go look at small-scale PEV

Not relevant to the discussion at hand.

You're right that they shouldn't be, and don't have to be. That doesn't mean that the ones that actually exist in the automotive world actually are, and it's rather egregious to claim that they aren't. Doubly so when you try to substantiate that with devices that regardless of propulsion are drastically simpler, cheaper, and different devices. It's like trying to claim airplanes aren't complicated because a gliders are simple.

Not all of them are as bad as the BMW in the OP, but very few (if any) road legal mass produced EV's are truly simple.