Zorb750

Zorb750 t1_ja60jt9 wrote

This is actually pretty interesting. I read over your couple of pages you sent me.

As far as safety margins, I'm not sure. I know that the highest I have ever seen on mine was in the low 400 volt range, but I also know the newer Model S has a 500 volt configuration, and the model 3 is approximately 350 volts. I know that they wouldn't run the connector right up to its tolerance, or I think even within 25% of it. That with the model 3 is part of what really surprises me, though. I'm not sure how they are pulling that off, if maybe the model 3 connector is slightly different of the car end. I have looked at mine in detail obviously, but it's old now. I'm still somewhat impressed every time I see much over 100kw (seen low 120s), at over 300 amps at 400 volts. I don't use the supercharger often, though.

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Zorb750 t1_ja43z20 wrote

Well, the size of the pins is never going to have anything to do with voltage. Voltage ratings are always a function of insulation, whether that is in the form of an air gap, some sort of dielectric material like wire insulation, even the dielectric properties of the material the connect your body is made of.

I'm going to read over this. Remember that there are plenty of very thin conductors that carry high voltages. The pin size only needs to be able to handle the amperage, as well as having reasonable properties against wear. In fact, one of the reasons that higher voltages are often used in a DC circuit, is to allow more power capacity with a given size of conductor. Look at Qualcomm with quickcharge 2 and 3. Your normal USB cable is good for roughly 2 amps, maybe a little bit more, so you can't increase the amperage beyond that, but you can drive up the voltage and just use a buck converter in the phone. That's also why those phones get so hot when they are charging.

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Zorb750 t1_ja31y0f wrote

Well, this is about them making more money because it's a lot cheaper. The result of the consumer is going to be a heavier vehicle. A heavier electric vehicle means less range Edit: On the other hand, for vehicles it will be used around town, like mail trucks, this will be advantageous despite weight, both because those vehicles do not go very fast, and because they will be subject to more charging cycles.

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Zorb750 t1_ja31gz9 wrote

Whatever, downvote away. I have one. I can see the cross-sectional size of the pins. I feel like the "V3" superchargers, which deliver around 700 amps through this connector, are really the practical limit. My car does not have this, but I can tell you that when interrupted during the highest amperage (about half of the above) parts of charging, the connector is warm. I can't see tripling as feasible.

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Zorb750 t1_ja1zqvs wrote

That's my feeling, because this article is garbage. There's nothing special about LFP batteries. They are cheaper, last more charge cycles, can usually sustain higher charge rates at higher states of charge, but are substantially heavier, and have lower energy density both by volume and by weight.

I don't really see this as an improvement except in the low budget sector.

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Zorb750 t1_ja1zb3t wrote

This isn't newsworthy. LFP batteries are not uncommon in electric vehicles. It's also interesting that this article only talks about the positive points of those batteries, but skips right over the fact that they are significantly heavier, and that their energy density both by weight and by volume is significantly lower than that of NMC and NCA chemistries

Also, it's not NCM, it's NMC. While we're on that subject, I wasn't aware of that most electric vehicles didn't include Tesla, who does not use NMC. Tesla uses NCA and LFP chemistries.

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