Sorry, best we can do is massive, expensive pseudo-luxury SUVs
I wouldn’t call Kia nor Hyundai nor Toyota nor Honda anything close to pseudo luxury. Has the bar been lowered because of all the plasticated electronics and DUAL ZONE AC?
The fit and finish of interiors in general has really fallen… literally plastic everywhere. Uphostery, leather, wood/wood-effect etc are all mostly gone
There’s quite a wide range within those brands. Is it safe to say that you would consider Lexus or Acura to be at least pseudo luxury? What about their entry models that are just a rebranded version of the Honda/Toyota model?
Hell, how do we even define luxury? You can get heated leather seats in just about anything these days, and a few decades ago those were both ultra premium options.
Luxury often gets confused with high-cost. Which is confusing for people and kind of boils down to your definition of luxury.
Personally a new top of the range 35k Kia with heated seats, HUD, electric tailgate and radar cruise control is luxury but others will only consider a Porsche or above luxury? Donno it’s just never going to be globally agreed
That kia is a piece of shit (quality wise) that will fall apart easily, has literal cardboard in the seats and panels, has no sound insulation for road noise, handles like garbage, and has poor performance. Heated seats and cheap electronics do not make it luxury.
It is all opinion, but I think every person that’s driven a wide array of cars would not consider kia luxury. Ever.
Interesting opinion.
I worked for Audi for two years which most would consider luxury but almost every part on an Audi was shared with SKODA and SEAT which others wouldn’t consider luxury. It’s all the same shit with a different badge.
I know plenty of luxury cars with recycled seats, poor handling, bad sound insulation and underpowered engine. Honestly if you feel so strongly that Kia and Hyundai are not luxury and Lexus is you’re way behind in modern vehicle standards
Lexus & Acura, yes, entry level luxury. I’ve never seen one that clearly competes with higher end brands. The similar lower models I think are faux luxury. The cheapness is not hard to find.
American BMW & Mercedes to me are clear moderate / mid level luxury. Most models anyway. I say American because I’ve seen some very low trim models in Europe. Also, those brands are just my example. I know there are others.
I define luxury as long lasting comfort, high level quality control, sound insulation, responsiveness, economics, durability, etc.
Luxury certainly has changed over time. Just my opinion.
I wouldn’t even call Tesla expensive (to make) or luxury. Every Tesla I’ve been in has seemed empty, plain, and feels cheap. The only expensive part about it is the batteries and the labor to make it. I’m sure the price is just inflated due to all of the attention and hype that company has received over the years.
Small cars, small profits.
Lots of small cars sold, lots of small profit.
For a lot of producers, that’s not even true for ICE cars anymore. More safety features and emission regulations make them more expensive to produce relative to larger cars.
The large profit margin SUVs are necessary for a company to achieve scale to then be able to produce the smaller cheaper stuff. Fixed costs like the factory, tooling, training, designing, that all takes a lot of money up front before even selling a single vehicle, and the smaller and cheaper the vehicle coming out of that production pipeline is, the longer the payback period will be. And when we’re talking about billions of dollars in cost, it’s hard to remain solvent when interest payments on the debt grow exponentially over time.
It’s why before tesla there had not been an American auto company startup for like 70 years, Tesla almost went bankrupt, and Rivian is just starting to head in the right direction. Lucid is probably fucked and they’re mostly Saudi owned these days anyways, and the rest of the US EV startup space ranges from a joke to a scam.
What legacy automakers already have in staff and part of the production line established is actually kind of useless when they have to wait to establish their electric motor, battery, and chassis production, which probably just means a new factory anyways. Give it a few years and the cheaper smaller stuff will come, because right now AFAIK only tesla actually has the free cash flow to fund an EV economy car at scale. Everyone else is still sinking billions establishing any EV production at all, and interest rates aren’t helping the speed of their progress either.
There’s more than one way to skin a cat. The Chinese EV companies that have come up in the last few years use a diversity of business strategies, not all involving high margin SUVs. BYD’s cars, for example, are spinoffs of its battery manufacturing business.
BYD was selling ICE vehicles up until March of 2022, and their current split is somewhere around 50/50 BEV/hybrid so they’re still not a full EV company. Their lineup is still being supported by their existing infrastructure, subsidized by the already established supply chains for ICE that they can incrementally cannibalize while building up the EV part of the company. It’s a good blueprint for legacy auto, but not for an EV startup. That is even before mentioning the very generous subsidies and incentives for electrification provided by the national, provincial, and city governments to producers and consumers. Not to say there is anything wrong with that, because I believe the US also needs that level of investment into electrification, but my point is that it’s not the same business model.
BYD also put lots of resources into electric buses. Anyway the point is that there’s multiple game plans EV makers can follow, not only Tesla’s.
I’m not sure you understand economies of scale and profit margin.
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“Car companies needs SUVs to survive financially!” is not a thoughtful response. It can easily be disproven by looking at the first 60 or so years of the automobile industry before SUVs were even a thing. The SUV takeover is a pretty recent phenomenon which has taken shape over the last twenty years.
But it was based on light truck exemptions from CAFE standards, so they can be cheaper to build and sell at a higher margin. But now average buyers don’t want anything smaller for fear of being run down by all the trucks and suvs.
You say that targetting only the top 5% restricts the adoption rate. Consider me shocked…
It’s almost as if consumers influence markets.
unfortunately we have to have a competing option to vote for with our wallets. There is not a single affordable EV available in the US.
