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165 Comments
- allaboutdatiki, on 10/10/2007, -7/+38I'm not keen on the idea of buying a car made in either China or India, because of quality and safety issues.
Cheap is one thing. Dead is another. - 350Zed, on 10/10/2007, -3/+12WOW!!!
Wait... GM already did this in 1996.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_EV1
Lame!!! - LordSlashstab55, on 10/10/2007, -0/+7I'm all for the push towards electric go power. I'm more on the Chevy Volt side though. But why in two years??
- shoelace414, on 10/10/2007, -2/+9A good solution would be charge it overnight when the electric grid has extra capacity.
- kenx007, on 10/10/2007, -5/+10If they can't even produce toys right what will happen with a car?
- brstilson, on 10/10/2007, -1/+5The great thing about electricity is that it can be generated by many different means, and most of them don't pollute. Besides, the extra pollution a power plant would put out (if any) would be FAR less than the pollution put out by refining gas (or, creating hydrogen), transporting it, and then burning it in an engine. Electric motors are 85-95% efficient as opposed to combustion engines that lose over 75% of their energy to heat.
- Smight, on 10/10/2007, -6/+10...or I could buy a $2000 used car, put a down payment on a $100,000 house, not have a higher electric bill, and still have enogh gas money left over for the next 6 years.
- JohnnyXmas, on 10/10/2007, -3/+7http://www.teslamotors.com
They're AMERICAN, and say they'll have an "affordable" FAST electric car by 2009 - airwalkery2k, on 10/10/2007, -0/+4Ah man, to use this car, I need to find a place that has gasoline dispensing equipment every few hundred miles.
Where there's a will, there's a profit-making way. Workplaces, city municipalities, hotels and stores could definitely sniff out a demand for parking spaces with outlets either for free as a way to entice travelers, or more likely in parking-meter type equipment that dispense electricity while you're parked and away from the car. Think of it as a passive visit to a gas station.
It's just a tad bit difficult for the early adopters. - krnldmp, on 10/10/2007, -2/+6Sell solar panels along with the car.
- rudy23, on 10/10/2007, -3/+7There are two types of Made in India and China.The Made in India/China for US is usually pretty good. its the Made in India/China for India/China that you should be worried about.
- plainOldFool, on 10/10/2007, -0/+4He said his commute is 80miles a day ... 40 miles each way. Think anyone will Bike that? Even if one could ... I have a similar commute .... all highways. No bike or peds allowed. Try again
- norman619, on 10/10/2007, -0/+4Assembled in the US is not the same as made in America. There is a difference. The US gave away the electronics and most of the manufacturing business. Very little is actually made in the US.
- NerdyNinja, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3How is your argument contrary to mine? I'm perfectly happy to get away from $3/gallon gas prices, I just simply don't think the technology is ready to warrant the switch yet. I think we both agree that 'it will take time'. I want my car, if I'm going to pay 30 grand for it, to be as flexible as I need it to be. I personally do a lot of long range driving, due to my commute and having family all over the country. Sure, I fly out to places that I can't drive to within 8 hours, but I don't want to have to deal with the airport every time I want to go out of state. But for 30 grand, I better be able to drive the car to where I want to go - it's not like you would buy a green cellphone only to be able to talk on it for one minute out of 5.
- inmatarian, on 10/10/2007, -2/+5According to http://trucks.about.com/cs/suvreviews/a/hummer_fuel04.htm
2004 HUMMER H2 SUV
Fuel tank holds 32 gallons.
Cruising range of 310 miles at an average of 30-40 mph over a hard surface and rolling terrain.
310 miles / 40 mph == 7.75 Hours
From http://www.internetautoguide.com/car-specifications/09-int/2004/toyota/camry/index.html
2004 Toyota Camry
18.5 gallon main unleaded fuel tank
Fuel economy EPA highway (mpg): 32 and EPA city (mpg): 23
18.5 Gallons * 32 Miles per Gallon = 592 Miles
592 Miles / 85 Mph = 6.9 Hours.
As you can plainly see, these cars can not drive 10 hours at 85 mph. I suspect no car can. - crimsonnblue, on 10/10/2007, -7/+10This seems pretty pointless to me. Why would I want my electric bills to be 300 dollars a month? We need a better alternative than electricity. Besides, I hear that our electric grids are so boggled down in the summer because of AC, could you imagine if we had a few million of these charging at the same time.
