When do you think you will buy a 100% pure electric vehicle?

[HFCS]

Yeah...its a joke...as many of us said all along.

Tesla has some great tech, but the CT is a steaming pile of dumpster trash that is Elon's ego.

As a career product designer, aesthetically it seems like someone was determined to make a concept drawing work and designing from the outside inward. There's a reason you see a lot of changes from concept to market so frequently, some are pretty good reasons. I'm no expert in vehicle design but it's that way on most products.

When decisions like that are being made in that way for basic design aesthetics and ergonomics (form not following function) it makes me wonder about all the tech where I'm not at all an expert.

 

[HFCS]

PSA: get your ev now!

Hertz to sell off EV fleet in shock U-turn after Tom Brady ad blitz, will re-focus on gas-powered cars

The company said the high costs to repair electric vehicles and a lack of demand among renters led to its decision to abandon those plans.

nypost.com

Kind of skeptical of this source that has a history of denying all sorts of scientific findings. Even if collision repair is more expensive, about every other kind of maintenance and repair is cheaper for an EV.

Demand is demand and people have been programed to hate the product without trying it so I wouldn't be shocked at all if there is low demand. Also not sure EVs are as ideal for rentals just yet. An EV is more convenient for 100% of people who have a garage, but probably is not as convenient for travelers picking up a car at an airport depending on the trip and where they stay.

 

[cycloneG]

PSA: get your ev now!

Hertz to sell off EV fleet in shock U-turn after Tom Brady ad blitz, will re-focus on gas-powered cars

The company said the high costs to repair electric vehicles and a lack of demand among renters led to its decision to abandon those plans.

nypost.com

"Hertz is dumping 20,000 EVs, a not-insignificant portion of its roughly 50,000-EV fleet (as of October) and a third of its total EV fleet globally. According to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission related to the sale, Hertz "expects to reinvest a portion of the proceeds from the sale of EVs into the purchase of internal combustion engine ("ICE") vehicles to meet customer demand."

But consumer demand is just a portion of the total picture. Many of the EVs that Hertz owns are used for its rideshare rental program with companies like Uber. As a recent investor conference in October, Hertz executives signaled that there are many factors that influenced its decision to pull back on EVs—even before the sale of 20,000 EVs was announced. The instigating factor seems to have been repair costs for rideshare EVs, which were much higher than expected. This is not maintenance costs, which Hertz notes are lower than ICE vehicles, but rather collision repair costs."

There Is More to Hertz Dumping 20,000 EVs From Fleet Than Appearances Suggest

Hertz’s investor report makes it clear it’s not just about consumer demand. It’s about Tesla.

www.motortrend.com

 

[dmclone]

EV's are a tough sell for rental companies.

You get off a 4 hour flight to Minneapolis. It's 8pm on January 12th and -10 degrees. You've never driven an EV and you need to get to your hotel across town

• How do I unlock this car?
• How do I connect my phone so I can use AA/Carplay (you can't )
• How do I defrost the windshield. How do I adjust the vents?
• Will this tesla drive itself?
• What is one pedal driving?
• Holy ****! This thing has rocket acceleration
• Does my hotel have charging?
• How do I put it into drive?
• Do I need to create a Tesla account? How am I going to pay for charging?
• How do I lock this car?

It would take a good 30 minutes for someone just to learn the basics. Most probably spend less than 10 and are a danger to themselves and others on the road. Yes, an iPhone is better than a blackberry but if you've been driving a blackberry for 30 years, moving to an iPhone in 10 minutes is pretty jarring.

 

[dmclone]

Vote for Decorah!
Decorah Charger

 

[clonechemist]

Tesla supercharging station packed in Oak Brook, dead cars line parking lot due to frigid temps

Electric vehicles may be the way of the future, but many EV owners are having trouble dealing with Chicago’s bitterly cold temperatures.

www.fox32chicago.com

LOL

 

[mramseyISU]

Tesla supercharging station packed in Oak Brook, dead cars line parking lot due to frigid temps

Electric vehicles may be the way of the future, but many EV owners are having trouble dealing with Chicago’s bitterly cold temperatures.

www.fox32chicago.com

LOL

I saw a lot of dead gas and diesel vehicles the last few days around here too. Not the cars fault the owners were too dumb to precondition the battery.

 

[VTXCyRyD]

Tesla supercharging station packed in Oak Brook, dead cars line parking lot due to frigid temps

Electric vehicles may be the way of the future, but many EV owners are having trouble dealing with Chicago’s bitterly cold temperatures.

www.fox32chicago.com

LOL

I read that too. Must have been a bunch of unprepared people there. It shouldn't have been that hard to have your battery charged or have enough juice to make it to the next charging station before the weather hit.

BTW, in my 50 mile trip I drove in my electric car by 2 different diesel trucks that were dead on on the side of the road yesterday. My local town's gas station was out of fuel for over 24 hours because they couldn't get a refill truck in.

Cold weather problems affect all vehicles.