The Chevy Bolt and Nissan Leaf are both under $30k, and there’s a Mini Cooper that’s just barely over $30k. There’s only 1 other car from Chevy that’s cheaper than the Bolt, and only 2 models from Mini cheaper than their EV. Nissan seems to be a leader with cheap cars, with 6 cheaper models than the Leaf. When you add in the tax rebates for buying electric that reduces the price an additional $7500.
Just 20k more to go to compete with what chinese drivers have access to.
Well yeah. We have safety laws. You cant build a car out of chinesium and have it pass US Safety tests.
You know whats safe? A smaller, cheaper engine with a lower top speed. I dont need hundreds of miles of range and 100mph top speed
Well you need a strong engine to get up to speed in a decent amount of time, and to go up hills full loaded. You also need tall gears for fuel efficiency. Combined, it means almost every production car can go 100+ mph.
Also range? Thats just a gas tank. A 10 gallon gas tank will take most small cars 300 miles, its not a lot. Why focus on range? Seems weird to me.
As if American cars had any reputation for reliability XD
That’s great. Half of America needs a 15k car. That’s the magic number for Mass adoption.
And where are you going to find any new car in the US for $15k? The average cost of a new car in the US this year was over $40k, and there are several EV options available for practically anyone in the market for a new car.
Kia Forte
Hyundai Venue
Nissan Versa
Mitsubishi Mirage
Kia Rio
Kia Soul
Cars aren’t supposed to cost more than half your annual income. Half the country makes less than 36k a year. The domestic auto makers are trying to hide behind inflation for their price increases, but their record profits tell us they aren’t just raising prices with cost.
2024 Kia Forte $19,790 Starting MSRP - https://www.kia.com/us/en/forte
2024 Hyundai Venue $19,800 Starting MSRP - https://www.hyundaiusa.com/us/en/vehicles/venue
2024 Nissan Versa $16,130 Starting MSRP - https://www.nissanusa.com/vehicles/cars/versa-sedan.html
2024 Mitsubishi Mirage $16,695 Starting MSRP - https://www.mitsubishicars.com/cars-and-suvs/mirage
2023 Kia Rio $16,750 Starting MSRP - https://www.kia.com/us/en/rio (There isn’t a 2024 version as this model has been dropped)
2024 Kia Soul $19,990 Starting MSRP - https://www.kia.com/us/en/soul
Which of these cars that you listed are $15k? The Chevy Bolt EV is less than half the cars you listed when you look at the base price ($26,500) minus the Federal Tax Credit ($7,500).
The original comment I replied to said that “there is not a single affordable EV” in the US and I listed 3 that are under the average cost for any new cars in the US. Then you claimed that EVs need to be $15k in order to reach mass adoption, even though there are no new cars available in the US at that price. You can argue that cars are priced too high, or the car companies are making too much money, but the fact is that for anyone in the market for a new car, there are EVs available in every new car price range.
If we start with an expensive sports car we will make enough money that it will eventually trickle down to affordable vehicles.
Porsche does have an EV, and there’s an EV mustang now (only $45k, which shocked me)
Don’t call that thing a Mustang 😡
Imo the mustang name should have been retired 20 years ago.
No way, the REAL modern Mustangs are rad.
I think it is at least as much about maturity of the technology, and competition in the market. Obviously we all want better cheaper cleaner cars. That hasn’t suddenly changed.
There are several EVs out now for under $50k, and a few under $40k, so things are improving.
alternatively we could get rid of car dependency
That’s fine for people who live in cities (which I acknowledge is a lot of people), but for people who live in smaller more remote and more rural places, it will never be possible to fullly be free of personal vehicles.
Electric bike solves a lot of those issues, but you are correct.
I want to ride a bike really bad, but cars have killed more cyclists in my city year over year my entire life.
It’s just simply terrifying out there when a douche in an Escalade is in a hurry.
Even without that, weather is a huge issue.
You could just get a small EV like a Citroën Ami but having more than two wheels on a vehicle does make you an eco-terrorist according to Lemmy.
We hardly have any small EVs in the US. I’m keen on the mini that’s coming out next year, but 40k is a big ask for a short commute.
I guess it’s busloads of tweakers for me for a while.
I stopped riding my motorcycle because of idiots in cars. No way in hell am I taking an electric bicycle to get groceries
If electric bikes were the only thing allowed on back roads, it would work great.
Edit: yeah, it would involve extreme changes to bike design so that they could carry more things, and there is always a need for a tractor, a semi hauling things, and moving vans.
I suppose for rural cycling to work safely, it would need a network of separate paths, plus some bike lanes attached to the roads in strategic places.
If electric bikes were the only thing allowed on back roads, you’d never be able to make enough grocery/dump/Tractor Supply runs to have time for anything else in your life.
I don’t think you understand what rural means. There were people who had to travel 1 hr+ by car to get to the local grocery store where I came from. An ebike isn’t appropriate for places where you may need to travel 60+ miles, and/or in snow or bad conditions that might persist for weeks, and/or in ungodly hot / humid conditions that also persist for weeks. All three of those are true for decent swaths of the year in my area.
I’m not sure why you’re being downvoted. Electric bikes are a great solution for those that don’t need to haul much or go far. Weather permitting of course. I sold my ICE sedan about a year ago and don’t miss it.
