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Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US

businessinsider.com

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Re: Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US

#531

Post by rbanffy »

rappatic wrote: post #60

The article talks about range concerns as if they're simply incorrect or ill-founded: > Niedermeyer said that while an electric car can meet most people's driving needs, it struggles with edge cases like road trips because of the need to recharge. Since Americans have been promised a one-to-one substitute for their gas cars, this seems like a failure; an EV should be able to do everything a gas car can. This idea per…

One solution I adopt when I want to do a family trip with more luggage or people than our daily commuter can manage is to rent a bigger car.

A week back I needed to help a cousin move while my wife needed our car. The solution was simple - I rented a slightly bigger one that managed the move with ease. The total cost is still much lower than if we had two cars.

Re: Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US

#532

Post by jliptzin »

theshrike79 wrote: post #422
gamepsys wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The last time I bought a personal vehicle (2022) I did some math. I drive X miles a year, I pay Y for gas, I pay Z for electricity. I then compared some vehicles in the segment that fits my needs and found the ICE options to have a significantly lower cost of ownership for the 8-10 years I expect to operate the vehicle. So I left the extra 15 grand in stock, which will see a much higher rate of return than an EV woul…

I bought an EV because it needs way less regular maintenance. I don't need to do oil changes or replace parts at an interval defined by the manufacturer. I don't even need to go to a gas station. And every time I leave home, I've got a full tank, charged with cheap electricity. And as a bonus it's really comfortable to drive, including having the ability to keep itself cool/warm even when the engine is not running. I…

Same, going on 5 years now, still only had to get my tires replaced. It’s been night and day compared to my last vehicle that always had something breaking for >$1,000 and I definitely don’t miss gas stations

Re: Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US

#533

Post by Olreich »

cj wrote: post #525
rappatic wrote: post #60

The article talks about range concerns as if they're simply incorrect or ill-founded: > Niedermeyer said that while an electric car can meet most people's driving needs, it struggles with edge cases like road trips because of the need to recharge. Since Americans have been promised a one-to-one substitute for their gas cars, this seems like a failure; an EV should be able to do everything a gas car can. This idea per…

I recently carpooled to the airport multiple hours away with someone with an EV. We got stuck in unexpected traffic, had to pull over to charge, and we missed the flight. Sure, EVs work for 98% of trips. But they really suck for the 2% of trips where you’re driving 3 hours to+from an airport through a busy city where chargers are difficult to find. And then there’s the experience of taking a 20 minute detour to go to…

Charging infrastructure and speed would mitigate that as well. Driving 3+ hours is going to cut it close on many combustion cars’ ranges too, but gas stations are ubiquitous and almost always have gas. When they don’t, you get the gas crises we’ve seen around the world when supply or delivery runs low.

Re: Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US

#534

Post by iamleppert »

Until they can produce an EV that doesn’t feel like a massive downgrade in connvience, performance, cost, basically all the ways normal people measure the decision of buying a car, I’m not sold.

I like the fact it takes a few minutes to refuel my car, and it’s the same process regardless if I’m traveling 5 miles or 500. I don’t need to deal with charging stations, and if I run out of gas I can take a gas can to the car and problem solved. I can also store as much excess gasoline as I want just by having an extra container and if I take it with me, I can basically define whatever range I want.

I also don’t mind stopping at gas stations and it’s part of my routine where I like to talk to the people there. Sitting alone for an hour in a parking lot where I have somewhere to be isn’t my cup of tea.

I don’t want a vehicle that gradually looses half of its range over time, then has to have over $10k invested (sometimes quite a bit more) in a new battery every 100-150k miles. It’s like buying a gasoline car where the engine not only wears out and performance greatly degrades, but is virtually guaranteed it will always need a complete engine replacement.

I don’t want to worry about greatly reduced range in the winter. I don’t want to worry about a battery fire. When’s the last time you have seen a gasoline car spontaneously combust just sitting in a garage? Despite having a lot of flammable liquid it just doesn’t happen.

I also expect the resale value of the car to be reasonable, at least consistent with a good quality gasoline car.

Then there’s Elon Musk. His toxicity is reason alone for me to delay any EV purchase (not just Tesla) for as long as possible.

Outside of the tech echo chamber, I think I represent the majority of people who aren’t interested in EV’s and likely never will be. I wouldn’t care if they had a full self driving car, or make the car out of glass, or put a giant screen in it, I’m not buying it.

Re: Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US

#535

Post by samcheng »

rappatic wrote: post #60

The article talks about range concerns as if they're simply incorrect or ill-founded: > Niedermeyer said that while an electric car can meet most people's driving needs, it struggles with edge cases like road trips because of the need to recharge. Since Americans have been promised a one-to-one substitute for their gas cars, this seems like a failure; an EV should be able to do everything a gas car can. This idea per…

We’ve road-tripped over much of the American West in our Tesla. The range issue is indeed FUD - it’s really not a big inconvenience to stop and charge while you’re eating, sleeping, or stretching your legs.

