Electric Vehicle Thread!

[orangpelupa]

So uh... Is this another of your famous computer glitches, or did you maybe just respond to the wrong thread?

AFEELA is sony mobility's car brand that was announced in CES 2023 with a bunch of nonsense talking by Qualcomm head, epic head of something, and sony mobility head

EDIT:
sorry for the QC typo

 

[wco81]

The first implementation of the EV tax credits under the IRA is a mess. There is a list of EVs which are eligible but those will change by March in all likelihood. For now the Treasury is waiving the battery sourcing requirements because they haven't found a way to determine where batteries on different EV models came from.

Joe Manchin is said to be irked.

Last summer's big climate law limited the tax credit by adding strict sourcing requirements for the battery components. Because battery supply chains have historically been concentrated in Asia, carmakers will likely struggle to meet those requirements.


And for now ... they don't have to. Until the IRS figures out the rules for meeting those requirements, which will be March at the earliest, the Treasury Department says the restrictions simply don't apply.


Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., who added the requirements in order to boost American manufacturing, is very upset about this — but for car buyers, there's a window of opportunity. Cars that qualify for $7,500 right now may only get $3,250, or no credit at all, come March.

Buying an electric car? You can get a $7,500 tax credit, but it won't be easy — NPR

The government is offering a hefty tax credit to buyers of electric vehicles, but taking advantage of it is not straightforward. Here's what you need to know.

apple.news

It's even crazier, there are two price limits, based purely on MSRP, for EV credits, $55k for cars and $80k for trucks and SUVs.

But an ID.4 does not qualify for the SUV limit unless it's the more expensive AWD version.

There are also initial rules for used EV tax credits.

So if you can get $7500, it might make sense to buy now, providing you can take delivery before March when rule change may mean you only get half that amount.

In 2024, they're expected to be ready to have rebates at the time of purchase so that you don't have to file for the tax credit in your income tax return.

 

[AlphaWolf]

Well, lets be fair to Rivian here: they build pickup trucks, which are not meant to be aerodynamic nor particularly energy efficient. Just like ICE vehicles, if you want higher fuel (energy) efficiency, you buy a sedan-shaped car and not a block-shaped truck.

Tesla vehicles are very aerodynamic in comparison, both in coefficient of drag and in total frontal area. Tesla also spent a lot of time thinking about other sources of drag such as underbody and down the sides. Every little bit helps...

The R1T weighs almost 3 and a half tonnes. The model y is under 2. They could make the r1t a perfect tear drop and it would still fail to match the model y in mpkw.

 

[Albuquerque]

The R1T weighs almost 3 and a half tonnes. The model y is under 2. They could make the r1t a perfect tear drop and it would still fail to match the model y in mpkw.

Sure, that is a fair callout. Still, energy consumption as relate dto weight is most meaningful during acceleration and braking (both of which apply to changes in elevation.) Once you've achieved a constant velocity, maintaining velocity is mostly a function of drag. Nevertheless and much to your point, every little bit helps.

Another example along these same lines: the factory wheels and tires on my 2022 Model Y Performance are 21"x9.5" wearing 255/35R21 on the front and 21"x10.5" wearing 275/35R21 on the rear. I swapped all four corners for 18"x8" Martian MW03 wheels and Michelin 235/55R18 tires. The result is an almost 15% increase in range as measured by miles per kwhr per the onboard energy management system. more efficiency is found in start/stop traffic and lower speeds. The rotating mass of the wheels and tires are down more than 20lbs per corner, and the smaller diameter wheels mean more of the weight is closer to the axle centerline so inertia is also significantly down.

 

[Deleted member 2197]

Mercedes-Benz to build 400 high-power charging hubs in North America by 2027

Mercedes-Benz announced at the CES 2023 that it would start building a high-power charging network in the US and Canada this year and in Europe, China, and other key markets in the coming years, aiming to build a global charging network by the end of the decade.

www.digitimes.com

 

[orangpelupa]

Finger crossed I'll win BEV lottery!

Got some entries in lotteries by my cellphone provider and AMD.

 

[Deleted member 2197]

Tesla cuts prices by up to a fifth to boost demand

The electric car maker is reducing prices by thousands of pounds as global downturn threatens sales.

www.bbc.com

 

[Pressure]

Tesla cuts prices by up to a fifth to boost demand

The electric car maker is reducing prices by thousands of pounds as global downturn threatens sales.

www.bbc.com

Used Teslas are now more expensive than new Teslas.

Good for first time buyers that want a Tesla. Bad for resellers and current customers that saw their value drop by 20% over night.

