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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

#601

Post by lupusreal »

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.

Rebadging doesn't add any meaningful consumer choice.

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

#602

Post by smallerfish »

Aurornis wrote: post #429
ethagnawl wrote: post #362

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also who sedans and compact cars have largely ceased to exist. The vast majority of new vehicles are crossovers or _light trucks_, which aren't held to the same emission/efficiency standards.

> It's also who sedans and compact cars have largely ceased to exist. Consumer demand is still an important factor. Sedans and compact cars are still out there, sitting on dealer lots with reasonable prices.

Consumer demand is driven by marketing.

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

#603

Post by globnomulous »

RandomBacon wrote: post #261
hylaride wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yes, definitely. It being a 2 seater is kind of a deal breaker for families. What you need is not a pickup truck. Catering to families means expensive bells and whistles, like entertainment systems, etc. > Back in the day, we'd stuff 3 kids between two adults, but these days the Safety People would have a heart attack just thinking about that. Rightfully so. Back in the day we did so many things we shouldn't have,…

> Catering to families means expensive bells and whistles, like entertainment systems, etc. It absolutely does NOT mean those things. Cars didn't have entertainment systems for nearly a century and families did just fine. My entertainment system was the window. Observe the world, not just whatever AI-generated garbage some algorithm pushes to a small screen 8-10 inches away from your eyes.

Or read books!

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

#604

Post by octorian »

Aurornis wrote: post #597
taylodl wrote: post #43

I LOVE it! THIS is the kind of truck I'd be looking at to replace my 1998 Ford Ranger. Here is what could be potential deal-breakers: - Lack of a mobile app. Minimalist design is great, but I still want an app to manage charging and be alerted to any vehicle issues. - Lack of good charge management and battery conditioning. Either that, or a cheap and easy to replace battery pack. I'd really like both! - Comparable h…

This is why it's so hard for companies to introduce stripped-down or small models of anything: People will tell you how much they want it, but as soon as they see it they realize they actually miss something from the models that are already out there. It happens with small phones (iPhone mini) to laptops and cars. There are comments throughout this thread claiming that everyone would be buying small sedans if not for…

I'm grateful they don't make truly stripped down models of cars anymore, because those were always what would end up in the rental car inventory. Every time I'd rent a car, it felt like I was taking a step back in time.

Now all rental cars actually have some reasonable set of features, without you having to pay for any up-sells.

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

#605

Post by nullc »

aidenn0 wrote: post #253

For anyone curious, if you made a similarly sized gas-powered pickup with an i4 engine, it would be penalized more than a full-sized pickup for being too fuel inefficient, despite likely getting much better mileage than an F-150 because, since 2011, bigger cars are held to a lesser standard by CAFE[1]. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_average_fuel_economy...

I have a small(*) twenty year old i4 pickup and I regularly get cash offers for it while out and about. There is a lot of demand for the small inexpensive and relatively fuel efficient utility vehicles that the government currently prohibits manufacturing.

(*Ironically, though small it has a considerably longer bed than many currently produced larger and less fuel efficient trucks... I'm mystified by trucks that can't even contain a bike without removing a wheel or hanging one over a gate. Looks like the bed on this EV is a bit short too, but a short bed on a small truck is more excusable than a short bed on a huge truck)

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

#606

Post by 7thaccount »

fckgw wrote: post #269
7thaccount wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. I want this truck...but with a 4 cylinder ice engine. Nothing fancy. No needed stereo or seat warmers or complicated anything. I want a small, simple, and affordable truck with good reliability. Before anyone asks, I can't drive the tiny Japanese trucks in my state. They are cool, but look too small when people are driving what are essentially container ships with wheels these days.

The base model Ford Maverick XL exists and is the truck that 95% of most people need.

No thanks. More expensive with garbage infotainment system that violates the user's privacy. Also I'd bet the engine won't hold up well in the long term

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

#607

Post by twiddling »

sema4hacker wrote: post #255
pnw wrote: post #244

I'm really intrigued to see how this does. Kudos to Slate for trying something new and building it in Detroit at a great price point. I see a ton of discussion on social media from people who want to buy simpler vehicles with less features at a better price point (e.g. the Japanese Kei trucks). I'm not convinced Americans will actually buy such a vehicle because we are used to our modern conveniences in new vehicles.…

> I'm not convinced Americans will actually buy such a vehicle because we are used to our modern conveniences My town is FULL of workers doing hauling, painting, gardening, construction, etc., and they're all driving old worn rusting pickups that barely seem held together. There's definitely a market for minimal trucks designed to just get the job done without the "modern conveniences".

I also see this truck appealing to city/college/corp. campus fleets.

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

#608

Post by conductr »

ty6853 wrote: post #84
neural_thing wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to this, there is only one new car model of any kind selling for under $20K in the US these days https://www.carfax.com/rankings/cheapest-cars

One would be wiser to based on annual depreciation in real $ plus time value of purchase price. I suspect out of new trucks a tacoma would be the cheapest since the depreciation is low to negative (IIRC recently a Tacoma was worth more 1 year old than new).

All new car brands/models will not have comps for several years. Even folks buying Rivians, etc have no idea how the resale value will play out so you’re always going to have to take a gamble

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

#609

Post by skort »

maerF0x0 wrote: post #587
blt wrote: post #529

As a car audio enthusiast, the biggest obstacle to putting a system into a new high-tech car is bypassing the deeply-embedded infotainment system while retaining decent aesthetics and steering wheel controls. The idea of getting an electric drivetrain and new-car safety with a 90's-style blank canvas for audio is amazing. I hope that the noise isolation and intended speaker mounting locations are good!

feature, not a bug, they want you to buy their $4000 BOSE upgrade which is actually $500 of equipment.

Do you have any proof or even a hint of a reason that this will be the case? Or is this just nonsense?

Their FAQs even state: > Built-in infotainment systems raise a car’s price, and they become outdated quickly and have high failure rates.

It seems unlikely that a company saying this will throw in a $4,000 infotainment system in a $20,000 vehicle.

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

#610

Post by bgnn »

brianwawok wrote: post #476
bgnn wrote: post #473

Earlier quoted context omitted.

why can't we just tax the gas at the pump? this is, at least, what I'm used to in Europe.

We do. But it’s a super regressive tax. Lots of very poor people depend on a bad MPG car to get to work and live.

that's a different problem. US cities used to have good publhc transport, but the urvanization policies since 50s is car-centric. plus, because of the American cars having huge engines they have bad MPG. The current situation US is in is nothing to do with the tax regime.
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