KCRag Forum

On a future road trip, your robot car decides to take a new route, driving you past a Krispy Kreme Doughnut shop. A pop-up window opens on your car’s display and asks if you’d like to stop at the store. “Don’t mind if I do,” you think to yourself. You press “yes” on the touchscreen, and the autonomous car pulls up to the shop.

Wait, how did the car know that you might want an original glazed doughnut? Because it has data on your driving habits, and you’re a serial offender when it comes to impulsive snacking. Your car is also linked to your online accounts at home, and you had recently “liked” Krispy Kreme’s Facebook page and visited its website.

Is this future scenario convenient—or creepy? It’s one thing if a car’s driver-drowsiness detection system (which exists today) sees that you’re nodding off and suggests coffee. But to make your automated car divert from its usual course because some advertiser paid it to do so, well, that sounds like a mini-carjacking.

Your car is also linked to your online accounts at home, and you had recently “liked” Krispy Kreme’s Facebook page and visited its website.

Missouri has become the latest state to advance legislation that would ban Tesla’s direct-to-consumer sales model, a move the Palo Alto, Calif., electric car maker attributes to pressure from the auto dealers lobby.

The company said in a blog post that on Wednesday night “anti-Tesla” language was added to a bill, HB 1124, that then passed in the Missouri state Senate. The proposal, which made it through the House last month without that language, could soon come back to the House floor “for a final vote, essentially without debate.”

“This change is not an innocent, minor amendment,” the company said in a blog post. “It is completely unrelated to the original bill, which was about laws regarding all-terrain vehicles, recreational off-highway vehicles, and utility vehicles. It is also a complete 180 from current law.”

It added: “To be clear: this is worse than a mere case of dealers trying to protect an existing monopoly — this is a case of dealers trying to create a monopoly.”

KCMax wrote:Missouri working to ban Tesla. Why? To protect existing auto dealers.

Missouri Pulls a New Jersey on Tesla

Missouri has become the latest state to advance legislation that would ban Tesla’s direct-to-consumer sales model, a move the Palo Alto, Calif., electric car maker attributes to pressure from the auto dealers lobby.

The company said in a blog post that on Wednesday night “anti-Tesla” language was added to a bill, HB 1124, that then passed in the Missouri state Senate. The proposal, which made it through the House last month without that language, could soon come back to the House floor “for a final vote, essentially without debate.”

“This change is not an innocent, minor amendment,” the company said in a blog post. “It is completely unrelated to the original bill, which was about laws regarding all-terrain vehicles, recreational off-highway vehicles, and utility vehicles. It is also a complete 180 from current law.”

It added: “To be clear: this is worse than a mere case of dealers trying to protect an existing monopoly — this is a case of dealers trying to create a monopoly.”

pash wrote:Perhaps they should rethink their antipathy to the left-coasters. After all, Tesla sells coal-powered cars in Missouri.

FangKC wrote:GM to Introduce Hands-Free Driving in Cadillac Model

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-09-0 ... model.html

chaglang wrote:

FangKC wrote:GM to Introduce Hands-Free Driving in Cadillac Model

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-09-0 ... model.html

Given the age of Cadillac's demographic, that's great news.

Batteries seem to be the limiting factor in the popularity of electric cars. They are one of the most expensive components of the vehicle, and have limited range compared with gasoline powered vehicles. While there have been some impressive advances in recent years, a team of researchers have created a supercapacitor film that could replace the need for a battery altogether within the next five years. The collaboration between scientists at Rice University and Queensland University of Technology resulted in two papers, published in Journal of Power Sources and Nanotechnology.

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Ordinary batteries take up a large amount of space, whereas the supercapacitor film could be integrated into multiple areas of the vehicle, such as the body panels, roof, floor, and doors. A supercapacitor this large could provide the vehicle with the amount of energy it needs, while making the vehicle itself much lighter.

The graphene-based supercapacitor film would be able to be fully charged in a matter of minutes, rather than the several hours it takes for a conventional battery. But while it might charge and release energy faster than standard batteries, they currently don’t hold nearly as much energy. This is one aspect that the scientists hope to change with further study.

"In the future, it is hoped the supercapacitor will be developed to store more energy than a Li-Ion battery while retaining the ability to release its energy up to 10 times faster - meaning the car could be entirely powered by the supercapacitors in its body panels,” added co-author Jinzhang Liu. "After one full charge, this car should be able to run up to 500km (310 miles) - similar to a petrol-powered car and more than double the current limit of an electric car.”

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