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

Western carmakers' retreat from electric risks dooming them to irrelevance

theguardian.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

291–300 of 370 posts

Re: Western carmakers' retreat from electric risks dooming them to irrelevance

#291

Post by neya »

lelanthran wrote: post #203
neya wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are free to believe what you want, I'm just presenting the data.

> You are free to believe what you want, I'm just presenting the data. It's not a matter of belief: what does the data you presented (profitability and employee count) have to do with the claim about product types? I mean, you could have presented data showing that the sky is blue - your data is correct, but irrelevant to whether the manufacturers are cutting down on a specific product type.

> what does the data you presented (profitability and employee count) have to do with the claim about product types?

If you actually read the article, it says the profitability and employee count are a direct consequence of the product type. It explicitly says EV was a factor in the source cited.

If manufacturers cutting down on product types isn't evidence of cutting on product types, then what is?

Here's more data: https://www.caranddriver.com/news/g68920984/evs-discontinued...

Re: Western carmakers' retreat from electric risks dooming them to irrelevance

#292

Post by magicalhippo »

StilesCrisis wrote: post #271
BobaFloutist wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does the random reboot affect the motor, lights, defogger, signals, anything else absolutely essential to driving? Don't get me wrong, I'd be annoyed and unsettled if the sound system or gps or whatever rebooted while I was driving, I'm just curious just how dire it is

American safety standards require that the car be more-or-less entirely functional without the infotainment system.

On my Renault Megane e-Tech, the Android infotainment system sometimes requires a reboot while driving. If I have the route visualized on the instrument cluster screen, that stays working fine while the infotainment reboots.

So clearly entirely separate systems, despite it is obviously also running Google maps to show the route. Presumably this is quite common.

Re: Western carmakers' retreat from electric risks dooming them to irrelevance

#293

Post by pink_eye »

olyjohn wrote: post #284
Marsymars wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like the form factor of the 500e, but boy do I not trust Fiat.

My friend has had one for about 6 years and put about 40,000 miles on his. Then one day some battery control module died. Now the car is a brick, and isn't worth fixing. The whole battery has to come out to get to the module, and it's possible that the battery itself is still bad. But we won't know until the module is replaced... which means putting the battery back into the car before knowing it's condition.

How is all this Battery waste good for the environment?

#ElectrifiedEnvironmentalDestruction

Re: Western carmakers' retreat from electric risks dooming them to irrelevance

#294

Post by Dylan16807 »

toast0 wrote: post #258
Gud wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I work all over Europe and I’m not super impressed with the state of charging infrastructure in general and it seems particularly bad in German. One thing that’s super annoying and this is not specific to Germany, but why the fuck do I need some shitty app to use your charger? Should be tap and go like any other purchase. You know, like how I pay for my petrol? Seems to me like everyone wants to force an app down my…

> why the fuck do I need some shitty app to use your charger? I have PHEV that doesn't pull much from a charger, and I usually don't use chargers for money, but... When I charged for fun while I was shopping at a grocery store, it ended up being like a 70 cent charge. If you bill 70 cents to a credit card, it doesn't make sense. Tieing it to an app, you can either charge more and have me loan you the balance, or you…

Paypal will do small payments for 9 cents plus 5%, or 7 euro cents plus 6.5%. That can handle pretty small charges.

And a charger network can have a running balance for small payments without a garbage app.

Re: Western carmakers' retreat from electric risks dooming them to irrelevance

#295

Post by giardini »

M0r13n wrote: post #82

I've had a rough time with the last two EVs I've owned. I bought a Honda e in 2020 because of its retro-future charm, but ended up being disappointed by several things: - the range was miserable - the software quality was bad - no OTA updates ever (despite Honda's promises) - slow charging - poor public charging infrastructure in Germany I should have known that a 35 kW battery wouldn't deliver great range or chargin…

Two bad purchases from normally high-quality companies and you're still good to go for more! Amazing!

Re: Western carmakers' retreat from electric risks dooming them to irrelevance

#296

Post by Dylan16807 »

cmurphycode wrote: post #224
campl3r wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd love to see that math

https://cmurphycode.com/electricity Not Europe, but unfortunately, my state of Massachusetts has terrible electric costs for complicated reasons, so I understand what the OP is saying. I had to keep explaining this to my friends in MA - I replaced a Prius with a Nissan Leaf and my running costs are far higher. (note that these prices are yearly averages for the state selected, but you can also fill in your own values…

> I understand what the OP is saying.

You understand what OP would be saying if most of Europe had gasoline for $3.50 a gallon. Put in $2/liter instead and the crossover goes from 29MPG to 62MPG.

Re: Western carmakers' retreat from electric risks dooming them to irrelevance

#297

Post by hnlmorg »

joe_mamba wrote: post #5

I think Ferrari, Lambo, Rolls Royce, Bugatti, Zonda etc. will do just fine with selling luxury ICEs with many cylinders that go vroom to rich people. In fact they'll probably do better as global wealth gap increases. It's the Audis, BMWs, Mercedes, etc of Europe they'll probably end up the way of Philips, Blaupunkt, Alcatel, Grundig, Nokia, Thomson, Gigaset, SAgem, etc. meaning selling off their consumer civilian ope…

I can’t speak for all of the western world, but European car makers don’t seem to be struggling selling EVs on the UK.

Re: Western carmakers' retreat from electric risks dooming them to irrelevance

#298

Post by JuniperMesos »

pink_eye wrote: post #293
olyjohn wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My friend has had one for about 6 years and put about 40,000 miles on his. Then one day some battery control module died. Now the car is a brick, and isn't worth fixing. The whole battery has to come out to get to the module, and it's possible that the battery itself is still bad. But we won't know until the module is replaced... which means putting the battery back into the car before knowing it's condition.

How is all this Battery waste good for the environment? #ElectrifiedEnvironmentalDestruction

Mostly by replacing the use of a gasoline-burning internal combination engine car.

Re: Western carmakers' retreat from electric risks dooming them to irrelevance

#299

Post by triceratops »

kube-system wrote: post #108
declan_roberts wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think this is true, at least for Tesla, which has a very mature and wide range of chargers almost everywhere. AFAIK, Rivian can also use Tesla chargers now.

It is mature enough to barely support the current level of adoption which is between 1 and 2% of cars on the road. Also charging at home is a significant part of EV infrastructure which is also sorely lacking in the US

US car garages don't have regular, 120v power outlets?

Re: Western carmakers' retreat from electric risks dooming them to irrelevance

#300

Post by kube-system »

triceratops wrote: post #299
kube-system wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is mature enough to barely support the current level of adoption which is between 1 and 2% of cars on the road. Also charging at home is a significant part of EV infrastructure which is also sorely lacking in the US

US car garages don't have regular, 120v power outlets?

Less than half of US occupied residences have a carport or garage that they own. Many single family homes lack a garage, particularly in the northeast US. And many in apartments lack access to power even if they have a garage.
Post reply on HN