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Comment on Future apocalypse movies won't have survivors scavaging abandoned cars.

Kinda wrong.

You can’t get enough solar energy to directly drive a car any practical distance, but you aren’t actually driving your car most of the time. When you look at weekly energy requirements, most drivers would be able to accumulate enough energy for all of their driving with just a few decent panels. You would need a battery to take advantage of this, or only drive at night.

Also, check out the solar cannonball run. A guy made a mobile rig of like 40 flexible panels and drove a Model three across the US using only solar charging.

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podperson@lemm.ee ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
Just gonna leave this here:

aptera.us

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- Bytemeister@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
  Oh boy.
  
  Alrighty not even gonna click that link, here is why…
  
  Aptera claims to get about 40 miles of range per day with their full solar package and ideal conditions. Which is fantastic! But, it’s not the solar technology that makes that car viable, its the high efficiency of their vehicle. If we assume 40 miles per day, 12 hours of sun, you could hypothetically directly drive the Aptera with solar at a blistering …3.3mph. To put it simply, unless solar panels get an order of magnitude more efficient, we are not going to get a direct solar driven vehicle. It will always be solar plus a big ass battery.
  
  I’ve been watching Aptera closely since 2015, and I already have a reservation for one. That’s the other reason I don’t have to click that link. I get updates straight into my feed and I’ve gone over their documents multiple times forward and back.
  
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  - podperson@lemm.ee ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
    Correct - not direct drive, but seems like that’s not really a necessary goal for most of us. If you really need to be able to just drive non stop all day while the sun is out, I don’t think that’s been solved yet (would still have to stop for gas even).
    
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    Bytemeister@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago
    Hence why I said “Kinda Wrong” .
    
    Practically any solar panel can fully recharge an EV, it’s just a matter of how long it’s going to take. Sure there are some battery losses, yada yada, but a single 100W panel would charge up an EV in a few months.
    
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spankmonkey@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago

practical

If the car is tied to a location that is already safe and secure in a post apocalyptic setting, then sure. But a post apocalyptic car is really only needed to haul stuff around or as protection against things outside the vehicle, and depending on the apocalypse you likely need to stay mobile, reinforce a secure location, or relocate to somewhere remote away from urban areas. Transporting the panels to a remote location will take time and effort, and if you need to be mobile you won’t have time to charge.

Now if you had a rural home with solar panels on the roof and the location was secure an electric car would serve you well until something mechanical or the batteries failed and if you didn’t need to travel far you could use it regularly too.

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