Harvester Talk: Q&A
- Thread starter Harris005
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And if I may add one more thing to your one more thing in the form of a question to Scout?
If a Harvester could run its onboard generator to charge itself while parked… could it also be used to charge a Scout EV sitting next to it??? A lot of camping happens out on the trails. These downtimes would be perfect for generator charging your Harvester rig and your pure EV Scout buddies.
I'd imagine so.
One of the appeals for the Harvester, is the ability to act as a "large portable generator". People are talking about using them to power their house during power outages, or other things like that. In fact, we've been talking for ages about how exactly the harvester will be implemented, if its big enough to keep up with the electrical demands of the vehicle while its on the highway, or not.
But almost no matter what, the generator will be more powerful than any L2 charger you can find/plug into the 240v outlet.
The generator in the harvester needs to be at least 35-40KW to keep up with the highway demands, and the smallest EREV generator we've ever seen on the market (for the BMW i3, which is a MUCH smaller vehicle), was 25KW.
My home L2 charger is 7.7KW. And I think I've seen up to 19KW?
So yeah, the generator will the umph to charge another vehicle, if it has the connections for it.
And honestly, not a bad usecase for it. You can rescue any stranded EV.
Again, I totally agree. It seems like generally, towing reduces range by ~50% (I've been reading many of the same reviews/reports it seems).
I think we differ primarily on expectations. Perhaps my expectations are wrong. But my expectation is on a long road trip, is that I will not HAVE to charge at ALL while, unless I want to. Otherwise the benefit of having a gas engine seems perhaps not worth the cost/complexity, if all it does is delay how long until you need to refuel, and also recharge (just making that stop take longer than if you had to do just one, and also the pain of finding two of those next to each other).
Its my believe that this expectation (and specifically, to do it while towing) is why the Ramcharger has a relatively large gas engine, and a huge 27gal fuel tank. Because I believe they're trying to make sure that someone can tow with it, and still get decent highway range out of it on the road (while retaining the EV benefits while commuting locally).
Given, I don't think that the Scouts will be using such a large gas engine, and also don't think it will be subjected to exactly the same expectations either (most people buying these are likely more interested in the offroady-ness of them, rather than people that want to tow camper trailers long distances... although there is some overlap). But if the gas engine can't generate the power needed to at the very least keep up with the demands under "relatively common heavy use cases" like high speeds on the highway with bikes on a rack, or towing 50% of the rated max load for long distances through the mountains, that would be a major disappointment for me.
So I'm fairly new to wanting an EV since they are finally gaining in their ability to go distances and actually live up to their abilities instead of just being some cute hipster social badge. My confusion and honestly my hesitation to owning one is that all manufacturers talk about 0-60mph at a blink, 10k+ towing capacity, insane amounts of torque... but in the fine print they only can go a few miles at these boasts. SCOUT is based on a brand that boasts freedoms to go and do what you needed to do in the boondocks and make it back... so that's what I'm expecting from them since they said they could do it. If not I'll be happy with my gas guzzler until technology changes. It still cracks me up to hear people say they want pure electric vehicles but also are seemingly oblivious as to how much more fossil fuels are being used to produce the power to charge the vehicles, I love the outdoors and love exploring them, it would be so incredible to be able to explore and not take along the noise and physical pollutants of gas vehicle.
Looking forward to see what SCOUT brings to the table.
Looking forward to see what SCOUT brings to the table.
The “Refuel Anywhere” leads people to believe they can get gas and keep going without worrying about charging. Even the smaller note about “go the extra mile, and then a couple hundred more” makes it sound like you can travel north of the 500 miles on gas alone.
I'm sure you can just gas and go indefinitely. There is nothing from Scout Motors to indicate otherwise.
It's just a vocal minority on this forum, are assuming the Generator Engine is tool small to do that, so they think you can't use the range extender to drive down the highway once you exhaust the battery.
Not sure I understand why the ad jargon is misleading: it doesn’t say “Go an extra 502 miles, and then exactly 254 more, all on gas.”
The point of the Harvester is to keep the battery charged. It’s not powering the drivetrain or doing anything other than recharging the battery. I don’t think this is making any kind of bold claims.
As I was new to EV when joining 2 years ago (still don’t own one-yet!) I’ve learned a lot. I’ve said before-I started on hear because of my love of Scout and hoping for 34 years that someday I’d drive another. I don’t truly think most members here are environmentalists looking to eliminate fossil fuels. I’ve learned on here that an EV is a much simpler vehicle, I can refuel at home and yeah-there is some environmental advantages that may help the earth stay nice enough for my future grand children and the way it looks for changes coming any little bit of environmental friendliness is an added bonus.
As for bursts of power it just drains batteries faster, no different than burning gas faster. If you can home charge and want to rocket around the neighborhood for a few laps you can do that, then park it in the garage and charge it back up again for another go.
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Hopefully battery tech will improved by 2027 and the battery only range + harvester could be closer to 200 miles on the battery before engine kicks on….
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Winter coming to many up north things to consider is how Range on the battery is reduced by almost 20 %.
I've been looking at the different models of Range Extended EVs available and I hope Scout follows the Ramcharger model and not try to refill the battery alone, but allow the generator to send power directly to the electric motors. If fact, I don't care if the onboard generator powers the battery at all (that's what the wall charger's for) as long as it supplies enough power to haul and tow to the electric motors. 100 miles battery only is enough to allow an EV lifestyle day to day; when it's drained, I can plug it in to reacharge. But under no circumstances should the harvester version become usless or even crippled as long as ICE has gasoline.