Personally I have the grace of Jar Jar Binks. My last few forays on a bike, when I was younger and less frail, were disastrous. Proponents of E-bikes must be very young and fit, I guess? Because all of us older, disabled, or just plain clutzy people need four wheels and walls of metal between us and the world.
Having said that, I wouldn’t mind having a glorified golf cart to run around town. Seal me in from the weather and give me AC and Bluetooth, that’s all I ask.
Maybe, but I feel like that ship has sailed in the US. Both for practical/economical reasons and because will resist. If half the people fought against wearing masks to protect vulnerable people from covid, good luck getting them to give up their "single family home with a yard + 2 cars” lifestyle. For those fortunate enough to have a single family home, that is.
I’m not saying it SHOULD be this way, and I’m not arguing against reducing cars with public transit and walkable/bikeable towns. However, from my perspective inside suburbia that borders rural areas, electrification of vehicles and supplying the grid with renewables is 1000x more likely as the path to fix this stuff environmentally.
And to get rid of cars for non-environmental reasons, I think that will be even more difficult. I mean, I visited Sweden earlier this year and for all the progressive stuff they’re way ahead of us on, there are still cars everywhere. They are smaller, more sensible cars with a much larger proportion being electric, but cars just the same.
We are screwed in the US because one side is actively and honestly against transit. The other side plays transit lip service but their actions prove they only want transit as a way to funnel money to some supporter (and so projects cost far too much and what we have runs bad schedules)
Yeah… essentially, one side is bad faith crazy trying to burn it all down, and the other side is full of politicians.
They are not tHe SaMe, but neither is pushing hard for it. But at least some slow progress may be possible if the typical politicians stay in power.
Start small, support deregulating zoning so people can build more dense housing, and small corner shops in residential areas, that way it’s not so far to go places. Support bike lanes so people can ride safely if they want to ride. Support work from home to prevent people from having to go anywhere in the first place.
You make a good point bringing up WFH. The speed of the internet these days should allow us to reduce demand for transit rather then looking for the best way to meet that demand.
Think of the shareholders!
If we started now, we’d be ready in a couple decades in all but the most compact metro areas. And that’s after we build the requisite political will. The US fucked itself hard leaning into cars as transport.
But that’s reality for most of us living in the burbs where the schools are better and the neighborhoods are better for kid stuff.
neighborhoods are better for kid stuff
Maybe it’s just me growing up in the city, but I would not want to raise my kid in an American-style suburb. Imagine being a tween but never being able to go anywhere without your parents, because everything is too far away to walk or bike and public transport is not available. Yikes.
My kid is younger but we moved from the suburbs to a dense urban area shortly after he was born. I have to agree even though he’s not yet that independent. Some of my friends back in the burbs were like “what are you going to do with a kid in the city?” But we ride bikes to parks and gardens, go to different museums and the zoo, visit festivals for different cultures. It’s pretty awesome and almost every weekend is an eventful thing for us.
But we ride bikes to parks and gardens, go to different museums and the zoo, visit festivals for different cultures. It’s pretty awesome and almost every weekend is an eventful thing for us.
A thing often misunderstood by suburb and rural denizens is that when beautiful and interesting things are more easily available to you you can actually make meaningful use of them. Sure, they’ll brave the city once every six months and maybe go to the zoo or a cultural event once or twice a year, but nothing beats being able to do these things on a random weekend (or sometimes even weeknight) without much hassle, additional cost, or preparation.
Yea, Cities are great and all, but I’d argue nothing beats having 103 acres of forest and field and a house or two to play around in. I don’t need to go to a park, I step outside. I can have different hobbies with space for a wood shop, a sawmill, a backhoe etc… I can ride 4wheelers and offroad my crossover on a private road / path we built. I don’t have to hear sirens daily/nightly, or worry about lights shining in my bedroom window. I can go for a walk or hike on my property and not see any strangers. I can go swimming or fishing in my pond, I can play badminton and boccie ball and croquet in my lawn.
I’m not saying that cities are bad, but to claim rural people don’t have beautiful and interesting things easily available to them is just misunderstanding what some people find beautiful and interesting. I’m just back from London, and while Christmas at Kew was amazing, and better than anything I’ve ever seen in the US, it’s not like I don’t have access to theaters, stores, and events like Christmas Markets, though we do them as summer festivals and the like. They’re also ~ 30 minutes away, similar to how long I’d spend on getting to the tube, on it, and getting to the event location from my hotel. It’s just far more convenient to walk a much shorter distance to the car, drive to the local small city, and walk a shorter distance from parking to the festival or show, or whatever. We have local museums, but I think you overestimate how much people who aren’t tourists go to the museums. I haven’t been to any of my local ones in quite a while, and I remember my NYC family never went to the museums - it’s always the “huh, yea, I never had a reason to go outside of a tourist family member showing up”.
That is rural life though, not exactly suburban. Suburbs have the worst attributes of the city and countryside, while having little benefits of both)
I’m not saying that cities are bad, but to claim rural people don’t have beautiful and interesting things easily available to them is just misunderstanding what some people find beautiful and interesting.
They may have accessible nature, though not all of them even enjoy that in my experience, but they often do not have easily accessible cultural experiences at all. Not everyone appreciates the things they live by, and that’s just humanity. We can be miserable anywhere.
But it’s been my experience living in the states that it’s extremely commonplace for people to shit on the very idea of cities, and especially raising children in them, and overwhelmingly encourage people to set up shop miles away from their jobs in the suburbs and rural areas despite the downsides.
