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Dyson has scrapped its electric car project

bbc.com

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Re: Dyson has scrapped its electric car project

#201

Post by perlgeek »

djaychela wrote: post #23

I'm surprised at this - seems bizarre that it's a 'great product' but isn't commercially viable in any way? As an aside, I really can't understand why people are so enthusiastic about Dyson products - I find them to be poor to use and poor performers. My gf has a dyson vacuum cleaner (a v6, I think), and it's terrible. Battery life is minimal, the suction is poor compared to anything I've used in the past, all the no…

> I'm surprised at this - seems bizarre that it's a 'great product' but isn't commercially viable in any way?

If you had a reputation for highly engineered/polished electric devices, would you admit that you hadn't managed to build a working electric car?

You'd put up some vague reason that's impossible to disprove, and try to salvage your reputation.

Re: Dyson has scrapped its electric car project

#202

Post by jack2 »

carlmr wrote: post #194
dpark wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don't get why this states "25 seconds". Do people have hands made from sponge? I don’t know why 25 seconds is hard to believe. That’s the manufacturer’s claim. I’d imagine if anything their claim is optimistic and the 60 seconds people claim is more realistic. If you have washed your hands properly, you’ll have several milliliters of water spread across the surface. Slow blowing warm air isn’t going to dry that o…

There was this TED talk once about shaking your hands twice to only need one towel. I've been doing it ever since and an Airblade will dry my hands in 10 seconds.

Only it was twelve times.

Re: Dyson has scrapped its electric car project

#203

Post by bonestamp2 »

whywhywhywhy wrote: post #105
djaychela wrote: post #23

I'm surprised at this - seems bizarre that it's a 'great product' but isn't commercially viable in any way? As an aside, I really can't understand why people are so enthusiastic about Dyson products - I find them to be poor to use and poor performers. My gf has a dyson vacuum cleaner (a v6, I think), and it's terrible. Battery life is minimal, the suction is poor compared to anything I've used in the past, all the no…

> Dyson hand dryers in public toilets Just disgusting mold and bacteria traps, absolutely terrible design, just blows the water back in on itself and it collects or leaks down the side of the walls. Give me an Xlerator Dryer any day.

Agreed. I was blown away in Japan though. They have Panasonic and Mitsubishi dryers that are similar looking to the Dyson models but they're much quieter and don't seem to have the same design problems (somehow) or they're just better at keeping them clean (probably).

Re: Dyson has scrapped its electric car project

#204

Post by jonplackett »

Unsurprising. Dyson can barely make vacuum cleaners anymore.

I remember a while back they tried to make a washing machine, totally over engineered it with a drum spinning both ways at once so it would finish the cycle quicker. The downside? It was 6 inches or so deeper than other machines and stuck right out into your kitchen. No thanks.

Re: Dyson has scrapped its electric car project

#205

Post by laurencerowe »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #117
djaychela wrote: post #23

I'm surprised at this - seems bizarre that it's a 'great product' but isn't commercially viable in any way? As an aside, I really can't understand why people are so enthusiastic about Dyson products - I find them to be poor to use and poor performers. My gf has a dyson vacuum cleaner (a v6, I think), and it's terrible. Battery life is minimal, the suction is poor compared to anything I've used in the past, all the no…

I love my v8, you are right it isn’t the “best” vacuum cleaner, but it is so easy to use casually that I don’t really care. I might upgrade to a v10 someday because it fixes the emptying container problem, but I can even live with that for the moment. If someone knows of any better cordless full sized vacuum cleaners, I’d love to know about them. Right now there are lot of low quality Chinese models available, but if…

Supposedly the LG cordless vacuums are good, but double the price I paid for a v8. We have two floors of stairs leading up to our apartment so being cordless is a huge time saver.

Re: Dyson has scrapped its electric car project

#206

Post by gnicholas »

joncrane wrote: post #150
hourislate wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Stop using air dryers in bathrooms. They blow fecal matter all over the place. >Hand dryers suck in fecal bacteria and blow it all over your hands, study finds. We know fecal bacteria shoots into the air when a lidless toilet flushes — a phenomenon known, grossly, as a "toilet plume." ... Into a hand dryer and onto your clean hands, perhaps. That's what a new study suggests. https://www.businessinsider.com/bathroom-h…

Most bathrooms with hand dryers eschew the paper. So the alternative is just walking around with wet hands? Or not washing your hands at all?

