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

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

#481

Post by HeyLaughingBoy »

bluGill wrote: post #349
ty6853 wrote: post #35

I love it. However I wonder about the overlap between people that need a truck and this particular truck. I have only owned trucks when I needed to go out in the middle of bumfuck nowhere with a payload, in places with poor access to electricity. If I need to go in bumfuck nowhere without payload then there is no need for the truck, and if I need a payload in the city it's just way way cheaper to have it delivered wh…

Rural areas tend to not have gas close. 10 miles or so. I know farmers who get gas delivery just because some cars never go to town, just field to field. Charge an ev at home and they avoid a lot of fuel headaches.

LOL. I live in a rural area, and I think a gas station 10 miles away is close.

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

#482

Post by Wowfunhappy »

MostlyStable wrote: post #338
aidenn0 wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's overly reductive. 1. Poorer people tend to drive older vehicles, so if you solely encourage higher fuel economies by taxing carbon emissions, then the tax is (at least short-term) regressive. 2. You can work around #1 by applying incentives for manufacturers to make more efficient cars should lead any carbon tax 3. If you just reward companies based on fleet-average fuel economy without regard to vehicle size,…

All carbon tax is inherently regressive but that's also trivially fixable. Make it revenue neutral and give every citizen a flat portion of the total collected revenue. Bam, it is now progressive , since on average richer people will spend more on fuel (and therefore the tax) even though it is likely a much smaller percentage of their spending. Every single one of your ideas has problems that are solved by a carbon t…

^ In addition, I find it notable that the political party that is in favor of more regressive taxes is also against a carbon tax.

In an ideal world, I'd like the tax to be made more progressive, but I'll take anything!

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

#483

Post by HeyLaughingBoy »

tayo42 wrote: post #91
ty6853 wrote: post #35

I love it. However I wonder about the overlap between people that need a truck and this particular truck. I have only owned trucks when I needed to go out in the middle of bumfuck nowhere with a payload, in places with poor access to electricity. If I need to go in bumfuck nowhere without payload then there is no need for the truck, and if I need a payload in the city it's just way way cheaper to have it delivered wh…

I'm living in a suburb but been thinking about a pick up Some uses are, impulse Craigslist and local furniture purchases, outdoor sports equipment, home garden projects. My sedan is trashed from ocean related stuff I'm always putting in it. I was in a rush the other day, accidently left something wet in the car all day and have a mildew smell now to deal with. Dumb stuff like that seems avoidable.

A 9x8 trailer is a cheap alternative. Although, living in a suburb it might be hard to find a place to put it.

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

#485

Post by data_ders »

thederf wrote: post #462

I'm quite excited about this. Ticks all my boxes for "low" tech, simple, moddable, useful, and cheap. I'm hoping my aging Pontiac Vibe holds out long enough to upgrade to one of these, if they succeed. I put in a preregistration!

Hell yeah Pontiac Vibe! My 2008 is at 308k! I’ll drive into the ground

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

#486

Post by mikestew »

MetaWhirledPeas wrote: post #398
ryandrake wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yea, it's pretty exciting. I'd like to see how much more they could strip out to reduce the price and still have a viable commercial product. I guess I'm living firmly in the past, but $20K still seems to be a high price for a car. Then again, I haven't bought a car new since the 90s, so I'm probably just an old fart who hasn't grokked what things cost today. I still remember the day when the base-model Corolla start…

> $20K still seems to be a high price for a car Keep in mind this price is before the USA federal tax credit. So we're potentially talking about a $12,500 car. And consider inflation.

After federal tax credit, ergo $27K.

(Hat tip to @vaidhy: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43794867)

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

#487

Post by leoapagano »

Don't get me wrong, I absolutely adore this truck. But I feel the same way about this truck that I do about the Framework Laptop (having owned one)—cool idea, cool product, but will Slate be around in 5 years to keep making parts and offering support for it?

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

#488

Post by rchaud »

pavlov wrote: post #469

For comparison, this is a $16k car in China: https://carnewschina.com/2025/03/25/byd-sealion-05-ev-launhe... It’s like if you could buy an old Nokia for $200, or a new Android smartphone for $160. The old Nokia certainly has nostalgic qualities and some concrete practical benefits like all-week battery life, but overall it’s not a great deal. And this is why you have >100% tariffs on Chinese cars — American manufactu…

Those cars are priced for the budgets of domestic Chinese consumers. BYD exports to Europe are priced similarly to car models sold there. For the same reason, this Slate truck is very unlikely to cost just $20k when it reaches the mass production stage.

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

#489

Post by masklinn »

mmooss wrote: post #394
_fat_santa wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My favorite thing to come out of CAFE regulations was the Aston Martin Cygnet. It was just a re-badged Toyota iQ whose sole purpose was to raise the average fuel economy within their fleet. Later they made a one off version for Goodwood that has a V8 stuffed under the hood.

> My favorite thing to come out of CAFE regulations was the Aston Martin Cygnet. It was just a re-badged Toyota iQ whose sole purpose was to raise the average fuel economy within their fleet. Maybe that's a good thing. It compelled Aston Martin to provide their customers with a fuel-efficient option.

Nobody looking for a fuel efficient car would look at Aston, and nobody looking at Aston would go for a fuel efficient car.

Which was borne by its sales: sold for nearly 3 times the price you'd have paid Toyota for an iQ, it sold all of 600 units in two years before being cancelled, Aston's second shortest production run. The shortest was the Virage which sold more than 1000 units in a year.

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

#490

Post by doctorpangloss »

thederf wrote: post #462

I'm quite excited about this. Ticks all my boxes for "low" tech, simple, moddable, useful, and cheap. I'm hoping my aging Pontiac Vibe holds out long enough to upgrade to one of these, if they succeed. I put in a preregistration!

The problem is, the kind of person who cares about those things, as valid as they are, buys 0-1 cars per 20 years, and the market is driven (ha ha) by people who buy 2-3 cars every 2 years.
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