The main thing I see is our cities still often require you to have a car, yet rent is 3x or more what it is out in the burbs. It’s hard to make that work. I don’t think anyone likes commuting a long way. Though I think we need both more housing in cities to try and drive the prices down and more WFH so less commuting in general.
As the gp poster I didn’t mean to sound like I’m dumping on rural life. I grew up in a rural area, riding four-wheelers and roaming the woods till the sun went down. One of my best friends started a family around the same time I did and opted to buy some acreage a decent commute away from town. They ride dirt bikes with their kids on literal mountains in the backyard, have a chicken coop and machine shop, deer wander up and eat their vegetable garden. It’s super rad and I wouldn’t mind having gone that route either.
I really didn’t dig the suburbs and having to drive literally everywhere though. On the balance I liked the diversity in the city and having easy access to metropolitan amenities. I’d never shit on the rural route and it may well be where I end up, I just thought it was wild how much blowback I got from wanting to raise a kid in the city.
Honestly the only problems I see with cities is the cost if they’re not able to set you up car free. If you’re paying 3x in rent, if you can’t offset that by not paying the car costs you have to be making a lot more money. And most US cities don’t make it easy to go carless.
I wish I could upvote you more than once.
My local huge park, pool, and sports complex is .7 miles. I have multiple stores and restaurants .5 miles away. Our library is also about .7 miles away. My burb is relatively walkable and perfectly bike-able.
Our grid has its own problems and is completely unsafe for cyclists a lot of the time. I know; I work there. My city has removed lanes from streets to create space for bikes and people still get killed by idiots in cars. Still inadequate public transit. Only more walkable than my own burb in certain, hyper expensive neighborhoods. Cheaper areas have homeless problems (warmer climate) resulting in tons of property crimes (mostly stolen bikes and break-ins). Many encounters with bonk-shit crazy guys yelling at stop signs (and people). Some of them have large, aggressive dogs. Oh, and then there’s the fires they start by attempting to cook or warm themselves and then getting high or drunk.
Frankly I would be stoked to live in a townhouse or condo or something on the grid. All my favorite restaurants are down there, lots to do, etc. But it’s shit for kids and the schools are rough as fuck.
Yes. One alternative is communal traffic. People are just to lazy so they can’t wait for it. If every car was indeed banned, gues how good the communal traffic would then be. Since the need increase, a lot. They would be going a lot often and suddenly there are no more cars blocking the roads. Also note that you would not have to be driving so you could do other stuff than looking at the road. And you dont have to save up money for the cars. No need to fix the car when it breaks. No need to find a gas station in time. Just less things to think about. Just look at how the flying business work today, no average people own their own plane. But still people make use of communal planes.
My city (Houston) had a bus system that goes everywhere, but the sheer size and the lack of logical routing makes it hard to use. My friend could drive 20 minutes to work (but cannot drive because of a mental disability) or take multiple buses for 3 hours each way. She now rides an e-bike, but it still takes nearly an hour and she is literally risking her life because there are no bike lanes. Plus the cost of the bike was $3000 and it regularly needs maintenance.
Nothing beats covinience. If it’s easy, people will pay up. That means you are right, that if the communal traffic improves as you say, it would get alot more people using it.
But unfortunately, cars are just so, so convinient, it’s almost impossible to beat, if you don’t straight up outlaw them.
We can’t, though. It would cost trillions of dollars and massive population relocation for it to happen.
Cars are here to stay. The only reduction I can see happening is if fully autonomous cars are a thing. I’m betting they won’t be sold to the public and will be used like Uber.
Not really. It would cost trillions of dollars - but it would be cheaper than car infrastructure. The key is to start building and running using transit now where it makes the most sense and expand that.
You’re delusional if you think there’s even a remote possibility of that ever happening in the US without inventing a time machine to stop the auto industry from killing the rail industry in the early 1900s.
The cat has been out of the bag way too long to put it back in now.
The dirty little secret is we’ve basically done that already - building train lines or subways in the US is so astronomically expensive that no one is doing it “for profit” anymore, and it looks likely that it’ll never become financially viable unless something changes massively. I mean, from what I can tell NYC can’t profitably retrofit the subways, forget about building a new line. Amtrack is constantly in bankruptcy or being bailed out. No one is going to build a modern train line from Rochester NY to NYC again - there just isn’t going to be the passengers.
I just want more car options and less truck/SUV options
hear hear.
I want to buy a honda plug-in hybrid.
they only make a fucking SUV plug-in hybrid.
RIP Honda Clarity
tell me about it. my kingdom for a Civic plug-in hybrid.
Jazz Hybrid?
i dont believe I can drive a car called a Jazz
Why not? It’s music. Music is nice
I just want a Citroën Ami in America
This is exactly what I want, I don’t need 300 miles of range, I don’t need luxury entertainment systems. I need a simple vehicle with decently comfortable seats and a shitty Walmart $80 bluetooth head unit. In Europe and various parts of China / Japan you can get a small electric vehicle for like 8,000 US dollars and that’s what I want here God damn it
Honestly that would be great - make the head unit similar to a car from '07/'08 and then if we want to upgrade it wity something aftermarket, we can. Then we can choose what bells and whistles we want.
No autopilot, not internet connected BS. Heck I’d even go without adaptive cruise control and lane assist.
07/08 really was one of the best eras for car interior, because the head units weren’t usually integrated into the dash, meaning you didn’t have to replace trim pieces with your unit in order to upgrade the damned stereo.
