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Next generation Honda FCX (FCEV) for 2015

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anticitizen13.7

Not posting at TMC after 9/17/2018
Dec 22, 2012
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Honda is still moving forward with it's Fuel Cell Electric Vehicle: http://www.hondanews.com/channels/c...-debut-at-los-angeles-international-auto-show

There are some notable improvements over the current-generation FCX Clarity:

The fuel cell stack is now much smaller and can fit under the front hood of the vehicle. Currently, Honda's fuel cell stack sits in the center tunnel of the vehicle (like the Chevy Volt's battery), which restricts the passenger capacity to 4 persons. Power is also now greater than 100 kW, or 134 horsepower. Not that impressive IMO, but enough for a Honda Accord sized sedan.

Honda is predicting a 300-mile range and refueling time of 3 minutes, but the catch is that the hydrogen gas must be compressed at 70 MPa, which is around 10,000 PSI.

Anticipated launch date is sometime in 2015.

I don't think this has any realistic chance against Tesla, but it's an interesting vehicle.
 
10k PSI Hydrogen stored in the front of the vehicle where it is subject to frontal crash impact... why does this not sound like a great idea to me?

Not exactly. The fuel cell stack (the device that turns the hydrogen into electricity) is in the front of the vehicle, but does not actually store the hydrogen. The H2 is stored in a tank that is behind and below the rear seats, similar to a conventional petrol tank.
 
Are they actually going to sell the things?

Or only massively subsidized leases?

Are they going to sell/lease as many as the market will demand or sell/lease less than 5K units per year in USA on first come first served basis?

Using massively subsidized fuel?

Using a fueling network that is planned to get off the ground in 2020?

Or can you can only use it driving around LA, Dearbon, and 8 college towns?
 
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Are they actually going to sell the things?

Or only massively subsidized leases?

Are they going to sell/lease as many as the market will demand or sell/lease less than 5K units per year in USA on first come first served basis?

Using massively subsidized fuel?

Using a fueling network that is planned to get off the ground in 2020?

Or can you can only use it driving around LA, Dearbon, and 8 college towns?

All questions which have yet to be answered. The FCX Clarity leased to a small number of SoCal customers for $600/month (includes maintenance and insurance), but this was more of an R&D effort for Honda and not something to profit from.

At least the Honda hydrogen vehicle looks good. Toyota unveiled their hydrogen car concept today, and all I can say is: whaaaaaaaa?!
 
The result wouldn't end up on youtube. No fire burning for minutes, no fire fighters in battle gear extinguishing flames. Whole thing over in seconds. Car might even look undamaged.
True. Hydrogen burns with an invisible flame, so there wouldn't be much of a spectacle. Unless the leak for instance filled the cabin right up to the ideal hydrogen/air mix, and there was a spark. Then the car would explode. (No visible flames though.)

You can of course have a hydrogen fire that spreads to the rest of the car, there's a lot of plastic in all cars that burn quite suitably for youtube.
 
It depends on where the tank and hole is located. The Clarity has the tank in the trunk (taking up most of the trunk space) and given hydrogen vents upwards (it's lighter than air), it'll most likely burn a hole through the trunk and vent upwards. If the tank is under the passenger compartment then that's more dangerous (for obvious reasons).
http://en.rh2.org/is-it-safe/

It's more dangerous if it fills up in cervices inside the car or in an enclosed space like a garage (explosion risk).

In general, holes are less dangerous than if a pressure relief valve fails. In that case, you may have a big explosion from the tank failure and lots of shrapnel (there was an incident of arson and that happened to a CNG vehicle; the results were similar to a car bomb).
http://www.cleanmpg.com/forums/gene...xplosion-dialup-warning-many-photos-7555.html
 
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Hydrogen does burn clean but no doubt other materials will catch on fire from the heat, and you'll get black clouds from burning plastic, etc.

More worrisome hydrogen is explosive in air in an incredible range of concentrations - much greater than for any other gas or vapor. Yes if you get the exact H2O ratio you end up with the biggest bang, but it's still pretty energetic even if not.

As has been pointed out, the extreme pressures also present some risks. The fueling stations themselves are likely dangerous as well, even more so than gas stations.
 
We should to know pretty soon if fuel is funny cell (according to Musk) in 2014-15. Hyundai has nice SUV for lease in LA area for $500 ($3k down).

We are not too far away from knowing toyota, honda, hyundai & other are fool (again according to musk they are or wait everybody's fool..electricity come from where...)
 
Hyundai has nice SUV for lease in LA area for $500 ($3k down).

The Hyundai FCV is a version of the ICE Tucson that has a starting MSRP of $21,450.

So you willing paying the lease of a $50k car but get the functionality of a $25k car because I assume the base FC version will come nicely equipped.

From what I read the acceleration and performance is on par but not better than the base ICE Tucson.

BTW A kg of Hydrogen has roughly the same energy as a gallon of gas.

A kg of Hydrogen cost about $12.50 in LA.

The Tucson FCV is said to get 55 miles per kg of Hydrogen.
 
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From what I read the acceleration and performance is on par but not better than the base ICE Tucson.
The acceleration is actually much worse than the base ICE Tucson. Here in the US we get the 165hp 2.0L and that has a 0-60 of 8 secs. The FC Tucson has a 0-60 of 12.5 which is the same as the 117hp 1.7L diesel in the UK.

The $500 lease-only program tells me this program is really not much different than the Clarity's $600 one (a very limited test fleet). The hydrogen comes free in this program (I doubt people will want drive it if they had to pay for the hydrogen, which currently costs more than gasoline).