Ignoring the April 1 date on the Forbes/Marsupial article, having an intercom system in some cars isn't such a bad idea. I've cruised in my brother's 7 passenger minivan on a trip before and the people in the back row really can't talk to the front seat passengers very easily.
I'm still going with my theory that Tesla will go broke pretty soon and end up selling off some of their technology. I think the "bottom up" approach works better for car technology. You can sell a lot of first generation digital watches for $300 dollars to get capital but you can't sell a lot of $125,000 electric sports cars.
Henry Ford figured all this out 100 years ago, and bet against everyone who insisted on selling $4000 large cars in 1908. They are dead, he lives on!
Maybe if Toyota were building the Tesla that would be a different story, but they aren't. Tesla has one poker chip in a very big game.
Well, maybe trucks and SUVs. My 1975 Cadillac Sedan DeVille was as big as cars ever got. They've been getting smaller since 1977.
I think even with trucks and SUVs, they're going to hit a point where it's just not worthwhile to make them any bigger. With SUVs, that point may have been hit with the Excursion. It was 226.7" long, 79.9" wide, 77.2" tall, and weighed 6600 pounds.
I think 80 inches is pretty much the tipping point for width. Once you build a vehicle wider than that, it gets classified as a heavy truck, or something like that, and gets taxed differently. IIRC, the 1960 Ford cars actually came in at something like 81.5", and had to be registered as trucks in some states!
With shoulder room, 57" is generally considered the bare minimum to get 3-across seating. Once you get to 60" of shoulder room, you get into cars that start feeling more like old-school full-sized. 64-65" is about as generous as any passenger car got in shoulder room. The cheaper versions of GM's big '71-76 cars were this wide. The nicer models had thicker padding on the door panels, pull straps, etc, which cut into the shoulder room measurement, even if they really didn't make the cars feel smaller inside. The '91-96 Caprice and its offspring were also about this wide inside. My '85 Silverado is also about 65" wide inside. Once you get into vehicles that big, you have 3-across seating with some considerable spread-out room. Unless you're fitting linebackers in there, chances are you're not even touching elbows. The Excursion has 68.3" of shoulder room. That's starting to get into overkill territory though. It's really not going to make it any more comfy for 3-across seating for the majority of people, and the only real advantage there is if you want to sleep in it!
But then, where do you go from there? 4-across seating? That's not really something I see a market for. And if you need 57 inches minimum for 3-across seating (I got that figure years ago from CR, I didn't just make it up), then you're going to need a whopping 76 inches of shoulder room to break into 4-across seating.
So it seems to me that, shoulder room wise, at least, once you get above about 65 inches, anything more is just not useful, and only contributes to an overly wide, unwieldy vehicle.
Just for comparison, the Ford Expedition EL, which essentially replaces the Excursion, is "only" 221.3" long, 78.8" wide, 77.7" tall, and weighs 5800-5900 pounds. It's shrunk down inside, too, to 63.2" of front shoulder room.
The Suburban comes in at 222.4" long, 79.1" wide, 76.8" tall, 5607 pounds, and 65.3" of shoulder room. Except for the curb weight, I doubt if that's much of a difference from a 1973 Suburban.
Also, as long as full-sized truck beds are designed around the concept of the 4x8 sheet of plywood, I doubt if they'll get much bigger, either. They might get longer, as people demand more storage space behind the seat. Plus, we have configurations these days that didn't exist once upon a time such as the crew cab with the 5.5 foot bed, or the "1 3/4" cab models like the Dodge Ram. But then, as they get too big, they just become too impractical to be very popular.
With cars, it seems like they're starting to gravitate towards a mean. We don't have big mastodons anymore like the 1975 DeVille, and even the size of cars that emerged from the first wave of downsizing, cars like the Crown Vic/Grand Marquis and Town car aren't long for this world. Once they're gone, it seems like about 205-210" is as long as most cars will be. But then, on the low end, we don't have these microscopic little toy cars running around anymore. Sure, there's stuff like the Aveo, Yaris, Fit, Accent, etc. But they have a lot more substance to them than something like, say, a 1973 Civic.
My new 2007 Cadillac DTS is about 207" long (6.6 longer than the Seville STS) and on a 111" wheelbase. Back in the day, that would've been considered a compact. My girlfriend thinks the car is huge compared to my last ride. My 1989 Cadillac Brougham is 221" long on a 121" wheelbase for comparison. I remember people thinking the 1974 Chryslers becoming small on a 124" wheelbase. Wasn't it something like 127" or more before 1974?
I remember people thinking the 1974 Chryslers becoming small on a 124" wheelbase. Wasn't it something like 127" or more before 1974?
Chryslers were on a 124" wheelbase from 1965-73, and that went unchanged for 1974. However, Imperials kept on shrinking. The 1957-66 was on a 129" wheelbase, and it dropped a bit to 127" for 1967-73, and then finally to 124" for 1974-75, all but erasing the difference between an Imperial and a Chrysler.
I'm not sure how long those '74-78 C-bodies were, though. I have a used car book that says something like 224" for the Newport, 225" for the New Yorker. If so, they sure didn't shrink them much when they downsized, as my '79 Newport was 220.3", and my '79 NYers are something like 221.3".
I've heard that the 1974 Chryslers actually were a bit shorter overall than the 1973 models, but I don't know if they really are or not.
207" long, on a 111" wheelbase, would have still been big for a compact even in the 70's, and would have almost been pushing midsize. My '76 LeMans is 208" long, on a 112" wheelbase. GM's midsizers were smaller than Ford or Mopars back then. While the GMs were about 208/212 inches (2/4door), the Fords and Mopars were more like 215/219 (2/4 door).
A 1975 Dart is about 205" long, while my '68 is only 196" long. However, I think a lot of that length was fluffed up by what they tried to pass off as 5 mph bumpers...basically just putting a set of big rubber blocks on the bumpers.