Heck the lane assist, adaptive cruise, and auto pilot isn’t that crazy pricy either.
The comma 3 plus harness is 1500.
I think a large part of the move towards integrated head units had to do with the mandated rear backup camera that necessitates a decent sized screen in the dash in order to use it. The death of CD’s and CD changers also allowed for the screens to grow in size. Lastly, the touchscreens themselves are ever cheaper to manufacture. I love the giant screen in my Chevy Bolt - especially given the Google integration means I don’t have to use the nonsense baked in apps from Chevy.
Except they could totally fit a radio compatible with rear view cameras in a standard double din area, with a decent enough sized touch screen.
My double din aftermarket stereo I installed in my '07 Fiesta XR4 (ST150 for those not in Australia) is fully capable of all the inputs a modern connected stereo has, and more. It has an almost 7 inch touchscreen, has tactile media controls on the front and inputs for front, rear and a third camera, along with RCA’s for Amplifiers and subwoofers. It also supports Bluetooth, Wifi and 4G via user provided SIM(although I don’t use the 4G - I just hotspot it to my phone via WiFi) it also has Apple carplay and Android Auto supported.
Best part is it runs full fat android 10 and supports OBDII readers, meaning it’s a built in scantool for my car.
My preferred setup in any car is tactile aircon controls, steering wheel controls, and tactile media buttons on the head unit. I don’t like touch screens because you usually have to take your eyes off the road to use them. which is dangerous. Tactile controls are better because you can usually tell what they are just by feel and therefore don’t have to look away from the road to use them.
So if it has one, I prefer it not be Tesla sized. I’d say 10 inches is my maximum, and small enough to fit in a double din is my ideal size. Especially given no two stock head units are the same, and some better than others - I’d like the opportunity to upgrade it if necessary without having to rip half my damned dashboard apart.
My current car you could slide out stereo using with 4 euro type head unit removal keys (you can however use some steak knives in a pinch if you don’t want to spend the $2-10 for the keys) no dash disassembly needed.
300 is more than I need, but I do want 200 miles of range.
I would absolutely buy the Mini if I could expect to go over a hundred miles from 80-20% for 10 years, but with a 110 mile range on day one, that just isn’t happening. The 2025 model is rumored to have increased range. If that’s the case, I’ll probably get one.
but I do want 200 miles of range
But why?
It seems like many people (me too) base what they think they’ll need off of what they’re accustomed to. My car will get 275-300 miles out of a tank of gas so it just seems crazy to accept less than half of that. But I don’t actually drive that much. Trips where I start full and have to refill before my destination are very rare. Doubling the refueling stops and extending their length wouldn’t actually bother me much, especially considering that for my day to day my car would just charge overnight and I never have to go out of my way for it. I guess what I’m getting at is that if I really think about it, a 110-150 mile range is probably about as much as I should be paying for.
My EV has 280km range and it’s a bit short. I would prefer to have 450km.
Reasons:
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charging above 80% is slow and bad for the baterry, you also don’t go to 0% before charging. so on most days I don’t actually have 280km range, more like 200km
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I drive more during the weekend, usually just around 200-300km. I can charge for free at work but with 280 range I can’t charge for the whole weekend which would be nice and would reduce my costs to nearly 0
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on longer trips 280km means a stop for charging about every 2h. Make it 3h and it would be perfect
280km is enough for daily driving but in my case, 50% bigger battery would a big improvement overall.
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In my case I live in a place where cities are spread out and where it gets cold in the winter. My parents live 40 mile away and don’t have an EV charger or a 220v outlet in their garage. Take 10% max range off in the winter, and I would have to use the only charging station (Tesla supercharger) or spend at least 6 hours charging at their house to be comfortable getting home in case of extra traffic or detours. I semi regularly drive even further, 80-100 miles one way. I’d have to stop to charge on my way there and on my way back in the winter, adding at least 30 minutes to an already 2 hour drive. There is also poor charging density on the route, so it has to be planned.
I drive a plug in hybrid now, and can get to work and home on battery only, but only in the summer and no extra stops or alternate routes are possible. People start getting antsy under a 1/4-1/8th tank of gas, it’s worse with battery. Add to that I am able to charge at home, if you have to go visit a charging station because you live in a ln apartment or townhouse without garage space, you need at least 5 days of charge range between fill ups, because most everyone isn’t going to want to add a 30 minute stop to charge daily.
I think it largely boils down to 2 things: How spread out things are in the US that can result in longer trips rather frequently, and the lack of electric car infrastructure.
These 2 things combined mean people are more concerned about the range that they can get compared to an ICE car. The only EV chargers I know of in my town are just down the street from me and are locked up 24/7 because they’re on the property of an elementary school (stupid idea on the town’s part putting them there). This would mean that if I had an at home charger and an EV with a 100 mile range, I could get about 45 miles out before I would have to turn around and come back to charge it. If I want to go to the city for something (a day trip to the museum, for example), that’s 75 miles - one way. I used to make that drive daily in my old RAV-4 for work, and it isn’t a big deal when the round trip would be a half a tank of gas, but that would mean about 25 miles of battery to find a charger once I get there, or finding at least one stop on the way up and probably on the way back as well. And that’s in optimal conditions. I never saw any EV chargers on that commute in the 5 years I had that job, so it would probably mean going out of the way to find charging stations, which would add additional miles to your battery usage.