- flatpick, on 10/10/2007, -1/+4Buried for no levitation.
- SavageBlackCat, on 10/10/2007, -1/+4So Plan A is a car whose range is not enough to get me to work and back, and at a speed slow enough to piss off other drivers.
Jesus, I'd hate to see Plan B. - ricree, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3To be fair, it is a pretty damned cool car for those who can afford it.
- darkkmind, on 10/10/2007, -1/+4Key Words "Chinese-made sedan" ! No thanks.
- ngmcs8203, on 10/10/2007, -1/+4I concur. My avg commute is 80miles a day. Unless I found a plug, I wouldn't be able to do much more than my daily commute unless I found a place to charge the bad boy.
- explnx, on 04/27/2009, -0/+3Just to clarify for those who aren't big car people, 0-60 in 4 seconds is really, really, good. Most cars that cost more than the tesla can't do that. I watched one of these. A car doing that with no engine noise seems like it is violating the laws of pysics. There are only 2 gears becuase the car has so much torque. It is actually faster than the Lotus Elise it is based on.
- adrianmonk, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3If the quality is good, it's probably because the company selling in the US is being smart and staying involved in the process.
I worked with a major US electronic goods manufacturer on a quality program back about a year ago. They bought parts from Asian companies and did in-house testing to validate that the design met their quality requirements, but were in the process of delegating this testing to the parts manufacturers.
One of the things they found is that some of the parts manufacturers would just make up bogus test data and submit it, apparently hoping to save the time and expense of actually doing the testing. We are talking about million dollar contracts with major manufacturers, and a few of them would just cut and paste data from tests on some completely different model of electronic component and try to pass it off as new data.
The US manufacturer I was working with was able to spot the fake data pretty easily and go yell at the parts manufacturer. And of course the majority of the component manufacturers did what they were supposed to. But some seemed to have an attitude that they were going to try to get away with whatever they could without getting caught. Of course, there are dishonest businesses anywhere, but when you are working with a business on the other side of the planet, it's harder to keep an eye on them. - adrianmonk, on 10/10/2007, -1/+4To get across west Texas?
(The speed limit is actually 80 mph in places out there, and it really does take 6 or 8 hours to get places.) - MikeonTV, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3say goodbye to driving huge distances with multiple drivers
- greenm1981, on 10/10/2007, -5/+8Why do you need to drive 10 hours straight at an average speed of 85mph?
- mos6507, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3That's a dumb statement. Imagine the total area of sunlight currently wasted by rooftops across the globe. That probably represents terrawatts of potential power.
- Waiting2awake, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3 In some areas they have that. The other option though is to use solar and wind power to offset your electricity bill.
- inactive, on 10/10/2007, -5/+8Stop making sense. You are supposed to be stupid enough to piss away 30k on a car!
If I ever spend that much on a car, it wont have been made in China. - NerdyNinja, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3Yeah, but you can fill up on gas and not spend 6 hours doing it.
- Langford, on 10/10/2007, -1/+4Thats way too much money. People who are willing to spend that much on a car, are people who don't have to worry about fuel costs.
- IllBeBack, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3I can refill my car with gasoline in under 10 minutes and go for 600 miles. An all-electric car cannot do that. Isn't a charge cycle several hours? Do you want to sit and wait for hours while your car recharges?
- s0rce7, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2My concern is that although we won't be burning fuel while driving an electric vehicle. What about producing energy to charge up all these electric car batteries. Isn't that going to just move the stress onto power plants ? Which a good number of still burn oil to produce energy. How much would it really decrease overall carbon emissions ?
- sonicdevo, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2He'll live wherever the hell he wants as long as the economy supports his decision.
