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Tesla's 'long-haul' electric truck aims for 200 to 300 miles on a charge
- dchuk 9y agoI work in the telematics/trucking software space. Many many many trucks travel less than 2-300 miles a day (Intermodal, dray, etc). Not every truck driver is crushing miles every day, many operations are just between different modes of transportation or operating in same counties, etc. What will be interesting is seeing how reduced "fuel" costs (electricity) will balance out with faster turn arounds (a truck can fill up in a few minutes, charging will take a long time). I could see fleets valuing either side depending on how they operate. Fleets reroute based on saving a few cents per gallon, so this could be great for the fleets that can afford to recharge overnight.
- mankyd 9y agoTesla has demonstrated physically swapping battery packs in cars at least once before. For their demonstration (performance, really), they managed to do it in faster than a gas fill up. I'd bet they'd work to actually get that production ready for these trucks. Seems like an easier and more useful place to get it working.
- Pxtl 9y agoMany of these trucks are servicing facilities already equipped with overhead cranes in the loading bay. An overhead crane could be used for battery-swapping in addition to loading/unloading cargo.
- gondo 9y agotruck with engine is usually detachable from trailer/payload. instead of swapping batteries or loading/unloading cargo, you can simply attach the trailer to the fully recharged truck waiting for you
- IgorPartola 9y agoHow does that work if you own the truck?
- williamscales 9y agoIf you own the truck you can charge it at night when you're not driving it. The kind of operation described above seems to imply fungibility of trucks.
- gondo 9y agoisn't the idea that trucks will be self-driven? in that case one company will own multiple trucks. in the meantime, if you are independent driver who own's the truck, you could be switching trailers with different cargos. you deliver the trailer to some point, unplug it, recharge, plug in different trailer and continue to its destination. or are you asking me if I own a track and how the mechanics of truck/trailer works? no i don't own the track and this https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3e/Conventional_18-wheeler_truck_diagram.svg/1280px-Conventional_18-wheeler_truck_diagram.svg.png https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3e/Co...
- stock_toaster 9y agoOr make the trailer itself have a large battery in it that the truck just hooks into, then the truck only needs a small capacity battery to handle moving from trailer to trailer. Then the trailers can charge while they are empty or during loading/unloading.
- hetspookjee 9y agoTrailers are vastly cheaper than the truck. I think it is insolveable to depend on battery loaded trailers. You lose so much flexibility with such a setup. Much better to keep the battery in the truck.
- stock_toaster 9y agoyeah, you are probably right. I guess in the future if you don't need a cab (no human driver), and you don't need heavy fuel tanks (plus full fuel weight), you can use much of that space to put quite a bit of battery.
- jwhitlark 9y agoOr make a portion of the battery an autonomous vehicle of its own, and have them disconnect to go recharge while a new one takes over the task.
- Govindae 9y agoThat... What? If you need to use your customers overhead crane to make a delivery, you will be going out of business fast.
- Pxtl 9y agoI'm thinking of businesses where you have integrated trucking service, not seperate owner/operators. Specialized fields like steel where there's a limited number of players and the relationship between the carriers and the warehouses are very tight.
- Xcelerate 9y ago> I work in the telematics/trucking software space Which company, if you don't mind me asking? (I work in the travel center data science space, and we're trying to understand truck traffic patterns.)
- dchuk 9y agoI technically can't say. But, my twitter handle is in my profile if you want to reach out privately.
- xd1936 9y agoThat's an impressive number considering the weight that it'll be pulling, but hows does this compare to gas range on current new rigs? Those refill to a full tank in a few minutes, whereas you need to wait quite a while from a full to empty electric charge.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- jdavis703 9y agoI'm thinking trucking companies will start building cab-switching depots. So your truck is almost out of battery juice, just get another, hook it up to your trailer and continue on.
