[cricketo]

Do wonder some things on that 2012 EV model:

1. Would the batteries be as good? how much would they degrade if they are from 2012?
2. how about the weight to capacity ratio of the batteries?
3. how was the electric motor technology back in 2012? did the efficiency stay the same to modern third party electric engines?
4. the car seems a lot heavier too at 1829kg, while only having 166km range. this sounds like a problem.
5. It looks like it only has a slow charger port, and saw it described as needing more than 24h to fully recharge.

if interested in the 3 door version, it was discontinued after 2005 or so, so there doesn't exist a modern variant, nor an electric version.
Wouldnt a DIY approuch save weight, while improving range, efficiency & recharge rate compared to that 2012 ev model? or would that be too optimistic? i'd love to hear your analysis.

offnote: seems that standard ev model rav4 also has around 42kWh battery capacity, but the range is 166km instead and has 25hp more compared to standard older models needing 115kW instead of 92kW. (i guess that has to do with the higher weight)

second gen (2012) Rav4 EV was using a drivetrain supplied by Tesla. That drivetrain was cobbled together out of Model S and Roadster components, obviously from that period, so performance / longevity would be on par with Tesla vehicles of that time.

 

[cricketo]

Batteries from 2012 would not be in the best shape most likely.

A DIY version could very well be more capable than the RAV4 EV, that car was not far off from a DIY anyways (tesla parts cobbled together to produce a small number of units).

Cost is another story however. An EV conversion is almost never cheaper than just buying a used factory EV.

I don't know how much NCA cells degrade from the age alone, but let's consider this. That vehicle had a range of roughly 100mi on a charge. I've recently seen a 2014 Rav4 EV with 40,000mi on it - that would be 400 full cycles. Those cells should be able to take a couple of thousand cycles pretty well. Additionally, there was no ChaDeMo adapter on most of them, so they all were charged rather slowly without stressing the cells.

Even though the drivetrain was "cobbled together", it was still properly engineered and built out of parts Tesla engineered for their other vehicles. There is no way 99% of DIYers can match that.

 

[cricketo]

Fair point. Battery technology has come a long way though, and a DIYer can certainly convert a gas RAV4 with more than the 103 miles of range of the OEM (2014) variant.

Toyota also wasn't even pushing the limits at the time, as the RAV4 EV was primarily a compliance car to meet California fleet emissions standards.

There are no magical unicorns that came to exist since 2014. There are EVs that achieve significantly more range because of the classic reasons - bigger battery packs, better aerodynamics, lower overall weight, and in exotic cases high efficiency motors. Nearly none of these factors will apply to a home conversion of a gas vehicle. So if anything, I would expect a DIY conversion to do WORSE than 103 miles.

 

[cricketo]

Per wikipedia, the battery pack in the RAV4 EV weighed 840lbs and had a total capacity of just 41kwh. It's a NiMH pack, less energy dense than today's (mostly) lithium packs. Production technology and scale have improved and have made lithium cells economical enough for use in EVs.

Throw in 12 Tesla modules from a recent LR model S/X and I'd expect range to be 160+ miles.

First of all, there were two generations of the electric Rav - first one indeed used a NiMH pack. Second generation is the one with the 41kWh Lithium pack you're describing. It's all on that same Wikipedia page, you just got to go through the entire page I don't know where you're going to throw 12 Tesla modules, but you would need approximately 72kWh battery pack to move that vehicle 160miles.

 

[cricketo]

Ah, you are right. I'll blame reading on my phone lol...

Regardless though, 840lbs for 41kwh of capacity is far worse than more recent vehicles. A model S pack weighs 45% more but has 150% more energy capacity.

12 modules shouldn't be too difficult. I have 10 in a Ford Escape, without compromising interior space. Throw a couple in the trunk and you'll have no issue with space.

This 40kWh pack is built out of 18650's, just like the Model S pack. It will be slightly heavier than battery packs made out of pouch or even prismatic cells due to large amount of "packaging" material, but your comparison to a Model S pack is not apples to apples. Each factory battery pack will have a bunch of components that take a certain amount of weight independently of the capacity. Then there also will be some things that will scale non-linearly. Building your own you can of course take shortcuts, and omit things like the enclosure for the entire battery, especially if you're willing to sacrifice the interior room instead of mounting it under the vehicle. Then from the capacity standpoint (and contributing to weight) it really depends on the era of your Model S donor - it is likely that capacity of the cells has changed slightly over the years, but if you go back as far as 2014, you'd likely get the same ones that were used for Rav4.

I see that for Model S 85kWh pack is 6216 and 7104 cell counts are cited in different places. Which one are you looking at for comparison ?