The '76 Volare/Aspen and 1977 Diplomat/LeBaron were marketed as compacts initially. They were on a 112.7" wheelbase (108.7" for Volare/Aspen coupes). They probably topped out at around 206-207" for the 4-door Diplomat/LeBaron. Then, as downsizing progressed, the Diplomat/LeBaron were passed off as intermediate cars for 1980. Then, when the big R-bodies were dropped for 1982, the Diplomat and M-body New Yorker were marketed as full-sized cars!
We repeatedly blame the manufacturers for the large size of vehicles.
We should be blaming the buying public. They vote with their dollars.
Sure, the new Sequoia is bigger. Why? Because the old one was criticized for being way too small for its class, and it got pummeled in the sales race against the Tahoe and Expedition.
You want efficiency? Buy a Sienna. 149 cubic feet and decent gas mileage, and you don't even have to give up AWD.
Yet minivan sales keep dropping, because the buying public wants SUVs (and more recently, crossovers).
Ford only stopped selling the Excursion because sales were slow. Seems the public finally got a clue.
Now they are downsizing, but only very slightly, to very large crossovers. Look at the Outlook and Acadia, and the upcoming Ford Flex.
The Flex just might rival lemko's Cadillacs in length (I'm not sure).
You want efficiency? Buy a Sienna. 149 cubic feet and decent gas mileage, and you don't even have to give up AWD.
Speaking of efficiency, could someone explain this to me? The old 1973-1990ish style of Suburban, according to Edmund's, at least, had 167 cubic feet of cargo space. The new Suburban "only" has 137 cubic feet. Still pretty generous, but an awful big drop for a vehicle that's about the same size.
So, where did the extra 30 feet go? Could it perhaps have something to do with the newer Suburbans having fold-flat seats, which still take some space to store, whereas the old ones just had simpler seats that you had to pull out completely?
As for Lemko's old '75 DeVille, I think those things came in at 230". That's about as big as mass-produced cars ever got. I think the Lincoln Continental sedans and coupes got up to 233", while the Mark V was around 231".
Biggest car I ever had was a 1969 Bonneville. 225" long, and that was BEFORE they started putting those jutting 5 mph bumpers on cars! Somewhere on the net, I saw the 1976 Bonneville listed somewhere at 226" long. Only an inch longer overall, but considering the way those bumpers stuck out in '76, that would seem to indicate to me that the '69 actually had a bigger body?
As big as that thing was though, it actually handled quite well. When it ran, that is.
I think that people rejected the Mega-SUVs because they were simply too big to be practical. The Excursion didn't fit in garages or public parking spaces. It was difficult to maneuver in traffic and on tight city streets. It and its Mega-Siblings were like English Mastiffs -- kind of neat to have around, but way too big for day-to-day use.
To be fair, the Excursion, et al., were not substantially larger than the behemoth cars of the 1970s. However, parking spaces and home garages back then accomodated those vehicles. Parking spots and garages today don't fit.
My subdivision was built between 2003 and 2005. My neighbor had to pay for an "extra-long" garage just to accomodate his standard Chevy Pickup. This is in Texas, mind you.
My new 2007 Cadillac DTS is about 207" long (6.6 longer than the Seville STS) and on a 111" wheelbase. Back in the day, that would've been considered a compact.
What day was that? GM's "senior compacts" were 192" long with a 112" wheelbase.
Ain't that the truth! I actually work in the same building that I worked at back in 1992. There's a parking lot across the street, but you can also parallel park along the street. I remember driving my grandmother's 218" 1985 LeSabre to work one day back then, and had no trouble fitting in the parallel spaces. I moved out of this building in 1993, but then our project moved back in late 1998. At some point they re-striped the parking spaces. While in the past, that LeSabre would park easily in those spots, all of a sudden it wouldn't even physically fit between the lines! It would overhang just a bit on either end.
One of my friends bought a townhouse in 1998, with a one-car garage. He has shelves across the back. His 2001.5 Passat just barely fits. A few years ago, he bought a 1978 Mark V. Even if he took the shelves out, it wouldn't fit. And worse, it won't fit in his driveway, either! It sticks out too far and blocks the sidewalk!
If it's any consolation though, sometimes they didn't build spaces big enough back in the day, either. I used to have a condo that was built in 1973, and it had a one-car garage. I forget how deep the garage was, maybe 20 feet? It was only about 10 feet wide, though. If I parked my '57 DeSoto or '67 Catalina in there, I had to park it way off to one side, almost up against the wall, so that I could open the door wide enough to get out. Both of those are 2-door cars, which makes entry/exit even more interesting in a tight squeeze.
There were these old people who lived in our quad who had a 1976 or so Chrysler Newport. Sometimes it was downright amusing watching them try to get it in and out of the garage. It usually involved the husband standing outside, trying to direct the wife in and out. It could get annoying early in the mornings though, with him hollering "CUT IT TO THE LEFT!! NOW CUT IT TO THE RIGHT!! NOW CUT IT BACK TO THE LEFT!! WHOOOOAAAAHHH!!!" How about just cutting it out, admitting defeat, and either moving or trade that dreadnaught in for a Corolla! :P
What day was that? GM's "senior compacts" were 192" long with a 112" wheelbase.
Probably from around 1974-78. By the time they outfitted cars with some of those 5-mph crash bumpers, you had compact cars that were about the same size as what intermediates had been just a few years before.
In 1977-79, Consumer Reports actually eliminated the midsized class, for their purposes at least. They just grouped cars into what they called Subcompact (Chevettes, Omnis, Accords, etc), Compact (Novas, Volares, Diplomats, Granadas, Fairmonts, but also the downsized Malibu and company) and Large (pre-downsized intermediates such as the 1977 Malibu, LTD-II, Cordoba, Coronet/Monaco, downsized big cars like the B/C bodies, Panthers, and R-bodies, and the the old mastodon class full-sizers like the '77-78 LTD/Marquis and '77-78 Newport/New Yorker).
