I would love to see some analysis on the average car production cost invoice cost. The current numbers being shown focus too much on MSRP or final sale cost, which include vehicle options or markup. It would be very useful to look at these trends.
The withering dream of a cheap American electric car
761–770 of 780 posts
Re: The withering dream of a cheap American electric car
#762Earlier quoted context omitted.
Have you ever gotten behind a diesel truck with emissions deleted? I have...a lot. The roll coal crowd doesn't have EV on their radar whatsoever.
Which is fine. Deleted trucks are already illegal, and soon enough you won’t be able to buy a new ICE vehicle. They will be gone in my lifetime.
America just overwhelmingly voted to go back in time.
Re: The withering dream of a cheap American electric car
#763Earlier quoted context omitted.
The EV charges while you sleep. You always start your journey with a full tank. If you can't do that then, yes, an EV is less convenient than a gas car that is true.
Home ownership is a distant dream for most Americans, and the sort of rentals that have parking AND EV charging tend to be extremely pricy luxury new-builds. Gas is unfortunately going to be around for a long, long time for normal working-class Americans.
Homeownership Rate in the United States
Re: The withering dream of a cheap American electric car
#764Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not really. PHEVs are usually one-and-a-half drivetrains at most. They're almost never as complicated as a separate BEV and ICE drivetrains would be individually.
They don't typically have a full transmission or CVT either. Taking the new hybrid Civic for example: it just has a basic planetary gearbox that handles forward, reverse and highway cruising. Any time you're not at highway cruising speed, it's just in the normal position where the electric motor drives it (the engine only functions as a generator). It's effectively an electric car with a small, far under provisioned…
The "S" trim of the current Nissan Leaf (with the 40 kwh battery) weighs 3509 lbs.
Re: The withering dream of a cheap American electric car
#765Earlier quoted context omitted.
An advantage of a pure EV over a hybrid is that you don’t have the maintenance liability of the combustion engine, cooling system, and transmission.
Combustion engine is a perfected tech, which can easily last 100K+ miles. EVs do have a cooling system for the battery. EVs also have a battery which can be $20k, and electric motors which are $10k. This really makes them awful on the used market when the warranty runs out. If a used Model 3 needs a battery it is basically scrap.
Battery costs keep coming down. We are now sub $100/kWh, and Chinese batteries are approaching $50/kWh. So a 75 kWh battery will cost less than $4000 in the not too distant future. And costs should be way more interesting when you have to replace your battery in 2040.
https://www.visualcapitalist.com/charted-lithium-ion-batteri...
Re: The withering dream of a cheap American electric car
#766Earlier quoted context omitted.
Are you lucky enough to own your own house, do you put up with a corporate landlord/big condo, or are you in street parking?
I live in a single family residence like the majority of households in the US. My point still stands. Despite driving more miles on my EV my ICE wastes my time on pumping gas especially before all the time I waste with routine maintenance. I am far from alone. Why would anyone waste their time going to gas stations all the time and wait for oil changes and have to deal with all that maintenance of things like timing…
Sounds like you have a residence where you can charge overnight. That's a nicety right there. For everyone who can't, is it faster to get 400 miles by finding a place to charge and waiting on the charging or by filling a tank?
Re: The withering dream of a cheap American electric car
#767Earlier quoted context omitted.
I live in a single family residence like the majority of households in the US. My point still stands. Despite driving more miles on my EV my ICE wastes my time on pumping gas especially before all the time I waste with routine maintenance. I am far from alone. Why would anyone waste their time going to gas stations all the time and wait for oil changes and have to deal with all that maintenance of things like timing…
Sounds like you have a residence where you can charge overnight. That's a nicety right there. For everyone who can't, is it faster to get 400 miles by finding a place to charge and waiting on the charging or by filling a tank?
Sure it's a nicety, but it's also pretty common. Most households in the US would be able to do it.
You'll spend considerably more of your life standing next to a gas pump than they spend waiting for their cars to charge. And you'll spend more money per mile in the end for the energy cost. And yet somehow you'll continue to feel superior about it. Congrats on spending so much of your life pumping gas my dude. I'm glad I don't have to spend nearly as much time anymore.
Re: The withering dream of a cheap American electric car
#768Earlier quoted context omitted.
Its not up to a single individual to fix monetary policy. Maybe you should work on your social skills before calling someone greedy for merely making money.
we are all greedy, it's human nature, and greed is good, it makes us strive and human striving is what brings us all benefits. So when I use greed, it's not meant as an insult. Only people who use it as an insult (frequently socialists), as if they themselves are not greedy, need to hear it hurled at them, simply as a proof of "hey, you're a human too, stop thinking you're better than other people". and we're talking…
For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs.
Calling greed a virtue is certainly a thing a person has said.
Re: The withering dream of a cheap American electric car
#769I can't believe that the average price of a car in the U.S. is almost $50k. For rapidly depreciating assets. Here I am working out TCO costs for a range of mid-sized cars for my next purchase, and trying to decide if the extra $2k for a Prius Prime over a Prius will beat the differential in fuel costs for my driving situation. I feel like a chump, but I know it's the smarter thing to do with my money. I coworker of m…
A $100k pickup isn't a regular pickup, anymore than an $80k sedan is a regular sedan. It's gotta be more expensive than 95% of the pickups on the road. If it gets 11 mpg it must have a really beefy engine and be geared for towing. If it uses premium fuel, it's one of the badged models likely. One thing that's odd about the pickup market is it isn't segmented into low tier/mid tier/luxury tier the way other vehicles a…
Well regulated marketplace huh? You mean the marketplace that forces customers to purchase through a dealership because of dealership lobbies? You mean the marketplace which has those same dealers charge outrageous markups just because the law says they must exist? Ok.
Re: The withering dream of a cheap American electric car
#770Earlier quoted context omitted.
It is one of those 'was it really that long ago? I am getting old' moments to actually look this up, but the last major safety features which moved the needle on keeping you alive in a car were the mandates for side-impact protection and anti-lock braking systems. Both are more than ten years old. I think you would be hard-pressed to name a single innovation from the past five years which has increased your lifespan…
Anti-lock brakes, if I remember correctly, had essentially no safety effect in the real world. Stability control, on the other hand, dropped single car accidents by something like a third. Perhaps you were thinking of that? Regardless of that, the threat environment has changed pretty dramatically in the last two decades. I gave up my 2006 VW sedan for a new SUV this year because the IIHS numbers had started to look…
You are correct, I was thinking of stability control. Both were mandated by NHTSA at the same time I think.