 

[wco81]

Not in the market but still wouldn't buy.

A Tesla that is. An EV, definitely.

 

[wco81]

The Economist visits the Midwest to see if the EV transition has given new hope to domestic manufacturing, specifically domestic auto manufacturing, to unions and workers.

2023 ought to be a big year in America’s transition towards electric vehicles. The federal government has set aside billions to encourage consumers and manufacturers to hitch a ride, and to ramp up the nation’s charging infrastructure. What do electric vehicles tell us about the future of American industry?

On a road trip across the Midwest we look at whether America's industrial and environmental goals are compatible. We visit a factory making a battery-powered version of a popular truck. Ethan Karp from MAGNET talks about the prospects for a manufacturing renaissance in what some rudely call the rustbelt. And Chuck Browning from UAW considers what the transition means for union workers.

John Prideaux hosts with Charlotte Howard and Jon Fasman.

‎Checks and Balance from The Economist: Checks and Balance: Electric dreams on Apple Podcasts

‎Show Checks and Balance from The Economist, Ep Checks and Balance: Electric dreams - Jan 13, 2023

podcasts.apple.com

They interview some Ford workers making the Lightning F-150. Some of them worked on the ICE version. All the ones quoted express enthusiasm, with some considering personally purchasing an EV F-150.

Then they interview some auto workers union heads, who are more guarded. They want to see the EV transition happen but they don't know what the demand will be and will seek to get jobs guarantees in new labor contracts, essentially wanting at least the same level of union worker employment as they have had with ICE manufacturing.

There's some concern that EVs have far less mechanical content than ICE cars so requires fewer workers to manufacture an EV vs. a comparable ICE vehicle. So one possible goal for the unions would be to get involved in the manufacturing of all components in EVs, rather than have their supply chains still be based overseas.

They reporters cite the provisions of the IRA, specifically about percentage of battery content sourced in the US as well as the manufacturing of the batteries. They question whether the policies which the Biden administration has enacted for EVs are prioritizing decarbonization or domestic manufacturing, specifically jobs. Well considering that Manchin had a big hand in shaping the IRA, does that question even need to be asked?

They also note that transportation is the biggest category of GHG emissions in America at slightly over 25% -- not sure if this is the case, I thought maybe some industrial categories may emit more.

They say charging infrastructure needs to be better. The US trails Europe and China in charging infrastructure as well as having fewer EV models available in the market. Supposedly under either the BIF or the IRA, Biden administration can set a charging standard, so that Tesla's proprietary network wouldn't be copied by other EV makers. They conclude, based on a bad experience with charging, that EVs are great every day cars but they're not for road trips.

 

[Albuquerque]

Used Teslas are now more expensive than new Teslas.

Good for first time buyers that want a Tesla. Bad for resellers and current customers that saw their value drop by 20% over night.

Having paid for a fully equipped Tesla Model Y in November, I can't say that it really matters to me. If I couldn't afford it, then I wouldn't have bought it. I'm always confused about how people think they're "owed" changes in price after they've bought a thing. If you buy a TV today and in three months that TV reduces in cost by 20%, are you owed the updated price? If you buy a car today and in three months the cost comes down, why are you owed the difference?

And for all the complaining about Tesla dropping price, we seem to have forgotten the stupid markups (oh I'm sorry, regional price adjustments) the dealerships sneak into basically every other EV model available. When you get on the Tesla ordering page and see a $48,107 price tag for your car, that is literally the price you will pay for the car. There isn't the mysterious hand of your Ford dealership grabbing your Mach E order you've been waiting on for months to then insiert another $20k in the name of "well, supply chain and stuff, dawg...." So you gonna recoup that $20k dealer markup when they're finally able to start selling them at MSRP again? Haven't seen anyone bitching about this happening for the last, oh I dunno, four decades?

I'm sure it "matters" more to those folks who are continually buying new cars every few years. Maybe they should cut it out and stop being being wasteful, consumerist turds? We plan on driving our Y until our youngest kid (7yo son) is off to college, and there's zero reason to believe it cannot live at least that long if not more with minimal to zero maintenance -- outside of tires and a few cabin air filters.

They say charging infrastructure needs to be better. The US trails Europe and China in charging infrastructure as well as having fewer EV models available in the market. Supposedly under either the BIF or the IRA, Biden administration can set a charging standard, so that Tesla's proprietary network wouldn't be copied by other EV makers. They conclude, based on a bad experience with charging, that EVs are great every day cars but they're not for road trips.

