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GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

wsj.com

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Re: GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

#71

Post by kevin_b_er »

throw0101a wrote: post #26

My parents' house does not have a garage or a driveway, how exactly will the only-full-EV future work for them? Where are they supposed to charge?

Your replies are mostly hostile, sadly. The electric vehicle "future" has yet to identify how to handle this. The charging infrastructure is incredibly weak unless you have a garage with a charger installed. A lot of people rent or have a small plot of land w/o a garage and they park on the street.

The public charging infrastructure outside of California cities is weak. There are very few fast chargers, and the electric vehicles charge slow unless they're a Tesla.

The Chevy Bolt from GM? The fast charger is optional and is only 50kW. This means about 50 miles every 17 minutes. That's over an hour to refill the tank.

The rebuttal to how slow the public charging charging is is always "top off at home" and the rebuttal to no at home charging is always "public fast charging". Yet we see neither is doing well.

Re: GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

#72

Post by dreamcompiler »

50 years from now we'll look back on hybrids as a brief transition phase in the history of automobiles. They're much more complicated than ICE cars and vastly more complicated than electric cars. Once good enough, cheap enough batteries happen (i.e. now) there's no reason for hybrids to exist.

Re: GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

#73

Post by gdickie »

Someone1234 wrote: post #2

To fully electric. As the article says, both companies produced these as regulatory compliance vehicles. Now they're shifted that effort over to electric because the incentives are better for them. The only companies trying to make hybrids for real are Toyota and Honda. Everyone else is just pumping out low effort compliance vehicles. It is hardly surprising that these vehicles haven't been hugely successful. I'd lov…

The federal tax incentive is a refundable tax credit. So it doesn't interact with deductions.

It's regressive in the sense that you need to be buying a new car to get it. But it passes to used car owners in the form of a lower residual value for the car. A one year old plug-in hybrid lease-return can be a great deal.

Re: GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

#74

Post by bduerst »

rootusrootus wrote: post #34
searine wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't be surprised if the Volt comes back in a few years as a full EV sedan.

I would rather they upsized it slightly. The Volt is essentially a Cruze body with a different drivetrain, and it is pretty small. I looked at buying one but banging my head on the roof on my way to sit down made me rethink the plan. It doesn't even need to be that much bigger, maybe just taller. A Prius, by comparison, is pretty spacious.

Same. Test drove a Volt and it felt like a plastic toy car, meanwhile the Bolt actually has headroom.

Re: GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

#76

Post by Spivak »

rconti wrote: post #46
yardie wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> both companies produced these as regulatory compliance vehicles. At one point I was completely fascinated with the Fiat 500e. Here was an electric car that was stylish, quirky, and could be had on the used market at a great price. But as I got further into it I realized that FCA hated producing this car. Its only reason to exist is to allow them to produce more pollutant vehicles as a regulatory balance. And if it…

Why does it matter to you, as the consumer, that FCA hated producing the car? It's still cheap to buy and operate.

Because, in dev speak, the parts of the code base that get the most love are the ones the devs enjoy working with. The car that was produced begrudgingly as a means to get back to the cars the engineers wanted to make doesn't exactly inspire confidence that parts will be available and cheap, mechanics will be able to service it in a decade, people will make 3rd party parts, etc..

In cars there is a lot of hidden value in buying popular models.

Re: GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

#77

Post by tlb »

rconti wrote: post #46
yardie wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> both companies produced these as regulatory compliance vehicles. At one point I was completely fascinated with the Fiat 500e. Here was an electric car that was stylish, quirky, and could be had on the used market at a great price. But as I got further into it I realized that FCA hated producing this car. Its only reason to exist is to allow them to produce more pollutant vehicles as a regulatory balance. And if it…

Why does it matter to you, as the consumer, that FCA hated producing the car? It's still cheap to buy and operate.

Things made as a result of cynical box-ticking are never good. It's better to fill your life with things designed by people trying to make something great. Even if they didn't fully succeed, you can appreciate the effort. Whereas something made grudgingly will depress you with every detail.

> What counts as a trick? Roughly, it's something done with contempt for the audience. For example, the guys designing Ferraris in the 1950s were probably designing cars that they themselves admired. Whereas I suspect over at General Motors the marketing people are telling the designers, "Most people who buy SUVs do it to seem manly, not to drive off-road. So don't worry about the suspension; just make that sucker as big and tough-looking as you can." -- http://www.paulgraham.com/goodart.html

Re: GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

#78

Post by jedberg »

sho_hn wrote: post #68
jedberg wrote: post #58

I'm trying to replace my 2012 SUV with another SUV. I've been looking all over for a plug in hybrid SUV, and there aren't any good ones. I want the plug in hybrid because 95% of the time we do less than 30 miles locally, but once in a while we drive a couple hundred. I would be fine with an all electric SUV with a decent range, but those don't exist either. The model X is not sufficient, and is also terrible for ever…

How do you feel about the EQC?

It looks awesome, but I can't get in the US. :(

Re: GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

#79

Post by j2bax »

dawnerd wrote: post #69
j2bax wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure what your mileage needs are, but I recently picked up an off lease 2016 eGolf with 33k miles for $12,500 from the VW dealer as my commuter. Gets about 80 miles to a charge in town/city driving, more than enough for my daily commute. Wife drives the long range ICE family vehicle. Some day I hope to be able to affordably replace that as well!

You can get a 2019 eGolf for about the same price. Dealers are willing to negotiate big time. I got mine almost two months ago for 10k off msrp + state and federal.

Yeah, the challenge for me is that they don’t sell them locally and my state doesn’t do an incentive. Would have been hard to beat $12,500 without a bunch of hassle although I’ve read that there are ridiculous deals happening if you qualify for all of the incentives available.

Re: GM, Volkswagen Say Goodbye to Hybrid Vehicles

#80

Post by jedberg »

elorant wrote: post #64
jedberg wrote: post #58

I'm trying to replace my 2012 SUV with another SUV. I've been looking all over for a plug in hybrid SUV, and there aren't any good ones. I want the plug in hybrid because 95% of the time we do less than 30 miles locally, but once in a while we drive a couple hundred. I would be fine with an all electric SUV with a decent range, but those don't exist either. The model X is not sufficient, and is also terrible for ever…

Mitsubishi has a plugin hybrid SUV. It's called Outlander PHEV.

Thanks! I hadn't seen that in any of my searches. Which means it's either too new or no one likes it. :) I'll have to check it out.
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