Chevy Bolt: the First Practical, Mass-Market Electric Vehicle

Post by greglindahl » Mon, Oct 23, 2017, 3:38 AM UTC

dpweb wrote: post #82

hedora wrote: post #20

We just managed to sell another flagship GM vehicle, and the software was so bad, it was nearly a deal-breaker. (Most years of this model had software bugs that were so bad, they could literally kill you — for example, the exhaust system could overheat, and burn the car down). Also, basic electro-mechanical things, like seat belts and the FM radio started to die after 3-4 years. This is with light use in CA. Even whe…

"Kill you"? Sorry but this is fud unless you can cite death rates. This site here lists the Volt as lowest death rate listed among small 4-dr cars. http://www.iihs.org/iihs/topics/driver-death-rates

Post by perl4ever » Mon, Oct 23, 2017, 3:41 AM UTC

greglindahl wrote: post #33

bane wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love the idea of Electric cars and even own Tesla stock, but I think they're still a ways off from me seriously considering buying one. Why? I drive a large Hybrid sedan. I get a bit above 600 miles on a tank of gas without thinking about it. That's a trip from NYC to Toronto with about 100 miles of driving around range left before having to think about finding a gas station...or for our European friends, Paris to…

The only problem with your analysis is that there appear to be 100s of thousands of US consumers who want a pure electric car and not a (Edit: plugin) hybrid, many more people than are interested in hybrids. So you've got a fine personal datapoint, but you don't appear to be typical of the market, or at least of a market big enough to launch a high-volume car.

Post by BuckRogers » Mon, Oct 23, 2017, 3:44 AM UTC

redler wrote: post #88

mikeash wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm wary of comparing with laptops and cell phones, because a proper EV drivetrain will suffer much less degradation. Consumer electronics batteries are poorly cooled and prioritize daily capacity over long-term life, so they degrade much more quickly. I'm sure you know this, but I see a lot of people thinking their car battery will only last 2-3 years because that's how their cell phone is. For what it's worth, I ap…

I thought I read, perhaps here, that Tesla over-provisions its batteries and uses software to optimize the battery "working set" to minimize perceptible range degradation.

Post by bane » Mon, Oct 23, 2017, 3:47 AM UTC

greglindahl wrote: post #33

bane wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I love the idea of Electric cars and even own Tesla stock, but I think they're still a ways off from me seriously considering buying one. Why? I drive a large Hybrid sedan. I get a bit above 600 miles on a tank of gas without thinking about it. That's a trip from NYC to Toronto with about 100 miles of driving around range left before having to think about finding a gas station...or for our European friends, Paris to…

The only problem with your analysis is that there appear to be 100s of thousands of US consumers who want a pure electric car and not a (Edit: plugin) hybrid, many more people than are interested in hybrids. So you've got a fine personal datapoint, but you don't appear to be typical of the market, or at least of a market big enough to launch a high-volume car.

Post by greglindahl » Mon, Oct 23, 2017, 3:48 AM UTC

zanny wrote: post #53

erik_seaberg wrote: post #23

Hours per week charging is better than hours per day, but still only practical for people who can run heavy wiring to a private garage. I keep wishing gas station battery swaps were happening.

The industry cannot even standardize a charging port between Tesla and everyone else (which really is more on Tesla for using a proprietary port nobody else is using and then trying to act like they are the victims by offering royalty free access to the patents... after the fact). It will be a very, very long time before standardized batteries are a thing, if they ever will be. As soon as true self driving cars are a…