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

Honda is killing its EVs

techcrunch.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

401–410 of 919 posts

Re: Honda is killing its EVs

#401

Post by robocat »

jmspring wrote: post #383

I have a 2016 Tacoma I bought in 2015. It has ~114k miles, so ~11k miles/year. Gas is 16-18gal/mi. It's paid off. There is no math, outside of major repairs (it's maintained regularly) where any Hybrid or EV makes sense for the next 10+ years. Maintenance ~ 250 a year; Tires ~12-1300 every 3 years (more due to age than wear). So - 11k/year w/ fuel at $5/gal and 16mi/gal - $3.4k in fuel, 600/year in maintenance and ti…

> Unless I went a budget used Prius

Take care - the Hybrid battery can be expensive to replace and they do eventually fail. Note that Toyota changed from NiMH to LiIon 2017/18. I recently had to wreck an old Toyota Hybrid because replacing the dead battery was going to cost 2/3 of the value of the vehicle. Context: New Zealand.

Re: Honda is killing its EVs

#402

Post by hnav »

shnock wrote: post #399
metaphor wrote: post #380

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's all motherhood and apple pie, but I'm sorry: the reality that we live in and incentives at play are such that if a capability can be exploited, then it will be exploited to the detriment of the consumer. Full stop.

This is a classic example of slippery slope fallacy, and not in the spirit of intellectual curiosity for which this forum exists

But it's true? How does an automaker that doesn't engage in those tactics compete when the rest of the market does?

Re: Honda is killing its EVs

#403

Post by jjav »

bojan wrote: post #241
jacquesm wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My daily driver is approaching the ripe old age of 30, my main reason is a lack of software.

Are you doing the maintenance yourself? I guess at some point the yearly maintenance costs exceed the value of the car itself.

> I guess at some point the yearly maintenance costs exceed the value of the car itself.

This is often mentioned but is not relevant.

In terms of cost, what matters is whether an equally good (for whatever metrics a car is "good" to you) replacement car will cost less or more.

Re: Honda is killing its EVs

#404

Post by eddythompson80 »

pix128 wrote: post #389
jmspring wrote: post #383

I have a 2016 Tacoma I bought in 2015. It has ~114k miles, so ~11k miles/year. Gas is 16-18gal/mi. It's paid off. There is no math, outside of major repairs (it's maintained regularly) where any Hybrid or EV makes sense for the next 10+ years. Maintenance ~ 250 a year; Tires ~12-1300 every 3 years (more due to age than wear). So - 11k/year w/ fuel at $5/gal and 16mi/gal - $3.4k in fuel, 600/year in maintenance and ti…

okay? others are in the market for a car

Weird, why didn’t they buy a car in 2016?

Re: Honda is killing its EVs

#405

Post by peab »

spookybones wrote: post #393
ggm-at-algebras wrote: post #349

In Shenzhen for a tech meeting. The streetscape is quieter, despite high traffic levels and I hear not only MORE birdsong, but the birds do more complex songlines. The air is clean. For sure some of this is because it's a coastal city and has fresh sea breezes, but I've been in other Chinese coastal cities in times past and the air was significantly less clean. There are social upsides for an almost-all-EV city. This…

Mexico City needs this badly. It would be beautiful if it wasn't for the smog and noise of traffic.

I'm sure it's coming. I'm in Mexico this week and was surprised to drive by not one but two chinese car dealerships. Looks like almost 10% of cars sold last year were EVs

Re: Honda is killing its EVs

#406

Post by 2postsperday »

phainopepla2 wrote: post #192
speedgoose wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don’t like active safety features ? Even if you think you are great and better than most, don’t you think it would be neat that the other drivers you share the roads with have active safety features ? So they don’t crash into you or run over your kids?

I am convinced that some safety features (such as lane assist, for example), actually make roads less safe on net, because they allow or encourage drivers to be less engaged in the act of driving. But then, if it were up to me we'd all be driving manual transmissions.

Even if they do make people safer "on average" these systems are not tested by a lot of the auto-safety organizations. In fact, some of these organizations simply bump up the "safety rating" automatically depending on how many "safety" features are included, without actually testing the effectiveness of the feature.

This is important, because forward collusion detection is not a binary thing. Each auto maker has their own set of parameters, sensors and implementations to achieve a similar goal, but each act independently.

I would also prefer if people were more engaged with driving too. I don't think we should encourage people to "rely" on these systems to keep them out of trouble as these systems can and do act unpredictably and may harm other road users as a result of a programming decision since the car in front acted unexpectedly.

