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The Chevy Bolt Is the Ugly Car of the Near Future

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Re: The Chevy Bolt Is the Ugly Car of the Near Future

#171

Post by kalleboo »

codeulike wrote: post #13

I think it looks fine. You Americans have a weird dislike of hatchbacks. To European eyes, it just looks very normal. Good luck to GM but I suspect their dealerships won't bother trying to sell many of these.

I know this isn't a popular opinion here, but I don't think the Tesla looks very good either... in PR shots and renders it looks just fine (nothing special though - I mean look at an Aston Martin, that is a work of art), but in life it has some weird bulbous, un-sleek feel to it. I've always written off all the praise it gets for its looks to a difference in America vs European styling trends, but maybe it's just me?

Re: The Chevy Bolt Is the Ugly Car of the Near Future

#172

Post by dkfmn »

gizmo wrote: post #71
pseudometa wrote: post #5

"Tesla loses money on every car too." This is false, Tesla averages $18,000 margin on every model S & model X it sells. "So how did GM pull off a $30,000 car with 200 miles of range?" It didn't. It is $30k only after $8000 of federal tax credits.

Tesla uses very unconventional accounting to arrive at that gross margin. Specifically they don't subtract R&D costs from their margins. When you correct for this Tesla's gross margin is within a few percent of the median for the automotive industry. > In 2015, Tesla spent over $700 million on research and development while selling about 50,000 vehicles. If Tesla reported gross margins like other automakers, gross ma…

R&D costs are, by definition, operating expenses and thus should NOT be subtracted from gross margins. The opinion piece you link states:

"Gross margin is generally considered the incremental profit margin delivered by the sale of a product"

This is not remotely correct. The author is confusing Gross Margin with marginal profit, sometimes referred to as variable margin.

Re: The Chevy Bolt Is the Ugly Car of the Near Future

#173

Post by DannyBee »

Decade wrote: post #67
dirkg wrote: post #38

Why are diesel cars hated in the US? You can get a range of diesel car sin Europe which give you 50-60mpg, have all kinds of comforts and can be cheap, without the trickery of tax credits.

Instead of trickery of tax credits, you get trickery of rigged emissions tests. Because when you regard air quality, it is not just carbon dioxide, but various nitrous oxides. Also, most diesels are noisier, and diesel fueling stations are further apart, and the federal tax is higher, and gasoline-electric hybrids have much better consumer branding. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/06/automobiles/as-the-world-e... http…

" most diesels are noisier, and diesel fueling stations are further apart, "

Both of these are myth.

Having driven a Q5 and Q5 TDI, they are totally and completely indistinguishable, noise level wise. Same with BMW/Mercedes, if you prefer people passing newly stringent emissions tests (IE EPA gave them a special proctology exam in 2017 before approving those models).

"further apart" is also certainly not true, unless you live in a very very weird area. Yes, not literally every gas station has diesel. But that's about it.

To whit: Over 55% of gas stations in north america offer diesel. http://www.greencarreports.com/news/1094908_fewer-gas-statio...

As for air quality, in the US, we seem very happy to require things that are better in the air for the environment but much worse in the air for people[1], so i'm going to reserve judgement as to whether it's truly better in the relative scheme of things

[1] As a random example: low-voc regulations have pushed coatings manufacturers towards 2k isocyanate based polyurethanes. Previously, the solvents used in wood coatings and auto coatings and what have you were not great for people, or the environment, but not often horribly toxic either (in a relative scale). By contrast Isocyanates are horribly toxic to people, and by the time you can smell them, you are many times over the PEL. Thus, spraying them requires supplied air. They easily cause permanent asthma, etc. However, in the amounts being used, they are better for the environment.

So yeah, worse for people, better for "air quality". Meanwhile, tens of thousands of workers end up with serious overexposure issues. (and if you read the studies they use to justify doing this, the level of emissions wasn't really that high in the first place. Now they are finally going back and saying "hey, we also think you should get rid of isocyanates, too". At some point, at least they'll run out of chemicals to regulate)

Re: The Chevy Bolt Is the Ugly Car of the Near Future

#174

Post by spiznnx »

Someone wrote: post #125
_ph_ wrote: post #3

From all I read, the interesting parts of the Bolt are actually completely made and designed by LG - all the electric components. And Tesla makes more Model S per day than GM builds Bolts. But I am happy that Bolt exists, as it currently is the most affordable electrical car with a long range. We need more of those.

https://www.tesla.com/blog/tesla-and-panasonic-collaborate : "Tesla and Panasonic have entered into a non-binding letter of intent under which they will begin collaborating on the manufacturing and production of photovoltaic (PV) cells and modules in Buffalo" That can be read as the two companies will work on manufacturing cells and modules together, but I think that isn't the case, given that that same press release…

Is Tesla-Panasonic more than just PV? I don't see how it's related to their EV business, just their Powerwall and Powerpack products.

