5 ms·

We have trains in chicago that reach whiskers up to charging lines above them. Same as the trolley systems in San Francisco. What if every major city to city fr

We have trains in chicago that reach whiskers up to charging lines above them. Same as the trolley systems in San Francisco. What if every major city to city freeway stretch had these in a lane for electric vehicles?

dmayle 5y ago
I don't know whether or not it is legal, but I have seen an electric car with tram whiskers before. I think I saw it in San Francisco, and I think it was a Prius. Some quick Googling fails to turn it up, though. EDIT Found a link: https://thebolditalic.com/hacked-prius-running-on-muni-power-lines-the-bold-italic-san-francisco-80cdbe55d68e https://thebolditalic.com/hacked-prius-running-on-muni-power...
- athenot 5y ago
  That is awesome but the article's date is April 1st 2014.
  - dmayle 5y ago
    Be that as it may, I saw the actual car before I ever saw the article. Maybe it was him, maybe the article is fake, but it inspired someone to try it for real. Either way, I've seen a real life car doing this. EDIT I've found confirmation that the article is an April Fool's joke. I still, however, have seen a car doing this (or at least attempting to do this) on the streets of San Francisco.
    - jtbayly 5y ago
      I question your memory. Lol.
      - dmayle 5y ago
        Fair enough... Memory is definitely fallible. In my memory, the car is blue, and what I remember seeing is someone pulling the poles off of the line, but just like we've seen with neural networks, maybe my brain is backfilling the events after having read the story.
ErikVandeWater 5y ago
Are all the cars going to reach up 13 feet in the air to the charging lines? That would be a very tough sell. Not to mention the increased danger of live power lines coming down in an accident. Also, how would lane changing work? Do they have to decouple from one set of power lines and connect to another?
- pcarolan 5y ago
  Why not? We do it safely in busy urban areas already. As for changing lanes, even the most basic autopilots could solve the lane changing problem. Also, making connection can help steer the car and coordinate with other cars in the charging lane.
- genewitch 5y ago
  Southern California has linked the carpool/ZEV lanes for several freeways, so for the best case of "north of los angeles" to "southern orange county" you wouldn't ever "change lanes" - you'd take the left fork of a gentle Y, which overhead lines can already do fine. Speaking of Southern California, Interstate 57 had some work done around 2000, they were installing some sort of lane sensor substrate into the right two lanes of the freeway. there were some people claiming they wanted to do power delivery or collection too - like solar roadways.
rektide 5y ago
Seems like a lot of physical infrastructure spread out over a lot of area for little gain. Little gain because it doesn't feel like charging at fixed stations is so bad, and it's not something folks need to do that often. There's other challenges too. You'd also need to build some system for billing, such that people don't start to steal power. Do we trust the cars to meter themselves? Or do we try to have the line monitor who is using how much power continuously? Personally i more imagine something like this video, except instead of physically towing a car to run it's generator, the "tow" vehicle is merely a truck with a lot of batteries, battery-powered charger (easy), and charge plug at the end of a boom arm. Folks can summon a on-the-go charger & it follows them around for ~30 minutes & charges them. I like the big-dream nature of your ask, how it seeks to adapt the infrastructure of the road to the new power modality. It seems dauntingly expensive, but it's certainly going to be more power-effective & material-effective than battery-charger-trucks are.
- pcarolan 5y ago
  The other advantage is coordination and self driving. You could pretty much get in the charging lane, go to sleep and wake up in chicago. The whiskers can provide steering and other vehicle coordination if you think of them as power + data.
  - rektide 5y ago
    And you can build special roads that only your model of cars can drive on, with your model of cpu brains. And maybe get some government grants to build it all.
- wolverine876 5y ago
  > Little gain because it doesn't feel like charging at fixed stations is so bad I think people would like very much never having to charge their cars as long as they remain in the city.
- genewitch 5y ago
  Commercial drivers routinely make at least $0.50 per mile... towing hazardous materials (lithium or sulfuric acid and lead) is an endorsement that guarantees more money, as well. Add in amortized cost of the truck, charger, fuel, and batteries, you're looking at a "30 minute charge truck" costing like $25, minimum.
jeofken 5y ago
Volvo did a trial of this. Not sure how it ended up. https://www.volvogroup.com/en/news-and-media/news/2018/sep/volvo-plans-to-build-electric-roads.html https://www.volvogroup.com/en/news-and-media/news/2018/sep/v...
- rightbyte 5y ago
  There are nasty leak currents when the ground is wet. I wonder of they managed to fix that. Air wires will probably be the way to go, but those will unfortunately be to high for cars.
  - jeofken 5y ago
    They also did a trial of a highway with power lines above, like a city tram, but I don’t know the search query to find anything about it. Was ~5 years ago
wolverine876 5y ago
Why not wireless power? I would guess that it's highly inefficient, and goodness knows the radiation levels that would have to be broadcast throughout the city to charge all the cars, but imagine if everything you had was charged automatically in the city.

