Electric Cars

Electric cars (or Battery Electric Cars) utilize electrical energy for motion instead of relying on energy generated by burning fuel. Batteries are the main source of energy, and are used to power electric motors in order to produce wheel or axle movement

History of Electric Cars

In the mid-19th century Robert Anderson, a Scottish businessman, came up with the early version of an electric vehicle that more or less resembles the carriage that was popular in his time. This car came before the invention and perfection of cars that run on gasoline and diesel. Robert Anderson’s invention is thus considered to be one of the earliest forms of automobiles.

In the mid-20th century, the technology for storage batteries was greatly improved due to the independent efforts of Gaston Plante and Camille Faure. This made battery-powered or electric-driven vehicles a good option for vehicles and increased the industry’s interest in such technology especially in Europe.

The world’s interest in electric vehicles started declining with the advent of internal combustion engines and escalated petroleum or fossil fuel discovery and extraction. Fossil fuels such as diesel and gasoline were much cheaper alternatives when compared to electric cars. The costly production of storage batteries that have comparably limited capabilities was a large factor in the decline of the electric car’s popularity.

Parts of the Electric Car Engine

In a nutshell an electric car isn’t unlike the lights in your house. When the switch is off, the car doesn’t move. When the switch is on, electricity is flowing and the car can begin to move. However, electric cars are, when looking under the hood, a bit more complicated. It should be noted that when looking at the engine of an electric car, you won’t see pipes flowing around; instead, you’ll see a lot of wires. Gasoline cars are a plumbing project; electric cars are a wiring project.

Electric cars depend solely on batteries. As such, the components of the Battery Electric Car greatly differ from the parts of a car with an internal combustion engine. While there are many parts of an engine, there are a few very important parts. These parts, when combined together and working in sync, are what make the electric car go from stop to start. And, because they are all electrical parts, they are completely silent. Here are the important parts to remember:

• Accelerator: You press your foot on the accelerator and this reads as, “Go.” Therefore, the car reacts and begins to move down the road. As you press harder, the car begins to move faster and faster. This is the most basic.
• Controller: The controller reacts to the accelerator. It is, as mentioned above, the on and off switch. When the accelerator is pressed, it turns off. When it is released, it turns off. However, the general problem with that is that an on/off switch is very rigid and you’d have to continuously press and release on the accelerator to get any sort of speed. Therefore, another part is needed.
• Potentiometer: This is the part that controls the controlled. As you press down on the accelerator, the potentiometer determines how much electricity the controller is going to need to release to the motor to allow the vehicle to run. It sends a pulse that allows that much energy to flow.
• Battery: This is the fuel of the car. There are a dozen, two dozen and sometimes more batteries stocked away in the car that carry a charge. When the controlled gets the signal from the potentiometer, the battery sends charge to the controller which then sends it to the final part of the engine.
• Motor: The motor of an electric car is different from one found in a gasoline car because of the fuel. However, it is still responsible for providing the energy needed to turn the wheels. However, the motor cannot function without the other parts, so as important as it is, it works in sync with the rest.

The batteries used in electric cars are rechargeable and usually come in these forms or variants:

• Nickel-Cadmium (NiCd)
• Lead-acid (both Valve Regulated Lead Acid or otherwise)
• Nickel Metal Hydride (NiMH)
• Lithium Ion (LiON)
• Lithion-ion polymer

Battery power output is measured in terms of kilo-watt hours (KWh) that denote how much energy a certain rechargeable battery will be able to store or produce.

How an Electric Car Works

When the user presses down on the accelerator, the potentiometer recognizes how much speed is desired. In most cars, there is a second potentiometer to act as a check to the first one. When both potentiometers send the same impulse to the controller, then it reacts. However, if both impulses are not received or one is different than the other, the controller stays off. This is to prevent any dangerous situation from occuring.

When the two potentiometer signals get to the controller, it reacts and opens. Think of the controller as a flood gate. The more it is opened, the more energy from the battery is going to flow through it to the motor. Therefore, if the person wants to go only fifteen miles per hour, the potentiometer will tell the controller this and enough energy will be given to make it go that speed. When the speeds go up, the controller opens more.

At the end of the day, when the driving is done, the user can then plug the car into a regular outlet and allow it to charge. The batteries get their necessary electricity so that when the controller opens the next time they drive, the person has the needed fuel.

It should be noted that an electric car is different than a hybrid. A hybrid car uses gasoline which charges the batteries. So, when driving through the city, the batteries are used, but when driving on a highway, gasoline is used and while the gasoline is being used, the batteries are being recharged. Electric cars, on the other hand, only use electricity. There is no flow of gasoline found in the vehicle. In many electric cars, there isn’t even a muffler.

Advantages

When compared with cars that use internal combustion engines, the battery electric car is much cleaner when it comes to tail pipe emissions. The electric car does not require any combustion to be able to generate energy and so, no gaseous emission will be produced.

Issues

In most cases, the energy that is needed to charge the batteries of the car is generated from power plants which burn fossil fuels to produce the electricity. This has posed some concerns due to the possible increase in energy demand that the electric car batteries will require. However, the rise of solar power as the source of electricity may help mitigate this issue.