- irishasaurus 9y agoI would assume since these are going to be commercial vehicles Tesla will resurrect or otherwise leverage their battery swap idea. Which fizzled out for private vehicles but would really help extend the range of these trucks. http://www.teslarati.com/tesla-to-debut-battery-swapping-stations/ http://www.teslarati.com/tesla-to-debut-battery-swapping-sta... Also more of the tractor can hang underneath the trailer so there's the chance for a larger battery capacity. Like this extended tractor (the semi painted green not the flatbeds behind it) in this image that is 22 feet long. http://www.bigtruckguide.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/South-Dakota-17-axle-truck-trailer2.jpg http://www.bigtruckguide.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/Sout...
- yourapostasy 9y agoTSLA may intend to debut battery swapping with the trucks, where the large physical form factor might be more amenable to swapping. While the range is low, if the equivalent mpg is higher, and the energy recovery from braking significant enough, then it would pencil out as an financial advantage to use the electric truck. A Yahoo Answers post [1] gives an idea of the kind of metrics TSLA will have to soundly beat. Fuel is the biggest cost. Bring that down and you'll get the trucking companies' attention for the pitch. Not all semis are long-haul; there are local delivery semis that fit into the 2-300 mile range, and that could be an initial market. [1] https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100327005347AA4AAGO https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20100327005347A...
- gigatexal 9y agoNot sure how this will compete with traditional long haul incumbents unless they can get battery swapping down. Also if they can find a way to keep the batteries and the efficiency up in extreme heat and extreme cold (truckers experience it all) then they will have something truly interesting on their hands. Otherwise, and this is unlikely, if they intend for truckers to do 200 - 300 miles on a charge and then hit up a special truckers only supercharger this isn't going to work.
- mjevans 9y agoWhat if there were an add-on (quick swap) battery pack, or if they were bolted on under the mid-section of the cargo loads?
- gjem97 9y agoThis probably makes more sense than it does for consumer-owned vehicles. My guess is that at roll out, the battery may be swappable, but the feature won't be publicized or used for a while.
- akira2501 9y agoI've run the numbers before.. and yes, you could do this. It will considerably impact the weight that a truck can pull, though. You're going to sacrifice anywhere from 5,000 lbs to 15,000lbs of load capacity depending on how much capacity you want and how much armor you're going to need (an exploding semi radial is not something to disregard). The _real_ problem is charging capacity, especially in large depots and yards. You're going to need a rather insane tap into the grid in order to pull the current necessary to re-charge these batteries in anything less than a day, and if you can't do that, you're going to end up with a huge stockpile of batteries and a new set of logistics challenges you're going to have to absorb to make it work. Part of logistics currently is to track fuel prices across the country, and determine based upon the trucks location the "correct" amount of fuel to put in the truck to get the best pricing given the miles needed to travel. You're going to have to re-build this entire system and track electrical rates. Finally.. consider that some loads in this country will travel for 2,000 miles or more on a truck before being delivered. A 300 mile capacity battery is utterly ineffective for this mode. It _might_ be better suited to mid-size local delivery trucks that never stray more than 100 miles from their depot, outside of that, it's doable, but it introduces more problems than it solves.
- erikb 9y agoPlease don't write in Imperial numbers in an international comunication platform. Most of us don't know what a mile is compared to a kilometer. (Yes you can google it, but you have no 'feeling' for it still, and why put the workload on many that could be done by a single person?)
- QuercusMax 9y agoSounds like a prime opportunity to write a Hacker News unit-conversion bot. Unless bots are banned.... In that case, I bet there's a browser plugin which will convert units for you automatically.
- grzm 9y agoSounds like something that could be accomplished with a browser extension. No need to rewrite/repost anything on the site itself.
- marcell 9y agoA mile is about 1.7 km, you can double it to get a rough sense
- grzm 9y agoThe submission title is the article title, and submission guidelines specify to use the original title (with some caveats). Hacker News also has a large US contingent. While that doesn't mean everything should be converted to imperial units, it also shouldn't be surprising when they show up. I wouldn't expect people to modify their units in this way in either direction, frankly. As you mention, it's not that hard to find a place that does the conversion, and it's also not that much harder to become accustomed to having a ballpark feeling of another unit system.