dmayle 5y ago

I don't know whether or not it is legal, but I have seen an electric car with tram whiskers before. I think I saw it in San Francisco, and I think it was a Prius. Some quick Googling fails to turn it up, though. EDIT Found a link: https://thebolditalic.com/hacked-prius-running-on-muni-power-lines-the-bold-italic-san-francisco-80cdbe55d68e https://thebolditalic.com/hacked-prius-running-on-muni-power...

athenot 5y ago
That is awesome but the article's date is April 1st 2014.
- dmayle 5y ago
  Be that as it may, I saw the actual car before I ever saw the article. Maybe it was him, maybe the article is fake, but it inspired someone to try it for real. Either way, I've seen a real life car doing this. EDIT I've found confirmation that the article is an April Fool's joke. I still, however, have seen a car doing this (or at least attempting to do this) on the streets of San Francisco.
  - jtbayly 5y ago
    I question your memory. Lol.
    - dmayle 5y ago
      Fair enough... Memory is definitely fallible. In my memory, the car is blue, and what I remember seeing is someone pulling the poles off of the line, but just like we've seen with neural networks, maybe my brain is backfilling the events after having read the story.

ErikVandeWater 5y ago

Are all the cars going to reach up 13 feet in the air to the charging lines? That would be a very tough sell. Not to mention the increased danger of live power lines coming down in an accident. Also, how would lane changing work? Do they have to decouple from one set of power lines and connect to another?

pcarolan 5y ago
Why not? We do it safely in busy urban areas already. As for changing lanes, even the most basic autopilots could solve the lane changing problem. Also, making connection can help steer the car and coordinate with other cars in the charging lane.
genewitch 5y ago
Southern California has linked the carpool/ZEV lanes for several freeways, so for the best case of "north of los angeles" to "southern orange county" you wouldn't ever "change lanes" - you'd take the left fork of a gentle Y, which overhead lines can already do fine. Speaking of Southern California, Interstate 57 had some work done around 2000, they were installing some sort of lane sensor substrate into the right two lanes of the freeway. there were some people claiming they wanted to do power delivery or collection too - like solar roadways.

rektide 5y ago

Seems like a lot of physical infrastructure spread out over a lot of area for little gain. Little gain because it doesn't feel like charging at fixed stations is so bad, and it's not something folks need to do that often. There's other challenges too. You'd also need to build some system for billing, such that people don't start to steal power. Do we trust the cars to meter themselves? Or do we try to have the line monitor who is using how much power continuously? Personally i more imagine something like this video, except instead of physically towing a car to run it's generator, the "tow" vehicle is merely a truck with a lot of batteries, battery-powered charger (easy), and charge plug at the end of a boom arm. Folks can summon a on-the-go charger & it follows them around for ~30 minutes & charges them. I like the big-dream nature of your ask, how it seeks to adapt the infrastructure of the road to the new power modality. It seems dauntingly expensive, but it's certainly going to be more power-effective & material-effective than battery-charger-trucks are.

pcarolan 5y ago
The other advantage is coordination and self driving. You could pretty much get in the charging lane, go to sleep and wake up in chicago. The whiskers can provide steering and other vehicle coordination if you think of them as power + data.
- rektide 5y ago
  And you can build special roads that only your model of cars can drive on, with your model of cpu brains. And maybe get some government grants to build it all.
wolverine876 5y ago
> Little gain because it doesn't feel like charging at fixed stations is so bad I think people would like very much never having to charge their cars as long as they remain in the city.
genewitch 5y ago
Commercial drivers routinely make at least $0.50 per mile... towing hazardous materials (lithium or sulfuric acid and lead) is an endorsement that guarantees more money, as well. Add in amortized cost of the truck, charger, fuel, and batteries, you're looking at a "30 minute charge truck" costing like $25, minimum.

jeofken 5y ago

Volvo did a trial of this. Not sure how it ended up. https://www.volvogroup.com/en/news-and-media/news/2018/sep/volvo-plans-to-build-electric-roads.html https://www.volvogroup.com/en/news-and-media/news/2018/sep/v...

rightbyte 5y ago
There are nasty leak currents when the ground is wet. I wonder of they managed to fix that. Air wires will probably be the way to go, but those will unfortunately be to high for cars.
- jeofken 5y ago
  They also did a trial of a highway with power lines above, like a city tram, but I don’t know the search query to find anything about it. Was ~5 years ago

wolverine876 5y ago

Why not wireless power? I would guess that it's highly inefficient, and goodness knows the radiation levels that would have to be broadcast throughout the city to charge all the cars, but imagine if everything you had was charged automatically in the city.