Once the EPA started classifying cars based on interior volume though, many compact cars were actually midsized, as they fell in between 110-120 cubic feet of interior volume. Similarly, some of the less space-efficient pre-downsized intermediates, which CR started calling "large" cars, fell back down into the midsized range.
As for Lemko's DTS though, isn't the wheelbase actually something like 115.6"? That would put it close to a downsized Impala/Caprice, which was 116.0".
Oh, the bad old days when the domestics were in a race to the bottom to see who could build cars with the worst ratio of interior space to exterior dimensions.
Yup, those were the days! I remember comparing my '76 LeMans coupe to my '68 Dart hardtop. 12 inches longer (208 versus 196), but only 1 extra inch of wheelbase (112 versus 111). And I think it's about 4 inches wider (maybe 76 versus 72?).
For all that extra bulk, the only real advantage I see is shoulder room. About 3.5" more up front, maybe 3" in the back. But since it's 4" wider overall, that's nothing to crow about. Legroom is no better, neither front nor rear. Now I can get more comfy in the LeMans because it has a power seat, and the seats themselves are padded better, but there's no extra room. Headroom is actually a bit worse up front, I'd say about an inch less than the Dart. About the same in the back though, which is good considering how rakish the roofline is. The trunk is actually smaller. The Dart's is about 17 cubic feet, but I think the LeMans is only 15. Its rump actually tapers more than its sibling Cutlass, Regal, Century, Chevelle, etc, and the rear fender tops are lower than the decklid, so I think its trunk is even smaller than those other cars. About the only real advantage is that the trunk has a spot that's deep enough that I can fit a pretty big cooler in there if I situate it just right. The Dart's trunk is so shallow that the cooler wouldn't fit anywhere in it and would have to go in the back seat.
And even under the hood, I'd say there's no advantage to the LeMans's extra bulk. The Dart's engine bay is actually easier to work in.
Now, I think the LeMans is a prettier looking car than the Dart, with its long hood, rakish roof, and flowing lines. But it's much more wasteful. Oh, and speaking of wasteful, the Dart's 318-2bbl could probably get from 0-60 in about 9 seconds, and get fuel economy around 13/17. The LeMans, with its 350-4bbl (I thought it was just one of those 2-bbls that used the 4-bbl plate and they'd weld over the secondaries, until the other day I was messing with it, noticed a linkage, and sure enough, it had secondaries!) might do 0-60 in about 12 seconds, and get, on a good day, 11/16.
The best car buying decision I made was purchasing a TCH about a year ago. I get about 34mpg in town..40 mpg on the highway. I'm three years from the break even point. I plan to stay with this car UNLESS something better comes along..perhaps the Chevy Volt?
range of travel. So, say I want to have a range of around 200 miles before a re-charge is required. Will the 2009 Mitsubsihi EV do that, and 75 mph and re-charge in about 4 hours and cost no more than $19,999?
If so, I am going to follow it's development like a hawk. I would not be one to under-estimate Mitsubishi's R&D abilitities, either. Something tells me Mitsu would satisfy my electric automobile requirements better than ZENN would.
I seriously doubt it. I don't think even the Tesla can do that. Batteries with a high enough energy density and high enough output don't really exist yet.
As a rule, electric cars can either go fast for short distances or go slow for long distances, but not both without being astonishingly expensive.
" I do think that Toyota may have pushed the new Sequoia in the wrong direction."
I think they probably did the right thing to plan for an even bigger Sequoia making modest sales. Where they screwed up big time was not seeing the sea change in gas prices and consumer preferences two years ago and working like mad to get a 50-state diesel ready for the new Sequoia launch.
Now they are talking about putting even more incentives on the new Tundra to try and make their 200K sales goal next year. The new Sequoia will have all the same negatives attached to it that this year's new Tundra did: terrible gas mileage, less and less buyers in the segment all the time, and established sales leaders already in the segment (mainly GM here) with models that totally dominate the competition.
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
IIRC the Tesla can go 135 miles on a charge and can achieve highway speeds and do so quickly. It seems to be at the point that it would satisfy a good number of peoples needs in speed and range if it weren't for the price.
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
What do you do with gasoline above $4? Well, one either drives, walks, takes the bus or train, or stays home. I'm buying a new '08 Chevy Impala and if gas gets above $4, I'll still drive. This kind of fuel cost has been in Europe for many years. We've been so used to cheap oil for so many years over here, we don't know how to act.
range of travel. So, say I want to have a range of around 200 miles before a re-charge is required. Will the 2009 Mitsubsihi EV do that, and 75 mph and re-charge in about 4 hours and cost no more than $19,999?
No, the range will initially only be around 100 miles but a 30 minute re-charge will bring you back up to 80% SOC. While 100 miles doesn't sound like much it is already an improvement of 20% over their first prototype. This is purely a result of battery advancement, which should continue. The size of the battery pack is only 16 kWh. This isn't all that big but it keeps the cost and weight down. Actually 100 miles on 16 kWh is very impressive.
I seriously doubt it. I don't think even the Tesla can do that. Batteries with a high enough energy density and high enough output don't really exist yet.
The Tesla Roadster was rated by the EPA to have a 245 mile range. So if your driving style yields EPA-like mileage you could expect to get this range in a Tesla. However, as you point out, this car is very expensive, $98k.
If I could get 100 miles on one charge, I would seriously consider getting one if the price was not outragous. That would more than cover my daily commute and then some. I am luck in that I live about 10 miles from work (when you consider dropping off the kids). Also, the highest posted speed limit on my commute is 45 mph and that is only for a few blocks.
