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Looks like Tesla has just taken 325,000 potential car buyers out of the market.
I suspect a lot of these people are looking to trade Model 3 futures, so to speak.
This link says the spots aren't transferable. (teslamotorsclub.com)
I am most interested in the point in time when the dopey tax breaks run out.
Also, of all the pre-orders, at least 100,000 of those buyers will get no tax break whatsoever.
Tucker wasn't really "shut down" by the D3. I mean, he only built 51 cars! Tucker's big problem was his big mouth. He really ticked off some very powerful people in Washington DC and in the D3. Humility and grace would have paid him back handsomely, but he had neither. I mean, Elon would never say things like "Fords are pieces of junk!" or "Congress is conspiring to frame me, so that I can't give the American public the best car in the world".
Tucker changed nothing except the collector car hobby. Used to be you couldn't give a Tucker away, and now you have to cough up 1/4 million. Seems crazy. Powerful car, though, with a helicopter engine.
"Carmakers typically have to drum up enough interest in a car to pay for its R&D and production costs. Tesla has essentially the opposite issue; it has to figure out how to profitably produce one of the most anticipated cars in history." (Mashable)
So let's assume Tesla fails, either because they can't make them cheaply enough, or because they don't have a dealer network or the warranty costs kill them.
Meanwhile the demand for EVs with decent range is going to get met by the Bolt and every other manufacturer who wants to compete in this arena. And that's most of them.
Elon may get the last laugh by focusing solely on battery production.
Secondly, about 40% of the people who put down money to "reserve" a Model X have not acted upon it. No bank is going to loan on that level of "pre-order reluctance" seems to me.
In my opinion, the bare facts are that battery technology still basically sucks. A totally new kind of battery will have to be invented for any EV to become a "game changer".
EVs are still a toy. To use your Tesla, or your Bolt, you have to treat it like a pet going on vacation. You have to plan ahead to make sure it will have everything it needs to travel.
People (most) may love their Teslas, but there is no spontaneous use about it.
If I tried to sell you a cell phone that you could only charge at home or at my charging stations, you'd throw it back at me.
"Motorola DynaTAC 8000X. This was the first handheld mobile phone made available to the market in the United States." (link)
It takes a while for this stuff to hit critical mass, but EVs sure have that same feel about it.
Right now, I look at the EV as the steam car of 1910---highly capable in its own way, but not able to compete with a gas engine, a self-starter, and an affordable MSRP.
I'm with you, until a different battery is invented the EV is a limited use vehicle. As I mentioned before a neighbor with a LEAF has already run into issues with charging. His wife commutes 35 miles each way to the Navy terminal. More than once she has come out to find her car unplugged from the charging station. Fortunately it stops charging until it is plugged in again and a CC swiped. It caused her to not make it all the way home once. I don't think AAA has fast chargers on their trucks.
Lastly I posted an article about people in Norway where the Tesla is extremely popular. They are having 4-5 month waits for repairs. I think the main Power unit is less than reliable.
I also saw numerous Priuses in Milan, Amsterdam and Berlin, more than in previous visits. In fact, my taxi from the Berlin train station to my hotel was a Prius.
I think it's too early to predict whether Tesla in particular, or EVs in general, will be major disrupters. With the billions going into battery research in many countries, and research to utilize current (no pun intended) batteries more effectively, I suspect there's a good chance that EVs will ultimately gain significant market share.
In the meantime, like it or not, there's no question that Tesla has spurred every major vehicle manufacturer to speed up research, development and introduction of EVs. Sure, rapidly tightening mileage and pollution standards around the globe are the main reason for this, but wouldn't you agree that Tesla's success has moved the process forward?
Supposed "green" legislators and policymakers across the developed world and elsewhere will be lured into this as well - social engineering is their game, and they will do what it takes to put more EV passenger cars on the road. Just don't think about that already stretched-thin power grid, or where the batteries come from, or about commercial vehicles. Or for some Euro places, where the money will come from, as they recently signed up for years upon years of expenses which few can fathom.
Tesla gets a huge break in Netherlands, maybe enough to make a taxi a nice publicity stunt. I think it is the top selling EV there, and EVs are huge there in general. I don't know if the break is as much as Norway, where with the break, a Tesla can cost less than a Passat. I suppose that kind of stuff is easy when you have a big sovereign fund and your defense is subsidized. I think they also get special lane access and parking, as has been seen in parts of NA. I remember seeing Prius V taxis in Germany and Switzerland, although still not nearly as many as E-class and MB/VW vans and tall wagons.
"Whether it was the Erie Canal, the first transcontinental railroad, or the interstate highway system, state and federal resources have repeatedly been deployed to build new types of transportation infrastructure that the private sector couldn't, or wouldn't, fund. Over time, these investments paid huge economic, social, and national-security dividends to the country." (Slate)
Point source pollution, but don't think about the manufacturing or where the juice comes from Just send it to someone elses backyard, the green movement has been doing it for eons. Bus or dinky EV for you and your shoebox low-E efficiency unit, nice private car and comfortable detached house (bought for nothing) for me, that's the greenie Seattle way anyway.
I'm also hoping for big time EV adoption (with decent range) so I can quit going to the dealer for most maintenance.
Finally, I'm hoping Tesla comes to their senses and switches out the rear gulls for sliders.
The X is essentially a fancy AWD minivan, but sliders wouldn't appeal to the target demographic. It's all about image and showing off. Maybe it will come after the 3 is up and running, maybe 2026?
Yes, there are certainly more German vehicles than Priuses for taxi and livery service in Berlin. The Prius I rode in was a standard hatchback model.
