What sounds should electric vehicles make?

[Lock]

If the law requires it make a noise I suggest the most annoying sounds known to man.
1) A woman talking incessantly ( Valley girl cadence)
2) A crying baby

Been there, done that. Marriage and parenthood teaches ya how to to tune out those sounds. Sorry.

I propose the mating cry of the Red Wattlebird
View attachment REDWATTL.wav
Lock

 

[John in CR]

Blind people will hear EV's just fine due to tire and wind noise. Others need to look anyway. Some newer ICE cars are extremely quiet, quiet enough that I missed hearing them coming up from behind. My vote is for no added noise, but 2 different horns, just like I want to put on my ebikes. A bike bell like the euro's use, to pleasantly notify peds and cyclists that I'm coming (hello here I come in a courteous manner), plus the loudest most obnoxious directional horn I can muster for oblivious cagers. The extreme noise is to make their predictable braking the norm, so I know which direction to first direct my escape route.

Idiot lawmakers advocating this added noise ridiculousness should be targeted for group visits to their home neighborhoods to demonstrate what noise pollution is.

 

[stanz]

Blind people will hear EV's just fine due to tire and wind noise.

At parking lot speed, under 5mph, a bicycle is louder than a Prius. At least a bike's rear wheel clicks when it rolls by, the Prius is silent. In a shopping center even the carts are noisier. It is incredibly quiet under 5mph.

I'm guessing that the low roll resistance tire don't make as much noise as we're used to in ICE cars.

They do make more noise backing up for some reason. There are a bunch of them in my town, I've taken the time to listen to them as they pull out of their parking spaces.

 

[liveforphysics]

Reverse is a straight-cut gear (and hence has gear-whine noise). Forward gears are helical cut, and silent.

 

[fizzit]

I say dubstep coming from a big down-facing subwoofer 8)

Even deaf people would notice that

 

[Roy Von Rogers]

I have a Zap PK truck, and I can asure you beween the whine of the Curtis controller and the tires, it is not that quiet and people can hear me.

Roy

 

[TylerDurden]

The gearbox on a CitiCar whines a bit, but a Prius in all-electric mode is deathly silent under 5mph.




Edit: removed landmine. ES remains independent.

 

[theRealFury]

The gearbox on a CitiCar whines a bit, but a Prius in all-electric mode is deathly silent under 5mph.

My bicycle is deathly silent below 5mph... doesnt mean i should be forced to play chain or tyre noise sounds of what it would sound like if i was doing 30mph. at 5mph a prius is no more dangerous than a milk float and electric milk floats have been around for a LONG time with no complaints. Get a prius up to normal road speeds and i GUARENTEE you it is no less noisy than a standard hatchback. It really does sicken me that even people on one of the best EV forums in the world can be sucked into this pointless and clearly unproven argument that a standard electric car is any less noisy than a standard ICE car at road speeds.

Show me some real 3rd party unbiased tests showing noise levels of passing cars in DB at a fixed speed and i bet you would be surprised.

 

[stanz]

My bicycle is deathly silent below 5mph... doesnt mean i should be forced to play chain or tyre noise sounds of what it would sound like if i was doing 30mph. at 5mph a prius is no more dangerous than a milk float and electric milk floats have been around for a LONG time with no complaints. Get a prius up to normal road speeds and i GUARENTEE you it is no less noisy than a standard hatchback. It really does sicken me that even people on one of the best EV forums in the world can be sucked into this pointless and clearly unproven argument that a standard electric car is any less noisy than a standard ICE car at road speeds.

Show me some real 3rd party unbiased tests showing noise levels of passing cars in DB at a fixed speed and i bet you would be surprised.

How much damage would be done if a pedestrian walked in front of your bike doing 5mph compared to a Prius?

We don't have milk floats in the states, until the latest crop of hybrids we haven't had any serious numbers of electric cars in the States since the early 1900s. The electric starter motor hastened the death of the electric car in 1911. (Actually it didn't appear in a car until 1913 but hey, the writing was on the wall.)

