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General Motors Is Going All Electric

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Re: General Motors Is Going All Electric

#41

Post by 5ilv3r »

thinkling wrote: post #35
aphextron wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The Nissan Leaf is just not competitive anymore, and I see no sign of a newer version of it with better range. Depends on your needs. My Leaf has been incredible. I paid $5k for an older one off lease and it gets me round trip to work/school/running errands for essentially zero marginal cost. People are stuck in an ICE mindset where they can't imagine a car being useful with less than 400 miles range. But the reali…

This is all well and good if you're in a two-car household, but we only have one car and we do pretty regularly do longer road trips, e.g. to go skiing. Even with a 240mi Bolt those trips could be awkward.

This reminds me of a car sales strategy I heard a long time ago. Don't sell people the car they need for the life they have, sell them the car for the life they want. That's one way you end up with huge pickup trucks being grocery getters and such. They were sold on the idea of owning horses and pulling them around, but that isn't the life they have...

The same ideas work well to discourage EV ownership.

Re: General Motors Is Going All Electric

#42

Post by DennisP »

WorldMaker wrote: post #25
twblalock wrote: post #6

I'm impressed that the American car companies have embraced electric technology so quickly. I'm also disappointed that the Japanese companies are falling behind. The Prius was a very innovative car when it was first released 20 years ago (that's right, the first Prius was a 1997 model!), but it is falling behind. The Nissan Leaf is just not competitive anymore, and I see no sign of a newer version of it with better r…

> So, I guess electric car ownership is effectively another perk of home ownership. It's another chicken-and-egg bootstrapping problem, though. If everyone had electric cars, there would be more market demand for electrified street parking, and there would be more demand for electric parking spaces in apartment complexes. At some point it becomes less of a market differentiator (luxury apartments use it to stay compe…

Fortunately it's a chicken-and-egg problem where all the homeowners already have eggs.

Re: General Motors Is Going All Electric

#43

Post by thinkling »

bovermyer wrote: post #11
twblalock wrote: post #6

I'm impressed that the American car companies have embraced electric technology so quickly. I'm also disappointed that the Japanese companies are falling behind. The Prius was a very innovative car when it was first released 20 years ago (that's right, the first Prius was a 1997 model!), but it is falling behind. The Nissan Leaf is just not competitive anymore, and I see no sign of a newer version of it with better r…

I don't know that this is true. To compare, would you expect every house to have a gas station built in? Granted, a full electric charge doesn't last as long as a full tank of gas, but that's going to be decreasingly relevant as battery technology improves.

What matters isn't how long the charge lasts, but how long it takes, and how awkward that is when you really need a charge.

If I remember right, the stats for the Bolt were that (when empty) it can charge 100mi of range in 30 minutes, but after that the charge rate falls off quickly, and a full charge actually takes much longer than you'd expect.

If you get unlucky and get to a charge point but the charger is occupied, you're going to be waiting up to 30 mins to get a 30 min charge, taking an hour to gain 100mi range. If I'm on a longer drive, that's just not something I want to put up with.

Imagine going skiing at a place that's 100mi away. It's winter, so you're running the heater in the car, and the ski resort is inherently uphill from where you live, so you use more than 50% of the car's range to get there. When you get to the ski resort, early arrivers have already filled up the chargers. So now you have to park somewhere else (possibly a shuttle ride away from the lifts), and come back off the mountain at lunch see if a charger is available, fetch your car, maybe hang around until the others actually move their cars off the chargers, etc. Ugh. Sorry, but I don't want to be the early adopter in that situation, and I'm wondering if there will be enough chargers to make the problem disappear once EV adoption is high. Range extenders in the car make a lot of sense to me.

Re: General Motors Is Going All Electric

#44

Post by KGIII »

r00fus wrote: post #26
mrlyc wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> People who park on the street have no realistic way to charge their cars at their homes Perhaps there could be combined parking meters and charging stations. You would pay a certain amount of money if you just wanted to park and you would pay more if you wanted to charge your car too.

That's an amazing idea. Also imagine solar covered parking which could be a good moneymaker (sell energy and/or sell preferred parking spots).

I wonder how viable covering parking lots would be in areas where you get a lot of snow. At some point, you will have to find a way to remove it - sometimes even a bunch of ice.

But, it has a bonus of keeping the precipitation that would land on your vehicle. That might just be its best feature.

Re: General Motors Is Going All Electric

#45

Post by stevenwoo »

mrlyc wrote: post #22
twblalock wrote: post #6

I'm impressed that the American car companies have embraced electric technology so quickly. I'm also disappointed that the Japanese companies are falling behind. The Prius was a very innovative car when it was first released 20 years ago (that's right, the first Prius was a 1997 model!), but it is falling behind. The Nissan Leaf is just not competitive anymore, and I see no sign of a newer version of it with better r…

> People who park on the street have no realistic way to charge their cars at their homes Perhaps there could be combined parking meters and charging stations. You would pay a certain amount of money if you just wanted to park and you would pay more if you wanted to charge your car too.