Charging network is the sole reason for buying a Tesla at this point, and honestly was the primary driver for us as well. We just finished an 800 mile road trip (396 miles door to door from Memphis to Louisville and back) in the Model Y. Leaving Friday night started us at 36*F and driving east alongside an 8mph wind out of the north, ending in Louisville six and a half hours later at 24*F in the dark driving straight north into a 22mph headwind. It took a single charge in Nashville to break up the trip, and we used the 30 minutes for our two kids to use the bathroom and all of us to eat dinner. There are five charging stops available to us along the route not including the origin and destination cities -- Jackson, Charlotte Pike, Dickerson, Bowling Green and Elizabethtown. Even if our range was only 100 miles (our first stop was 197 miles) we could charger-hop the entire way there and still not have any problems. Even more to the point of charging access, a year ago we Turo'd (rented) a Model Y as a pre-test-drive for whether we wanted to buy one or not), and we drove it from Memphis, Tennessee to Benton Harbor, Michigan through the flyover wasteland of I55 North to I57 North. We had literally zero problems finding charging options, well inside of any range anxiety-inducing battery percentage remaining.

The native integration of Tesla supercharging stations directly into the trip planner software in the Tesla navigation system also includes charge rate (KW), charging cost, number of stalls in a functioining state, number of those functioning stalls which are currently in use, historical averages of utilization at this charge location, and a list of amenities nearby. And as of around six months ago, the trip planning system now integrates not only GPS data (street type, speed limits, distances and elevation changes) but also weather predictions (current temperature and wind speed and direction where you are now, predicted temperature and wind direction and speed along your route) to estimate charge remaining at your next stop, along with the historical averages of your own driving style across different road types (city vs highway) and your car's own battery and general efficiency performance (trending over the past 31 days of your car's consumption.) It's really good at helping you estimate and plan on how to use the available charging stops.

A shitty charging network in the US is a problem for EVs that aren't Tesla.

And yeah, let's be sure to leave space for talking shit on that dumass Musk. I don't necessarily want to fund his ass-hattery and douche-baggery either, but Tesla isn't Elon Musk and a million robots -- it's tens of thousands of US employees earning a living wage. I don't want to support Elon, but I'm also not against supporting US jobs.

 

[orangpelupa]

Tweeting to Ford no longer provide you with solution for the mark up?

 

[Albuquerque]

Tweeting to Ford no longer provide you with solution for the mark up?

It never really did. Ford would purportedly "threaten" a dealership by limiting future inventory access, but at the same time if theres only one franchise dealership owner in a five hundred mile radius, is Ford really going to cut off a flyover midwest region of that size? Such threats are only really useful in places with competition in the Ford dealership franchise space. And if the competition conspires? This doesnt qualify for monopoly laws because there are plenty of non-Ford options you could hypothetically choose from. Its a franchise agreement issue, and probably one that would be difficult to fight in court.

For the record, this markup problem isnt limited to only Ford, and also isnt limited to EVs either. I brought up Ford because the Mach E is a good competitor to the Model Y, yet it suffers from blatant dealership pricing shenanigans. Still, broken levels of dealer markup has been a thing for decades, especially with very popular and sought after models, yet somehow we forget how those years of dealership pricing abuse have cost consumers when Tesla decides to make their fleet less expensive.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Keep in mind that dealership mark-up goes both ways, however. When stock is limited compared to demand the dealership obviously benefits. When stock isn't limited, then consumers can benefit, but it requires work on the consumer's part. Basically negotiating.

I've never bought a brand new factory delivered car at manufacturer MSRP. I've always received between a 10-30% discount as I've always negotiated the price down from the manufacturer MSRP. Keep in mind this is discounted from manufacturer set MSRP and not from dealership marked up price.

So, yes, it can be bad buying from a dealership but it can also be good. Just depends on whether you are attempting to buy a limited stock vehicle or a non-limited stock vehicle and whether you want to work to get that discount. Sometimes I've had to negotiate hard and sometimes just mentioning the desire to negotiate and that I'm willing to buy from a different manufacturer is enough to get the dealership to start offering below MSRP discounts.

Tesla's model and before them Saturn with the fixed pricing certainly removes dealership involvement, both good and bad and comes with it's own good and bad points. As you mentioned you won't get overcharged for a limited stock vehicle (low supply versus demand). OTOH - you don't have the option to spend more to get it quicker and if supply versus demand is good you don't have the opportunity to negotiate a significant discount. Another benefit of the Tesla/Saturn models is that if you don't like the negotiation process you don't have to worry that another person is getting a better deal on the vehicle than you are, everyone pays the same price regardless. So, can't get overcharged but you also can't get a discount.