Yes, I concede that a Prius makes noise at higher speeds, it's 5mph and under where it's a problem.

You know what, I've expended enough cycles on this topic. I assume we will eventually have some sort of noise on cars running in EV mode at low speed, it's the way things work in today's society.

 

[theRealFury]

How much damage would be done if a pedestrian walked in front of your bike doing 5mph compared to a Prius?

Im no Scientist but i beleive that the impact of a prius at 5mph and the impact of my bycicle at 5mph would be roughly the same (unless the Prius was 3 inches wide) The only discernable difference would be the damage caused by someone getting run over by a prius as appoased to being run over by my bike at 5mph due to weight difference.

You know what, I've expended enough cycles on this topic. I assume we will eventually have some sort of noise on cars running in EV mode at low speed, it's the way things work in today's society.

I have no doubt that there will be a law put in place to make it mandatory for EV's to play some kind of stupid noise, however the main reason this will be put in place will not be for safety, it will be to stem the flow of new EV purchases because lets face it, the oil companies dont want to loose their grip on our throats until every last drop of oil is gone.

Ther eis nothing like a good debate for me but i understand that not everyone feels the same as me. At the end of the day though we all have our own oppinions on things and look at things with a different perspective. Personally i wish that we could make vehicles silent or amlost silent, but then i have my eyes so i can see them coming. If i was blind i may think differently. Living in a city centre with noisy traffic passing by night and day really helps to outline the noise pollution that vehicles make. From my perspective making a law to make it illegal to cross any vehicle right of way as a padestrian unless it is in a designated crossing with beepers and lights would be a much better use of the law rather than making vehicles emmit a false noise to alert padestrians crossing a road that it is coming.

 

[Miles]

From my perspective making a law to make it illegal to cross any vehicle right of way as a padestrian unless it is in a designated crossing with beepers and lights would be a much better use of the law rather than making vehicles emmit a false noise to alert padestrians crossing a road that it is coming.

I'd fight that one, tooth and nail....

 

[theRealFury]

From my perspective making a law to make it illegal to cross any vehicle right of way as a padestrian unless it is in a designated crossing with beepers and lights would be a much better use of the law rather than making vehicles emmit a false noise to alert padestrians crossing a road that it is coming.

I'd fight that one, tooth and nail....

Haha, i thought that might raise a few eyebrows, but to me forcing an EV to make a false noise is worse than this.

 

[Miles]

Roads are far too dominant, as it is.... Perhaps a compromise would be a zebra crossing every 50 yards? No patronising lights and bleepers for me.

 

[theRealFury]

Roads are far too dominant, as it is.... Perhaps a compromise would be a zebra crossing every 50 yards? No patronising lights and bleepers for me.

Sounds just like where i live... Welcome to England lol

 

[Miles]

Zebra crossings are wonderful.......

 

[stanz]

Living in a city centre with noisy traffic passing by night and day really helps to outline the noise pollution that vehicles make. From my perspective making a law to make it illegal to cross any vehicle right of way as a padestrian unless it is in a designated crossing with beepers and lights would be a much better use of the law rather than making vehicles emmit a false noise to alert padestrians crossing a road that it is coming.

There is the crux of the difference, I live in a small town with only a few crosswalks compared to all of the street crossings pedestrians have to make. Only our main streets have marked crossings and they have no lights. I wouldn't be able to leave my block if I needed a marked crossing, there isn't one for over 3/4 miles.

In the US pedestrians have the right of way followed by bicycles, cars and trucks are last.

I don't think we'll see the law until some kid is run over by a Prius, but we will see it in my lifetime. I'm just surprised Toyota hasn't added it as a safety feature.

It could be as simple as the sound of Al Gore muttering "global warming" over and over again.

edit: I'll give you another example why pedestrians need every advantage: I was driving around this afternoon and I stopped to allow a pedestrian to cross the street. The idiot behind me then started to pass me! If I hadn't stopped them the pedestrian might have been hit..