By the way, the foreign, non-English speaking driver drove like a crazy man, flooring it and slamming on the brakes repeatedly. Most taxi and livery drivers in Europe drive in a very professional manner. Well, not so much in Italy, south of Rome sometimes. I had a couple of rides in Naples a while back where the driver blew through red traffic lights and drove the wrong way down one-way streets, even cursing other drivers as he did that (kind of humorous, in a way), but these drivers didn't abuse their cars. This driver in Berlin drove like a New York taxi driver on steroids.
"Ford pays $199,950, $55,000 over sticker price, to buy a Tesla Model X SUV." This was presumably so it wouldn't have to get in line for delivery.
This is another sign that the world's major auto makers are anxious to learn about Tesla's designs, its mystique, and why investors are willing to assign such a lofty valuation to this electric car maker. Some say Tesla stock is running on fumes (figure if speech, since EVs don't emit fumes). However, the valuation of Tesla shares has been very high for over two years, compared to that of its much larger competitors, which is a long time for a company with no or meager earnings to command a multiple several times higher than its industry peers. Amazon is another example that comes to mind, but these are very rare.
I'm sure Ford and others would like to learn the formula to Tesla's secret sauce, given that their valuations are considerably below the average for the S&P 500. High valuations make financing easier and more affordable
They didn't have to pay top dollar like Ford to get one though.
The Tesla website only claims 170 miles after a 40 minute Super Charge. 40 minute pee break every 2.5 hours of driving seems excessive. We try to average about 650 miles a day when traveling. Or about 9 hours is our limit. Leaving at 7AM and arriving at our destination around 4PM. IF and that is a huge IF, we had to find 4 SuperChargers that would add at least 2.5 hours to our daily drive. When they get an EV SUV with a 600 mile range I might consider them. Until then, make mine diesel.
Six hours at 50 mph average sticking to blue highways used to our usual goal. That leaves ample time for breaking camp, a nice meal or two and an activity, like a set of tennis or a hike, then plenty of daylight left to sit around camp and read or putz around a lake in a canoe. Don't know why we've sped up in our old age.
Despite the enthusiasm the Tesla Model 3 seems to be generating, sales of electric and hybrid vehicles are sputtering in the U.S. and consumers are demonstrating weak loyalty to these powertrain solutions, based on a review of IHS Automotive loyalty data.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/stephaniebrinley/2016/04/21/are-ev-and-hybrid-buyers-loyal-to-the-powertrain-ihs-data-suggests-not/#6285f46b655c
My understanding is that if you sign up for a Tesla, you can't later sell your place in line.
I can't get to Forbes anymore, but I assume that story is based on today's PR by Edmunds? Still waiting for the home office to post the article online so I can link to it and not some nefarious cookie loving site.
So a certain amount of skepticism seems healthy at this point, and not mean-spirited.
Hey, at least this place allows Tesla skepticism and criticism - some supposed automotive sites have been known to censor it.
Maybe the Prius guy just hated the car, and drove it hard out of frustration. That's how I explain aggressive Prius drivers Aggressive driving in something with the 0-60 capability of a Tesla is a scary thought, as they seem to appeal to those not exactly into cars or driving.
Fortunately, we here like all points of view.
There really is a Tesla cult out there.
Lithium-ion batteries are expensive to manufacture and this is in part due to the high material cost and complex preparation processes. The most expensive metal of most Li-ion is cobalt, a hard lustrous gray material that is also used to manufacture magnets and high-strength alloys.
Knowing that billions of Li-ion batteries are discarded every year and given the high cost of lithium cobalt oxide, salvaging precious metals should make economic sense and one wonders why so few companies recycle these batteries.
The reason becomes clear when examining the complexity and low yield of recycling. The retrieved raw material barely pays for labor, which includes collection, transport, sorting into batteries chemistries, shredding, separation of metallic and non-metallic materials, neutralizing hazardous substances, smelting, and purification of the recovered metals.
http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/battery_recycling_as_a_business
This is probably why Musk is lining up suppliers of Lithium for his new GigaFactory. So much for his acting Green.
Currently the majority of the world’s supply of lithium comes from Bolivia, Argentina and Chile. While recycling batteries to extract lithium makes perfect sense, financially it is not worth it since the cost to recycle the lithium exceeds the cost of mining new lithium.
http://cleantechnica.com/2015/07/23/electric-vehicle-battery-can-recycled/
Seems to me the major marketing point for EVs is economical cost to run, and "future tech"--the Apple sort of thing.
Let's be honest about it, at any rate. EVs aren't cheap to buy, and they aren't "green". It might be arguable that polluting a desert or remote rural area is better than polluting a city, but that's not how the desert or countryside feels about it.
You don't get something for nothing in the world ruled by physical laws. Only in ad agencies.
Exactly what I have tried to get through to Rocky. He truly believes we can build a large enough solar farm in the desert to supply the entire USA. I ask him how we get the energy to NY. His response is Bury underground cables across the country. How do you argue with that sort of simplistic view? The Rocky mountains to him is not an obstacle. National Parks are there to be used including plowing through the middle with huge cables. It frustrates me that so many people think like that.
Problem is...most futurists have been proven wrong, and the "gurus" who are worshipped for being right aren't really futurists at all--they were just clever enough to see existing things in a new way.
Musk isn't "inventing" anything--he is working with what already was. We already had batteries, we already had electric motors, we already had cars and we already had computers.
We also have the power plants fueled by coal or natural gas (and to a minor degree, by thermal and wind and solar) that literally propel all the EVs you see on the road today.
If you "plug it in", it's still a fossil-fuel burner, unless you are charging off solar panels directly----which would take either a lot of time or a lot of panels to power an EV efficiently.
"New" technology for the EVs of the future hasn't been invented yet.