We thought we’d take the gas car on those longer trips, but the trip is comfortable enough that we take the EV despite the charging stops.

I have high hopes that the NACS standardization and Tesla’s growing supercharger network will put range anxiety to rest for good.

Re: Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US

#536

Post by HumblyTossed »

rappatic wrote: post #60

The article talks about range concerns as if they're simply incorrect or ill-founded: > Niedermeyer said that while an electric car can meet most people's driving needs, it struggles with edge cases like road trips because of the need to recharge. Since Americans have been promised a one-to-one substitute for their gas cars, this seems like a failure; an EV should be able to do everything a gas car can. This idea per…

I hope that what we’ll see happen is charging stations become more family friendly. Clean facilities, and things for the kids to do to get the wiggles out. I think range concern would go away if people didn’t picture themselves sitting in their car for 30 or so minutes waiting for a charge every few hours.

Re: Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US

#537

Post by jliptzin »

gamepsys wrote: post #129
rdtsc wrote: post #66

> But an analysis from CarGurus found that EV prices were still 28% higher than gas-vehicle prices on average. To me that is bonkers. When EVs were becoming popular, I was expecting to see super cheap, under $10k vehicles. That was the promise: forget about all the IC complicated gears, alternators, transmission, fuel pumps and imagine getting a motor and batteries, what could be simpler!". But no, we ended up with m…

The last time I bought a personal vehicle (2022) I did some math. I drive X miles a year, I pay Y for gas, I pay Z for electricity. I then compared some vehicles in the segment that fits my needs and found the ICE options to have a significantly lower cost of ownership for the 8-10 years I expect to operate the vehicle. So I left the extra 15 grand in stock, which will see a much higher rate of return than an EV woul…

You’re valuing your own time at $0/hr that is spent at gas stations, doing oil changes and other ICE maintenance, unless you have a personal assistant to do that stuff for you.

My calculation was 15 minutes/week for gas, 1 hour every 3 months for oil changes, and 1 hour a month on average dealing with other ICE problems (for instance I had a water pump failure cause my engine to overheat on a busy highway, had to wait 2 hours for a tow truck waiting in a dangerous location, then took another 2 hours to finally get home).

So that’s ~30 hours of my time per year. I value my own free time at $300/hr so even at a much higher initial cost an EV still made sense to me.

Re: Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US

#538

Post by homefree »

rappatic wrote: post #60

The article talks about range concerns as if they're simply incorrect or ill-founded: > Niedermeyer said that while an electric car can meet most people's driving needs, it struggles with edge cases like road trips because of the need to recharge. Since Americans have been promised a one-to-one substitute for their gas cars, this seems like a failure; an EV should be able to do everything a gas car can. This idea per…

The supercharger network makes road trips fine too. I’ve done them they’re not a big deal.

I also somewhat take issue with the article’s premise anyway - model y was the top selling car on earth this year. Clearly people are buying EVs.

Re: Fewer people are buying electric cars in the US

#539

Post by ben_w »

iamleppert wrote: post #534

Until they can produce an EV that doesn’t feel like a massive downgrade in connvience, performance, cost, basically all the ways normal people measure the decision of buying a car, I’m not sold. I like the fact it takes a few minutes to refuel my car, and it’s the same process regardless if I’m traveling 5 miles or 500. I don’t need to deal with charging stations, and if I run out of gas I can take a gas can to the c…

> and if I run out of gas I can take a gas can to the car and problem solved.

Fair. IMO there should at least be an emergency slot for a short-range battery to get you a few miles.

> I don’t want a vehicle that gradually looses half of its range over time, then has to have over $10k invested (sometimes quite a bit more) in a new battery every 100-150k miles. It’s like buying a gasoline car where the engine not only wears out and performance greatly degrades, but is virtually guaranteed it will always need a complete engine replacement.

Sure, but also the engine doesn't need (so much) servicing in the meantime. You can pick your poison — and yours preference is of course valid, and I suspect the norm — but there's no perfect answer.

> When’s the last time you have seen a gasoline car spontaneously combust just sitting in a garage? Despite having a lot of flammable liquid it just doesn’t happen.

Apparently it does: https://electrek.co/2022/01/12/government-data-shows-gasolin...

> Then there’s Elon Musk. He’s reason alone for me to delay any EV purchase (not just Tesla) for as long as possible.

This is a bit of a surprise. "Musk -> no Tesla" I can understand, but why take his shenanigans to also exclude all the other car companies?

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