There's a big difference between going 75 mph, and 135 miles; versus going 75 mph for 135 miles.
To maintain 75 mph in an aerodynamic vehicle really doesn't require all much power. The Tesla Roadster has been driven from San Francisco to Lake Tahoe on a single charge. This is a distance of just over 200 miles on highways where the flow of traffic is typically 70+ mph. Now I guess they could have driven significantly below the flow of traffic but that probably wouldn't have been a very good PR stunt for this type of car.
What's a sprinter cost? I saw one the other day and it looks expensive. This was a camper-thingie.
As motorhomes, those Sprinters might actually be premium-priced, as they're sort of a unique design. Usually with van-based mini-motorhomes (Class C) they just drop a fairly stock body down on a medium-duty truck frame supplied by either GM, Ford, or Chrysler, which has a van cab. The Sprinter may require more of a unique conversion though, which will no doubt add more to the cost.
And if they're doing those real small motorhomes, which tend to fall somewhere between conversion vans and Mini-Motorhomes, prices can get REAL expensive, partly because of all the miniaturization involved in furnaces, air conditioning, appliances, etc.
My MB Cruiser cost me $59k in December 05. I sold it in April this year for $55k cash. I only put 5200 miles on it. It was pretty easy to get 24-25 MPG. Not bad for an 8500 lb vehicle. My biggest complaint was getting passed by semis on the Interstate would bounce you around a bit. We went through some desert winds that were not pleasant driving. The guy I sold it to has 3 daughters and they love camping in it. Most economical motor home in the US.
EV thing from Mitsubishi. OK, 75 mph for just 100 miles. tpe, are you agreeing that I could get that range from a charge from a regular wall outlet for 8 hours? And, this Mitsubishi EV would cost $20,000-$22,000 somewhere. I'm guessing Mitsubishi would not overprice their first all-electric EV car.
Now, suppose my wife and I take off for the city that houses my Mitsubishi dealer, which is the city of Sierra Vista, AZ. About 90 miles from our little SE Arizona cowtown that we live in, which has no Mitsu dealer and in fact, has no new car dealer at all.
We drive the 90 miles to Sierra Vista to go to the Mitsu dealer, or the mall or WalMart, or Lowe's, etc. The issue comes up about getting back to our little SE Arizona town. We need a re-charge.
Would I:
1) Drop in to my Mitsubishi dealer with a big smile and request a complimentary re-charge of 1/2 hour to get us the 90 miles back home
2) Stop in at the local Chevron gas station for a free 30-minute re-charge (like a ripoff gas station like Chevron is really going to give us a free re-charge)
3) Stop in at somebody's house with confused desperate looks on our faces and demand a re-charge of 1/2 hour from a complete stranger
4) Trade some Mitsubishi pamphlets to a complete stranger for a free 30-minute re-charge
5) Stop by the City of Sierra Vista building and see how progressive they've become and demand a free 30-minute re-charge
Vote for your favorite choice here. The Mitsubishi dealer or the Standard Chevron station would have to be front-runners but feel free to improvise as required.
Once EVs actually become available I think this issue of where to recharge will be quickly resolved. Setting up recharging stations will be trivial compared to what was involved in creating a network of gas stations or the infrastructure that would be required to accomodate hydrogen fuel cell vehicles. I believe many businesses will equip their parking lots with charging outlets for their customers. Employers might do the same. The fast charging stations will be a little pricey but after the initial investment they will essentially be zero overhead money makers. So the entrepreneurs will rush in to fill that void.
I wonder if there will be different grades of electricity?
Regular = 2.5 Amps @ $1.00 per kilowatt Silver = 3.5 Amps @ $1.10 per kilowatt Premium = 4.5 Amps @ $1.20 per kilowatt Ultra = 6.0 Amps @ $1.29 per kilowatt
Wonder if you'll hear comments like this in the future?
"Yuck! You're using Westinghouse electricity? That stuff is garbage! I only take my car to the General Electric station!" "You both are nuts! There's no difference between them or Square D, Federal, Murray, or Thomson-Betts!"
We drive the 90 miles to Sierra Vista to go to the Mitsu dealer, or the mall or WalMart, or Lowe's, etc. The issue comes up about getting back to our little SE Arizona town. We need a re-charge.
I wonder, if they put a hand crank on the sucker, so that if you ran out of juice in some desolate location, how long you'd have to crank before you charged the batteries back up to get any use out of them?
One of the Costco stores here in San Diego has two parking spots with EV plug-ins. Not sure if it costs money or what. I will look closer next time I am there. They used to have those contraptions for charging the EV-1. They pulled those out a few years ago.
That was the issue I discussed with the Xebra dealer that is 48 miles from my home. I would have to put it on a trailer to get it home. It would have to be hauled back for any problems. We have a steep driveway, which he said could be a problem. There were no steep roads where we test drove the car/motorcycle.
Nothing on the market yet that would be really be more than a toy. "The guy that dies with the most toys wins!!!" :shades:
I believe many businesses will equip their parking lots with charging outlets for their customers.
And cities could retrofit their parking meters to accept credit/ATM cards, which would be used to pay for the parking and any recharge electric. That would save on installing a separate device to accept payment for each.
The only problem I see with recharging in parking lots like a Walmart is - you hookup your car and head in the store. I pull alongside so my hoookup is nearby, disconnect you and plug in my car. Keeping an eye out for you I recharge, and reconnect your car. You come back, and either find you have recharged very little or if you're there a while you are charged for 2X the electric. I could also see kids disconnecting them, or gluing them on as pranks.
And then of course the connection has to be weatherproof if you're doing it in a parking lot. If the (future) battteries are going to store a lot of energy for range and speed, and 30-min. or quicker recharges are the norm. that means a lot of amperage flowing thru that line. And if that is not completely safe (foolproof)you're going to have news-stories of people being killed by the high-amperage. So I believe these city and parking lot recharging units are not going to be cheap!
