Dakguy201 As nearly as I've been able to determine (there is confusion between model year and calendar year), in 2014 there were 118k electric vehicles sold. Total new cars sales, excluding pickups, were more than 5 million. I'm just not enthusiastic about adding an amenity for use by 2% of the customers.
As nearly as I've been able to determine (there is confusion between model year and calendar year), in 2014 there were 118k electric vehicles sold. Total new cars sales, excluding pickups, were more than 5 million. I'm just not enthusiastic about adding an amenity for use by 2% of the customers.
When it come to PC image, it isn't about the real numbers it is about the image that gets created.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
Wizlish, I don't claim to know the electrical engineering aspects of this idea, so I'll bow to anybody who does. I'm sure there would be a number of factors to consider, which I've never thought of.
I'm not at all surprised when you say the axle-mounted generator is probably not viable.
As for keeping the HEP-equipped carriers separate from the non-equipped ones, that type of thing has been done. The Auto Train used to have trilevel carriers for the small cars and bilevels for the larger ones. Vehicles would drive into the end of a carrier at the ramp and drive through several RR cars to reach their position. When one level was full on a loading track, the ramp would be raised to load vehicles on the next level. Since vehicles couldn't drive through from one type of carrier to the other, they had to be kept in separate cuts for loading at separate ramps of different heights. Nowadays the cars are all bilevels so they don't have to be kept separate for that reason. However, it is now possible to pay extra to be guaranteed that your car wll be among the first to be unloaded. This is done by designating one loading track as the track for priority vehicles. The same type of separation could be implemented to separate HEP-equipped carriers from the rest. Of course, this would complicate the priority loading situation if drivers of both electric and non-electric vehicles want priority unloading.
Mike, the autos are in a moving queue until they arrive at the greeter's booth. Then they proceed to the canopy where the driver turns the vehicle over to an Amtrak contract driver, who drives the vehicle directly onto the auto carrier. I don't think there would be a time when the vehicle would be stationary for a long enough time before loading, to do as you suggest. Also, there isn't likely to be a good place at either terminal --- especially at Sanford --- to do this. Nice thought, though.
Tom
ACY ... For locations other than Auto Train, I hope some Amtrak parking lots already have charging facilities, or will have them soon. Tom
... For locations other than Auto Train, I hope some Amtrak parking lots already have charging facilities, or will have them soon.
How about a charging facility that you plug into while your car is waiting to be loaded? These cars could be loaded last. Land charging should always be more cost effictive than on-board charging.
A Voice of Experience!
ACY I see two possibilities: First, the old-fashioned idea of having axle-mounted generators on individual designated carriers. I suspect there would be reliability and maintenance issues.
I think this may have to be ruled out. Amtrak is banning the use of Spicer drives on private cars soon, and I think this is an indication they would not favor use of anything that might seize up a wheelset at speed and provoke derailment. Likewise I don't think 'direct generation' with permanent magnets on the wheels or bearing caps is likely to meet with favor for high-current power generation.
A thought might be fuel cells (of the type developed for automotive APUs) on the cars -- this would help build a market for commercialization of these things, and allow them to be at least partly costed-down for production.
An alternative 'might' be banks of batteries/supercaps on the cars, charged from something like SKF's system for producing power from suspension motion (or, in this case, train vibration). This produces just the sort of power useful to charge a BEV over an extended time, but not that useful for other purposes on a train...
Second, installation of HEP cables on several designated carriers, to be coupled close to the passenger cars. Non-equipped carriers for gasoline or diesel vehicles would be located farther back in the train. Since HEP demand is already high on this train, it might be necessary to set it up so that auto charging is only done in off-peak hours, such as during the nighttime hours when no cooking is being done.
The immediate question I have is -- is it practical to do the special switching and connecting needed to put the 'electric' carriers in this position on every train and monitor the charging progress and integrity, etc.?
An alternate question: does the full HEP connection need to be provided down the carriers to provide charging for the number of vehicles being carried in each, for the length of time available? Seems to me that high voltage at rather restricted current is all that's needed; "commercially" this is difficult in the absence of a safely-accessible high-voltage source, but that voltage is already accessible at the connections on the last passenger car...
I'd expect some sort of 'metadata'-regulated charging controller that would respond to time of day, draw of various train sources, outside temperature, etc. to figure out how to optimize the HEP load being drawn for charging. This would only have to be designed and low-level programmed once, and I'd expect it to have many other potential uses in other types of equipment once designed for manufacture. It could probably be largely or wholly made from OTS components and cores.
Is there such a thing as a graph or profile of power demand plotted against time or route waypoints for an Auto-Train, or can someone like Don Oltmann produce one from data he can access?
CMStPnP I was thinking, it would be pretty neat if Amtrak's Auto-train could equip some of it's auto-carriers with chargers for electric cars with a governor to draw electricity from the trainline during non-peak periods. Could be a marketing ploy as well for folks that wanted to bring an Electric car that the car would charge along the route and would arrive in Florida fully charged. Not sure how much that would cost but it's an idea to add to their services.
I was thinking, it would be pretty neat if Amtrak's Auto-train could equip some of it's auto-carriers with chargers for electric cars with a governor to draw electricity from the trainline during non-peak periods. Could be a marketing ploy as well for folks that wanted to bring an Electric car that the car would charge along the route and would arrive in Florida fully charged.
Not sure how much that would cost but it's an idea to add to their services.
Sounds like a good marketing concept that reaches far beyond whomever "This Week at Amtrak " Carleton referred to by his drivers of "guilt-mobiles."
C&NW, CA&E, MILW, CGW and IC fan
I'm not sure what challenges there may be, but the idea certainly has merit. Already, there are street-parking spaces in Sanford, FL where electric vehicles can be plugged in.
As noted, the auto carriers do not have HEP cables. I see two possibilities: First, the old-fashioned idea of having axle-mounted generators on individual designated carriers. I suspect there would be reliability and maintenance issues. Second, installation of HEP cables on several designated carriers, to be coupled close to the passenger cars. Non-equipped carriers for gasoline or diesel vehicles would be located farther back in the train. Since HEP demand is already high on this train, it might be necessary to set it up so that auto charging is only done in off-peak hours, such as during the nighttime hours when no cooking is being done. For locations other than Auto Train, I hope some Amtrak parking lots already have charging facilities, or will have them soon.
Not only is it reasonable, and a good marketing opportunity -- there's no real need for providing 'supercharger' (Tesla's term for a fast charger) capability even for relatively short segments.
On the other hand, looking forward, there might well be a valid use for auto-train service in other services or even corridors, and fast charging might be a significant value-added service for 'corridor' services in areas where there is road congestion or delay or where road travel is difficult (for example, I-77 north of I-81) and actual trip time might be relatively short.
So in the aggregate, it might be useful (especially if wholly set up with grant funds) to develop this idea, at least as far as a concept ready to make tenders for components or to 'build out'.
Interesting idea. The auto carriers do not have HEP lines running through them. You would need that and transformers before adding whatever charging equipment would be needed. The HEP load for the passenger part of the train already challenges the capacity of the locomotive supplying so this may be a non-starter. Then there is the issue of the differences between the automakers; I don't think they use a common plug. There is also the matter of who would use this service; how many retired yankees drive a guilt-mobile? BTW, there is no "non-peak" time on a train. Whatever power isn't going to the HVAC is going to the traction motors.
Editor Emeritus, This Week at Amtrak
Our community is FREE to join. To participate you must either login or register for an account.