Meeting Minutes - Tim Burrows - The Future of Electric Cars - May 31st. 2018
President Ed Herold opened the meeting for May 31st, 2018 at 9:55 with 50 members present plus guest speaker Tim Burrows. He also welcomed three visiting guests: Bruce Johnson, Murray Stevenson, Nigel Morris.
Announcements
Coffee Meetings – Andy Curtis
- take place on alternate Thursdays at 10:00 am at both the Boathouse and Airpark Café.
Events/Activities – Ray Biffis
- The Firehouse our resulted in 15 members plus one guest attending;
- At the next Membership Meeting there will be sign-up sheets for the Grand River Boathouse Cruise on Wed. Sept. 19th, 2018 at a cost of $55 per person;
- The Elora Horse Race night is scheduled for Mon. Sept. 24th, 2018 for 30 to 40 guests.
- Today is the last day to sign-up for next Thursday’s Sleemans tour which will cost $5 per person and each person will receive a gift from Sleemans.
Acknowledgments/Recognition – Ed Herold
- President Herold recognized the volunteers that make up the Board of Directors and introduced each member;
Next Meeting: Annual General Meeting – Thurs., June 14th
starting @ 9:45 with coffee @ 9:15 am
Julian Sale introduced today’s guest speaker, Tim Burrows "The Future of Electric Cars"
Tim has owned and driven battery-electric cars for the past 5 years and has logged over 160,000 kilometres without the need for gasoline or diesel fuel. He now enjoys sharing his EV experience with others and breaks down many myths and misconceptions about electric vehicle ownership.
Bio:
Tim is a retired Vice-President of Forty Creek Distillery and a graduate from the University
of Toronto where he earned an honours degree in psychology.
Presentation:
(editorial note: Much of the information that Tim Burrows presented can be found through the link:
www.timtalkstesla.com )
Tim Burrows
He began by informing us that electric cars (EV) have been around since the beginning of the 20th C and actually dominated the vehicle market at the time. However, Henry Ford brought the cost of cars way down by mass assembly line production of gasoline driven cars. With the subsequent reduction in pricing of a cars by the 1930’s the gasoline driven car had replaced the electrically driven car.
In 1996 General Motors produced an electric car, the EV1, in California. But this was subsequently scrapped because they could not make a good enough business case to continue production. All the cars already made were collected and scrapped.
Today electric cars are about to become one of the most disruptive events in automotive history.
Tim told us about how the industry and technology is quickly moving toward electric cars.
Countries and already some cities are moving toward banning internal combustion engines that create smog and pollution in an effort to reduce greenhouse gases.
He particularly informed us about the Tesla models, Tesla Model ‘S’ and Tesla Model ‘X’, the model that he currently owns. He showed a brief video about EV’s and there are some video’s referenced in the link mentioned above.
There are frequently asked questions that Tim gets about EV’s which he proceeded to repeat and answer:
- Where do you get an EV charged?
- besides charging your car 95% of the time at home (over-night) there are many charging stations in numerous cities and along major highways.
- How long does it take to fully charge an EV?
- As little as 20 minutes will almost fully charge a car on a fast charger system with minor exceptions on how much charge the battery takes;
- with his current Tesla ‘X’ he can drive about 475 km on a fully charged battery.
- What is the battery life?
- Usually longer than the life-time of the car or 400,000 to 500,000 km without full battery degradation.
Electric Vehicles are simply better.
- there is much less manufacturing parts and needed repairs for a battery than for a gasoline or diesel combustion engine;
- they are silent and the only sound is what is made from the tires on pavement or the road;
- they are very powerful with lots of torque;
- you never require an oil change;
- the brakes never need to be replaced because the electric motor is what brakes the car;
- refueling the car takes less time because you simply plug it in and walk away;
- electricity compared to gasoline is much less expensive; it’s about the equivalent of 20¢ per liter;
- Having no engine in the car leaves more space and the front of the car where the engine would normally go is now a trunk.
- The biggest bonus is that EV’s are much better for the environment. Batteries components are all recoverable.
For Tesla owners on long road trips there is a large network of superchargers all across the country that will charge a car in 20 minutes.
Another innovation is connected cars with internet connection. These connections allows for downloads directly to the car for new features and improvements to the car. NAVI updates including charging locations / states are loaded directly into the navigation system.
There is an app for your phone that allows you to program the car to charge at a certain time. The app will start the car and track the car and show the state of the battery charge. Soon, an update will drive the car without the driver in it. This is the advent of self-driving cars. Every Tesla car built since October 2016 has eight hi-def cameras around it and forward-facing radar to see through fog and snow.
Three Ways Autonomous Cars will change society:
- Fewer deaths;
- greater independence for those unable to drive;
- a child born today will likely never have to learn to drive.
Jim Burrows finished his presentation by challenging us to just imagine waking up every morning with a full tank of fuel.
Following the formal part of Mr. Burrows presentation he responded to many questions from the membership. After the meeting he invited members out to the parking lot to see his Tesla ‘X’ and demonstrate its features.
Julian Sale thanked Jim Burrows for his intriguing presentation.
The next meeting is the Annual General Meeting on June 14th @ 9:45 am with Julian Sale presenting “A Sri Lanka Travelogue - Information & Images about This Fascinating Country"
Adjournment @11:10 am.
Recording Secretary: Kerry Gennings