That applies to EVs as well. Some friends of mine got their Chevy EV a few years back for a significant discount by negotiating with the dealership.

Regards,
SB

 

[Albuquerque]

Yup, I think you summarized it well: dealerships absolutely waffle in terms of pros and cons, especially when talking price. And in that model, we've just become accustomed to the waffle. Sometimes you pay more, sometimes you don't. Sometimes it messes with your resale, sometimes it messes with your insurance costs. Meh.

However, much to your point and also back to mine: no individual customer is "owed" the price that someone else paid, whether the difference is a function of effective negotiation, or a function of dealer locale or markup, or as a function of time. If Person A paid $10 for a thing, and Person B was able to get it for $7, then that's the price you paid and (outside of regulatory / legal concerns) that's the end of it.

And it's been that way for decades, even in the dealership model. Hence my negative response to people decrying Tesla being "unfair" because someone else is getting a better deal now. Yeah, some folks are getting better deals now for sure. Guess what? Been that way for decades, welcome to capitalism!

 

[Sxotty]

I dislike dealers whether you can get a good deal sometimes or not. I also dislike prices changing 20% like Tesla did. Obviously I don't mind them dropping the price and let's be honest they were just talking advantage of demand. Having prices that change super fast though is just a way they mine out consumer surplus which makes me as a customer sad.

With the new prices a model y is closer but I think I'll just wait and see despite the likely loss of 7500 credit. I don't want a credit anyway I just want a rebate. I love that Tesla does certain things like have a third row in a small vehicle (nobody else did that in an ev). But it's dislike a lot of other stuff they do.

 

[eastmen]

Tesla cuts prices by up to a fifth to boost demand

The electric car maker is reducing prices by thousands of pounds as global downturn threatens sales.

www.bbc.com

they are certainly much more in line with what a car should be

Model Y awd is now only in the mid 50k range

I dislike dealers whether you can get a good deal sometimes or not. I also dislike prices changing 20% like Tesla did. Obviously I don't mind them dropping the price and let's be honest they were just talking advantage of demand. Having prices that change super fast though is just a way they mine out consumer surplus which makes me as a customer sad.

With the new prices a model y is closer but I think I'll just wait and see despite the likely loss of 7500 credit. I don't want a credit anyway I just want a rebate. I love that Tesla does certain things like have a third row in a small vehicle (nobody else did that in an ev). But it's dislike a lot of other stuff they do.

Yea I think the large drop like Tesla did was a bit silly as it hits their brand value. They should have done smaller cuts maybe 2 this year to get to that 20%

 

[Albuquerque]

Tesla is very obviously aiming directly at the price ceiling for the federal tax rebate on EVs rather than smooth ramping thing. Employing a strategy of two (or more) smaller cuts over the course of a year wouldn't drive the purchasing volume they now enjoy, as it wouldn't have been big enough fast enough to get so many of their most popular models under the IRS price threshold before the March 31st deadline.

And bluntly, Tesla might be the only EV producer in the US domestic market to have sufficient scale and vertical integration to build this many cars at this pricepoint while still sustaining good (enough) margins. They have been scaling their production capacity for a decade and I'll wager a fifty spot there's literally nobody else in the US EV market who can right now in Q1 of 2023 touch Tesla's sheer production capacity within a single order of mangitude.

In Q3 of 2022:

• The well reviewed Kia EV6 sold 4,996 units
• The comfortable and accessible VW ID.4 sold 6,657 units.
• What might be the strongest Model Y competitor, the Ford Mach E sold 10,414 units.
• The venerable Chevy Bolt, a super popular and quite inexpensive EV for everyone, sold 14,709 units.
• The Tesla Model 3 moved a whopping 55,030 units.
• And despite costing more than the M3 for what might be considered the same essential platform, the Model Y moved an even crazier 60,271 units.

I only listed what I felt were the most obvious contenders. The Bolt is the closest to Tesla in terms of absolute sales numbers, and it's still a landslide in Tesla's favor. This all in spite of how much more expensive even the cheapest Model 3 is compared ot the Bolt. Now imagine a world today where the Model 3 price is within spitting distance of the Bolt (after IRS rebate), then imagine a customer thinking about how to make that decision when all the Bolts are pretty much spoken for and the Model 3 is faster, longer range, more energy efficient, has a better charging network and may arguably have better creature comforts.

Yeah, I'm sure Tesla would rather the fatter margins, however someone with a complicated math degree from an Ivy league college surely napkin math'd it out to determine slightly lower margins (for a while) are more than made up when you pound out a quarter million sales in a single quarter. At the historical rate Tesla has been increasing production capacity for both the Y and 3, I wager they can probably produce that number too.