The Ramcharger advertises a 130 kw onboard generator, so I've been trying to find small form factor generators with similar power output get a better idea what the harvester generator may look like. Turns out, they're not a large as I thought - https://www.electricgeneratorsdirec...ick-the-Perfect-Power-Take-Off-Generator.html
The Ramcharger advertises a 130 kw onboard generator, so I've been trying to find small form factor generators with similar power output get a better idea what the harvester generator may look like. Turns out, they're not a large as I thought - https://www.electricgeneratorsdirec...ick-the-Perfect-Power-Take-Off-Generator.html
Those generators aren't that large because they don't include the gas engine. The gas engine in the tractor is used to turn them. Include that, and they would be rather large.
Of course
Of course, following the Ramcharger model I hope the harvester delivers an electric drive train powered by a gasoline generator with enough output to power the Terra as a useful truck. The battery is then a (massive) MPG booster if you don't typically drive farther than the battery pack range. Most days under casual usage you'd use 0 gas. Even if the harvester motor isn't much more efficient than a standard ICE vehicle, not using it for trips under the battery pack range would be huge gasoline reduction for some.
This is PHEV life.
I have a PHEV (my first ever hybrid vehicle). It has a tiny 33 mile range.
Yet, in the last 7800 miles, I've averaged ~245mpg. I went ~2400 miles on one tank this summer (its an 11 gal tank). It gets ~33mpg while on the highway operating in "normal hybrid mode". I think our lifetime avg is somewhere around ~90-100mpg atm (this summer we didn't do it, but the other years we did a 900 mile one way road trip, that adds somewhere around 3k miles of only gas mode operation to the mix).
With a 150 mile EV range, I actually don't know if I would have hit any gas use this year (maybe once, or twice). And I think thats the attraction with the Harvester. Day to day, its an EV. Long trips/off grid, you can also use fuel.
The Ramcharger model includes a giant 3.6L Pentastar V6.
The Terra will have a giant frunk and additional storage capacity - quite a different set-up than "the Ramcharger model" you refer to. Ram has some serious work to do when it comes to competition. They sit squarely in the 3rd spot for BIG 3 truck sales, wayyyy behind FORD.
The lackluster & traditional design of the new Ramcharger may appeal to the existing Ram truck ownership base, but since that represents only a fractional ownership pool when compared to Ford and Chevy, I'm not sure that appeal will go far. The new Scout will likely attract buyers from a much broader consumer base with and will pull truck buyers from the traditional BIG 3. I can also see the Terra appealing to Toyota, Honda, Nissan, Rivian owners, etc.
Scout has a huge opportunity to take truck marketshare straight out of the gate. I love the fact that they appear to be distinguishing themselves from the Ramcharger, and not following that exact same model. In fact, if the Terra had a giant V6 and looked like an ICE truck from 2009, it would be far less interesting.
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A bit new to EV's myself, my partners family all has them and she just got one herself.
Currently have a Ford Maverick Hybrid, which I love because even though it's a baby truck, it gets 40 MPG on most days. The harvester seems like a bit of a no-brainer for me in an idealistic world. I'm really curious about the exacts of how it will work (which I don't think are published yet) that might not get me to a pure EV, but gets one step above the current mode I have.
That said, right now though, the intent on the harvester is a bit concerning in my opinion between the speculated performance, range, and exact specifications on it. I'm optimistically watching and eager to see exact specs and the how it works idea in the future.
Currently have a Ford Maverick Hybrid, which I love because even though it's a baby truck, it gets 40 MPG on most days. The harvester seems like a bit of a no-brainer for me in an idealistic world. I'm really curious about the exacts of how it will work (which I don't think are published yet) that might not get me to a pure EV, but gets one step above the current mode I have.
That said, right now though, the intent on the harvester is a bit concerning in my opinion between the speculated performance, range, and exact specifications on it. I'm optimistically watching and eager to see exact specs and the how it works idea in the future.
I wouldn't count on that. The current range claims are already pushing the limits of know battery technology given the size of vehicle and battery pack.
Battery tech improves every year but it's incremental, not leaps and bounds. It's historically been on the order of 1 or 2% improvement per year as far as energy density and the like. Remember, despite what many people believe EVs have been around for a long time now, they are a mature technology at this point. Don't believe the hype about magical battery breakthroughs, that's all nonsense. There are and have been a lot of very smart and very dedicated people working on improving battery technology for decades now. Any magical breakthroughs have already happened. There are limits to what can be done and are imposed by the laws of chemistry and physics. Humans are pretty clever though and chip away at problems, that's why we've seen pretty consistent improvements of a couple percentage points a year.
For those wanting the Harvester to power the drivetrain, go buy a hybrid or a PHEV. I have a Ford F-150 PowerBoost and that's exactly how it works. 100% battery at (very) low speed and (very) short distances, gas kicks on at highway speeds, when more power is needed (towing) and to charge the EV battery as they are depleted. It gets 1mpg better gas mileage than the non-hybrid version, lol. In other words, that setup just doesn't prove sufficiently beneficial. I will spend more in maintenance, batteries, and a whole host of other bugs than I'll ever get back. It's the reason I want a pure EV with a gas generator that only serves as a generator. It makes the EV architecture the sole focus, with some added reassurance of a generator to help when no plugs are available. Broken down to the most simplistic elements, Scout is building an EV and supplying a gas-powered generator with every purchase to charge it. Granted it's gonna be considerably nicer than your standard, backyard generator, and will have it's own host of systems, software, control, design, etc. But at the end of the day, the Harvester is a portable battery charger, that's it.