 

[RedlineSi]

It's a shame that Tesla wasn't more responsive. Usually their network is top notch.

Also, it appears some owners were not prepared for the temps. Even with a gas car, and these extreme temps you need to be prepared.

 

[Clonehomer]

I saw a lot of dead gas and diesel vehicles the last few days around here too. Not the cars fault the owners were too dumb to precondition the battery.

Well, hold on there professor. The car manufacturers need to account for dumb owners. Not every EV owner is going to do enough research to know about preconditioning a battery. We still have ICE owners that don’t understand that they need to change the oil occasionally. In general, people are dumb and the manufacturers need to account for that to avoid the bad publicity of this sort of thing. Cause those dimb people are going to see this and not care of the whys. They only see the what’s.

 

[mramseyISU]

Well, hold on there professor. The car manufacturers need to account for dumb owners. Not every EV owner is going to do enough research to know about preconditioning a battery. We still have ICE owners that don’t understand that they need to change the oil occasionally. In general, people are dumb and the manufacturers need to account for that to avoid the bad publicity of this sort of thing. Cause those dimb people are going to see this and not care of the whys. They only see the what’s.

As an engineer I'm always reminded of the quote, "Never assume your customers are morons but never forget that they are".

 

[herbicide]

As an engineer I'm always reminded of the quote, "Never assume your customers are morons but never forget that they are".

In my world it’s best to assume they are. Nobody ever complains about how simple something is to use.

 

[HFCS]

I read that too. Must have been a bunch of unprepared people there. It shouldn't have been that hard to have your battery charged or have enough juice to make it to the next charging station before the weather hit.

BTW, in my 50 mile trip I drove in my electric car by 2 different diesel trucks that were dead on on the side of the road yesterday. My local town's gas station was out of fuel for over 24 hours because they couldn't get a refill truck in.

Cold weather problems affect all vehicles.

Deisel is $6.50 in SoCal right now and electric equivalent is about $1.25.

 

[Marcelason78]

Not in the know here—— how is a EV battery preconditioned?

 

[RedlineSi]

Not in the know here—— how is a EV battery preconditioned?

Depends on the EV, but it warms up the battery in a few different manners.

I set in my app that I wanted to leave my cabin at 3pm on Sunday. When we got in, the cabin was 70 and my battery was 58 degrees. It was -10 outside.

 

[dmclone]

Not in the know here—— how is a EV battery preconditioned?

It's just the software deciding to warm up the battery enough to charge optimally.

What @RedlineSi said. Plus if you're driving, and it knows you're going to charge, it will start pre-conditioning the battery for optimal charging. It does this even in the summer

 

[Billups06]

As an engineer I'm always reminded of the quote, "Never assume your customers are morons but never forget that they are".

Reminds of a saying that you can try to "idiot-proof" everything but you can never prepare for a "sufficiently talented idiot"...or something like that.

 

[clonechemist]

I had to read almost to the end of the article to learn that there are ‘pre conditioning’ mechanisms built it, and it sounds like the user may need to even hit a button to start the process (owners like @dmclone will know the process better than me)

Before getting to that point I was going to make a dumb joke about how Teslas will need an engine block heater for cold weather just like diesels.

 

[mramseyISU]

Not in the know here—— how is a EV battery preconditioned?

There are two sides to it, battery preconditioning and cabin preconditioning. The cabin is pretty self explanatory, it's just making it comfortable when you get into the vehicle ahead of time. The battery wants to be in a certain temperature range to operate optimally, it depends on the cells and the battery management system but it's roughly 50F-100F. BEV's mostly use liquid cooled batteries and preconditioning uses the heater or the A/C system to get the battery fluid circulating and bringing the battery into that temperature range. It's better to precondition on a charger but you can do it off the charger.

 

[Lafaester54]

Just another opinion to share here…I’ve now had a 2021 Nissan Leaf for almost three years and 15K. I have the model with +/-160 mile range. For short trips around town…trips to Denver…Boulder…and into the local mountains (all 60 mile destinations) it’s fantastic.
Re charging, I charge at night (off peak) and almost always use just 110. We do have solar on our house so the off peak may not be a factor. No maintenance cost to speak of..and still a pleasure to drive. Rear seats fold down so I even use it for most hauling errands.
We’ve made some longer trips and use an App for charging stations. Did buy an extra cord so I don’t have to switch the cord out with the home charge cord. No matter what one’s feelings are it seems to me that an electric vehicle for around town commuting is really unbeatable. Here in Fort Collins most of the city Fleet cars are Leafs or Chevy Bolts.
It is always argued about how expensive EVs are but right now there are amazing deals on Chevy Bolts where your out of pocket is $7000 or so after rebates. One can also buy a used Leaf with a new battery for +/-$15,000.
Also, just for fun, Google auto fires of EV vs IC sometime…it’s bothersome that so many..including many of my friends…don’t do critical thinking.
And just one more FYI…even after three years, I sometimes pull into a convenience store and think I’d better get some fuel.