In short: there are bags of cash, then there are fat stacks of cash, then there is the mountain of mob cash Joker lit on fire in the 2nd Nolan Batman movie, and then somewhere beyond that poit is the sheer stupid amount of money Tesla is going to shovel into their fat maw after completely blowing out everyone else in this space during the IRS tax credit firesale.

Honestly, the very worst part of this is that asshole Musk getting rich from it. Ugh. Still, even to this day and this very moment, fuck that guy with all the sincerity in my heart.

 

[AlphaWolf]

Tesla is very obviously aiming directly at the price ceiling for the federal tax rebate on EVs rather than smooth ramping thing. Employing a strategy of two (or more) smaller cuts over the course of a year wouldn't drive the purchasing volume they now enjoy, as it wouldn't have been big enough fast enough to get so many of their most popular models under the IRS price threshold before the March 31st deadline.

And bluntly, Tesla might be the only EV producer in the US domestic market to have sufficient scale and vertical integration to build this many cars at this pricepoint while still sustaining good (enough) margins. They have been scaling their production capacity for a decade and I'll wager a fifty spot there's literally nobody else in the US EV market who can right now in Q1 of 2023 touch Tesla's sheer production capacity within a single order of mangitude.

In Q3 of 2022:

• The well reviewed Kia EV6 sold 4,996 units
• The comfortable and accessible VW ID.4 sold 6,657 units.
• What might be the strongest Model Y competitor, the Ford Mach E sold 10,414 units.
• The venerable Chevy Bolt, a super popular and quite inexpensive EV for everyone, sold 14,709 units.
• The Tesla Model 3 moved a whopping 55,030 units.
• And despite costing more than the M3 for what might be considered the same essential platform, the Model Y moved an even crazier 60,271 units.

I only listed what I felt were the most obvious contenders. The Bolt is the closest to Tesla in terms of absolute sales numbers, and it's still a landslide in Tesla's favor. This all in spite of how much more expensive even the cheapest Model 3 is compared ot the Bolt. Now imagine a world today where the Model 3 price is within spitting distance of the Bolt (after IRS rebate), then imagine a customer thinking about how to make that decision when all the Bolts are pretty much spoken for and the Model 3 is faster, longer range, more energy efficient, has a better charging network and may arguably have better creature comforts.

Yeah, I'm sure Tesla would rather the fatter margins, however someone with a complicated math degree from an Ivy league college surely napkin math'd it out to determine slightly lower margins (for a while) are more than made up when you pound out a quarter million sales in a single quarter. At the historical rate Tesla has been increasing production capacity for both the Y and 3, I wager they can probably produce that number too.

In short: there are bags of cash, then there are fat stacks of cash, then there is the mountain of mob cash Joker lit on fire in the 2nd Nolan Batman movie, and then somewhere beyond that poit is the sheer stupid amount of money Tesla is going to shovel into their fat maw after completely blowing out everyone else in this space during the IRS tax credit firesale.

Honestly, the very worst part of this is that asshole Musk getting rich from it. Ugh. Still, even to this day and this very moment, fuck that guy with all the sincerity in my heart.

Ford plans to produce 150 000 F150 Lightnings in 2023. I think that fits inside your order of magnitude.

 

[Albuquerque]

Ford plans to produce 150 000 F150 Lightnings in 2023. I think that fits inside your order of magnitude.

Thats a projection of a worldwide sales number; Tesla sold just shy of a million 3's and Y's worldwide in 2022 and they hold the record for best selling car period (irrespective of engine type) in at least three countries also in this year.

Maybe Ford can scrape together a combined 150k this year, however theyre really far from that production capacity right now. Tesla could sleep on all their production scaling increases for all of 2023 and still be roughly two thirds of an order of magnitude higher than Ford in provable (not speculative / projected) production capacity.

The reason Im even talking about this? Because Tesla has achieved the necessary scale to positively make money on volume sales rather than relying on thick margins on a (comparatively) small number of boutique offerings.

EDIT: I want to make it clear, none of my posts are meant to insinuate Tesla is the "best" EV in any way. Rather, its to point out the sorely obvious fact of how far ahead they are over every other US EV player. Right when the competition really started beating on Tesla's proverbial door for all the corner cutting (lidar gone, USS now gone, USB C ports in the center console now are only power, limited FSD functionality, strange equipment differences purely based on location of assembly just to name a few) Tesla pulled out the tactical nuke and glassed over the competition with a >20% slash in prices that literally noone else can hope to match.

Brutal.