So I believe these city and parking lot recharging units are not going to be cheap!
I think the cost will all depends on how fast the charge is delivered. A company callled Aerovironment has a division called PosiCharge, which has developed fast charging technology and now markets these chargers to industry. One of their chargers can deliver 35 kWh in 10 minutes. That would be enough to go about 150 miles in an average size EV. They've demonstrated this on the Altairnano battery packs. I have no idea what these things cost but I agree with you that they probably aren't cheap.
I think recharging will be a very safe process if done properly. I mean filling up with gas could be dangerous if you douse yourself with it then try to light a cigarette. That's what the Darwin Awards are for.
Shoot, ny best friend's older brother was filling the tank of a box truck with a lighted Marlboro dangling from his lips! I quickly ran the other way and he's like, "What's with you?" and I point out the fact that he's about to blow us all up if he doesn't snuff that cig!!!
I think recharging will be a very safe process if done properly. I mean filling up with gas could be dangerous if you douse yourself with it then try to light a cigarette.
Just because there are risks with gasoline, and with electric recharging does not make the risks equal as you infer. The mix of metal+moisture+electricity, has a much higher probability of injury than metal+moisture+gasoline.
My car sits outside in an apartment building parking-lot, and gets a varying coating of ice or dew on everynight. Am I going to want to come out in the morning, and disconnect it? and also hope nobody tampered with the connection or the cable overnight?
Also with gasoline refueling the equipment is monitored and maintained by people at the station. If recharging is done at every parking spot at stores or curbside, you now have unmonitored equipment that could be vandalized or tampered with. All someone has to do to create a safety hazard is cut a small piece of the shielding of the recharging cable where someone is going to grab it. :sick:
I'm not trying to be pessimistic but if recharging is done in a decentralized manner the costs and risks go up quite a bit.
I think the risks are higher with EV charging in an open venue. It will be risky enough as you say in the rain plugging in a 110V connection. Can you imagine a system that will charge that much battery in 10-30 Minutes? I imagine it would be 440V or 220V at the least. The first time WalMart gets sued by someone claiming to getting shocked and all the plug-ins will get pulled from WalMart parking lots. Personally I cannot see a future for charging stations. If the EVs ever get used to commute. Some folks will plug in and work to save a bit of electricity at home. I cannot imagine an EV that you head cross country in. CNG cars have been around for decades and you do not see many places to get them filled. Gas is still too cheap for anything to really compete.
Now that you mention it, I just went to www.gasbuddy.com, and checked my area of Maryland (Prince George's County), and it looks like the south side of $3.00/gal is starting to become common again.
I really didn't pay attention to the prices going into work this morning, but I think the last time I noticed, the local Shell had been at $3.099 and the Citgo had been $3.059. But neither of those two are showing up on Gasbuddy. Guess I'll know for sure when I head home tonite.
San Diego is back down to a low of $3.05. Highest I paid was $3.42 for premium to fill the LS400. Costco peaked at $3.29 here. C'mon 2 buck regular :shades:
Comments
Henry Ford figured all this out 100 years ago, and bet against everyone who insisted on selling $4000 large cars in 1908. They are dead, he lives on!
Maybe if Toyota were building the Tesla that would be a different story, but they aren't. Tesla has one poker chip in a very big game.
I think even with trucks and SUVs, they're going to hit a point where it's just not worthwhile to make them any bigger. With SUVs, that point may have been hit with the Excursion. It was 226.7" long, 79.9" wide, 77.2" tall, and weighed 6600 pounds.
I think 80 inches is pretty much the tipping point for width. Once you build a vehicle wider than that, it gets classified as a heavy truck, or something like that, and gets taxed differently. IIRC, the 1960 Ford cars actually came in at something like 81.5", and had to be registered as trucks in some states!
With shoulder room, 57" is generally considered the bare minimum to get 3-across seating. Once you get to 60" of shoulder room, you get into cars that start feeling more like old-school full-sized. 64-65" is about as generous as any passenger car got in shoulder room. The cheaper versions of GM's big '71-76 cars were this wide. The nicer models had thicker padding on the door panels, pull straps, etc, which cut into the shoulder room measurement, even if they really didn't make the cars feel smaller inside. The '91-96 Caprice and its offspring were also about this wide inside. My '85 Silverado is also about 65" wide inside. Once you get into vehicles that big, you have 3-across seating with some considerable spread-out room. Unless you're fitting linebackers in there, chances are you're not even touching elbows. The Excursion has 68.3" of shoulder room. That's starting to get into overkill territory though. It's really not going to make it any more comfy for 3-across seating for the majority of people, and the only real advantage there is if you want to sleep in it!
But then, where do you go from there? 4-across seating? That's not really something I see a market for. And if you need 57 inches minimum for 3-across seating (I got that figure years ago from CR, I didn't just make it up), then you're going to need a whopping 76 inches of shoulder room to break into 4-across seating.
So it seems to me that, shoulder room wise, at least, once you get above about 65 inches, anything more is just not useful, and only contributes to an overly wide, unwieldy vehicle.
Just for comparison, the Ford Expedition EL, which essentially replaces the Excursion, is "only" 221.3" long, 78.8" wide, 77.7" tall, and weighs 5800-5900 pounds. It's shrunk down inside, too, to 63.2" of front shoulder room.
The Suburban comes in at 222.4" long, 79.1" wide, 76.8" tall, 5607 pounds, and 65.3" of shoulder room. Except for the curb weight, I doubt if that's much of a difference from a 1973 Suburban.