Re: The Chevy Bolt Is the Ugly Car of the Near Future

#175

Post by mathw »

rangibaby wrote: post #161
dsfyu404ed wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So what you're saying is that they're buying a Prius with marketing?

and sex! The Prius' problem has always been that it looks like the healthy low-fat gluten-free quinoa kale almond milk salad of cars. The best word I can come up with describe Toyota's car designs is "inoffensive". They aren't necessarily bad, and they are easy to drive and comfortable to ride in, but they are mainly generic and forgettable. Being mass market cars like they are I guess that is kind of the point.

Well also don't forget that a Prius still burns fossil fuels to run. The Teslas aren't just shinier versions of hybrids.

Re: The Chevy Bolt Is the Ugly Car of the Near Future

#176

Post by mathw »

codeulike wrote: post #13

I think it looks fine. You Americans have a weird dislike of hatchbacks. To European eyes, it just looks very normal. Good luck to GM but I suspect their dealerships won't bother trying to sell many of these.

Yeah it just looks like... a car.

Headlining a review with "it's ugly" just seems like a bad idea. Tastes change, and not everyone thinks the same things are ugly anyway. Focus on what it does, how it drives etc. and let people make up their own minds about whether it's too ugly to be purchased.

Re: The Chevy Bolt Is the Ugly Car of the Near Future

#177

Post by MagnumOpus »

mathw wrote: post #175
rangibaby wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

and sex! The Prius' problem has always been that it looks like the healthy low-fat gluten-free quinoa kale almond milk salad of cars. The best word I can come up with describe Toyota's car designs is "inoffensive". They aren't necessarily bad, and they are easy to drive and comfortable to ride in, but they are mainly generic and forgettable. Being mass market cars like they are I guess that is kind of the point.

Well also don't forget that a Prius still burns fossil fuels to run. The Teslas aren't just shinier versions of hybrids.

There's been a plug-in version of it since 2012. Sure it has only 25 miles range on batteries, but that's enough for most people's commute, and they won't have to get out the slide rule when they visit grandma over the weekend.

(Also, 99% of electric cars also mostly burn fossil fuels - the exception being the ones deployed in Iceland, Norway and France, where fossil fuels are being phased out.)

Re: The Chevy Bolt Is the Ugly Car of the Near Future

#178

Post by Decade »

DannyBee wrote: post #173
Decade wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Instead of trickery of tax credits, you get trickery of rigged emissions tests. Because when you regard air quality, it is not just carbon dioxide, but various nitrous oxides. Also, most diesels are noisier, and diesel fueling stations are further apart, and the federal tax is higher, and gasoline-electric hybrids have much better consumer branding. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/06/automobiles/as-the-world-e... http…

" most diesels are noisier, and diesel fueling stations are further apart, " Both of these are myth. Having driven a Q5 and Q5 TDI, they are totally and completely indistinguishable, noise level wise. Same with BMW/Mercedes, if you prefer people passing newly stringent emissions tests (IE EPA gave them a special proctology exam in 2017 before approving those models). "further apart" is also certainly not true, unless…

I don’t see how you are disproving those points. Especially since I weasel-worded it with “most.” I had quickly fact-checked, and discovered that modern diesels can be quiet.

So a 2017 diesel SUV is as quiet as the gasoline model. That really doesn’t override the common experience of diesel in connection with either trucks and buses, or ancient Volkswagens. All of which are much more common, and much louder, than modern TDI vehicles.

Also, only 55% offering diesel automatically, mathematically, makes diesel fueling stations farther apart than gasoline. Exactly how much farther is something I don’t care to model at this time of the night. Except to say that that there do seem to be about twice as many gasoline-only stations as diesel stations in San Francisco, and the only Costcos vaguely in the Bay Area that sell diesel are in Concord and Santa Cruz.

As for the air quality, that was one thing that drove me to my current general anti-fossil-fuel sentiment. I was raised in a conservative family, and back in the late 90’s it was fashionable to be suspicious of the fuel, because of the oxygenation requirements satisfied by MTBE and ethanol. And then Al Gore did his spiel, and the Heartland Institute got into global warming denial, and conservatives here are positive about buying and burning fossil fuels again. I feel it is most consistent to simply be against emitting poisonous pollutants near population centers. Whatever the case, there is certainly a difference in air quality between gasoline-congested Los Angeles and diesel-congested Paris. Which is also partly because of the tough California emissions standards, which severely cut into the fuel efficiency and hassle-free operation that made diesel attractive in the first place.

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-summer-smog-2016...

http://www.businessinsider.com/paris-smog-problem-2016-12

Re: The Chevy Bolt Is the Ugly Car of the Near Future

#180

Post by SideburnsOfDoom »

RKoutnik wrote: post #19

This article (like many) misses why people buy Teslas. Teslas are amazing cars that just happen to be electric - not the other way around. The large car companies think that "electric" is enough to sell a car, whereas Tesla knows they need luxury options, autopilot & the supercharger network. I've got a Model 3 reservation myself and wouldn't even think of switching to the Bolt. I want a nice car, not just an electri…

> This article (like many) misses why people buy Teslas.

Does it? TFA talks about Tesla quite a bit, e.g.

> It's unlikely the Bolt will crush Tesla’s nascent Model 3. It has made essentially the anti-Tesla, a vehicle long on utility and short on sexy. What the Bolt will do is lure thousands of buyers who would otherwise buy a conventional car

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