11–20 of 99 posts
I saw this vehicle at the LA Auto Show and was able to speak to a team member prior to the general doors opening for a little while. Really cool technology at play here and it sounds like they have their shit together a lot more than Tesla. The fact that they take advantage of the individual motors to steer the vehicle without turning the wheels is pretty cool. It can rotate in-place similar to a tank.
Why do auto makers seem to be so against working with Tesla to bring electric vehicles to market? Now that I think about it, it seems like most car companies are trying to do the electric thing on their own, and if they do ask for help it’s from somebody that’s sort of out of their industry and not a direct competitor (yet). This is in contrast with for example how Mazda is working with Toyota on hybrid drive, and ho…
Volkswagen beat them to it. Volkswagen has developed their MEB electric car platform which they will use across their VW, Audi, SEAT, and Skoda brands:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_Group_MEB_platform
https://jalopnik.com/the-fascinating-engineering-behind-vws-...
VW is also open to licensing the platform to other manufacturers. Ford is thinking about using the MEB platform for their EVs:
https://jalopnik.com/volkswagen-wants-other-automakers-to-us...
I saw this vehicle at the LA Auto Show and was able to speak to a team member prior to the general doors opening for a little while. Really cool technology at play here and it sounds like they have their shit together a lot more than Tesla. The fact that they take advantage of the individual motors to steer the vehicle without turning the wheels is pretty cool. It can rotate in-place similar to a tank.
Is that for all steering? That sounds like a tremendous waste of tires.
The only thing I really take issue with on this truck is that the spare tire is accessed through the top of the bed. There are two reasons you don't want to do this in a truck: 1.) The bed needs to be very strong because people routinely put weight on dunnage in the bed, and the door doesn't appear to be corrugated to withstand load. 2.) If you want to change your flat tire you need to unload everything in the bed, w…
Also - There was a video with Sandy Munro on it and he couldn't talk about Rivian so he's either working with them or someone who wants to invest in them. So it seems like they are getting the right brains working on their problems.
Edit - this video, which is very interesting - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aVnRQRdePp4
The only thing I really take issue with on this truck is that the spare tire is accessed through the top of the bed. There are two reasons you don't want to do this in a truck: 1.) The bed needs to be very strong because people routinely put weight on dunnage in the bed, and the door doesn't appear to be corrugated to withstand load. 2.) If you want to change your flat tire you need to unload everything in the bed, w…
Who says that’s even going to be possible? It sounds like a complete design flop to me.
Why do auto makers seem to be so against working with Tesla to bring electric vehicles to market? Now that I think about it, it seems like most car companies are trying to do the electric thing on their own, and if they do ask for help it’s from somebody that’s sort of out of their industry and not a direct competitor (yet). This is in contrast with for example how Mazda is working with Toyota on hybrid drive, and ho…
You can read about the common problems on the forums; lots of the same problems Teslas had in the time period (i.e. loss of all propulsion while driving, loud motor noises followed by eventual motor failure, etc) in addition to software problems bridging the two companies' systems.
All solvable but I'm sure Tesla prefers selling $100k cars better than selling $15k generic skateboards.
This is interesting, so now Rivian is worth between 1 and 2 billion, while TSLA is worth "only" 53; makes TSLA look undervalued.
Why do auto makers seem to be so against working with Tesla to bring electric vehicles to market? Now that I think about it, it seems like most car companies are trying to do the electric thing on their own, and if they do ask for help it’s from somebody that’s sort of out of their industry and not a direct competitor (yet). This is in contrast with for example how Mazda is working with Toyota on hybrid drive, and ho…
Both Toyota and Mercedes sought Tesla's help with EVs for their California "compliance" vehicles: both the RAV4 EV and the Mercedes B-class EV had a Tesla frame, motors, batteries, and drive controller underneath. I don't know about the MB but the Toyota was rumored to cost roughly 2x the list price. In 2014, after Toyota made roughly 2000 of them (the minimum required by law) they stopped. You can read about the com…
https://electrek.co/2018/10/08/mercedes-benz-breaks-ground-b...
The only thing I really take issue with on this truck is that the spare tire is accessed through the top of the bed. There are two reasons you don't want to do this in a truck: 1.) The bed needs to be very strong because people routinely put weight on dunnage in the bed, and the door doesn't appear to be corrugated to withstand load. 2.) If you want to change your flat tire you need to unload everything in the bed, w…
>you need to unload everything in the bed, which will be a huge pain in the ass on the side of the road. Who says that’s even going to be possible? It sounds like a complete design flop to me.
But yeah, major design problem.