Also, as long as full-sized truck beds are designed around the concept of the 4x8 sheet of plywood, I doubt if they'll get much bigger, either. They might get longer, as people demand more storage space behind the seat. Plus, we have configurations these days that didn't exist once upon a time such as the crew cab with the 5.5 foot bed, or the "1 3/4" cab models like the Dodge Ram. But then, as they get too big, they just become too impractical to be very popular.
With cars, it seems like they're starting to gravitate towards a mean. We don't have big mastodons anymore like the 1975 DeVille, and even the size of cars that emerged from the first wave of downsizing, cars like the Crown Vic/Grand Marquis and Town car aren't long for this world. Once they're gone, it seems like about 205-210" is as long as most cars will be. But then, on the low end, we don't have these microscopic little toy cars running around anymore. Sure, there's stuff like the Aveo, Yaris, Fit, Accent, etc. But they have a lot more substance to them than something like, say, a 1973 Civic.
Chryslers were on a 124" wheelbase from 1965-73, and that went unchanged for 1974. However, Imperials kept on shrinking. The 1957-66 was on a 129" wheelbase, and it dropped a bit to 127" for 1967-73, and then finally to 124" for 1974-75, all but erasing the difference between an Imperial and a Chrysler.
I'm not sure how long those '74-78 C-bodies were, though. I have a used car book that says something like 224" for the Newport, 225" for the New Yorker. If so, they sure didn't shrink them much when they downsized, as my '79 Newport was 220.3", and my '79 NYers are something like 221.3".
I've heard that the 1974 Chryslers actually were a bit shorter overall than the 1973 models, but I don't know if they really are or not.
207" long, on a 111" wheelbase, would have still been big for a compact even in the 70's, and would have almost been pushing midsize. My '76 LeMans is 208" long, on a 112" wheelbase. GM's midsizers were smaller than Ford or Mopars back then. While the GMs were about 208/212 inches (2/4door), the Fords and Mopars were more like 215/219 (2/4 door).
A 1975 Dart is about 205" long, while my '68 is only 196" long. However, I think a lot of that length was fluffed up by what they tried to pass off as 5 mph bumpers...basically just putting a set of big rubber blocks on the bumpers.
The '76 Volare/Aspen and 1977 Diplomat/LeBaron were marketed as compacts initially. They were on a 112.7" wheelbase (108.7" for Volare/Aspen coupes). They probably topped out at around 206-207" for the 4-door Diplomat/LeBaron. Then, as downsizing progressed, the Diplomat/LeBaron were passed off as intermediate cars for 1980. Then, when the big R-bodies were dropped for 1982, the Diplomat and M-body New Yorker were marketed as full-sized cars!
We should be blaming the buying public. They vote with their dollars.
Sure, the new Sequoia is bigger. Why? Because the old one was criticized for being way too small for its class, and it got pummeled in the sales race against the Tahoe and Expedition.
You want efficiency? Buy a Sienna. 149 cubic feet and decent gas mileage, and you don't even have to give up AWD.
Yet minivan sales keep dropping, because the buying public wants SUVs (and more recently, crossovers).
Ford only stopped selling the Excursion because sales were slow. Seems the public finally got a clue.
Now they are downsizing, but only very slightly, to very large crossovers. Look at the Outlook and Acadia, and the upcoming Ford Flex.
The Flex just might rival lemko's Cadillacs in length (I'm not sure).
Speaking of efficiency, could someone explain this to me? The old 1973-1990ish style of Suburban, according to Edmund's, at least, had 167 cubic feet of cargo space. The new Suburban "only" has 137 cubic feet. Still pretty generous, but an awful big drop for a vehicle that's about the same size.
So, where did the extra 30 feet go? Could it perhaps have something to do with the newer Suburbans having fold-flat seats, which still take some space to store, whereas the old ones just had simpler seats that you had to pull out completely?
As for Lemko's old '75 DeVille, I think those things came in at 230". That's about as big as mass-produced cars ever got. I think the Lincoln Continental sedans and coupes got up to 233", while the Mark V was around 231".
Biggest car I ever had was a 1969 Bonneville. 225" long, and that was BEFORE they started putting those jutting 5 mph bumpers on cars! Somewhere on the net, I saw the 1976 Bonneville listed somewhere at 226" long. Only an inch longer overall, but considering the way those bumpers stuck out in '76, that would seem to indicate to me that the '69 actually had a bigger body?
As big as that thing was though, it actually handled quite well. When it ran, that is.
To be fair, the Excursion, et al., were not substantially larger than the behemoth cars of the 1970s. However, parking spaces and home garages back then accomodated those vehicles. Parking spots and garages today don't fit.
My subdivision was built between 2003 and 2005. My neighbor had to pay for an "extra-long" garage just to accomodate his standard Chevy Pickup. This is in Texas, mind you.
Some are seriously nice. The empty ones are so huge. They come in 3 lengths now.
I swear you can play racquetball inside the longest one.
What day was that? GM's "senior compacts" were 192" long with a 112" wheelbase.
http://www.mpt.org/motorweek/reviews/rt2713b.shtml
Check it out, 233, 273, and 289 inches! Because 273" wasn't big enough!
600 cubic feet is the racquetball court I was talking about. :surprise:
Not bad at 16.3mpg. Their Avalance only got 15mpg.
Ain't that the truth! I actually work in the same building that I worked at back in 1992. There's a parking lot across the street, but you can also parallel park along the street. I remember driving my grandmother's 218" 1985 LeSabre to work one day back then, and had no trouble fitting in the parallel spaces. I moved out of this building in 1993, but then our project moved back in late 1998. At some point they re-striped the parking spaces. While in the past, that LeSabre would park easily in those spots, all of a sudden it wouldn't even physically fit between the lines! It would overhang just a bit on either end.