- grecy 9y ago> right out of the gate I think that’s where they’ll start” What? This is not news. This is one guy guessing at what they are doing. He has no inside information of any kind.
- deweller 9y agoYes. Scott Perry from Ryder is speculating. But Reuters apparently has an unnamed source. Here's the news: > Tesla Inc (TSLA.O) next month plans to unveil an electric big-rig truck with a working range of 200 to 300 miles, Reuters has learned.
- grecy 9y agoYes, Reuters learned it from Scott Perry's speculation...
- Apes 9y agoThis doesn't sound very promising. There may be a niche of some kind here, but this is a very expensive, very short distance and very light weight alternative to diesel trucks. * 200-300 miles is around a 5 hour day when long haul trucking typically has a 10 hour day. * 4.7 ton payload (9,400 pounds) when the average local haul is probably closer to 10 tons. * Overnight recharging on a platform that values short downtimes. * Will likely cost 2x what a diesel truck costs. What you have here is a truck that costs twice as much and goes half as far with half as much load. The price/ton to operate this electric truck is going to be 4-8x what it is to haul with a diesel truck. If Telsa keeps pushing forward with this as is, business majors are going to be studying it in 10-15 years as an example of a terrible business decision that was pushed through despite all the red flags.
- nols 9y agoThis wouldn't be suitable for long range OTR trucking, but great for shorter regional trucking. Delivery drivers like UPS or Fedex don't hit 200 miles a day and other trucks in denser areas also travel shorter distances and diesel fumes in urban areas is a huge concern. There are plenty of use cases for an electric truck that can travel 200 miles, even if it won't immediately replace diesel or gas.
- dsfyu404ed 9y agoThey're targeting local delivery fleets that waste half their fuel idling at red lights, not Swift and Schnider.
- tyrw 9y agoAll of the comments re: swappable battery packs are missing the end goal. Once the driver is gone from autonomy, these fleets are going to be dirt cheap to operate. It won't make sense to swap a battery pack when you can just park one truck on the charger and let another take its place.
- tyrw 9y agoI'd also add that virtually the only compelling reason to have a single, large load like a big rig is to minimize the cost of a human driver relative to payload shipped. Without a driver, the optimal load size will likely be much different and will vary more by industry than it does today.
- mdorazio 9y agoYes and no. Cost of fuel is also a big factor. A big rig is typically running about 6 MPG, and for lighter loads that doesn't change very much if you're hauling a half-size or full-size container. Sending two trucks means burning twice as much fuel, which could easily be hundreds of dollars. But definitely that's less of a factor with an electric truck since the charging cost will be a lot lower than a comparable amount of fuel.
- tyrw 9y agoCost of fuel will also be greatly reduced for the use cases within electric range: - Removing the driver allows for more aerodynamic cab configuration, or no cab at all - Electric motors are more efficient, particularly in high-torque / low-rpm environment - Massive & inefficient 18-speed gearbox can be avoided - Cost of fuel itself (electricity) is much cheaper
- patrickg_zill 9y agoI think the bigger savings will come in being able to precisely control stops, starts, and turning, which will both minimize damage to the road surface and lengthen tire life. ISTR a case where a large open pit mine bought GPS-driven trucks and saved a great deal just from longer tire life (each tire was $20K).
- oh_sigh 9y ago200-300 miles may sound minimal, but it is the sweet spot for day trips like the article mentions. A lot of truck drivers don't want to be on the road away from home for extended periods, and so take jobs that are A->B->A, doable in one day, which works out to about 200-300 miles per leg.
- paulsutter 9y agoCould (extra) battery packs be in the trailers? Which often spend a lot of time getting loaded and present a good opportunity for recharging?