- BESTenemy, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Pardon if I misunderstood your point. I guess we are on the same page. Thanks for clarifying.
I personally think that people will switch to electrical vehicles, but not because they will soon advance to the level comparable with gasoline cars. I think it will be due to decline in economic feasibility of all the alternatives. Electric cars won't be much better, but everything else will be much more expensive.
Oil economy analysts are predicting the end of affordable long distance travel. Also, right now we often outsource productions to the third world. Even though it takes a great distance to transport goods, the fuel plus labor are still cheaper than labor here. People aren't willing to shop for domestic things. Eventually we'll have no other choice. Again, it won't be because we will start making things cheaper, or because the cost of labor overseas will significantly rise. It'll be because the fuel costs will no longer be negligible.
Oil represents cheap labor. Your car takes you to the store, few km away from the house, then back with a trunk full of groceries, all of just a few bucks. Replace that with a person. Try paying someone 10 bucks to go get you a shopping cart full of things from 40 km away. They'll laugh at you. Oil is as close to a "free ride" as it can get. When we run out of it, we might actually start doing jobs and putting the effort into tasks. Our society is industrial. Oil is our blood. - hmac, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2I'm waiting for the day where we have exchangeable battery stations. You run out of batteries, swap it at an exchange station for a charged one, they charge it up for a regular fee.
- Error601, on 10/10/2007, -1/+3You can't dismiss grid requirements no matter how many happy thoughts you have.
- 0260, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F09lG7U5bIs
simpsons know best - Sgurdcrimp, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2I'm sure we all watched "who killed the electric car"
but i think your wrong now, they can't get away with doing something like that, this is china, a completely new market in america.... they have no cars in are market, and aren't greedy savages.... i mean they are, but they respect clients better than the big 5 we got here - Error601, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Stop brainlessly regurgitation something from a movie and actually read up on the subject.
- NerdyNinja, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2True, but there's also the hassle involved. Driving a reasonably efficient car, you can get from Maryland to Massachusetts on a tank of gas. And say your destination isn't near an airport or train station, then you have to factor in the cost of a taxi, if you're not visiting someone who can pick you up. And then let's say you want to be able to drive a little around there, then you need to rent a car. That kind of money adds up as well, doesn't it? Besides, I personally enjoy driving, and I enjoy it even more compared to sitting around in an airport, possibly having my plane delayed or having to listen to some screaming baby. I'll take my flexibility over the questionable claim of cheapness you associate with flying.
- brstilson, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2generating electricity in a power plant is a far more efficient process than refining crude oil into gasoline, and then transporting it by truck thousands of miles to a service station.
- Godlike, on 10/10/2007, -1/+3WTF has been going on that electric cars are now more expensive or just as expensive as they were in 1985'? Seriously W T F because, there is no reason for it!
- Adonai, on 10/10/2007, -1/+3Remember you'd be spending money on electricity to power it, and the expensive repairs if something ever happens to it. You don't just insantly erase ALL cost of ownership with a car when you buy electric.
- wmarkusen, on 10/10/2007, -2/+4I think the grid can handle electric motors better than our environment can handle combustion engines.
- Error601, on 10/10/2007, -1/+3Maybe if they actually developed something beyond assembling expensive toys.
- Konformitee, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2That's what I was thinking too. Wouldn't it just make more sense to buy a Honda Accord or Civic and the price difference would more than pay for your gas over the operating life of the car compared to the electric car. That's without even factoring in the price for the electricity to charge the electric car on top of it.
- wmarkusen, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Or you could make your own for even cheaper: http://digg.com/hardware/Make_your_own_electric_car
- adrianmonk, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2A lot of areas do offer a rate plan for residential electric customers where your rates are lower during off-peak times, but it's not the default, and you have to request it.
- TruthforAll, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Tesla already markets solar panels with their cars. You can actually create excess energy over what you would need for the car. http://www.teslamotors.com/blog2/index.php?p=8& (read last paragraph "becoming energy positive")
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