These are in a lot of municipal parking lots for the cities/towns that fill the land between San Jose and San Francisco. At the coast haven't seen any in the smaller rural towns only 30 miles away.

Re: General Motors Is Going All Electric

#46

Post by thinkling »

cwbrandsma wrote: post #37
thinkling wrote: post #33

If fully electric cars don't quite work for your needs because of the range or the charge times, I recommend looking at the Chevy Volt. I think the Voltec drivetrain is a great design. It drives like an EV, even when the engine is active, but eliminates range anxiety. The integration of the electric motors and gas engine is really good. With my driving pattern, I end up driving on pre-charged electric 50% of the time…

My problem is seats. Ideally I want a vehicle that sits 8 people (minimum is 7) -- and not cost a small fortune. So, for the time being electrics are out of the running for me. I'll check back in 10 years when most of my kids have moved out.

Might be worth looking at the hybrid Chrysler Pacifica as a compromise.

I thought the Voltec drivetrain would be great in a minivan, but apparently GM engineers say it won't work in heavier cars [0].

[0] https://www.autoblog.com/2010/04/22/gms-randd-head-says-volt...

Re: General Motors Is Going All Electric

#47

Post by thinkling »

strange_quark wrote: post #40
thinkling wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is all well and good if you're in a two-car household, but we only have one car and we do pretty regularly do longer road trips, e.g. to go skiing. Even with a 240mi Bolt those trips could be awkward.

Then get a PHEV. I've had my Volt for almost a year now and although I don't drive a ton, I've managed to get about 80% of my driving done on pure electric. The other 20% is road trips where I still get ~40-45 mpg.

See my other comments--I drive a Volt too. :-)

Re: General Motors Is Going All Electric

#48

Post by takk309 »

5ilv3r wrote: post #41
thinkling wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is all well and good if you're in a two-car household, but we only have one car and we do pretty regularly do longer road trips, e.g. to go skiing. Even with a 240mi Bolt those trips could be awkward.

This reminds me of a car sales strategy I heard a long time ago. Don't sell people the car they need for the life they have, sell them the car for the life they want. That's one way you end up with huge pickup trucks being grocery getters and such. They were sold on the idea of owning horses and pulling them around, but that isn't the life they have... The same ideas work well to discourage EV ownership.

I live in a rural area that exemplifies what you are saying. The grocery store parking lot is full of trucks and SUVs that, at most, see a bit of snow on the plowed roads in the winter. At the same time I own two vehicles, a Ford F-150 and a Nissan Xterra. I use both for a lot more than grocery getting. I own three horses and tow a trailer regularly. The Xterra is used for camping and climbing trips that require a bit of off roading on a regular basis. All that being said, I would love to have an electric for commuting and short trips. I live 10 miles from work, I don't need much range.

Re: General Motors Is Going All Electric

#49

Post by stevenwoo »

cwbrandsma wrote: post #37
thinkling wrote: post #33

If fully electric cars don't quite work for your needs because of the range or the charge times, I recommend looking at the Chevy Volt. I think the Voltec drivetrain is a great design. It drives like an EV, even when the engine is active, but eliminates range anxiety. The integration of the electric motors and gas engine is really good. With my driving pattern, I end up driving on pre-charged electric 50% of the time…

My problem is seats. Ideally I want a vehicle that sits 8 people (minimum is 7) -- and not cost a small fortune. So, for the time being electrics are out of the running for me. I'll check back in 10 years when most of my kids have moved out.

Isn't your eligible list of vehicles tiny - 7 seater? Forget not costing a small fortune, off the top of my head a Mercedes Sprinter van and Chevy Suburban are not cheap to buy or run.

Re: General Motors Is Going All Electric

#50

Post by thinkling »

5ilv3r wrote: post #41
thinkling wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is all well and good if you're in a two-car household, but we only have one car and we do pretty regularly do longer road trips, e.g. to go skiing. Even with a 240mi Bolt those trips could be awkward.

This reminds me of a car sales strategy I heard a long time ago. Don't sell people the car they need for the life they have, sell them the car for the life they want. That's one way you end up with huge pickup trucks being grocery getters and such. They were sold on the idea of owning horses and pulling them around, but that isn't the life they have... The same ideas work well to discourage EV ownership.

While you bring up an interesting point, I'm not sure why my comment reminded you of it--the lifestyle that makes it awkward for me to drive an EV is the lifestyle I actually already have.

AWD is something that everybody thinks they need while much of the time FWD + snow tires is equally good or better in normal snowy conditions. I was willing to give up AWD because I'd only need it about 1% of the time and I'm comfortable with FWD+snow tires. I wasn't willing to add the hassle of charging the car to a day trip to go skiing.

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