Car purchase includes a huge amount of 'non rational actor' decision making. I like old jaguars. Walnut burr, doors that go "thunk" -in every sense (fuel economy, NCAP, reliability) they are irrational purchase: I still love them. And the Citroen DS19.
EVs are in a segment with high discretionary spend. Choices in discretionary spending are notoriously bound up in non-rational choices: I could invest in diamonds, or snort it as coke, or fly to the bahamas in a helicopter is totally different lifestyle choices to "I need to get to Walmart at 3am for diapers, and I cannot afford to pay for more than basic AirConditioning"
When EVs are in the segment of rational-decision bound purchases, when they are "boring" I will deem them to have succeeded.
As long as the competition is Fiskar, not VW, and Not the Ioniq, or other Japanese low-end EV, its not baked yet.
The low-end EV have to get about 50% more efficiency and drop price about 30%. There really is a sweet spot in most people's disposable income and on-road costs and range anxiety (also a highly irrational place btw) which is just around the corner:
under $20,000 in any local economy
over 300km range in real-life
chargeable for usable amounts (10%? 20%?) in under 15min
I think a lot of Tesla is simply that they're not the other guys. They're giving people what they want. The dinosaurs have been refusing to innovate in many areas, screwing customers with exploitive dealer networks, dragging their feet on features when it's demanded of them, or just plain making everything miserable about cars for decades. The dinosars deserve to get their ass handed to them until they wake up and serve customers.
I think a big part of Tesla is plain old dishonesty, or American bragging, if you want to call it that way.
Consumers want autonomous self-driving cars. So Tesla creates marketing videos and then calls their glorified lane assistance and distance keeping assistant an "autopilot".
And now, Tesla buyers are frustrated that the software isn't ready yet, or dying due to bugs in said software.
But Tesla gets to dodge legal responsibility by writing into the fine print of their EULA that the so-called "autopilot" isn't actually meant to be used like what autopilot means to most people.
On the other hand there is something very important with new things : Someone takes the risks, stands up and takes the responsibility.
This is necessary for human progress. Gutenberg with this idea that will make the investors rich. Colombus stands up and says: I am going to the Indies across the Atlantic, it is going to be easy! Or Magallanes crossing the world, or going to the moon, Knuth creating Latex or the AoCP as a "semester" project, Artificial intelligence would be solved in 10 years...
In the end Gutenberg almost bankrupted his inventors and died penniless, Colombus faced riots and almost starved, most of the Magallanes' crew perished, going to the moon took so much more money, Knuth project took his entire life...
But the courage paid off for society as a whole because they got involved and took responsibility and risk on their lives.
It has always been easier to criticize and risk zero, while cynically putting all progress down.
Tesla or Elon is not perfect, but no human being is, if you wait for something new to be perfect before is ready, then you will never get it.
Progress is not automatic, needs people that believe on it, probably even delusional people.
It's sarcasm. If Boeing's "High Quality" software kills people and they get dragged before congress, why isn't Tesla getting the same treatment when their software has also killed?
Because comparisons without baselines are silly. Boeing's 737 Max is compared to the industry average, which is amazingly good.
Tesla is compared to the industry average that is so bad that it kills a 737 load of passengers every hour. Tesla is better than average in that industry.
It is fair to debate why and whether or not Tesla could be even more above average, but that is the baseline.
Tesla has thousands of employees, sells thousands of cars and sometimes even makes money. I can't believe they still get away with "Sorry, we messed up, but we're a startup after all"
I doubt the self driving feature drives many sales. It does look flashy and even in its current form it can be very good. Do I think they can deliver self driving cars? No, but I also don't think anyone else can. What they have delivered is a car that can relieve the stress of driving and counter being distracted while driving long distances
As far as being frustrated by the software I am more annoyed how long it has taken for quality of life features to get put in, namely my number one complaint is full blue tooth integration with smart phones. While they finally added the ability to navigate a playlist on screen you still cannot select the playlist you want; or any other selection outside the list like artist and album. I dislike their fixation on games and other features only useful while parked.