Once the charging infrastructure is more robust (and hopefully isn’t monopolized by Tesla), I think this kind of thing will be much less of a concern, but people are still going to be bothered by it if they have to stop for long periods of time frequently in order to charge their car.
That is absolutely correct. 110-150 miles of range is exactly what I want. Actually, I was figuring 100 miles at and-of-life, which is basically 120, or or so, at purchase.
The reason I say I will not buy a sub-200 mile car is that one doesn’t drive an EV from 100% to 0% charge. Everyone I know runs 80/20. That takes 40% off the top. A 200-mile car is only good for 120 without pushing the battery.
Those numbers don’t even take into account the fact that when I do want to travel 100+ miles, I’m not doing it on city streets at 20 mph. Freeway driving can be expected to take at least another 15% off the EPA range, considerably more with climate control and music.
Suddenly, even with that 200-mile car, I’m looking at a drive to Sacramento trying to decide whether to over charge, stop on the way, or drive slow with no tunes and no AC. That’s OK with me. I’m willing to make adjustments for the benefits of running electric, but I’m not going to get something that can’t be used for longer trips.
In China they’re more like $1000
Don’t they also burst into flames though? I’m not sure that’s the one for me.
They probably don’t.
A surprisingly small amount of products need to malfunction before people get the idea that they all will.
I still hear about how my Samsung phone will explode any second now.
No, you’re thinking of Teslas.
It’s okay, you’ll have money left over for the medical bills.
Naa, sadly I’m in america. I’ll still be forced into bankruptcy.
The models sold in my country haven’t burst into flame yet, and they sold a lot of units here. Honestly, EV fire is my biggest worry, so I’ll probably wait for another year before considering getting a chinese ev to see if there is no fire incidents or other dealbreaking issues, but they’re looking pretty solid so far.
An Electric car for 8k€? Where, how, what? Cheapest new I’ve seen is roughly 35k
The Citroen Ami is one, starts around £7700 last i saw, tho it’s a little slow. There were some better ones around 10-13k but i can’t remember their names
Asia didn’t have so many dodge rams.
You sure about the tiny 6 car?
Ya there’s literally no way for poor people to buy EVs even if they wanted to. Another huge issue is poor people live in apartments and can’t charge EVs at home either.
If you’re being fiscally responsible there’s no way to buy most new cars. People are too used to living well above their means. How these Army recruits straight out of boot camp are dropping 80k on a truck that’ll never even see a sheet of plywood or drywall assuming the bed is even big enough is beyond me.
I haven’t paid more than 18k on a car and even that felt like too much. And I’m well above the median household income for my region.
Frankly I wish I didn’t need a car at all, but it’ll be decades before our infrastructure can support that lifestyle if ever. Unless you’re willing to give up an additional 2 to 3 hours per day on travel … and I’m not.
Ya the most I’ve ever spent on a car is 20k, that was 8 years ago and I’m still driving it. I have a coworker with an EV and it’s really annoying to hear him suggesting switching cars to save money.
The used EV market is what’s really preventing lower-income adoption. The insanity of the secondhand prices over the pandemic is only now beginning to break. I’m seeing polestar 2 models with reasonable miles in the high 20’s. That’s an enormous discount off the sticker. Tesla has also seen serious price drops.
Which is why car makers need to pursue ideas like e-fuels and hydrogen cars. The obsession with BEVs is tunnel vision, and is doing more harm than good.
Yeah I like how Toyota continues to pursue hydrogen engines. Their demos are very cool, I especially enjoy the exotic exhaust notes haha
Hydrogen cars pleeeeeease. Hydrogen power is so cool! Internal combustion that outputs water! It’s literally magic! And it’s powered by the most common element in the universe!
We, the consumers, have also been saying that. Like, for a while.
Yes - but a quick glance at the insane profit margins on large SUVs/trucks will tell you why this sadly hasn’t happened.
Something’s gotta give though…
The problem is they’re also adding all this other shit that adds up costs. Just make a car, but it doesn’t use gasoline. That’s it.
I got a barebones Chevy Bolt. Simple car - absolutely perfect for the city at times when public transport isn’t an option.
What’s more - it has AndroidAuto/Carplay (mandatory in any future car purchase for me).
GM subsequently cancelled the model (though rumours say they’ll bring it back?) and are building bigger cars instead. Ridiculous.
What we need is a smaller, practical EVs and a robust charging infrastructure. (especially in condos/rentals)
Similar experience from a European.
I own a 2015 Vauxhall Adam. It’s a brilliant little petrol car, 3 doors, very small and very reliable.
GM canned the model in 2019. It makes no sense to me, if they had stuck a battery in it for an electric version I’d have been sold in a heartbeat.
But no, GM wants to focus on big cars that I don’t want. I don’t want anything bigger than a 3 door hatchback, I’m only 20 and have no kids, why do I need some massive fuckoff SUV???
I will never understand how the same people that made the Volt and the Bolt made the Hummer EV
It’s such a different style, architecture, and platform that you practically can’t share any parts. So whatever they learned from 10 years of selling EVs went out the window.
Unfortunately, GM wants to get rid of Android Auto and Apple Carplay. They want to exclusively use Android Automotive. It looks like Android Auto but it’s standalone. GM claims this way the smart software will be more integrated with the car’s hardware… which sounds ridiculous to me.
Edit: More clear (I hope)
It’s utterly ridiculous. I will not buy a car without AA/Carplay (I don’t want Android Automotive).
