On Wednesday, 17 April 2019 19:53:17 UTC+1, NY wrote:
"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote in message
...
In article ,
NY wrote:
I've often wondered what the attraction with alloy wheels is,

Looks. Same as anything car wise. Otherwise we'd all be driving Allegros.

No we wouldn't. After this time, the Allegro would probably be a pile of
rust on the driveway :-( Also you picked a bad example because the quartic
steering wheel would probably have put a lot of people off buying in the
first place (I know it would have put me off).

Alloys are the one fad that I've never understood. They don't affect the
performance or road holding or comfort or fuel economy or anything like
that, and from a few metres away you'd be hard pressed to distinguish them
from steel wheels with metallic wheel trims. Not *everyone* is taken in by
posing and bragging rights of alloys.

I wonder what cars we'll be driving by the time the 2040 ban on petrol and
diesel cars comes into effect and all cars are fitted with speed limiters.
Driving will probably be very boring, with everyone going at exactly the
same speed (overtaking will be impossible on a motorway if everyone is doing
70.0 mph). And we'll all have to stop every 200 or so miles for an enforced
and prolonged recharging stop - that's the hurdle that really hasn't been
overcome yet: limited range coupled with *very* long recharging times. When
they bring out an electric car with a 700 mile range which can be recharged
in 5 mins to give another 700 miles, then I might be interested.

I wonder if the reduced range will cause people to move back to towns and
cities or on railway/bus routes, reversing the trend of the last 50 years.

Politicians saying we'll ban something 20 years later means approximately nothing.

Quick recharge is already doable: swap the battery pack. Charge the driver per charge used. If you can recharge the pack in 15 minutes it's doable at least for low use garage forecourts. Busy ones would need a big recharging shed with a busy forklift.

The other way to tackle the problem is improve the energy efficiency of cars. That is entirely doable. Gotta wonder why mfrs don't seem to care on that point. Many buyers do.


NT