Everyone who has ridden in my car had two comments, first being about how clean the interior looked and second being how it felt when accelerating. Every once in a while I will let the car drive and I explain it as letting your highschool kid drive but you have immediate ability to take control. About the only negative comments I get are the door handles which some say are cool but take use getting to but the top one is always pricing.
Similar comments here with Model 3. In a way it's almost incidental that it's an electric car.
When I had a Model S loaner, I was blown away how much they've simplified just from S to 3: wide open interior, reduction in the [already spartan] amount of physical controls. (I also briefly had a Kia loaner for that same visit, and I felt like a monkey trying to operate an Apollo spacecraft, unable to find the switches and dials for everything.)
Tesla, whether for cost cutting or genius, simply said "do you really need all of these manual/physical controls, or can it be A) done automatically via software, or B) put onto a single screen?", and it, in my opinion, has worked quite well. Yes the "AI" wipers took time to come around, and you hit the occasional UI bug, but it's far and away a very acceptable trade off for a magnitude more space in the cabin and (if you appreciate such things) clean, simple, lines throughout. Even the silly flip down LED visor mirrors delight people the first time they use them in my car.
AP/FSD may never get where they claim, but I've taken many-hundred mile trips with AP on (on highways), and even my drive to work is immensely better with AP in long stretches, so I consider it well worth the [AP] cost. As ridiculous as it sounds, all those micro-movements on the road do add up and take a toll on you during drives.
I actually drive fairly conservatively (turning into my "slow lane is fast enough" father), but for demos and when I do really want to pass someone, the acceleration and instant power still marvels. :)
I do enjoy physical buttons. My car has a mix of touch screen + buttons and I vastly prefer buttons. I can operate almost everything without taking my eyes off the road. Tactile feedback is great to have.
Like most manufacturers, Tesla leaves the most frequent controls on/near the steering wheel as sticks, buttons & thumbwheels (volume/track/source, air-conditioning, autopilot/cruise control, blinkers/wipers/headlights, gear, and voice command).
The benefits of the touchscreen controls (nav, settings, media player) are that they suck much less than most manufacturers, and with over-the-air updates can suck even less over time.
Just crossed 29,000mi on our 3, and I've got a decent amount of seat time in the S (my dad has had one for a few years, I had one as a loaner the one time I took my car in for service, etc).
Driving the S never felt weird to me until I owned the 3 and went 'back' to the S. I was simply overwhelmed at how many buttons there are, everywhere, for everything. There are something like 4 or 5 stalks coming out of the steering wheel, somehow. So many buttons ON the wheel (reminds me of my old Golf; it's great when it's your only car, but when you switch cars it's impossible to remember which buttons are for cruise, which are for the stereo, which are for calls, etc). Which is pretty shocking when I remember the first experience in an S surprised me at how SIMPLE the interior was.
What I've noticed, from Tesla groups, is that virtually nobody is disappointed with autopilot. People who like it, LOVE it, and wouldn't buy the car without it. Those of us who don't think it's all that great, either don't buy it, or bought it cheap (I bought it during the 1 week it cost $2000, as a "why not"). IMO, it's too aggressive to center the steering, too late to brake (waiting until the car directly in front of you begins slowing), often closes the gap too aggressively, etc. Don't get me wrong, I am an aggressive driver, but the AP is too.. "abrupt" for me. When I'm in traffic I like to ride the wave a bit and let gaps enlarge and slowly shrink.
The car is fantastic without autopilot, and it really changes the driving/car ownership experience, and in an almost entirely positive way.
The automatic wipers used to suck; they're great now. The addition of Spotify has made me SO happy. Seat memory based on which driver's phone is on the driver's side when the car unlocks is magic, I'm glad they added it. In general, the phone-as-key is the best feature ever for a 2-driver car in particular.
Things that I wish were buttons/switches:
* Mirror controls.
* Glovebox
* Wipers, probably, though it's mostly fixed now.
And to be fair, the mirrors are only because I've swapped mirror glass 3x now (factory -> suma wide angle reproduction mirrors -> tesla OEM european mirrors) and you never get your adjustment right on the first try.. and we have to do it for 2 drivers.. clicking through the screens while driving is a tad unsafe. But then, once they're set, you pretty much forget them, so I can forgive this. Would be hard for someone borrowing the car to deal with though.
