NYT drives electric Ford Focus mule
While it took months for GM to let the media drive its Volt mule, Ford has wasted no time in giving Bill Vlasic of the New York Times a chance to try out its own all-electric Ford Focus-based prototype. The company just announced the existence of the vehicle a few days ago.
Accompanied by Ford's Nancy Gioia and Barbara Samardzich, the reporter toured the streets of scenic Dearborn, Michigan while asking questions of his two handlers. Given the urban setting for the drive, there were no pedal-to-the-metal or other performance tests that might seek out the edge of the vehicles capabilities but we did learn a few things about the car. It's weight, for example, is a couple hundred pounds more than the gas-powered version and its battery can store 23 kWh of energy. That should be enough to take the car 75 to 100 miles. Bill says it accelerates and handles like a normal car but is more quiet (surprised?). Here's the link to check out this "first drive" for yourselves. We'll have the AutoblogGreen first drive report up in short order.
[Source: New York Times]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Sean 9:15AM (1/13/2009)
Awesome! Me want!
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oollyoumn 9:41AM (1/13/2009)
Ford, start selling this car before I settle for a hybrid! I want a car with this this range but no gas tank, but I can't wait too long.
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paulwesterberg 9:59AM (1/13/2009)
If it has a 23kwh battery then it has to have a plug.
Lithium or NiMH?
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Matt Lenart 10:01AM (1/13/2009)
wow!
maybe it really doesn't take that long to put a motor and a battery into an existing drivetrain.
props to ford. keep up the great work!
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Matt Lenart 10:04AM (1/13/2009)
no way its large-format NiMH. that patent is being sat on by cobasys (majority owned by chevron) until 2014. most definitely lithium ion.
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GoodCheer 11:38AM (1/13/2009)
"Sat on"?
http://www.cobasys.com/products/transportation.shtml
Matt Lenart 11:46AM (1/13/2009)
yeah. "sat on"
http://www.autonews.com/article/20080806/COPY/865460934
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cobasys (check patent dispute and criticism)
there was another european company that tried to get them to produce batteries for their vehicles and was denied.
i guess the $80 M this company loses annually is a drop in the bucket for chevron compared to its profits.
Meme 1:25PM (1/13/2009)
Give me a break. Cobasys provides batteries for all sorts of hybrids. By your logic, because they failed to meet deliveries for one luxury carmaker, that means that their deliveries to all of the others are part of a conspiracy, right?
Re, large format: Cobasys *does* have a large format battery available for sale -- the Series 9500. It's only available in volume of 10,000 units or more, however; they're not in the business of supplying hobbyists.
Re, patents: Cobasys only owns US rights. Notice a distinct lack of NiMH EVs in other markets? There's not exactly huge lines of people forming to build new EVs with obsolete tech. Also, PEVE has cross-licensed with Cobasys, so now shares US rights.
Matt Lenart 2:15PM (1/13/2009)
don't wanna drag this out too long... but last time i checked panasonic-toyota's joint venture as PEVE was japanese, and they originally made the batteries for the still in-demand RAV4-EV thats still on the road today w/ "obsolete" NiMH technology 10 years ago.
i could own a patent but refuse to make the product unless an order of 1,000,000,000,000,000 units was made and paid up front. or offer each unit at a ridiculously high price. for a company that loses $80 M annually you'd think they'd try to actually produce a large-format NiMH (in any quantity) to break even at least, otherwise retool your factories, sell the patent, and make something profitable in the market system.
Meme 2:51PM (1/13/2009)
"i could own a patent but refuse to make the product unless an order of 1,000,000,000,000,000 units"
That's, of course, a ridiculous comparison. A minimum of 10,000 is a perfectly reasonable quantity for battery packs for real *production vehicles*, and not concept/hobbyist vehicles.
"was made and paid up front. or offer each unit at a ridiculously high price."
That is not a requirement.
"for a company that loses $80 M annually you'd think they'd try to actually produce a large-format NiMH (in any quantity) to break even at least"
You're right -- they should turn that $80M loss into $100M loss by tooling to produce cells that they can only cell a couple hundred of. :P What kind of logic is that?
Tim 11:20AM (1/13/2009)
The 75-100 mile range is just fine with me!
How much does this car cost when compared to a gas model?
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meme 1:25PM (1/13/2009)
FYI, 23kWh packs don't come cheap. Expect that pack to cost $12k or so.
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fnc 1:24PM (1/13/2009)
Two hundred more pounds? I'm curious to know if they took weight saving measures on the model and the batteries ate it all up and then some.
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stas peterson 10:20PM (1/14/2009)
BEVs with that range won't sell. If it had the Fusion drive-train and was a few hundred pounds lighter over the larger car, it would. And it would get 50-60 mpg as a HEV just like the new Prius III.
The problem with BEVs, that would be reasonable "city cars" for a dense city like NY, is that recharging them in a city like Manhattan is nigh onto impossible. Reserve parking costs as much as renting an entire house in the rest of America, for a small parking space.
Most Manhattanites wander everywhere to find a place to park. Some take them out of the city and park them for occasional use only on the weekend. But BEVs might not have the range for that.
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ug 2:47PM (1/13/2009)
This gives you an idea of how quickly the major automakers can just take an existing car and stick an electric powertrain on it. This is what Chrysler is donig with ENVI, for instance. If they don't care about going the Aptera route, and just want to get something on the road, they can do it really fast.
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Chris H. 6:09PM (1/13/2009)
This Focus EV was actually developed by Magna International in Canada, and then presented to Ford recently. Ford said "Are you kidding? WTF are we going to do with that??? Ahhh, wait, maybe we could use it..." Now Ford is presenting the car as if they developed it themselves. Everybody makes that assumption, and Ford doesn't bother to correct them. Still, I'm glad to see that Ford has decided to go down that road
@ paulwesterberg: the battery pack contains Li ion cells
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601082&sid=azQnXElginoY&refer=canada
I'll post some links from last year when Magna announced that they were developing this EV.
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nardvark 8:43AM (1/14/2009)
To be fair, car companies outsource powertrain development all the time. Yamaha, Navistar, Cummins, etc... have all made engines for car brands you recognize as "the manufacturers."
Chris H. 6:56PM (1/13/2009)
Magna acquired a US company last October called Bluwav Systems specifically for their energy management technology for EVs:
http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/magna-electronics-acquires-bluwav-systems/story.aspx?guid={2F0E09D0-3D12-48C8-9F67-5EEE73BCE2C7}&dist=TQP_Mod_pressN
Magna expressed their intent to develop hybrid and BEVs last April, and used the Ford Focus as a mule for the new drivetrain:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20080429.RMAGNA29/TPStory/Business
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