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Comment Re:Life Expectancy Study. (Score 1) 115

Note that the failure rate for given kWh battery is independent of the number of cells. Batteries are basically a sandwich of anode, separator, cathode, and you need a certain area of sandwich to get a given capacity. Most failures are due to opens or bridging across the separator, so the failure rate is set by the size of the sandwich. It doesn't matter if you cut it into long strips and fold them into a prismatic cell, or cut it into short narrow strips, and roll them up and put them into cylinders.

Comment Re:Life Expectancy Study. (Score 4, Informative) 115

There are two approaches to battery design: 1) Use a few large cells. The Porsche Taycon Performance Battery uses 28 modules in series, each module 2 cells in parallel, 6 in series, 396 cells total. If a single cell fails, you lose 1/396th of your range and half your max power-- so the battery must be repaired. This means the modules must be easily removeable and serviceable, which means lots of connectors (subject to corrosion/vibration), and lots of steel. 2) Use a large number of small cells in large modules. The Tesla model 3 Performance uses 4 modules in series, each 46 cells parallel, 23 or 25 cells in series, 4,416 cells total. If a single cells fails, you lose 1/4416th of your range, and 1/46 of your max power. Cell failures are treated like bad sectors on a disk, or bad pixels in an LCD -- a certain number are expected, and the capacity is derated to account. This allows more soldered/welded connections instead of removeable connectors, use of glue, and less steel. Both schemes work -- Tesla Model Y (and presumabely Cybercab) LFP batteries use approach #1.

Comment Low latency is the killer ap (Score 1) 129

What people aren't realizing is that once the Starlink satelite-to-satelite laser links are running, Starlink will essentially have a monopoly on the lowest latency internet. High frequency traders, intelligence services, gamers, etc will pay unlimited money to have lower latency than the competition. Internet latency over long distances is dominated by time-of-flight, not time-through-routers. The speed of light in a vacuum is C; the speed of light in optical fiber is 0.7 * C. Starlink is only 300 miles up; that's trivial compared with global distances, and it can beam data in straight lines between satelites, forming a geodesic. Optical fiber, on the other hand, mainly follows highways and railroads, which follow rivers and valleys, because that is where people settled. Under ocean cables do follow a great circle route, but generally take the shortest route between continents to minimize the underwater spans. The faster optical speed plus shorter distances will be unbeatable (except by other massive LEO constellations). And SpaceX is the only constellation provider that also has their own rockets.

Comment Re:Plus (Score 1) 191

I don't have a garage, have multiple cars, and charge my Model 3 in my driveway (in rainy snowy New England). EV wall chargers have a relay in them; they don't energize the cable until it's plugged in and no ground fault is detected. When unplugging, the car won't unlock the cable until it's de-energized. Totally safe.

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