The fact that it is an incredibly hard problem that they are making steady progress in and they basically dragged EVs kicking and screaming into public consciousness and wide availability is just a minor detail!
I don't agree. Most of the Tesla's vision processing appears to be AIs trained with census loss, meaning the same stuff that Daimler Benz used in 2004 for their lane assistance systems.
I recently gave a "state of the art" talk about optical flow and I found it extremely disappointing that current technology still struggles with recognizing shiny surfaces and fences, despite 16 years of hardware progress.
But most AI researchers appear to be more interested in re-inventing the wheel on a GPU instead of doing actual mathematical algorithm research.
Tesla is doing marginally better than the average due to their custom hardware, which grants them more than the 10 GB that people using NVIDIA GPUs are limited to.
But still, Tesla, Skydio, and NVIDIA appear to be using optical flow AI architectures that are fundamentally incapable of performing well, due to being based on the (mathematically provably wrong) assumption that a scale pyramid works for optical flow detection.
Sure, I'm happy to discuss AI in more detail. The problem is that pretty much all AIs are built upon the PWC-Net architecture from Nvidia. The solution would be to use a different architecture, but that doesn't fit into GPU.
However, you cannot store one optical flow per pixel, because the solution is not unique. For example, that's why Tesla and Skydio have problems with reflective surfaces. You see both the surface and its reflection move, but the AI can only store 1 result out of those 2 movements.
In my opinion, the solution is to use Fourier methods, which were shown to work well in a 2000 dagm paper called minimum values of the structure tensor. But nobody has even attempted to port that to GPU yet or use it as part of AI.
Well Musk did recently state that Tesla is soon to release time-based object "3d labeling", where indeed the movement of objects through space is part of their labeling. [1]
The neat trick with this marketing is that people apparently don't know what a real autopilot (in an airplane) does. For example, a single-axis autopilot just levels the wings. Some will hold a heading.
So it's only misleading due to a common misunderstanding.
When they introduced it, they called the video "Autopilot: Tesla Self-Driving Demonstration" and it opened with a disclaimer that said "The person in the driver's seat is only there for legal reasons. He is not doing anything. The car is driving itself."
That's the buyer expectation for the word "autopilot" that I was referring to.
EDIT: Apparently, the sensor package is still called "self-driving hardware", which I'm sure creates a certain expectation if you purchase the "self-driving hardware & autopilot software" bundle.
Tesla still explicitly sells "Full Self-Driving Capability" which "Includes the Full Self Driving Computer" [0].
But the disclaimer on the bottom is pretty noncommittal:
> "The activation and use of these features are dependent on achieving reliability far in excess of human drivers as demonstrated by billions of miles of experience".
On one hand "are dependent on" actively avoids stating that they're there but the "billions of miles of experience" is clearly aimed at suggesting to buyers that they are. Which they are not since the car cannot handle many/most situations that a human driver is expected to handle to be called "a driver".
> For example, a single-axis autopilot just levels the wings. Some will hold a heading.
If you set an autopilot to hold a heading, it will hold a heading. You don't have to supervise it, you can concentrate on other stuff.
If you set a tesla autopilot to keep in a lane, you have to supervise it because it might fail to do so.
Granted, the latter problem is a harder one. But the point of an autopilot is that it manages to do want it promises to do on its own without constant supervision.
From wikipedia: "An autopilot is a system used to control the trajectory of an aircraft, marine craft or spacecraft without constant manual control by a human operator being required. Autopilots do not replace human operators, but instead they assist them in controlling the vehicle."
The important bit, which is apparently not understood by the public is that it's only used as an aid in controlling the vehicle. You still have to monitor it and be prepared to take over if it doesn't behave properly. I once flew an airplane, set the autopilot and the airplane decided to go into a rapid climb unexpectedly. That's exactly equivalent to the lane assist failing to keep the car in the lane.
That said, it's clear that because the public doesn't understand what it means to be an autopilot it's a bad choice of name. Or at least Tesla should be spending a _lot_ more time educating people on what it means before they use it.
> If you set an autopilot to hold a heading, it will hold a heading. You don't have to supervise it, you can concentrate on other stuff.