One of my friends bought a townhouse in 1998, with a one-car garage. He has shelves across the back. His 2001.5 Passat just barely fits. A few years ago, he bought a 1978 Mark V. Even if he took the shelves out, it wouldn't fit. And worse, it won't fit in his driveway, either! It sticks out too far and blocks the sidewalk!
If it's any consolation though, sometimes they didn't build spaces big enough back in the day, either. I used to have a condo that was built in 1973, and it had a one-car garage. I forget how deep the garage was, maybe 20 feet? It was only about 10 feet wide, though. If I parked my '57 DeSoto or '67 Catalina in there, I had to park it way off to one side, almost up against the wall, so that I could open the door wide enough to get out. Both of those are 2-door cars, which makes entry/exit even more interesting in a tight squeeze.
There were these old people who lived in our quad who had a 1976 or so Chrysler Newport. Sometimes it was downright amusing watching them try to get it in and out of the garage. It usually involved the husband standing outside, trying to direct the wife in and out. It could get annoying early in the mornings though, with him hollering "CUT IT TO THE LEFT!! NOW CUT IT TO THE RIGHT!! NOW CUT IT BACK TO THE LEFT!! WHOOOOAAAAHHH!!!" How about just cutting it out, admitting defeat, and either moving or trade that dreadnaught in for a Corolla! :P
Probably from around 1974-78. By the time they outfitted cars with some of those 5-mph crash bumpers, you had compact cars that were about the same size as what intermediates had been just a few years before.
In 1977-79, Consumer Reports actually eliminated the midsized class, for their purposes at least. They just grouped cars into what they called Subcompact (Chevettes, Omnis, Accords, etc), Compact (Novas, Volares, Diplomats, Granadas, Fairmonts, but also the downsized Malibu and company) and Large (pre-downsized intermediates such as the 1977 Malibu, LTD-II, Cordoba, Coronet/Monaco, downsized big cars like the B/C bodies, Panthers, and R-bodies, and the the old mastodon class full-sizers like the '77-78 LTD/Marquis and '77-78 Newport/New Yorker).
Once the EPA started classifying cars based on interior volume though, many compact cars were actually midsized, as they fell in between 110-120 cubic feet of interior volume. Similarly, some of the less space-efficient pre-downsized intermediates, which CR started calling "large" cars, fell back down into the midsized range.
As for Lemko's DTS though, isn't the wheelbase actually something like 115.6"? That would put it close to a downsized Impala/Caprice, which was 116.0".
For all that extra bulk, the only real advantage I see is shoulder room. About 3.5" more up front, maybe 3" in the back. But since it's 4" wider overall, that's nothing to crow about. Legroom is no better, neither front nor rear. Now I can get more comfy in the LeMans because it has a power seat, and the seats themselves are padded better, but there's no extra room. Headroom is actually a bit worse up front, I'd say about an inch less than the Dart. About the same in the back though, which is good considering how rakish the roofline is. The trunk is actually smaller. The Dart's is about 17 cubic feet, but I think the LeMans is only 15. Its rump actually tapers more than its sibling Cutlass, Regal, Century, Chevelle, etc, and the rear fender tops are lower than the decklid, so I think its trunk is even smaller than those other cars. About the only real advantage is that the trunk has a spot that's deep enough that I can fit a pretty big cooler in there if I situate it just right. The Dart's trunk is so shallow that the cooler wouldn't fit anywhere in it and would have to go in the back seat.
And even under the hood, I'd say there's no advantage to the LeMans's extra bulk. The Dart's engine bay is actually easier to work in.
Now, I think the LeMans is a prettier looking car than the Dart, with its long hood, rakish roof, and flowing lines. But it's much more wasteful. Oh, and speaking of wasteful, the Dart's 318-2bbl could probably get from 0-60 in about 9 seconds, and get fuel economy around 13/17. The LeMans, with its 350-4bbl (I thought it was just one of those 2-bbls that used the 4-bbl plate and they'd weld over the secondaries, until the other day I was messing with it, noticed a linkage, and sure enough, it had secondaries!) might do 0-60 in about 12 seconds, and get, on a good day, 11/16.
Ain't progress grand? :sick:
I get about 34mpg in town..40 mpg on the highway.
I'm three years from the break even point.
I plan to stay with this car UNLESS something better comes along..perhaps the Chevy Volt?
If so, I am going to follow it's development like a hawk. I would not be one to under-estimate Mitsubishi's R&D abilitities, either. Something tells me Mitsu would satisfy my electric automobile requirements better than ZENN would.
2021 Kia Soul LX 6-speed stick
As a rule, electric cars can either go fast for short distances or go slow for long distances, but not both without being astonishingly expensive.
I think they probably did the right thing to plan for an even bigger Sequoia making modest sales. Where they screwed up big time was not seeing the sea change in gas prices and consumer preferences two years ago and working like mad to get a 50-state diesel ready for the new Sequoia launch.
Now they are talking about putting even more incentives on the new Tundra to try and make their 200K sales goal next year. The new Sequoia will have all the same negatives attached to it that this year's new Tundra did: terrible gas mileage, less and less buyers in the segment all the time, and established sales leaders already in the segment (mainly GM here) with models that totally dominate the competition.
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)
2011 Hyundai Sonata, 2014 BMW 428i convertible, 2015 Honda CTX700D
No, the range will initially only be around 100 miles but a 30 minute re-charge will bring you back up to 80% SOC. While 100 miles doesn't sound like much it is already an improvement of 20% over their first prototype. This is purely a result of battery advancement, which should continue. The size of the battery pack is only 16 kWh. This isn't all that big but it keeps the cost and weight down. Actually 100 miles on 16 kWh is very impressive.
The Tesla Roadster was rated by the EPA to have a 245 mile range. So if your driving style yields EPA-like mileage you could expect to get this range in a Tesla. However, as you point out, this car is very expensive, $98k.
