T.a. edison told henry ford he had an electric battery that would make gasoline engines obsolete, wha happen?

Question

anyone scrummage around and find out how he made it?

Answer 1

The original Electric Car is on display at the RE Olds museum in Lansing, Michigan.

Recognize that this was in the early 1900's. Vehicles were lucky to top out at 30 MPH. Electric vehicles were very viable then, but gas was cheap, and abundant.

It doens't take anyone now to have to "scrummage" around to find out how he made it. You can get any group of automotive engineering students in a university to be able to build an electric car. I did it when I was in college in 1994.

The technology is there, and if you think the Auto companies don't know how to do it, you are fooling yourself. The issue is battery technology itself. Batteries that can store the power current vehicles need to go 80MPH, and over 400 miles on ONE CHARGE are difficult to make, requiring dangerous chemicals, and adding immense amounts of weight to the vehicle.

Edison's batterys, were likely lead based, and most industries are now trying to remove lead from all products, even in tiny amounts, because of the health and environmental risks involved. Lead will wreck your immune system. A leaking battery will cause havoc to any other materials around it.

The batteries of choice in the 90s were Nickel-Metal Hydride. They did a great job on the vehicle my college built in 1994, but they were expensive - beyond the range of the average consumer. We needed 6 of  them, that took up the space of an average sedan trunk, and they weighed about 1000 pounds. Difficult to install, difficult to maintain, and very challenging to design a vehicle around them.

Add on top of that that electric cars need a charging station. These batteries we used couldn't be charged by simply plugging them into a 110 outlet in the wall. They still needed hours to charge, and had to go through a converter that carried a HIGH and DANGEROUS charge in it. Think about having a power station in your garage to power your car. Not to mention, needing to have one at your office, or at a hotel you might stop at during a long road trip.

The technology is there, it has been for over 100 years. But the technology is not as simple as an ICE engine. The infrastructure does not support it, nor does the consumer base. Just ask GM about their EV One, a fully electric vehicle they built in the 90s, and ended up shuttering due to pressure from the oil industry, consumers, and the cost to maintain a low volume vehicle that was only a niche market, at best, at the time.

Answer 2

Edison also tried to sell DC current as a better answer than AC in (houses and communities) he electrocuted an elephant to prove his point I think and some other cockamany schemes.

Answer 3

A 1907 battery may have been better than a 1907 gas engine, but a 2007 battery is not nearly as good as a 2007 gas engine. Batteries have not improved nearly as much as gas engines in the last 100 years. And a 1907 battery is not even as good as a 2007 battery. There is no way there is some super battery that Edison invented that has been lost or hidden. No way at all.

Answer 4

Edison was a great inovator, but he also had a history of going down the wrong path and persisting beyond the point that most people would have realized they were wrong.  His persistence on using direct current as opposed to alternating current (which is what we all use now) is a classic example.  This mystery battery is most likely another.

Answer 5

KB's answer has some of the information.  Back in Ford's time, cars didn't need to go fast or far.  Now if you get a car that can only go short distances and top out at 30 mph, hardly anyone wants it.

Battery technology is advancing.  NiMh batteries have made some decent short-range EVs possible:

http://zapworld.com/electric-vehicles/el...

http://www.milesev.com/

http://www.zenncars.com/

Now advances in lithium ion battery technology are making long-range high-speed and reasonably affordable EVs possible in the near future (around 2009):

http://zapworld.com/electric-vehicles

http://www.milesev.com/

http://phoenixmotorcars.com/

Answer 6

Edison was wrong. Electric cars have been tried and failed over and over. Its the batteries. To heavy, To expensive, combined with short range.

Answer 7

It was just a dream . It takes real power to run a car at 70 mph.

Answer 8

What happened?

Massive discoveries of fossil fuels.  At the time those appeared to be the cheapest way to go, now that's proving not to be true, for several reasons.

Answer 9

Edison said lots of things.  He even worked on making a radio that could talk to the dead.  I doubt that he ever made a battery that could make a gasoline engine obsolete.

Answer 10

The proper quote is:

Thomas Edison invented the alkaline battery. My Baker still has some original alkaline batteries. These have lead plates and use acid; we wash them out and refill them regularly and I'll use them indefinitely. But even Edison realized the future of the automobile was elsewhere. Legend has it that back in 1896, at a dinner party, he passed a note to his friend Henry Ford. Essentially it said, "The electric car is dead."

Jay Leno's article on the Baker electric car.