Roadster Needs New Battery

[Tesleract]

I haven’t seen any battery news in the past year. I imagine the philosophy is the same as the Karma Chicago manager I spoke with regarding maintenance and service of my 2012 Karma Fisker. He admitted the company has 0% interest in catering to used car owners. It doesn’t help that a small number were produced. He wants to sell new cars. #PlannedObsolescence

 

[hanknum]

I bought/traded for my roadster a couple years knowing that the battery has a finite life... I've got a 1.5 with 54k miles on the original battery. I'm also anticipating that with all the major manufacturers eventually going electric (or at least some models electric), that there will also be a huge aftermarket. And, someone has got to come up with a modular battery that can be physically and electrically configured to fit different applications.

Here's something that a friend has developed. I don't know the capabilities or whether it would be an option for us, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed. I actually haven't spoken to my friend in over a year, but have some business down by his shop next week and will see if I can pop in and check out his shop.

Here's the link...

OX Drive Batteries - Electric GT - Electric Vehicle Systems

 

[Marius]

The big issue is effective cooling. If you stack 10 of these behind your seat you will burn the battery down. Not to mention effect on lifetime. Design of effective cooling compared with the small airco is the challenge. In NL a company is working on it. The engineering will take another 3 months minimum

 

[slcasner]

The big issue is effective cooling. If you stack 10 of these behind your seat you will burn the battery down. Not to mention effect on lifetime. Design of effective cooling compared with the small airco is the challenge. In NL a company is working on it. The engineering will take another 3 months minimum

Does "it" refer to a Roadster ESS replacement? Or just a cooling system that could be used with some other batteries?

 

[drewski]

I haven’t seen any battery news in the past year. I imagine the philosophy is the same as the Karma Chicago manager I spoke with regarding maintenance and service of my 2012 Karma Fisker. He admitted the company has 0% interest in catering to used car owners. It doesn’t help that a small number were produced. He wants to sell new cars. #PlannedObsolescence

I talked to Matthew Krahn, the infamous person behind "[email protected]", last week about something else and asked about Battery 3.0.

He said things were in late stages of testing for capacity and degradation, and that it had "newer chemistry" which would require PEM changes, but the pricing would still be at the $29K of the original 3.0 battery.

Interestingly he said this could end up as a new 3.0 or, depending on test results (range not what they were shooting for), could end up as a battery 2.0 replacement and then they would continue work on a 3.0 v2, which didn't inspire confidence, but I put my name on the list, if it became a new 3.0.

no commitment or deposit needed.

 

[Marius]

@drewski, personally I think they tell stories and make it look very complicated with PEM changes and software adjustment and bla bla bla.
I lost faith. I am waiting 3 years now and today my CAC dropped to 83. Every month I ask Tesla about the progress and they only say "no white smoke yet". They will not say no because of the legal impact.

@slcasner, the replacement pack that is engineered now will be exactly the same with improved cooling channels. The only thing that is new is the type of cell that will be used. To make this possible 11 sheets are completely built with 3D technology because the existing sheets are glued and not to be opened without damaging. I have higher confidence in this option than the fairy tales from Tesla. I expect another 4 months before there is a prototype working.