EDIT: Vehicle balance was reverted, including muscle engines. Most of this post is out of date, please ignore.
Part I: Rollerblades go 55kph (96kph if sprinting), best “Bicycle” can go 48kph [Edit: new safe speed is 64, unsafe speed is higher]
Part II: For Electric Engines, increasing speed doubles fuel consumption, doubling mass doubles fuel consumption. A 1300kg electric motor vehicle with one storage battery goes about 120 map tiles at 32kph, 60 map tiles at 64kph, with fuel consumption approximately doubling with each increase in speed or doubling in mass. A single storage battery takes about 5 days to charge from a single Quantum Solar Panel, 3 Upgraded Solar Panels, or 6 Solar Panels (assuming no rain, snow, or clouds and 15 hour days).
-----Part I: Speed Limits, Sprinting Rollerblades, Muscle Engines are Useless---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I did some tests comparing walking, sprinting, rollerblades, bicycles, and electric engines. Before I show my results, lets go over what the “practical” speed limits in CDDA are:
32kph Zombie speed (also speed at which it is safe to gently push cars off the road with a steamroller)
48kph Faster than a zombie (aka "sprinting)
64kph Ramming speed (many players never go over this speed for safety reasons)
96kph Cruising speed
128kph Unsafe speed (…to ram moose without a seatbelt)
Got that? Okay, now here are the current speeds in CDDA. I got these results by recording the minutes/seconds that passed in the time needed to pass through 10 overmap tiles. Due to how turns are calculated these results are approximations. I’m assuming no speed related perks, <10 encumbrance, 100 base speed and 100 movement cost on a straight paved road.
32kph Walking (or a bicycle loaded with heavy stuff)
51kph Sprinting (note: a character with “indefatigueable” can only sprint a little over 7 overmap tiles before exhaustion, a light bike can travel 10 without breaking a sweat).
55kph Rollerblades
64kph Bicycle speed [This is the new safe speed, before it’s max speed was 48]
97kph Rollerblades while sprinting (@#$#@$%???)
Now, in case you forgot, 96kph is a bit faster than RAMMING speed, is 4x faster than a zombie, twice as fast as the fastest “Bicycle”, and is essentially a speed normally reserved for vehicles. And I didn’t even have the “+15% speed on sure footing” or “+10% move speed” traits! To make things even worse, the fastest “Bicycle” folds to 3kg and 6L. Rollerblades are 1.64kg 3.75L! That’s right, you heard it hear first folks, you are better off with a pair of rollerblades than a folding muscle vehicle!
------Part II: Electric Vehicles--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[EDIT: This section is out of date. Engine speeds (and I assume, efficiency?) has been increased. My conclusion that increasing speed by one step or by doubling mass, you double fuel consumption per distance traveled, is still likely true as a rule of thumb.]
How viable are folding electric vehicles? Well, the Small Electric engine can move 21kg at 32kph at 16 electric charge per overmap tile. That’s 31 map tiles on a full small storage battery! For reference, recharging a small storage battery takes 5.5 hours of sun for a solar panel, 2.7 hours if upgraded, or .9 hours if quantum (mass of solar panel and storage not included in fuel efficiency test). Using the rule of thumb that doubling mass OR increasing speed by 1 step doubles fuel consumption, the above vehicle with added solar panel and floor trunk full of water (note: many junk items are twice as dense as water) will travel at 64kph at the cost of about 128 charge per overmap tile for a range of just over 3 map tiles on a full small battery (that recharges with 1 hour of sun with a Quantum Solar Panel!)
Well dang, looks like small storage batteries won’t make a good lootbike. How about a 1x1, 211kg, electric engine with a Storage Battery? Look below for the results of my tests (Note: The mass of a solar panel, cargo, and loot is not included. Note that doubling mass approximately doubles fuel consumption. A cargo carrier filled with water bottles will approximately double vehicle mass).
Small Electric Engine
32kph: 45.6cpm (chare per overmap tile) 877mr (overmap tile range on a full storage battery)
64kph: 90.5cpm 445mr (If you add a cargo carrier full of loot, you’re max speed will probably be lower than this).
80kph: 109.8cpm 364mr (Sprinting rollerblades are much faster)
Electric engine:
32kph: 47.2cpm 847mr
64kph: 92.3cpm 422mr
96kph: 138.9cpm 287mr
193kph: 487.3cpm 82mr (max speed for a 200kg handle with an electric engine)
Note that charging a 1x1 vehicle with a storage battery will take 444 hours of sunlight using Solar, 222 hours using Upgraded Solar, and a mere 74 hours using Quantum. Assuming 15 hours of sun a day that’s roughly 30 days for Solar, 15 days for Upgraded Solar, and 5 days for Quantum (assuming no rain, snow, clouds, etc.)
Last of all are the results of my electric car tests. Storage batteries are extremely heavy, and a single storage battery goes a long way, so I removed the extra battery (and the power draining security system) to save weight. To add weight later in the test, I filled both trunks with Hydrogen Canisters.
Electric Car, Electric Engine, 747kg
32kph: 184cpm, 217mr
64kph: 366cpm, 109mr
96kph: 533cpm, 75mr
128kph: 698cp, 57mr (by this point vehicle weight was 666kg due to the storage battery having lost half it’s charge.)
Electric Car, Electric engine, 1342kg
32kph: 331cpm, 120mr
64kph: 655cpm, 61mr
96kph: 975cpm, 41mr
128kph: 1259cpm, 31mr (by this point vehicle weight was 1152kg due to the storage battery having lost almost all it’s charge.)
Electric Car, Small Electric engine, 1317kg
32kph: 266cpm, 150mr (If you’re vehicle is light enough that a small electric engine will get the job done, it’s more efficient than a regular electric engine.)
Electric Car, Large Electric engine, 1379kg
32kph: 342cpm, 116mr
128kph: 1369cpm, 29mr
Conclusions:
Fuel consumption approximately doubles with each increase in speed or doubling in mass.
A single storage battery takes about 5 days to charge from a single Quantum Solar Panel, 3 Upgraded Solar Panels, or 6 Solar Panels (assuming no rain, snow, or clouds and 15 hour days).
