In this video he explains why he bought his old car, perfectly understandable, I got nothing against it ... served him well for ~10 years ... whatever... BUT the new car he bought is a excellent car, I couldn't pick a better one for today's infrastructure ... the problem starts as he's explaining why he bought it.
Long story short he doesn't understand how it works AT ALL! OK, maybe i'm exaggerating a bit, as I've followed the electric car industry closely for the past 3-4 years, so it's somewhat understandable that not everybody knows as much about them as i do, but GEEEEZ ... he pretends to know about technology in all those youtube videos .. and he doesn't know the first thing about plugin hybrids, nor about electric cars in general ... Shame on you, Linus!
The second generation Chevy Volt (which Linus bought used) has an all electric range of 50 miles and another hundred something miles on dinosaur juice. The battery can be charged from the grid or from the internal combustion engine, using gasoline.
As you can see in the picture above, the Chevy Volt's drivetrain is even more complicated than an ICE cars', but at least it is very flexible when it comes to operation, as it has:
- pure EV mode - the battery powers 1-2 motors to move the car up to 50 miles
- mixed mode - the computer decides when and which motor it uses
- generator mode - the gas engine charges the batteries and also powers one electric motor, which moves the car
- pure gas mode - the gas engine moves the car with or without charging the battery pack
*not necessarily 100% accurate, but IMO these are the logical modes, if you consider the components
This is all fine and dandy, if you're not sure what situations you'll be getting into with your car ... BUT the truth is that most people know, even if they don't want to admit it to themselves: a pure EV is all they need.
A pure EV is much more simple, has about 50 times less moving parts ... and it's much easier to operate.
As i tried to illustrate in the second photo, an EV only needs one battery, power electronics and one electric motor connected directly to the wheels (with gear reduction and differential, of course).
Teslas are the best available EVs out there, and they have a gear ratio of 9.3 to 1, perfectly fine for up to 155mph in just one gear, without any mechanical trickery (like Toyota's eCVT).
Q: So why would you buy a Hybrid or Plugin Hybrid today, when fast charging stations are all over the place?
A: Only when you travel to places without electricity, and the ~200 mile range of the average EV can't get you there and back.... BUT I DARE YOU to show me a place like that on Earth!
Where does Linus go, where he's more than 100 miles away from one of these dots, where he can fill up a Tesla for free in about 30-45 minutes?