Not _strictly_ true; faults can occur and the system always needs monitoring. Strong turbulence will also disconnect the autopilot (with appropriately attention-grabbing aural and visual alerts).
Yes technical faults can happen or it might be physically impossible to keep the heading (because the engines are too weak to counter the wind). But still, the autopilot delivers what it promises and it is certified for. You can (or are supposed to) take your hands from the yoke when it is activated.
The cruise control is much more an autopilot than the lane assist, which is just an assist but wrongly advertised.
In a plane you have some space to react before you can take control of but on roads you're bound to other interacting factors as well like other drivers on road. If the FSD isn't 100% self capable then you're basically playing a calculated risk with an array of sensors and data.
Yes, but even “regular” landings performed today are using what the airport provides. If it provides nothing the pilots are able to land it on their own.
It is about marketing, but not about advertising (or bragging as you call it). Developing and producing electric cars is a lot more expensive, so whatever price bracket you're in, a Tesla is going to have 10-20k of its price go towards making the car move that the other manufacturers don't spend. That's 10k less spent on every other feature of the car. That's why you drop $80k on a Model S, that has the look and feel of a $60K nice car.
That cost is already sunk, Tesla can't recuperate that, and everytime electric cars become a little bit more common, the coolness factor of the electric engine decreases which means the value of that sunk cost goes down. There's two things that save Tesla, the first is plain consumer attitude. Some (many?) consumers will simply not buy an ICE car anymore if they can afford not to, which means the other manufacturers have to compete on Tesla's playing field.
The second is cheap innovations. Tesla can spend a couple tens of millions, and maybe $1000 in hardware, and get something that looks like an AI into their cars that adds maybe $10k of coolness value. Add fancy doors, a big LCD screen, flush doorhandles, and whatever other little thing you have to spend R&D on anyway because you're a new car manufacturer so everything costs more R&D for you than the establishment, and you close the gap.
It's about putting a $80K Tesla next to a $80K Jaguar or whatever, and being able to justify why they cost the same amount of money when the Jaguar is better made.
edit: Note this whole story is about the Model S, which was Tesla's bootstrap model. The goal of Tesla is to produce a car that doesn't compete with Jaguar, but with Volkswagen (or Ford).
I can understand developing, but why producing electric cars would be a lot more expensive than ICE cars? Not an expert, but in my opinion in electric cars you can get rid of many components, such as complicated engine, transmission, fuel injection systems, exhaust, etc. This should bring the cost down, with battery being the single most expensive component
The battery yes. Also, an electric motor is simple mechanically, but it is more complex than it looks on the outside. There's a lot going on in their design, and the manufacturing process is complex as well, especially if you need it to be efficient.
ICE engines have larger complex elements that can fail for more reasons, but the most complex part is just this big block that they pour into a mold. After that's done you just have to mount all the little components onto it that the suppliers have refined the tolerances on for at least 20 years.
But the ICE and the electric engine are just peanuts compared to the material cost of producing these huge batteries.
Yes, Tesla/Elon has overpromised a lot in marketing. They've also made misteps in finances and trying to invent too much automation for their factories. The cars also continue to have quality issues and are lacking in the (interior) design space.
That being said, the customer experience of owning and driving a Tesla far exceeds the traditional options. I fail to find anyone who is unhappy with their purchase. They love their cars and there are still hundreds of features that Tesla has where other manufacturers are barely catching up.
Add in the ecosystem of solar/powerwalls and superchargers along with supplying the wider energy market, and this company has a great future ahead.
> the so-called "autopilot" isn't actually meant to be used like what autopilot means to most people.
Given that autopilot for cars doesn't and never has existed it is likely that it means different things to different people.
When I'm driving a car, my function is pretty much a glorified lane assist. If it can do that for me then I'm sold on it being an autopilot. I don't need my car to actually be smarter than I am.
You'd want the car to avoid mistaking reflective surfaces for tunnels. Or not seeing a truck turned sideways due to lack of AI training data. Plus your car should make it easy for you to do the right & safe thing.
For one that is changing the subject. For two; proving that a Tesla autopilot caused an accident and the regulators are grumpy isn't evidence of anything. Humans frequently have accidents and regulators are typically grumpy.
