Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

A $20k American-made electric pickup with no paint, no stereo, no screen

theverge.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

201–210 of 1001 posts

Re: A $20k American-made electric pickup with no paint, no stereo, no screen

#201

Post by victorbjorklund »

ramesh31 wrote: post #68
patagonia wrote: post #52

If this can’t compete head to head (no tariffs or other import restrictions) with BYD and the like, then I don’t know why one would get excited. Feels like an expensive consolation prize with tons of compromises. I want competition.

>"If this can’t compete head to head (no tariffs or other import restrictions) with BYD and the like, then I don’t know why one would get excited." Would you prefer our roads flooded with cheap Chinese EVs that are the automotive equivalent of Shein hauls? Protectionism has its place in certain areas, and I would say building a thriving domestic EV industry that isn't beholden to a single weirdo is one of them.

Do you think that the rest of the world needs to protect itself from Tesla then and slap tariffs on any Tesla cars exported?

Re: A $20k American-made electric pickup with no paint, no stereo, no screen

#202

Post by JKCalhoun »

linkregister wrote: post #48
seanalltogether wrote: post #24

Hand crank windows is a weird choice, are the locks manual as well?

In a 2-door vehicle, you can just lean over and roll up the window and toggle the lock on the other door. If you've ever had an old car then you'll know the annoyance of a broken electrical motor.

Never mind the additional range anxiety: rolling your windows up or down with a motor might shave a mile or so off your range.

Re: A $20k American-made electric pickup with no paint, no stereo, no screen

#203

Post by cornstalks »

ryandrake wrote: post #161
conradev wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd recommend folks watch the video – it's fascinating. The truck gets OTA updates through your phone and not some LTE modem. It doesn't have one. They moved all car management including OBD-like functionality to the phone, too, which I think is awesome. This is how I want the interior design philosophy of manual controls to be digitized – with digital control. I'd pay $10k more for physical buttons, though.

Ugh. Yuck. Very disappointing. Was really hoping this thing wasn't going to be phone dependent.

There's a difference between phone-dependent and phone-augmented. I don't know the details of the truck, but I think a happy medium would be for an app to exist to augment the truck's abilities and allow at-home updates, but to not require the app or phone to just use the truck (even for long periods; i.e. you could go forever without using the app and the truck will just keep working in its current state).

Re: A $20k American-made electric pickup with no paint, no stereo, no screen

#204

Post by tetris11 »

soared wrote: post #153

Does this strategy even make sense? You can charge $20k for a car. Why wouldn’t you add options that cost you nearly nothing but some amount of buyers will opt in for a meaningful revenue increase. Charge $1k for paint. Even if 95% of people don’t do that, 5% of orders just increased their revenue by 5%. Paint doesn’t take engineering time.. just spend $500 and let some other company do it. This is why trims exist, h…

I think it better if they just give options for easy modding. You take it to a garage for a mechanic to spray it, or to hollow out radio nook, or add a phone charger outlet.

Re: A $20k American-made electric pickup with no paint, no stereo, no screen

#205

Post by hedora »

Suppafly wrote: post #138
subpixel wrote: post #82

With a 1000lb towing capacity and 150m range (let’s call that 120 when you don’t charge 100%) this eliminates too many use cases. It’s the anti-cybertruck but aimed at people who actually could get by with a nice trailer.

>this eliminates too many use cases Such as? Seems like it meets a lot of use cases.

You could get a used non-truck EV, add a tow hitch and you'd be able to move more weight in the trunk and in the trailer than this thing can.

Of course, it's a truck, so it can move light + bulky stuff, like appliances and furniture.

Personally, I'd want to pay another $5-10K and get one that can also handle heavy loads. This, but for $30K ($37.5K pre incentives) with no truck-related caveats would be amazing. I'm guessing it wouldn't cost $10K for them to upgrade the suspension + drivetrain.

Re: A $20k American-made electric pickup with no paint, no stereo, no screen

#207

Post by danans »

shayway wrote: post #130
danans wrote: post #90

From the related Ars article[1]: > Rather than relying on a built-in infotainment system, you'll use your phone plugged into a USB outlet or a dedicated tablet inside the cabin for your entertainment and navigation needs. How is a "dedicated tablet" different than an infotainment system, other than not having vehicle telematics and controls? Also, a regular tablet UX would be dangerous while driving, and typically th…

Not being built-in is significant. Infotainment systems tend to get outdated, and are also a common point of failure that can be expensive to fix, so not having the tablet hardwired in allows for people to choose their own setup and is also more future-proof.

> Infotainment systems tend to get outdated, and are also a common point of failure that can be expensive to fix

Android Auto and CarPlay solve that problem for navigation/communication/entertainment. The automakers aren't going to provide an open API to the vehicle control systems, for both competitive and safety reasons.

What would be nice is the old fashioned DIN interface, where you could install an aftermarket AA/CarPlay unit like this:

https://www.bestbuy.com/site/pioneer-10-1-hd-screen-luminous...

Re: A $20k American-made electric pickup with no paint, no stereo, no screen

#208

Post by hedora »

Suppafly wrote: post #154
hedora wrote: post #67

The $20K is after incentives, so it's actually $27,500. That still compares favorably to Ford's closest offering, the F-150 PRO, which is $54,999 (pre incentives): https://www.fordpro.com/en-us/fleet-vehicles/f150-lightning/ The Ford comes standard with the same range as the upgraded Slate, though. The slate can tow 1000lbs, and hold 1,433 lbs, vs the Ford's standard 5000 / 2235, respectively (you can upgrade the ran…

It's meaningless to compare a small city truck to something like a full-sized truck, they are totally different classes of vehicle. I get that ford doesn't make a small electric vehicle, but that doesn't make the lightning the "closest offering".

Is there another EV offering that's closer and available in the US?

Re: A $20k American-made electric pickup with no paint, no stereo, no screen

#210

Post by kyledrake »

rozap wrote: post #120
PaulHoule wrote: post #14

I like it. My wife runs a riding academy and we use a Honda Fit the way some people would use a pickup truck: we can fit 10 bales of wood shavings in the back. [1] We’re dreading when it fails because they don’t make the fit anymore and compact hatchbacks seem to be on the way out. Recent experiences have made me a bit of a Buick enthusiast and I can see driving a 2005-ish sedan except that I won’t get those sawdust…

I also love this design and I'm happy that someone is doing it. I think it's unlike anything else on the market. But, they won't necessarily be competing against other new things on the market. My wife also rides horses and we got a $5000 20 year old F250 which is very basic but has been bulletproof, and it can tow. I imagine old, basic trucks, either cheap domestic ones or kei trucks will be what this thing competes…

All micro cargo van providers have stopped building them. The Transit Connect, Metris, Promaster City and NV200 are all now discontinued. The VW Caddy isn't sent to the states.

There are rumors that they will make a cargo van based on the Maverick but they make them in Mexico, and with the tariff situation I'm not sure if they will be going through with that anymore.

All of the perfect compacts and hatchbacks are slowly disappearing, and solid work trucks have been replaced with $60k+ fake trucks that will melt their gaskets with crappy turbos and can't even fit a piece of 2x4 in the back. There is an enormous category of consumers that just want an auto that's simple, affordable, safe, fuel efficient and reasonably sized. Almost nobody is serving them right now.

Post reply on HN