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I'm not sure why they would want to make this that complicated for something that should be really simple. I'm envisioning a "rail" system under the car that you pull on to, it would require basically no moving parts (apart from the car itself driving on) and would be capable of quite high currents.
An articulated robot arm may look cool, but it's incredibly impractical.
 
I guess elon is not solving engineering problems only but human problems. Battery swaping makes little technical and economical sense but people are jumping from joy. Robotic charging is engineering nonsense when compared to simple wireless charging but people again are ultra happy about it. THey Will pay 20k for such a charger instead 3k for a wireless one simply because this robotic one is more efficient.

17k buys pays for a lot of 'lost' energy but it just is not sexy. So be it ...
 
I guess elon is not solving engineering problems only but human problems. Battery swaping makes little technical and economical sense but people are jumping from joy. Robotic charging is engineering nonsense when compared to simple wireless charging but people again are ultra happy about it. THey Will pay 20k for such a charger instead 3k for a wireless one simply because this robotic one is more efficient.

17k buys pays for a lot of 'lost' energy but it just is not sexy. So be it ...

The current state of wireless charging is that to get reasonable efficiency, the two sides have to have precise placement that is close and correctly aligned. So either the thing on the floor moves around and rises up, or something in the car drops down and moves around. Then at best it's still somewhat less efficient than wires. So it seems to me that putting your car within a couple of feet of the right place and having something pop the door and plug in for me isn't all that much worse.
 
The engineering and design of a robotic charging "arm" would be significant, and one might reasonably question whether TM should divert engineering resources away from more pressing issues. On the other hand, such a device might not actually be all that costly, on a per-unit basis, once the design is solid and it can be mass produced. It almost certainly would be an attention grabber, and might "pay" for itself in that manner.

I do wonder how carefully TM has thought through the need for robustness. Surely Elon does not want to see TM distracted from its core activities by a bunch of unreliable robot arms. People will bump into these robot arms, drop things on them, etc. They will have to work in a full range of temperatures and humidity levels, since garages are not usually climate controlled. If there is any thought of using them outdoors with Superchargers, they'll have to be especially tough and stand up to the elements. There might need to be a heating element to de-ice the arm when necessary.

If TM can execute this well, perhaps they might end up being able to spin off a robotics company. LOL!
 
I think this falls under "a problem looking for a solution" or in other words, a problem that really doesn't need to be solved.

Sure, in Elon's ultimate vision, the car picks you up, drives itself, drops you off, goes finds it's own parking, pays for the parking meter, and has a robotic arm that charges the car, then goes buys you dinner, keeps it warm, and then picks you up and opens a bottle of wine.

But really? It's fun to fantasize (even for Elon!), but I really don't see this happening for a long, long time (if ever).

And as said above, at least not until the get "shuffle" working. :rolleyes:
 
I think this falls under "a problem looking for a solution" or in other words, a problem that really doesn't need to be solved.

Sure, in Elon's ultimate vision, the car picks you up, drives itself, drops you off, goes finds it's own parking, pays for the parking meter, and has a robotic arm that charges the car, then goes buys you dinner, keeps it warm, and then picks you up and opens a bottle of wine.

But really? It's fun to fantasize (even for Elon!), but I really don't see this happening for a long, long time (if ever).

I kind of thought this too, but on second thought, it's a great way to test out this kind of system for SpaceX. If he can get it working in all cases for a car, the problem of getting working correctly in space is mainly solved.
 
Wireless charging is more complex, more failure prone, and much less efficient. it is the absolute worst possible way to charge the vehicle. A rail system underneath would be way cheaper, way more efficient, less prone to failure, and take up the same physical space.

Wireless charging is "cool", but that's it's only advantage, and it has lots of disadvantages.
 
I'm not sure why they would want to make this that complicated for something that should be really simple. I'm envisioning a "rail" system under the car that you pull on to, it would require basically no moving parts (apart from the car itself driving on) and would be capable of quite high currents.
An articulated robot arm may look cool, but it's incredibly impractical.

How would the car be charged?

How is a robotic arm impractical? EVSE + arm, capable of charging the car at whatever speed you like. Extra hardware cost of car = $0. If the arm fails, it's still an EVSE.
 
This is something needed for SpaceX?

Hmmm..

Not the charging part, but manipulating an arm to do things under many different conditions in random environments (e.g. not a controlled factory floor like the assembly robots). Having this in a few thousand uncontrolled car locations will test far more effectively than a few lab tests and a couple of space tests.
 
Now that it's 2015.......
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