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The Electric Car

blog.geoffralston.com

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Re: The Electric Car

#161

Post by threeseed »

greglindahl wrote: post #109
msandford wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That means few millenials will ever be able to own them; real estate is just too damn expensive to buy, nevermind the car that you really only can get once you own a house with a garage.

Lots of places don't have super-expensive real estate, unlike the Bay Area and Manhattan. More and more places over time will require apartment garages to have chargers -- already a law for new construction here in Palo Alto. Personally, I charge at the city parking garage a block away.

The world is bigger than just the US.

Housing affordability is a major problem in almost every developed country.

Re: The Electric Car

#162

Post by JacobAldridge »

One element Geoff doesn't cover in the comparison, which I think will slow the take-up, is that the lifecycle of a phone (And those (from memory, please correct with data) are median averages. For every person still toting an iPhone3 I imagine there are scores still driving a 1993 Camry.

Smartphones exploded in use over the timeframe described, because the technology improved rapidly AND consumers upgraded 2-3 times so could choose the newest and best. Even if cars had similar tech trajectories, the market is moving more slowly.

Of course, electric cars have a secondary market that's much stronger than used phones, which will work against my numbers.

Re: The Electric Car

#163

Post by toomuchtodo »

ghaff wrote: post #153
toomuchtodo wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I guarantee you that self-driving cars will not be the mainstream even in 15 years. Probably more. Want to make a Long Bet on that? I'm willing to bet up to $1000 USD, loser pays winner's choice of 501(c)(3) US charity org, that self-driving cars will be mainstream in under 10 years.

What do you mean by self-driving cars? As in highly assistive driving on highways so that you can not really pay attention most of the time whether that's legal or not? That I could (maybe) buy though it's a stretch given replacement cycles. But something I can summon with an app and take a nap? 50 years may be too soon.

"Level 4: The vehicle performs all safety-critical functions for the entire trip, with the driver not expected to control the vehicle at any time. As this vehicle would control all functions from start to stop, including all parking functions, it could include unoccupied cars."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autonomous_car#Definition

Re: The Electric Car

#164

Post by chao- »

msandford wrote: post #142
greglindahl wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lots of places don't have super-expensive real estate, unlike the Bay Area and Manhattan. More and more places over time will require apartment garages to have chargers -- already a law for new construction here in Palo Alto. Personally, I charge at the city parking garage a block away.

So let me get this straight. In the "flyover country" where you DON'T get big city salaries, you're going to buy a $100k-$150k house because you don't make six figures. And then with all the leftover money that you don't have because you're not earning SF engineer salary, you're going to buy a car that costs anywhere from 25%-50% of your house?

Have you seen the vehicle culture in "flyover country"? You will absolutely see people put off repairs and upkeep to their house while they make sure they get a new car every 5 years (or stagger new cars with their spouse, 10 years for each because). If you haven't seen it, I can only ask you believe someone (me) with experience in it (various cities in Texas).

Would it surprise you as well to learn that "SF engineer" isn't the only job in the world that pays a high salary? In Houston for instance, I know dozens of people who earn comparable amounts from engineering in the medical and energy companies. And don't get me started on the consultancies that support them (megabucks) or salespeople paid on commission (ultrabucks). It's actually one of the biggest obstacles to our startup community here: luring good people away from their low-risk, high-salary position in energy, medicine and finance.

Re: The Electric Car

#165

Post by harshaw »

I wish people would be slightly more honest about technological change. Smartphones are very special. They are very cheap, easy to mass produce, and you can iterate on them very quickly. Cars on the other hand have a much longer life cycle, involve much more capital, and in general are going to follow an elongated investment / replacement cycle. Comparing these two systems, while enthusiastic and great for a college term paper, seems premature.

I am really excited that there may be a fleet of self driving electric cars in urban areas in 10 years. It's going to be awesome. But I am willing to bet for the rest of us its going to be a more conservative change that is going to evolve over decades.

Re: The Electric Car

#167

Post by kailuowang »

reedlaw wrote: post #156

I can't believe he's comparing a $70,000 electric car to a huge bucket labeled "old-fashioned gasoline cars". Of course the $70,000 car is better in almost every way. I've driven a lot of electric cars in the $5,000 to $10,000 range and I assure you they are not better than "old-fashioned gasoline cars". Our last gas-powered car was a used Lexus that cost us $8,000. It's an extremely comfortable luxury car that seats…

If I remember correctly, iPhone came out when most featured phone is either free with a contract or less than 50 bucks.

Re: The Electric Car

#168

Post by aabajian »

The original iPhone had a lot going for it, but I think it was the call-the-Starbucks example that really sold it for me. Remember Steve Jobs on stage looking up the GPS walking path to Starbucks, and having the phone number ready with one-push? It just made perfect sense - a smart phone eliminates the yellow pages.

I don't know if I can find such a feature for an electric car. It's nice that you can plug it in at home, but this is just replacing one need (visit a gas station) with another (remembering to plug it in / staying close to home).

Re: The Electric Car

#169

Post by chc »

dangrossman wrote: post #136

The future's already here. A 2-3 year old Nissan Leaf, top trim with all the features, with 10-20K miles on it and a 7-year factory CPO warranty, costs just $10-12K. That's thousands less than the average price paid for a used car last month. If your commute's less than 40-50 miles each way, you can have all the advantages of owning an EV today, not X years down the line. Zero gas, zero maintenance, zero emission ins…

Eh, I'm not sure the Leaf is the future for most people. Based on what I've heard from Leaf owners, even a commute of 35 miles can be iffy depending on travel conditions. And even if your Leaf can make the trip today, common levels of battery degradation on the Leaf will place that commute out of your range within a couple of years (the users at mynissanleaf.com estimate that a battery can be expected to lose about 10% of its capacity after one year, 15% after two years and 26% after five years under moderate conditions).

Re: The Electric Car

#170

Post by tomtang0514 »

I can't believe he said electric cars are more fun to drive. There're fun to drive electric cars such as tesla and fiat 500e, but they're never more fun to drive than most (if not all) other cars in it's price range. The only advantage of an electric car in terms of performance is torque. And it doesn't necessary has more torque. Yes electric cars has maximum torque at 0 rpm, but do anyone actually bother looking at it's torque curve? Different from gasoline cars, the torque of electric cars goes DOWN when rpm goes up. I do believe electric cars make a lot of sense for normal people, especially commuters, but please do not say it's more fun to drive because it's absolutely not.
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