There’s so much wrong with their proposal. I don’t want my credentials to persist on a shared car! I already have a device that I take with me that has all the connectivity/data I want.
Basically, if ‘forced’ to buy a car without AA/Carplay they’d better throw in a suction cup mount to stick over top of of the built in display so I can use the device I already pay for…
The true purpose is most likely the car has more of your info. Probably a mix of gathering metrics on their cars and selling your data.
Oh - undoubtedly. And potential revenue stream from services. None of this is for the benefit of the consumer.
Some of the aftermarket AA kits are actually pretty decent. we basically have a big tablet mounted over the original dash of the safira .
Any suggestions? Which do you use?
Can’t find the exact model we bought of aliexpress a few years ago. But I’d recommend watching some reviews on the Chinese AA screens. Good working ones are a dime in a dozen sadly.
GM claims this way the smart software will be more integrated with the car’s hardware… which sounds ridiculous to me.
They likely want to go the Tesla route: features people have to pay multiple times for, rented features, recalls via software update, etc. I believe investors rewarded them when they made this announcement. Everyone should know that in most cases what’s good for investors is bad for customers.
I suspect that Chevy is worried they won’t be able to compete against the Kia EV price point, but that’s just speculation.
But don’t you want your car to sing to you while it drives itself like a maniac during rush hour because the AI literally wants to beat traffic (very physically).
Og VW Beetle, but aluminum and EV please.
Same for the VW Golf
I’m so confused why they don’t sell the id4 as a sporty hatchback and call it the GEI or something. It’s the same platform, just tweak the suspension and add some more beefy motors, kinda like the whole idea behind the GTI
Because then people will stop buying the combustion cars, with which they make more money.
They did make the e-golf. Not gti, but still a golf.
And the id3 which is pretty much the same size
I can’t be the only one who has noticed the uptick in the negative EV press lately. Is this the same death throws akin to the buggy whip lobby of yore?
Edit* price needs to be attainable for the many for sure… but the amount of negative press is “sus” (as the kids say)
People are genuinely unimpressed with the high prices and low range numbers on what are supposed to be the next generation of vehicles. Volume and tech advancement were supposed to make them cheap and practical, but all that’s gone up is the price.
Especially with talk of banning the sale of gas vehicles in the fairly near future, they are going to have to do a lot better than this or a lot of people are just going to end up without any vehicle at all.
Myself living in a rural, cold climate, 200km from any major center, nobody has made any practical vehicle for me yet. I even already own an EV, but it’s really just a powerful golf cart. Once it gets much below freezing, I’m lucky to make it to a neighbour’s place and back.
I think a lot of people are just acknowledging that things haven’t gotten that much better with EVs. I think the lack of charging infrastructure charging time, and range make EVs impractical for many in the USA. Many could commute in one just fine but for long trips they just would be a hassle. Plus they are on average way too expensive.
They are giving americans what they want. The real problem is continuing to feed the deep rooted car addiction brought on by lobbying and corporate greed. There has not been a better time to instead invest heavily on public transportation, build extension inter-state, inter-city train systems, subway or rail systems for cities. Overtime phasing out freeways and replacing them walkable districts. I understand this won’t happen over night and cities like Houston and LA are sprawling cities of 100s of miles but it needs to start somewhere and it starts with heavy investment from the federal government. Time to finally invest the tax money back to the taxpayers not defense, wars (direct, proxy or funded) and foreign affairs in the name of “national security”. How about domestic security from corporate greed, price gouging, poor education, horrible Healthcare are system, costly drug prices to say the least. I understand for all these there’s need to be a massive social change booth in the country and in the world’s largest retirement home, US Congress.
They aren’t. They are making larger vehicles to keep up with the demands for fuel efficiency (in gasoline vehicles) and max range in electric vehicles because of NHTSA regulations.
There absolutely have been better times to invest in public transit and expansion of transit systems. You require skilled man power for those things. Not just to build them but to upkeep them. And we’re at a time where there are a lot of things that will need to be fixed first or we won’t be able to have nice things. The mental health crisis for one, and homelessness/ rising housing costs for another. Adding infrastructure skyrockets the cost of living making affordable housing farther out of reach, and that adds fuel to the fire where the mental health crisis is concerned. You touch on corporate greed but you don’t outright say we need more regulation. We do. But to get it we have to have people to enforce it. We don’t have that either.
Suburbia costs more in terms of infrastructure, density costs more because of demand. It is absolutely not the way to combat homelessness to build more sprawl.
Public transit for the masses would absolutely create more sprawl. We already have people living there. Are we just going to ignore those people?
brought on by lobbying and corporate greed
That they’ve brought on, mind you.
I always see the argument for making areas more walkable. But I like a good chunk of Americans live in a subdivision and unless they tear down my neighbors homes to build stores I need to walk like 20 minutes to get anywhere I can purchase something. That said I used to live in Chicago and everything was walkable, however the population density made it possible. I don’t think you can simply make a place more walkable unless the population density supports it.
I feel a way to combat suburban hellholes is to at least make it more cycle-friendly in those areas. Big stroads kill any chance of people being able to cycle to stores, I feel a lot of people don’t want to have to drive to get to a Walmart, especially in hot months and would probably prefer to bike it instead. There’s obviously also the health benefits of people cycling too. For those more lazy individuals, e-bikes and e-scooters are a good idea that can help them rely less on their car too, and are far cheaper to run than a full car.
