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This seems way to complicated why not just have a device under your car that injects the power socket. Like for example park the front wheels on a platter that

by acd 12y ago

This seems way to complicated why not just have a device under your car that injects the power socket. Like for example park the front wheels on a platter that by the weight of the car injects the socket.

gfodor 12y ago
How is this less complicated? In your case you'd need to install something non-standard connected to high voltage power in the floor of your garage and then have to carefully park your car every time. It'd be expensive and tricky to install, and impose a mental burden every single time you park your car. Not to mention that it would have moving parts that are often put under strain (particularly in those instances where you don't park correctly) and it would be prone to damage and wear. I believe the idea here is that this robotic snake idea should have zero impact on the user, and zero impact on installation, it should be a swap out replacement for the current charger. The only difference being that the user no longer has to plug it in manually. It may be a complex engineering problem but it's a simple, elegant design solution.
- josephwegner 12y ago
  I believe you're over-thinking it. You don't need to install it in your floor, you could simply place it on top of your floor. And it's not that hard to make it easy for people to line up - modern docks use a sort of fuzzy connector that doesn't need to lock in perfectly, just as long as you are within a certain range. The roomba is the best example that I can think of for this - I can pretty much set my roomba down anywhere roughly on the dock, and it will start charging. I could definitely park my car with the same accuracy.
  - EC1 12y ago
    I honestly have no idea how you don't see this as an awful idea. Not only do I not want to aim my car into the garage in the first place, now I have to aim within some range again? Definitely want to just park and have a snake extend into my car to charge, not some large clunky floor piece carrying the weight of my entire car.
  - cmsmith 12y ago
    The roomba achieves this through rather large contact pads on the base of the charger, which scaled up to car-size would be about 50cm across. What happens when my cat walks under my car and onto a large metal plate with a few kW of power flowing through it?
- higherpurpose 12y ago
  "Non-standard"? As opposed to the highly standardized EV chargers and their ports? The EV industry is just emerging and in huge flux. Charging the cars from the floor would make much more sense, especially if we're going to charge them even without cables, wirelessly, in the future (and yes, once again breaking the several year old "standard" in the name of progress).
- tomphoolery 12y ago
  The robotic snake just sounds hella inaccurate. Like it's so out there it's bound to be unreliable.
- wehadfun 12y ago
  I disagree. If it is under the car you don't have to worry about moving it out the way or playing limbo if you want to get to that part of the garage.
anigbrowl 12y ago
If it doesn't work right then it's inconvenient to have to crawl underneath the car to figure out what's going wrong. Also you lie down on the garage floor and it impales you, or it fails to retract and you trip over it and die or... ...plus you'd have to dig up your garage floor or at least put some sort of bolts into it to hold the thing in place. No, a roving tentacle works much better, and I can't believe I wrote that either.

by acd 12y ago

gfodor 12y ago

How is this less complicated? In your case you'd need to install something non-standard connected to high voltage power in the floor of your garage and then have to carefully park your car every time. It'd be expensive and tricky to install, and impose a mental burden every single time you park your car. Not to mention that it would have moving parts that are often put under strain (particularly in those instances where you don't park correctly) and it would be prone to damage and wear. I believe the idea here is that this robotic snake idea should have zero impact on the user, and zero impact on installation, it should be a swap out replacement for the current charger. The only difference being that the user no longer has to plug it in manually. It may be a complex engineering problem but it's a simple, elegant design solution.

josephwegner 12y ago
I believe you're over-thinking it. You don't need to install it in your floor, you could simply place it on top of your floor. And it's not that hard to make it easy for people to line up - modern docks use a sort of fuzzy connector that doesn't need to lock in perfectly, just as long as you are within a certain range. The roomba is the best example that I can think of for this - I can pretty much set my roomba down anywhere roughly on the dock, and it will start charging. I could definitely park my car with the same accuracy.
- EC1 12y ago
  I honestly have no idea how you don't see this as an awful idea. Not only do I not want to aim my car into the garage in the first place, now I have to aim within some range again? Definitely want to just park and have a snake extend into my car to charge, not some large clunky floor piece carrying the weight of my entire car.
- cmsmith 12y ago
  The roomba achieves this through rather large contact pads on the base of the charger, which scaled up to car-size would be about 50cm across. What happens when my cat walks under my car and onto a large metal plate with a few kW of power flowing through it?
higherpurpose 12y ago
"Non-standard"? As opposed to the highly standardized EV chargers and their ports? The EV industry is just emerging and in huge flux. Charging the cars from the floor would make much more sense, especially if we're going to charge them even without cables, wirelessly, in the future (and yes, once again breaking the several year old "standard" in the name of progress).
tomphoolery 12y ago
The robotic snake just sounds hella inaccurate. Like it's so out there it's bound to be unreliable.
wehadfun 12y ago
I disagree. If it is under the car you don't have to worry about moving it out the way or playing limbo if you want to get to that part of the garage.

anigbrowl 12y ago

If it doesn't work right then it's inconvenient to have to crawl underneath the car to figure out what's going wrong. Also you lie down on the garage floor and it impales you, or it fails to retract and you trip over it and die or... ...plus you'd have to dig up your garage floor or at least put some sort of bolts into it to hold the thing in place. No, a roving tentacle works much better, and I can't believe I wrote that either.