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Tesla Completes L.A.-to-New York Electric Model S Drive Chargers

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Re: Tesla Completes L.A.-to-New York Electric Model S Drive Chargers

#181

Post by cmelbye »

oinksoft wrote: post #162
toomuchtodo wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I offset the carbon emissions through Terrapass ( http://www.terrapass.com/ ). It's not perfect, I know, but I can't afford a Tesla at the moment without liquidating my TSLA stock. Total cost to offset ~2 metric tons of CO2: ~$20 ( http://www.terrapass.com/shop/ )

That's an interesting service, it makes me wonder what other indulgence-style businesses could exist for wealthy people ... +--------------------------+------+--------+ | Name | Qty. | Price | +--------------------------+------+--------+ | Littering | 1 | $6.95 | +--------------------------+------+--------+ | Water lawn in drought | 1 | $34.95 | +--------------------------+------+--------+ | Let's do this mega-trip |…

Doesn't that already exist? Where I live, there's a fine for all three of those things.

Re: Tesla Completes L.A.-to-New York Electric Model S Drive Chargers

#182

Post by stcredzero »

tobtoh wrote: post #145
MartinCron wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When you're a kid, the novelty of sitting rear facing in "the way way back" is enough to stop the nausea, at least for short trips. And if you're not a kid, there's no way in hell you're going to fit in the rear-facing seats, I'm pretty short and I still can't fit back there.

Exactly this - I remember my parents had a Volvo with similar seats and my brothers and I loved sitting back there. We always imagined we were in the gun turrets of the Millennium Falcon shooting down cars.

Grew up in a 240 wagon myself. Sometimes I would pretend a bug-spot on the windshield was a gunsight and pretend to shoot other cars, thinking of Star Wars the whole time.

Re: Tesla Completes L.A.-to-New York Electric Model S Drive Chargers

#183

Post by [deleted] »

cmelbye wrote: post #181
oinksoft wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's an interesting service, it makes me wonder what other indulgence-style businesses could exist for wealthy people ... +--------------------------+------+--------+ | Name | Qty. | Price | +--------------------------+------+--------+ | Littering | 1 | $6.95 | +--------------------------+------+--------+ | Water lawn in drought | 1 | $34.95 | +--------------------------+------+--------+ | Let's do this mega-trip |…

Doesn't that already exist? Where I live, there's a fine for all three of those things.

[deleted]

Re: Tesla Completes L.A.-to-New York Electric Model S Drive Chargers

#184

Post by tjmc »

r00fus wrote: post #95
grecy wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The side of history that can't afford a Tesla S Yet. There were millions that couldn't afford an automobile when they came out too you know..... Give it time, stop thinking a new product has to be everything to everyone so early on.

Range is a significant factor of the Tesla's cost, and it'd require a order of magnitude of efficiency increase to both support a cheaper model while also keeping the same charging range and keeping Tesla's profit margins in place.

Tesla's deal with Panasonic [1] should bring their costs down by a hefty margin. Current battery tech is improving at around 7% per year. So even without a true "order of magnitude" breakthrough like lithium-air batteries, you're looking at battery efficiency doubling every decade, plus additional savings from economies of scale.

My personal suspicion is that electric cars will hit mainstream sales levels by around 2020 and by 2025 they'll dominate new car sales.

[1] http://www.forbes.com/sites/markrogowsky/2013/11/06/teslas-b...

Re: Tesla Completes L.A.-to-New York Electric Model S Drive Chargers

#185

Post by kybernetikos »

grecy wrote: post #39
sliverstorm wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If that fits your pace, that's great, but that would have driven me nuts last time I was driving cross-country.

People said exactly the same thing when the automobile was introduced and it was horribly less convenient than a horse and cart. Of course a new tech is slightly less convenient out the outset, and of course it will only appeal to a certain percentage of the population, and of course it will get better over time. Which side of history are those people on? Which side of history will you be on?

I'm not sure someone who says "If that fits your pace, that's great, but that would have driven me nuts last time I was driving cross-country" is really looking to be on a particular side of history.

Re: Tesla Completes L.A.-to-New York Electric Model S Drive Chargers

#186

Post by yaeger »

NickM wrote: post #25
rdl wrote: post #6

I'm curious if I'd want a Model S (top model) or a BMW 535d or other mid-luxury diesel sedan in Germany in a couple years. Around the city, sure, big advantage to the Tesla. For Autobahn trips at 150-250 km/h, stopping every 1-2h would get old fast, even if every service stop had a supercharger.

If you're going that fast, you'll have to stop every 1-2h to refuel in just about any car, ICE or EV. On the one hand, yeah you might have to stop for a little longer in a Tesla, but on the other hand you're going to save shitloads of money: driving that fast is massively inefficient, so you're going to spend a lot of cash on fuel in an ICE, whereas the superchargers are free.

>If you're going that fast, you'll have to stop every 1-2h to refuel in just about any car

Yeah, no. No way in hell, actually. You think driving 150-200 for 2 hours would drain a 70-80 Liter gas tank? I drive 50 minutes to work each day going that fast, I have an 80 Liter tank and I have to stop for gas once every 5 business days. You can calculate yourself that this equals to a "little" more than 2 hours of net driving time.