Eliminating huge sprawling suburbs is a monumental task, but we can at least apply patch fixes for some things at the moment.
Why tear anything down? With zoning changes we could re-allow neighbors to build Front yard businesses like small grocers and cafes again
Everytime I consider buying an EV I do some research and they always seem to have all of the bells and whistles. Then I get to price and it’s like $60,000+ and I can’t help but wonder how much cheaper it could be without all of the added features.
Edit: I’m not going to reply to everyone and I really should have mentioned since it’s not immediately obvious but I’m Australian. No Chevy volt and and all vehicles are imported increasing prices on top of the usual AUD imbalance.
This. Just this, so much. How much would a battery, an electric engine and safety shit cost?
I’ve seen conversion kits for old trucks under $10k. So there’s your answer.
Unfortunately said kits are often lacking in range unless you’re willing to fill your truck box with batteries, because you can’t really retrofit a “skateboard” style battery.
I literally want that skateboard with seats and a steering wheel. Hell, give me a diesel burning heater and a washer fluid bulb I have to stomp on like I have in my old truck, I’m not picky
I just bought a used 2022 Polestar 2 under 20k miles for $35k.
Chevy bolt at least has half of the features but still quite a few, I would say a very set of features to include, but I do imagine it would only shave less than 5k if the bolt had the most basic of features. That means it would be 1-2k cheaper as a used vehicle. I do think it’s the more reasonable priced vehicle, and we need more competitors to this vehicle. On the other hand, most of the cost is the battery and it just something researchers must be paid to bring innovations for and its just not reasonable to pay them cheap as they are doing a great thing for humanity. However, this forces companies to charge higher prices and should instead be subsidized without trademark/IP protections restricting its adoption.
And they almost killed the Bolt.
The only reason they didn’t is because China is getting ready to ship stupid cheap cars to the US.
Is that true? Last I heard they couldn’t pass safety regulations.
I would be for it, we need more companies to show Hyundai how to child proof cars… By child proof I mean making sure the car isn’t so easy to steal, a child could do it.
China can’t but their corporations are welcome to submit cars to American testing to sell here. Look up Greely Automotive.
Greely Automotive.
I have never heard of them. I’m not knowledgeable on cars but their newest generation looks very interesting. If they can break the US market, I hope they can lower prices. Thank you for bringing them to my attention.
Last year I bought new Citroen e-berlingo for 25.000€. It would be €32.000 without subsidies but still not 60.000.
This. For most of my trips I could use a glorified golf cart.
Honestly, cheaper and smaller cars across the board would be nice. Everything is a fucking tank now.
Yep, because of a loophole in pollution regulation
A bit of a cobra bite.
The last paragraph of this article is right on. Don’t just tell people to buy EVs and then call it a day. Improve the infrastructure. Make buying an EV feel like less of an unsupported risk.
Lithium ion battery technology is not a good fit with the type of vehicles we currently produce. The energy density is nowhere near fossil fuels and this implies a big battery, which also adds mass. By 2027, Land Rover and other makers of SUV will be nudging 3000kg for some of their models.
IMHO the only viable solution for li-ion is ultralight vehicles. Bicycles and Velomobiles are light enough to get decent range at speed. A bicycle used with integrated high speed rail would solve most of our commuting problems. The fact is, whether you are making tailpipe emissions or not, F=ma. Moving a 3t mass around for one person is always going to use an extravagant amount of energy and that energy has to come from somewhere.
Work from home, eat less meat, make fewer journeys, use a bike more often, make fewer children. Those are some things most of us can do.
Yes the energy density is less, but the efficiency is better. ICE wastes like 2/3 of that extra energy. Still has more, but 1/3 that you might think.
Blame the manufacturers and our obsession with driving land whales, not the batteries.
A Tesla Model 3 SR+ was almost the same weight as a Toyota Camry hybrid of similar shape and size.
EVs should weigh 2-300kg more at most
“15 minute” suburbs should fix the need of large ass SUVs and such but somehow authorities resist this, like they have a stake in this 🤔 15 minutes cities/villages is a common and logical thing around the world yet in US it is weird… like americans want to drive 20 minutes for fucking 1 liter of Pepsi… Now when car prices are insane more of them wake up. Suburbs should have places to go to, shops, parks, schools
That is an excellent point. We’ve created the requirement for cars by the way we’ve organised our societies. I live in the UK, a much smaller country but my work is a 1.5hr drive away or 2.5hr on train. I wouldn’t do this job without WFH but my employer is now pressing people to come back to the office. Likewise, all my amenities are a good distance away, within cycling range but zero cycle paths. I cycle to the train station but it doesn’t feel safe or pleasant around traffic and the train to work is actually more expensive than the drive.
If we aim for sustainable living, the number of kids don’t matter, surely?
Correct. The goal isn’t to take the meaning or joy out of life but do we really need 10b people and is that sustainable under capitalism? It doesn’t look like it is without making some change.
Take public transit and advocate for more transit to replace car infrastructure, and for neighbourhoods to be made more walkable with a more even mix of commercial and residential. The latter can literally be as simple as lifting building use restrictions to allow people to open businesses in or on the same plot as residential homes and convert parts of commercial buildings to apartments.
The weight issue is why I’m looking forward to (hopefully) seeing the Aptera make it to production. Being super aerodynamic and lighter weight so that it can charge up to 40 miles a day on solar alone. Lithium batteries would be better suited for this form factor.
