OT: Brakes seizing on electric cars?

Think, with epicyclic autos, you don't have the same choice of ratios as you can have with a manual box. Unless you increase the number of epicyclic gear sets. The Rolls 4 speed - used in the 50s and 60s - had rather odd ratios. Not evenly spaced at all. Later four speed units are simply a 3 speed with effectively an overdrive added. Once 5 speed autos arrived, they seemed to provide 5 reasonably well chosen ratios.

Remember seeing a Met police spec Rover P6 3500 auto. The selector mechanism had been modified to prevent it being locked in 1st gear. Now on that BW 35 version, you couldn't select 1st above a fairly modest speed anyway. But move off from rest with it locked in 1st, and it would stay in

We haven't always had hazard lights? Or are you only talking about racing?

Correct, the VW beetle didn't have them.

Or are you only talking about racing?

That's what happens when automation tries to help without having enough information. It was trying to be helpful but made things worse. Imagine trying to drive with one person operating the wheel, one the pedals, one the handbrake and indicators.

The answer to all that paragraph is.... French electrics.

Doesn't bother me as I never use any type of handbrake. Park in gear and turn the wheels against the kerb. Hill start using the footbrake.

Each epicyclic gear train is capable of the following; low reduction, fast overdrive, moderate reduction, moderate overdrive, reverse reduction, reverse overdrive, direct drive and, finally, neutral. They are then compounded to give extra. My wife's Suzuki, for instance, has an Aisin 441 4 speed auto. It uses a Ravineax compound gearset where 4th is overdrive. Very much like the old Borg Warner 35 with added overdrive. The 9 speed 9G-Tronic from Benz only has 4 planetary gearsets to achieve

An interesting point with the ZF 9 speed, as used in the Jeep, is that

The ratios are chosen with regard to the engine performance and the expected use of the vehicle. If the ratios aren't ideal, the slack can be taken up by the torque converter capacity.

You have boy racer cops there too, huh?

Some autos don't even give the option of Lock 1.

He didn't say that. He said he didn't use the brakes. He might press the brake pedal, but on an electric car that should engage regen before the actual brakes. Real brakes are only used if you press hard on the pedal.

You can apparently adjust what it does when you let go of the gas. But unless the designer is monumentally stupid, no matter what your setting is, braking means regen THEN brake pads. No point in using pads when you could be charging the battery.

Done it and it was identical to a manual. VW Golf 1.9l TDI Mk 4, 1998.

What is an "overrun"?

If you're going at speed, then the revs don't drop, it behaves just like a manual. But if you're going slowly in town, then they do, but that's because it goes up a gear, not into neutral.

I'm surprised anything different is even allowed, yet you can set some cars so letting go of both pedals causes heavy regen braking. Not sure if it activates the brake lights, but it's going to cause an accident. I'd never set my car that way. What if you want to lift your foot to scratch an itch?

What's In Car Entertainment to do with it? If I buy a car from a private seller and it says ICE in the ad, I expect a good stereo.

Solid state batteries coming soon? 5 times the capacity, lifetime, cheapness, and recharging speed.

What were you driving, an original Mini? Only auto car I've ever seen do that. Oh and a Rover 75. Hmmm, both British s*it. Every other auto changes absolutely smoothly using the torque convertor. Sometimes you can't even tell it changed gear apart from the rev counter moving and bit more noise.

See above, just didn't happen with mine.

Then you come across something unexpected and mess about wasting time with the gears. Manuals suck. Autos are great for overtaking too, you don't have to get in a lower gear ready for that tiny gap, you just press the pedal when ready.

Except then you lose the weird government subsidy where you (if they still do this) get paid for what you generate, not what you give to the grid. So: Sunny day, feed to grid, get paid. Sunny day, charge car during the day, get paid for charging the car! Sunny day, charge car overnight, get paid but then buy it back at a higher price.

Ouch, last time I checked it was more like £3000, or is that a hybrid battery?

Are they? I've not found any under 6 to 8 grand. I can get a petrol car with a year's MOT for £500! So, several grand to buy it 2nd hand, several grand to buy another battery, how long before I would have used 14 grand of petrol? Not economical whatsoever.

Depends how you drive, presumably it's similar to mpg on petrol cars, it's variable. My golf said it got 45mpg. I could get anything from 23 to 58. 23 was fun, 58 held up truckers.

I never had to adjust any of mine.

Worst one I ever drove was my neighbour's Rover 75 (2004). It felt like a learner driver was ramming in the next gear while forgetting to use the clutch. It actually made everyone in the car jolt forwards.

No such things as kickdown. The car decides what gear to go into based on how far you've pushed the pedal. It could drop a gear (or more than one) a quarter of the way down, or half, or all the way down. Depends on the speed you're going and what gear you're currently in.

More nanny state bullshit. If the government want us to use electric cars, they need to invent ones that are actually usable.

Sounds usable.

Paul

Not for long trips, the recharge time is much too long.