To maintain 75 mph in an aerodynamic vehicle really doesn't require all much power. The Tesla Roadster has been driven from San Francisco to Lake Tahoe on a single charge. This is a distance of just over 200 miles on highways where the flow of traffic is typically 70+ mph. Now I guess they could have driven significantly below the flow of traffic but that probably wouldn't have been a very good PR stunt for this type of car.
As motorhomes, those Sprinters might actually be premium-priced, as they're sort of a unique design. Usually with van-based mini-motorhomes (Class C) they just drop a fairly stock body down on a medium-duty truck frame supplied by either GM, Ford, or Chrysler, which has a van cab. The Sprinter may require more of a unique conversion though, which will no doubt add more to the cost.
And if they're doing those real small motorhomes, which tend to fall somewhere between conversion vans and Mini-Motorhomes, prices can get REAL expensive, partly because of all the miniaturization involved in furnaces, air conditioning, appliances, etc.
What a pile of nonsense. If they did the 'illegal' things you say, get them arrested!
Now, suppose my wife and I take off for the city that houses my Mitsubishi dealer, which is the city of Sierra Vista, AZ. About 90 miles from our little SE Arizona cowtown that we live in, which has no Mitsu dealer and in fact, has no new car dealer at all.
We drive the 90 miles to Sierra Vista to go to the Mitsu dealer, or the mall or WalMart, or Lowe's, etc. The issue comes up about getting back to our little SE Arizona town. We need a re-charge.
Would I:
1) Drop in to my Mitsubishi dealer with a big smile and request a complimentary re-charge of 1/2 hour to get us the 90 miles back home
2) Stop in at the local Chevron gas station for a free 30-minute re-charge (like a ripoff gas station like Chevron is really going to give us a free re-charge)
3) Stop in at somebody's house with confused desperate looks on our faces and demand a re-charge of 1/2 hour from a complete stranger
4) Trade some Mitsubishi pamphlets to a complete stranger for a free 30-minute re-charge
5) Stop by the City of Sierra Vista building and see how progressive they've
become and demand a free 30-minute re-charge
Vote for your favorite choice here. The Mitsubishi dealer or the Standard Chevron station would have to be front-runners but feel free to improvise as required.
2021 Kia Soul LX 6-speed stick
Regular = 2.5 Amps @ $1.00 per kilowatt
Silver = 3.5 Amps @ $1.10 per kilowatt
Premium = 4.5 Amps @ $1.20 per kilowatt
Ultra = 6.0 Amps @ $1.29 per kilowatt
Wonder if you'll hear comments like this in the future?
"Yuck! You're using Westinghouse electricity? That stuff is garbage! I only take my car to the General Electric station!" "You both are nuts! There's no difference between them or Square D, Federal, Murray, or Thomson-Betts!"
I wonder, if they put a hand crank on the sucker, so that if you ran out of juice in some desolate location, how long you'd have to crank before you charged the batteries back up to get any use out of them?
Nothing on the market yet that would be really be more than a toy. "The guy that dies with the most toys wins!!!" :shades:
And cities could retrofit their parking meters to accept credit/ATM cards, which would be used to pay for the parking and any recharge electric. That would save on installing a separate device to accept payment for each.
The only problem I see with recharging in parking lots like a Walmart is - you hookup your car and head in the store. I pull alongside so my hoookup is nearby, disconnect you and plug in my car. Keeping an eye out for you I recharge, and reconnect your car. You come back, and either find you have recharged very little or if you're there a while you are charged for 2X the electric. I could also see kids disconnecting them, or gluing them on as pranks.
And then of course the connection has to be weatherproof if you're doing it in a parking lot. If the (future) battteries are going to store a lot of energy for range and speed, and 30-min. or quicker recharges are the norm. that means a lot of amperage flowing thru that line. And if that is not completely safe (foolproof)you're going to have news-stories of people being killed by the high-amperage. So I believe these city and parking lot recharging units are not going to be cheap!
I think the cost will all depends on how fast the charge is delivered. A company callled Aerovironment has a division called PosiCharge, which has developed fast charging technology and now markets these chargers to industry. One of their chargers can deliver 35 kWh in 10 minutes. That would be enough to go about 150 miles in an average size EV. They've demonstrated this on the Altairnano battery packs. I have no idea what these things cost but I agree with you that they probably aren't cheap.
I think recharging will be a very safe process if done properly. I mean filling up with gas could be dangerous if you douse yourself with it then try to light a cigarette. That's what the Darwin Awards are for.
Just because there are risks with gasoline, and with electric recharging does not make the risks equal as you infer. The mix of metal+moisture+electricity, has a much higher probability of injury than metal+moisture+gasoline.
My car sits outside in an apartment building parking-lot, and gets a varying coating of ice or dew on everynight. Am I going to want to come out in the morning, and disconnect it? and also hope nobody tampered with the connection or the cable overnight?
Also with gasoline refueling the equipment is monitored and maintained by people at the station. If recharging is done at every parking spot at stores or curbside, you now have unmonitored equipment that could be vandalized or tampered with. All someone has to do to create a safety hazard is cut a small piece of the shielding of the recharging cable where someone is going to grab it. :sick:
I'm not trying to be pessimistic but if recharging is done in a decentralized manner the costs and risks go up quite a bit.
I really didn't pay attention to the prices going into work this morning, but I think the last time I noticed, the local Shell had been at $3.099 and the Citgo had been $3.059. But neither of those two are showing up on Gasbuddy. Guess I'll know for sure when I head home tonite.
I say,
Gimme some of that stuff YOU'RE Smokin' Gary !!!
And I'm still paying $3.40, so what's up? Everyone else went down but we stayed high? That stinks. :-(
2014 Mini Cooper (stick shift of course), 2016 Camry hybrid, 2009 Outback Sport 5-spd (keeping the stick alive)