- joering2 9y agoHow about running "aid trucks" that would be going next to truck on highway to charge it remotely, like jet fighters grt refueled? Once fully chearged aid truck make u-turn and feed off another truck going opposite way.
- jpao79 9y agoActually I was thinking last time I was driving from LA back to SF that one way to move faster with autonomous trucking would be to dedicate a highway lane during very off peak hours (such as between hours of 12 am to 4am) to autonomous freight trucks. The lane could have flashing sign indicators similar to some carpool lanes in California to warn normal drivers about the risks. When I was driving around LA, the rush hour traffic seemed to be made worse by the number of freight trucks on the road (presumably moving stuff into/out of Port of LA/Long Beach).
- franciscop 9y agoIMHO trucks are not the best option right now, the best option to launch them is when they get fully automated driving. This could be 2-10 years later judging from Tesla history (I know, automated driving has been in the 5-year-range for the last 50 years). However, specially for trucks, when these come out who would want a non-automated truck? Unless of course they are forward-compatible, then I have said nothing ;)
- woodandsteel 9y agoI could be wrong, but I am guessing automating trucks is easier than doing it with autos. That's because so many trucks drive standard, well-mapped routes, whereas cars generally have to be able to go anywhere.
- zie 9y agoI think their first foray into autonomous trucking will be "follow trucks", so you have 1 human driver, but 2 or 3 trucks that follow the leader, without a driver.
- codeulike 9y agoTesla responded to Reuters questions with an email statement saying, "Tesla’s policy is to always decline to comment on speculation, whether true or untrue, as doing so would be silly. Silly!”'
- lpaone 9y agoI think the biggest problem, as stated in the article, which I think is being missed by many commenters, is the cost. According to the article, the batteries alone (not including the chassis) cost almost as much as a current diesel truck. Another huge issue is weight. Batteries are extremely heavy and a truck loaded with the batteries needed to have this range would seriously cut into the delivery capacity. A better 0 emission alternative that is already being tested in real world applications [1] is battery power with a fuel cell range extender. Loop Energy has a fuel cell that is cheaper than diesel per mile with comparable range for the drayage, bus, and port/distribution markets. Despite Musk's disparaging remarks about fuel-cell tech, until a major breakthrough happens in batteries, fuel cells are the best way to make battery powered heavy-duty trucks a reality from both a cost and practicality stand-point. [1] - http://www.marketwired.com/press-release/loop-energy-fuel-cell-range-extended-yard-truck-in-operation-2228935.htm http://www.marketwired.com/press-release/loop-energy-fuel-ce...
- Aron 9y agoI think it's interesting to point out that the semi program can exist as a halo program for Tesla consumer trucks i.e. the Ford F-150, GM Pickup bread and butter market which is unbelievably profitable in the US. e.g. if you can 0-60 a 40 ton load in 10 seconds, then maybe I want your product. I think the solving long-range is a down-the-road shibboleth.
- nbanks 9y agoRemember that the reason a supercharger takes an hour to charge is due to the limits of battery chemistry. If you quadruple the size of a battery, it will still take only an hour to charge. Presumably Tesla has a super-duper charger in mind which will be able to charge a truck in an hour just like normal super chargers can charge several vehicles simultaneously. Creating a high voltage/amperage charging system would be easier than swapping batteries. Truckers often prefer driving many hours at a time, but most would be willing to pay more for a rig that needs to stop every 4-5 hours to recharge the truck if the fuel costs are much lower. Owner-operators can only drive around 13 hours a day anyway. Maintenance costs should also be lower. Electric trucks should win a few years after you can find super-duper chargers everywhere. I look forward to the day we never have to hear another Jake brake.
- eru 9y agoGood analysis! Only: > Owner-operators can only drive around 13 hours a day anyway. Let's see how this changes with self-driving trucks in a few years. It seems like electric trucks and self-driving will arrive in the mainstream at roughly the same time.