 

[theRealFury]

Well, i had forgot about this thread (and some of you will probably wish i had not resurrected it from down the list) but i just stumbled accross this youtube video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oypkb9mIRP8&
of an electric pikes peak hill climbing car and to me, the sound of that car is the best sounding e-car i have ever heard... if all e-cars sounded like this i would be happy

 

[Doctorbass]

That high quality and dynamic PCB will make the sound you want !!... proportional to the throttle !

It incluse a specialized sound synthesizer and sound maker with loop and other great adjustments.

http://www.modelsolutions.ca/catalog_sound_systems.htm


SFX6.4 ULTRA HIGH PERFORMANCE SOUND MODULE

Item Name : SFX6.4 Ultra High Performance Sound Module
Item Number : SFX6.4
Price : CAD$199.95
Voltage : 10 - 26Volts
Power Output : 40 Watts (peak) at 26Volts!!
Dimensions : 44mm x 68mm x 14mm (1.73" x 2.68" x 0.6")
Weight : ONLY 24 grams (0.85oz)!
Maximum Sample Rate : 16 bit, 46875 samples/second
Sound Output Level : 106dB!! at 26 Volts using two of our
4" 20Watt 4Ohm Speakers in series

These modules offer TWO completely independent throttle controlled engine sounds which are proportional to two throttle stick positions. Both forwards only (e.g. model aircraft) and forwards/reverse (e.g. model boats and tanks) are accommodated. In addition, up to 16 other sounds can be controlled using a spare channel.

For model tanks and naval vessels, the second proportional "engine" sound can be used as a proportional gun turret rotation sound. This means that the speed of the turret rotation sound is proportional to the amount of stick movement from its centre position.

Remote Volume Control is possible if eitherThrottle2 orSoundSelect2 inputs are not used.

You can download your own sounds to this module using its USB interface and the user friendly SFXPC3 Windows 7/Vista/Windows XP 32/64 bit application.
A mini-B USB port is on-board.

Doc

 

[PedalingBiped]

I work in a warehouse setting/loading dock. Forklifts are required to have a backup alarm. With 40 lifts, its hard to know one is coming, the sound is already deafening with all the alarms going "beep - beep"

it would be the same with a large proportion of electric vehicles on the road. Maybe make the tire manufactures put noise treads on the tires.

But again, its just more noise.

Modern cars in the grocery store parking lot don't make noise either.

 

[Hillhater]

.... a prius is no more dangerous than a milk float and electric milk floats have been around for a LONG time with no complaints. .

Milk float + 10 dozen empty pint bottles + no suspension & solid tyres + pot holes = plenty noisy ! :lol: :lol:
... you can hear them coming in the next town !

 

[stanz]

.... a prius is no more dangerous than a milk float and electric milk floats have been around for a LONG time with no complaints. .

Milk float + 10 dozen empty pint bottles + no suspension & solid tyres + pot holes = plenty noisy ! :lol: :lol:
... you can hear them coming in the next town !

Here's a youtube video of a milk float, hardly silent:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pPDHX-aI8mw&feature=related

 

[wheelbender6]

Tie fighter from Star Wars.

 

[Kingfish]

None, except the road noise of tires rolling, or the sound of slip-streaming through the wind.

Although I suppose there could be peaceable alternatives, such as the sound of a hummingbird or that of the cricket or chirping beetle.

But then wouldn’t the gangsta-rap-hip-hop or the rudely-loud cellphone conversation be enough?

Silently, KF

 

[amberwolf]

What Simon and Garfunkel once said.


Really, more noise is not the solution.

Teaching people to pay attention to the world around them is.

I know that will never happen, because they only learn that they should do this when they get hurt, and then blame the other for it, but it is what would fix the problem best.

 

[el_bassboi_sv]

I just dont see how our bikes making noise will actually get someone in a vehicle to hear you unless you sound like a motorbike with the baffles out of the exhaust....

Or you could just get one of these... Loud and obnoxious 8)

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/07/random-green-product-of-the-day-ecoblaster-air-horn.php