Re: Tesla Completes L.A.-to-New York Electric Model S Drive Chargers

#187

Post by Shivetya »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #98
atourgates wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just doing some quick numbers (not related to current specific locations of quick chargers and gas stations), stopping 30 minutes every 170 miles would add a bit over 6 and a half hours of stopping to a LY->NYC trip. LA -> NYC is about 2,800 miles. If you had to stop for 30 minutes every 170 miles, that'd be 16.5 stops, for a total of about 8.25 hours of charging stops. If you assume 25mpg in a car with a 12 gallon t…

I just drove from Chicago to Tampa, stayed for two weeks in FL, and then drove back over the last two weeks. I did both sprints straight through in a 2008 Infiniti G37, which has a six-speed auto, V6 engine, and 20 gallon tank. At an average speed of 85 mph, the car averaged about 24mpg, giving me a range of around 420 miles per gallon (with ~60 mile reserve). This is an edge case of course. I'm 31, and drove the ent…

People seem to be missing your point, time is money. To those with lots of money time necessarily isn't as much money. Hence, the Tesla buyers have the luxury of time.

Going on a vacation for us means, the less time we spend getting there the more time we have on vacation since we have to work it in between what work allows.

Still I cannot believe even on this site all the people justifying stopping every couple of hours for thirty minutes. Even traveling with dogs that isn't necessary. Top it off, all those stops extend the trip which means yet another hotel.

Plus my number one issue, the supercharge network governs how you do your trip, which routes you take. That can simply put some locations out of practicality.

Re: Tesla Completes L.A.-to-New York Electric Model S Drive Chargers

#188

Post by Dewie »

mturmon wrote: post #158
encoderer wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disingenuous? Hey buddy, GFY. Last year I drove from Florida to San Francisco. We did it over 5 days, my wife and I with our dog. We stopped as-needed and always more than 10 minutes. Just filling the tank & handling payment takes that long. But in reality, you NEED to clean the windshield to clear off the bug splatter. And you NEED to use the facilities. Probably you and your passengers. And you really WANT a moment…

You're being needlessly aggressive. The comment to which you are responding was raising a reasonable point.

> You're being needlessly aggressive.

The first line of the abalone's post was needlessly insulting. I'm not saying that tit-for-tat is OK, but I can see what provoked the outburst.

Re: Tesla Completes L.A.-to-New York Electric Model S Drive Chargers

#189

Post by colinramsay »

atourgates wrote: post #89
TallGuyShort wrote: post #3

>> provide 170 miles of range in a 30-minute charge That would have still sounded impractical to me when I was still able to just drive through the night to get where I needed to be. Now that I travel with a young baby and a dog, that's about how often and for how long I have to stop for breaks anyway. This is impressive progress anyway, but I'm especially impressed now that it really wouldn't alter my own schedule m…

Just doing some quick numbers (not related to current specific locations of quick chargers and gas stations), stopping 30 minutes every 170 miles would add a bit over 6 and a half hours of stopping to a LY->NYC trip. LA -> NYC is about 2,800 miles. If you had to stop for 30 minutes every 170 miles, that'd be 16.5 stops, for a total of about 8.25 hours of charging stops. If you assume 25mpg in a car with a 12 gallon t…

There's a part of this comment which makes me think I'm missing something. According to their website, the Mercedes A180 CDI ECO gets 78.5mpg.

78.5.

I own a car I would consider sporty, and I can still get over 35mpg when driving on motorways at a sensible speed.

I'm in the UK. Are we using some other metric to establish MPG or are cars in the USA really that absurd that they get your quoted 25mpg on a long journey?

Re: Tesla Completes L.A.-to-New York Electric Model S Drive Chargers

#190

Post by vidarh »

base698 wrote: post #32
fit2rule wrote: post #14

I hope actually that Americans learn to drive less , not more, as a result of these sorts of changes in the market. It always amuses me that a majority of American life is lived on the road. For all the pleasures of the free and the brave, they love their little cages..

After moving to California 3 years ago I've seen stretches of Utah, Arizona, Nevada, Idaho, and of course California I'd never have seen without a car. Gotten to go to places impractical with any other transportation. I can't really imagine not having a car for my weekend trips. I get not wanting to stay in a car for 40 minutes each way on a weekly commute, but being trapped in a city like LA or San Francisco with no…

The thing is you'd only be "trapped" with no access to the natural beauty because everyone opts for cars instead of public transport.

Norway has a population density about 1/10th of the US (to get away from the "but the US is so big" argument that inevitably comes up), yet when I lived in Oslo, I could stroll along the main central city streets, and catch light rail to pretty much the middle of the woods in 20 minutes, regular rail to the central mountain massifs in a few hours, or a bus to the beach in 15 minutes.

That only works because of heavy investment in public transport over decades, probably in part because car ownership became common much later - Norway wasn't particularly wealthy until the oil revenues started pouring in in the 70's. Culturally the car has never gotten the same position as in the US. Even households that have 2-3 cars will often rely on public transport for commutes.

There'll always be areas where not having a car is impractical because of density - not everyone can sanely get away with not having a car in Norway either; and there's always be places that will be tricky to get to without a car - whether rented for the trip or your own. But the US is in the current situation because you've favoured the car for so long that everything is geared for it.

Of course it's self-perpetuating. I've spent quite a lot of time in the Bay Area, without a drivers license (never bothered to learn to drive as I've never had any use for a car in Oslo and now London), and if I'd lived there I'd have gotten a license as quick as - I'm generally quite flexible about walking long distances just for the walk, and happy to take things easy and wait for a bus or a train , but even somewhere like the Bay Area with a population density well over the places I grew up had so horrible public transit coverage it'd drive me crazy.

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