Electric propulsion is nothing new. Commuter trains and subways have been around for decades. Electric cars in their current form are more than a decade old. We have battery data from GM & Tesla showing >90% of battery capacity retained after 500,000 miles. This is hardly bleeding edge tech.
EV technology isn't even close to bleeding edge tech. It's been around for 2 decades if not longer.
How much of your driving is road trips?
Level 3 charging at rest areas takes 45 minutes.
Not that often but when it happens I definitely don't want to have to look for a charging station and potentially have to wait my turn in line...
The average American drives 40 miles per day. Electric cars on the market have over 200 miles of range. To base a vehicle’s viability on the one road trip most people take per year is irrational. We aren’t long haul truckers.
OK. Then let's say you get home after a long day and you forget to plug in your car. Then get up to go to work the next day and...oops. Gotta wait.
meh yes and no, really how many times you did a ops forgot to fill?
I probably take less road trips than most people, but it's still several times per year. I don't want to buy one vehicle for short trips and another for long trips, that's even less rational.
I’ve forgotten to charge my car one time in five years. It becomes habit like locking the door.
Why would you buy a whole car for the 1-2 times a year you take a road trip?
Most have a buffer in them. How much varies by vehicle. Volt battery when it’s “empty” there is still 20% juice left. The reason being it’s bad to fully discharge Li-on batteries. Tesla tells owners ti charge between 40% to 90% as often as possible. That charge pattern lets the battery last indefinitely.
More like 3-4. But why would I buy a car that wouldn't serve all my car needs, when I can buy another one that does? Besides which, where I live, charging stations are few and far between.
You said only Tesla can use the supercharger though.. wouldn't other car companies want to make their own super charger? You're saying it's encrypted for Tesla so I'm understanding that only Tesla cars are able to super charge...
Tesla supercharger are not the only level 3 chargers that exist. At rest areas they are universal non branded chargers. Called “fast charging” stations.
Your home is a charging station. 98% of the time most people are not on road trips. Compared to the gasoline car equivalent, EVs are faster, quieter, better handling, safer, lower operational cost, and better for the environment. I’m guessing you haven’t driven one…?
There is EVgo, which is the fast charge connector that Nissan Leafs use, and there is a special adapter for this to connect to Teslas. There is only one-way compatibility since nissans can't plug into tesla superchargers for fast charging.
A Nissan versa starts at $15k, a Leaf SV Plus (200-230 miles range, and the only one worth getting) starts at $36k. They are both compact sized. The bolt is more affordable, but it's still almost $20k more than the spark.
This is dishonest. They aren’t even comparable models. Better comparison was Chevy Cruze vs. Chevy Volt. They have damn near identical dimensions built on the same platform. The fully loaded Cruze ran for $28K compared to 40K for the Volt, which was still slightly better optioned out at the highest trim.
No, I haven't. All I'm saying is why would I buy a car that I can't take a road trip in? Or one that would be very inconvenient to take a road trip in, at least?
It's not a dishonest comparison. The only metric I'm going off of is the amount of money you have to spend to get cars with an equivalent driving range on one fill-up. Any vehicle with less than 200 miles of range is a non-starter for a lot people.
Test drive one. It will make sense.
That’s more of a Tesla specific issue. Non-Tesla EVs share body parts with other models of their make.
It is dishonest. That’s not how people shop cars. People don’t cross shop Hyundai Sonatas with a BMW 5 series because of driving range. They shop class and price point. Musk was smart to have Tesla play in the luxury car market. No Kia driver is buying a $70K Tesla.