Also, how do you open the door in a sanitary way, knowing that many of the hands on that door are really dirt? I remember visiting Google in Palo Alto (old Nest office, I think), and they had ingenious foot-level protrusions that you could use to open the door. Wish they were everywhere, especially as hand dryers replace paper towels!

Re: Dyson has scrapped its electric car project

#207

Post by hevi_jos »

xivzgrev wrote: post #66

Why do companies keep thinking they can build a fucking car? Yes Tesla did it but it was a company 100% dedicated to it. Dyson has a core business already. I’m also skeptical about Apple but at least they have one of the largest treasure chests in the world of cash so they can more afford a moon shot.

Apple has been(quietly) in the batteries business for a long time becoming number 1 user in the entire world for a long time.

An ipad, an iphone, a macbook. What do they have in common? They have batteries on it and sell in the tens of millions or hundreds of millions a year.

The most expensive thing in an electric car is batteries. The hardest thing to manufacture and get supplies for(cobalt and lithium mainly).

Apple already have lots of expertise in the area.

Dyson also sells batteries, because cordless vacuum cleaners use lots of batteries. And also have lots of experience in efficient , extremely powerful electronic motors.

Electric cars are extremely simple compared with ICEs.

Re: Dyson has scrapped its electric car project

#208

Post by sitharus »

dfasdfasd wrote: post #114
oxplot wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I really can't understand why people are so enthusiastic about Dyson products If you've used one and don't get it, you may not be the target audience. On multiple occasions, I've asked a friend of mine to try various products I use which I believe are excellent in many ways, only to be told that they were average or junk compared to what he uses. I believe what he uses mostly to be complete and utter junk! So I don…

It's great that they've improved, but I'm still confused about the hype. The best Dysons I've used are worse than my old, $400 Miele. They may be competitive now, but it took them 10 revisions to get to a point other manufacturers have been at for 20 years. They feel like a vacuum marketing company more than anything. People seem to like them because they've only ever used $100 vacuums and it's their first time with…

I've had both a decently priced Miele and a Dyson barrel vacuum before (can't remember the model numbers now, this was a while ago) and when dealing with pets and my wife's hair the Dyson wins hands down. The Miele clogged horribly. I guess it depends on what you're vacuuming, but I'd try Miele again.

Now I have a Dyson V-8 cordless and it works fine. It runs long enough to vacuum the whole house and a bit more and is more convenient than anything corded.

Re: Dyson has scrapped its electric car project

#209

Post by bdamm »

redwall_hp wrote: post #174
bdamm wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole "eco friendly" thing about hand dryers never made sense to me. In fact, I think it's a marketing ploy by the air dryer makers. Paper towels are great, and they come from trees, which we can and want to grow more of.

Well, paper and textile production is dirty as hell. Ask anyone old enough to have lived in a mill town. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_impact_of_paper

I have. From that wiki article, paper mills account for less than 1% of GHGs globally. Also, the most hazardous chemical effluent is dioxins, which have seen major reductions globally within the pulp and paper industry because the industry has switched to processes that use much less chlorine.

Re: Dyson has scrapped its electric car project

#210

Post by mstade »

djaychela wrote: post #23

I'm surprised at this - seems bizarre that it's a 'great product' but isn't commercially viable in any way? As an aside, I really can't understand why people are so enthusiastic about Dyson products - I find them to be poor to use and poor performers. My gf has a dyson vacuum cleaner (a v6, I think), and it's terrible. Battery life is minimal, the suction is poor compared to anything I've used in the past, all the no…

This airblade hand drier design nonsense has to stop. I was at a hotel in Miami some time ago and they had these airblade style drivers integrated into the water tap, like bars sticking out on either side, right over the sink. I took one look at it and went “nope, that’s terrible design; water’s going to spray everywhere.” As I’m leaving the guy who came up after me yells of a very annoyed “god damnit” as water sprays all over his blue shirt.

Whoever designed that really shouldn’t be designing things.

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