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Hybrid Electric Vehicles

These electric skid steers are starting to show up in Canada, or at least B.C.
Now on our farm we do use both tracked and wheeled skid steer loaders, they are both Kubota brand, and of course diesel. They are not expensive to operate, as long as I can stay ahead on maintenance and preventive maintenance. I’ve busted knuckles a few times on the old monkey wrench, but that’s part of the fun I guess.
That being said, I’d be willing to try an electric model if, and only if, it can run 5-6 hours without recharging, I can buy it used, and only if I can do the maintenance without involving very expensive technicians making field calls.

Pro and Pre had electric forklifts. Did they go into storage or sent over to Asterix?
 
do we write of the 25B we have invested in battery plants? Seems like with local manufacturers backing down the lion's share of production will go to the far east and I can't see shipping batteries from here to supply them?
Well if we convert them to ammunition and drone plants they might turn a profit.
 
On a go-forward basis perhaps, but 'retro-burial' would be prohibitively expensive. Besides, I recall a large part of the original ice storm problem was high voltage transmission towers, and it is impractical to bury those.


I heard that it used to be a local backyard industry to 're-shoe' brake pads (Don't know if it still is). It must have been quite a toxic brew in the days of asbestos.
Re-shoe brak pads? Why? You can get them new for as little as under $20 at Canadian Tire.
 
That was quite common in the 80/90's and you could get your shoes cut to fit your drums properly.
I grew up wrenching in the 90's and I never seen it done, I heard about it being done so I think 70/80's might be more accurate.

Some heavy duty brakes still use replaceable, bolt on friction material. The only ones I have seen have been on highway coach busses. But the new material is sold formed and cut with counter sunk bolt holes in it.

Less and less are even remanufactured anymore. (No-core) the last few semi trailers I did brake jobs on were new brakes where I didn't have to return the cores. It costs too much to ship them back to the factory to be re-lined
 
I grew up wrenching in the 90's and I never seen it done, I heard about it being done so I think 70/80's might be more accurate.

Some heavy duty brakes still use replaceable, bolt on friction material. The only ones I have seen have been on highway coach busses. But the new material is sold formed and cut with counter sunk bolt holes in it.

Less and less are even remanufactured anymore. (No-core) the last few semi trailers I did brake jobs on were new brakes where I didn't have to return the cores. It costs too much to ship them back to the factory to be re-lined
Yup, unless the cores are for components with valuable metals (like alternators w copper, etc) it’s easier to chuck out the old core.
 
I grew up wrenching in the 90's and I never seen it done, I heard about it being done so I think 70/80's might be more accurate.

Some heavy duty brakes still use replaceable, bolt on friction material. The only ones I have seen have been on highway coach busses. But the new material is sold formed and cut with counter sunk bolt holes in it.

Less and less are even remanufactured anymore. (No-core) the last few semi trailers I did brake jobs on were new brakes where I didn't have to return the cores. It costs too much to ship them back to the factory to be re-lined
There was still one place in Vancouver on Fraser doing them in the early 90's. We drop off a whack of old Landrover shoes and pick them up a few weeks later. Better quality than we go from the overseas places and a better price. I am sure all the people working their died of cancer.....
 
It's mainly about the subsidies, of course....

A Once Unthinkable Question: Could Electric-Vehicle Sales Decline This Year?​


The story of EV success is, in large part, a story about subsidies and government regulations — not just in the U.S. but around the world. Now that subsidies are shrinking or ending altogether, customers are already shunning the vehicles. After Germany abruptly ended its €6,700 subsidy for 2024, EV sales dropped immediately — even after carmakers said they would cover some of those costs. Similar cuts are taking place in France and are likely to happen soon in Norway. In the U.S., the number of cars that qualified for a $7,500 rebate dropped, with Ford’s month-over-month January-sales slide an early warning sign. And the opposite also appears to be true. According to Bloomberg, sales in China — where subsidies will continue through at least 2028 — are expected to rise to nearly 10 million this year, making the country the biggest single market in the world.

 
As I recall those Chinese subsidies only apply to domestically made cars as well. So manufacturers cannot take to much advantage of the market and there is to much turmoil and risk to expand production there.
 
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