I think the whole automation of everything in a car is a bit silly. Transmissions are whatever for me, although the full lane assist, cruise control, adaptive cruise control, even automatic wipers and headlights makes people feel so much more disconnected from the car, which I think leads to unsafe habits or worse, unable to handle the car in situations where the automatic systems fail or become unreliable (e.g poor visibility, wet roads, unmapped roads, off-road, obstructions on the road, road works, etc).

Re: Honda is killing its EVs

#407

Post by ehnto »

stackghost wrote: post #347
cyanydeez wrote: post #325

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's techcrunch. The angle of software-everything has to be there. Why honda is killing EVs is directly related to just how damn cheap Chinese EVs have become and how stupid Americans are when it comes to EV efficiency. Who the hell wants large vehicles for EV when the best solutions are small efficient vehicles with long drive times. Americans distort the market and margins, and Honda was never in the large SUV game…

Americans in most of their country are besieged by massive SUVs and pickups. Driving a tiny little Japanese/Chinese import in, say, Oklahoma is asking to get literally run over.

I don't disagree with your first statement but there is a huge range of cars in the Japanese market. They make the Toyota Land Cruiser and Nissan Patrol after all, smaller by American standards but the biggest cars most other countries will see.

Re: Honda is killing its EVs

#408

Post by partiallypro »

bryanlarsen wrote: post #123

OTOH, it really looks like Toyota is Goldilocks. Most companies invested too much too early and had to write off a substantial amount, but Toyota is rolling into 2027 with a small but nice selection of EV's. Over 25% of vehicles sold world-wide were electric in 2025, and that percentage is steadily increasing. So VW & Ford were "too hot", Honda is looking like "too cold" and Toyota might be the "just right" of the th…

Isn't Toyota betting big on the Hybrid EV? To me, at least in the US, this seems like the best medium-term bet. The EV infrastructure just isn't there yet, despite there being a lot of Tesla chargers. Even with that, the charge time, etc are too long to get going again. Hybrid EV seems to resolve this, and eases the customer into an EV future. Current EVs are great for being around town, but a lot of people in the US live 45min to an hour each way just to work, have to get their kids to school or practice in the meantime. It's just added stress thinking about finding a charging station or having time constraints.

The biggest issue I think every auto maker needs to solve is cost. The average car payment is insane, with dealership markups it's even worst than it would be otherwise. I'm not sure how we got here on that, to me car interiors are no nicer than they were from 2005ish on. I don't even know what the cost is going into.

Re: Honda is killing its EVs

#409

Post by defrost »

wileydragonfly wrote: post #388
boringg wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Two points. 1. Infra will need to upgrade in order to handle heavy charging in neighborhoods with wholesale change in the fleet. It would change our electrical use model considerably in terms of times of use -- and we would be adding all the energy used from gas powered cars to the electrical grid - which is somewhat significant. 2. While you are correct technically -- I think what I am implying is older cars (ICE) w…

We are a net oil exporter. I have no idea where everyone around here thinks all this electricity to charge cars is going to come from.

> We are a net oil exporter.

That's a problem and behaviour with poor long term consequences.

Bit like Columbia being a net cocaine exporter.

> I have no idea

There are annual IEA reports on global energy demand and supply by means and country.

Those looking ahead to sustainable energy are improving technology and infrastructure to better utilize the great fusion reactor in the sky.

Certainly the US could use a plan for charging infrastructure and grid improvements- it's currently lagging both the EU and China there.

eg: Electric vehicle charging - https://www.iea.org/reports/global-ev-outlook-2025/electric-...

( Just the current trends in public charging stations, not trends in supply )

Re: Honda is killing its EVs

#410

Post by koshergweilo »

sigmoid10 wrote: post #51
GianFabien wrote: post #30

Smart doorbells and thermostats that upgraded in the night often became a nuisance or an expensive brick. But a faulty software upgrade on a car can kill you and others. Car company execs need to take a chill pill followed by a reality serum. Monetizing subscription based basic features and delivering in-car advertising is the absolutely worst way to go. As consumers we need to stop buying into the bells, whistles an…

Consumers have very little power in this space. Have you tried buying a non-premium car with physical buttons instead of touchscreens in recent years? There used to be hardly any option because carmakers all somehow decided this was the way forward, even though science clearly said it was making cars less safe. So if you needed a car and didn't have a ton of money, you could merely accept it. Only now that safety rat…

> Have you tried buying a non-premium car with physical buttons instead of touchscreens in recent years? T

This is a USP for the Slate Truck. A lot of early commentary lauded the simplicity

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slate_Truck

Post reply on HN