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The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

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Re: The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

#51

Post by repsilat »

OldHand2018 wrote: post #50
xrd wrote: post #47

What's the hack to get something like this in the US? I don't want to drive my kids around in it, but I have a short drive on 35 mph roads to my co-working space and I would love to go electric.

There is no hack. Low-speed vehicles are legal in the US https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low-speed_vehicle I’ve seen maybe 2 or 3 in my life outside of Florida.

In TFA they made a big point of you not needing any kind of license to drive one in China. I guess that's true of ebikes in the US, but above that point I think is a regulatory line that will never be relaxed. If it has indicators you'll need a license in the US forever, IMO, even if limited to city speeds.

I suspect higher interest rates might change the calculus too. If you can get a low-interest, long-duration loan like people get these days in the US you're more likely to go big.

And, to be fair, a major part of why the US has bigger cars is that people can afford them. Compare the median wage between the US and China.

Re: The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

#52

Post by zdragnar »

dwaltrip wrote: post #41
zdragnar wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assume that 3 wheel cars have a bad stigma attached to them dating back to the Reliant Robin- at least the single-wheel-in-front variety. Since most of these cars have low top speeds, they also face a usefulness problem. Parking is too expensive in dense cities for super cheap cars to have a large market, and they are too slow to be useful in suburbs or the countryside.

I'm not following the cost of parking comment. What does that have to do with the cost of cars?

If you can afford parking in some cities, you probably aren't buying a cheap car.

If you are, you probably are commuting or at some point driving enough to where you need to be able to get up to highway speeds, and are better off buying used.

There is a market here for cheap city driving only cars, but it isn't terribly big, hence the trouble breaking into the US.

Re: The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

#53

Post by endisneigh »

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #40
endisneigh wrote: post #10

Given that many of these only have three wheels and to my knowledge regulation on “cars” only applies if the vehicle has four wheels- I wonder why these aren’t available in the USA at the same time.

They get classified as NEVs and are capped at 25MPH. If you want one they are available.

Where can you purchase in the usa? Trying it out could be neat

Re: The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

#54

Post by ulfw »

zozin wrote: post #14

These might work in a regulatory black hole in China, but they won't anywhere in the West. Smart has had a small electric car for sale for nearly a decade and you never see them around. Maybe when the alternative is a scooter an electric golf cart is a step-up, but the electric scooter market isn't exactly throthy in the West. Electric cars aren't that popular because the range is still mediocre for entry level ($25-…

So not true.

The Ami from Citroen is going to be quite the thing in Europe: https://www.topgear.com/car-reviews/citroen/ami

Review from UK perspective: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uUEKtOGmpVI

Re: The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

#55

Post by covidthrow »

mastre_ wrote: post #38

Tesla’s mission is to accelerate the world’s transition to sustainable energy[1]. They even have an "open source philosophy to patents[2]." I believe, based on what I've seen, all this makes Elon happy to see -- it's the world he envisions and, at least in [no small] part, helped spur on. --- [1] https://www.tesla.com/about [2] https://www.tesla.com/blog/all-our-patent-are-belong-you

I won't assert to know Tesla's motivation for open patents—and there is no doubt some goodwill involved—but do consider that it is not absent strategic advantage.

First and foremost, it's a form of deterrence. The presumption is that others will utilize Tesla's patents to compete, which in turn guarantees that said competitor can't sue Tesla for infringing on their patents. (Such activity is denied in the open patent promise.) It's kind of an informal, de facto patent sharing.

Depending on your opinion of mutually assured destruction, this is either a good thing or a bad thing. Good, perhaps, because of accelerated progress. Bad, perhaps, because this advantage is imbalanced towards Tesla. (They get to use any other company's patents—those that also use Tesla's—but those other companies do not by default get to use other competitors' patents.)

I mention all this free of ethical opinion. Just want to clarify that it is almost certainly not just a simple act of goodwill. Despite this, we can all—at least for now—benefit from such generosity.

Re: The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

#56

Post by thinkingkong »

brainless wrote: post #11

This is something I realized recently. I am in India and the number of small manufacturers who are making electric people movers is very high. These are not high speed vehicles, they are below 40 KM/h speed as I see them, but the big shift is that hundreds of small companies around India are producing and maintaining small electric vehicles, mostly locally. The drivers charge them at home at night or during longer lu…

How much of the shift is to ev from nothing vs from scooters and mopeds?

Re: The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

#57

Post by inasio »

xrd wrote: post #47

What's the hack to get something like this in the US? I don't want to drive my kids around in it, but I have a short drive on 35 mph roads to my co-working space and I would love to go electric.

A guy in jalopnik.com imported one of these mini electric cars from China and detailed the whole process, he was very happy with how it turned out [0].

[0 - one of many articles on the car] https://jalopnik.com/unboxing-the-worlds-cheapest-new-car-re...

Re: The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

#59

Post by rorykoehler »

brainless wrote: post #11

This is something I realized recently. I am in India and the number of small manufacturers who are making electric people movers is very high. These are not high speed vehicles, they are below 40 KM/h speed as I see them, but the big shift is that hundreds of small companies around India are producing and maintaining small electric vehicles, mostly locally. The drivers charge them at home at night or during longer lu…

I don’t think I ever drove above 40kmh in an Indian city if I wasn’t off the expressway or whatever they are called in India.

It’s the perfect solution for everyday life. Hopefully they become pervasive and help reduce air pollution dramatically.

Re: The road to electric is filled with tiny cars

#60

Post by esperent »

dragonsh wrote: post #30
brainless wrote: post #11

This is something I realized recently. I am in India and the number of small manufacturers who are making electric people movers is very high. These are not high speed vehicles, they are below 40 KM/h speed as I see them, but the big shift is that hundreds of small companies around India are producing and maintaining small electric vehicles, mostly locally. The drivers charge them at home at night or during longer lu…

It’s good and almost all of them assemble the small EV from ready made CKD (completely knocked down) kits from neighbouring country (imported legally or illegally due to policy ban to show as produced in India). The value addition is in terms of making an outer body or assembling the imported battery cells and wheels (comes with inbuilt motor), depending on the capacity. India lacks basic manufacturing capability at…

> is still a decade or two behind major players in this industry

Not likely. India produces a huge array of high tech goods like iPhones, vaccines, pharma products and so on. I doubt they can do all that yet somehow be two decades behind when it comes to EV parts.

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