And the evidence in that article is that the car is basically working on autopilot. So the brand name is quite reasonable. If you expect any transport system not to have accidents you are crazy - all modes of transport have accidents from time to time.
Also; a tired point; but Tesla's autopilot is going to learn from each fatal accident. That is a massive difference from humans; who stop learning after fatal accidents. Fatal accidents are not going to be a major long-term problem here which stands in sharp contrast to human drivers. It isn't a particularly bad sign as it means Tesla's autopilot will have learned a valuable lesson due to someone-who-is-not-me's misfortune. I'd happily pay money for that. Deaths from bad human driving are meaningless tragedies. Deaths in a new but engineer-able system are extremely meaningful tragedies and are almost good news for everyone who isn't immediately involved.
> My prediction is that we'll need GPUs with 60+ GB of memory before self-driving becomes more plausible.
Somebody has already linked an article showing that people in these cars are taking their hands off the wheel and playing videogames while 'driving'. These cars are already self-driving by a reasonable standard, and is certainly fairly described as an autopilot system. Your standards aren't normal.
> These cars are already self-driving by a reasonable standard
It's not that others have too high standards, it's that you have low standards and they make basically every mundane thing, that you use every, day a "self-whatever" thing.
> Somebody has already linked an article showing that people in these cars are taking their hands off the wheel and playing videogames while 'driving'.
Yeah? It isn't reasonable to expect no accidents; so that doesn't really tell us very much. It might be part of a broader pattern or it might not be. But it is evidence that there will be a lot of Tesla drivers out there leaving the car on autopilot which is pretty good support for naming the system 'autopilot'.
> proving that a Tesla autopilot caused an accident and the regulators are grumpy isn't evidence of anything. Humans frequently have accidents and regulators are typically grumpy.
Don't be shocked if they[1] do write guidelines for driver attention monitoring that Tesla has to adhere to. Also, don't be shocked if they apply across the board, even to cars that do not have autopilot like features.
[1] By "they" in this case, I do not mean the writers of that report, as that was the NTSB. The NHTSA will likely investigate the concepts more holistically.
I ride in Teslas when that's what the Uber driver drives. Maybe other cars have the same wow experience, but I don't get picked up in a Porsche or Jaguar. But the wow experience of a Tesla vs a Benz is unquestionable.
I don't mind it being called marketing. But I'd call it overall experience design. Or magic. You really feel it!
I feel the opposite way. When I get picked up in Tesla I notice that the controls are just on a big touch screen which the driver keeps looking at instead of the road.
I notice the quality of the interior isn't great.
But I do notice that it's quiet and has a lot of torque obviously.
If it wasn't for the emissions I prefer being in a Merc any day.
Pretty much all the Uber Black trips that I took were traditional BMW like the ones that taxis in Germany use.
I agree that's boring.
But it only is boring because BMW has such a crushing market share that the occasional non-BMW car feels like a breath of fresh air. Tesla feeling nice due to their low market share is, however, the opposite of what this article argues for.
Why would Tesla be a 'wow'? I take uber once or twice a weak and it'd obviously be a bit of a novelty experience if driver would pick me up with tesla instead of Toyota Prius,but it won't be 'wow'. I can't comment on how good or bad their cars are,as I haven't owned one, however they do look bland to me.
I was quite wowed when riding in a Tesla for the first time. It feels like a car designed entirely by a tech company as opposed to an incremental improvement over a classic car, or a classic car retrofitted with a bunch of luxury accessories.
My only disappointment was that the giant LCD panel in the middle didn't refresh at high frame rate. I hope they fixed that because I'd expect the car from the future to be able to scroll a map smoothly.
>I was quite wowed when riding in a Tesla for the first time. It feels like a car designed entirely by a tech company as opposed to an incremental improvement over a classic car,
Pary tell, in what way are they better? I've been in both a Model S and 3, and neither of them have a great fit and finish. My VW is far more polished than either. High level Mercs or BMW are way beyond.
I wonder if people saying stuff like this have ever been in a nice car?
I have one, i'm not disappointed. It's changed how I drive, and what I do. It's like an ipod to a walkman. I don't care about cars, but i'll never buy another brand until they compete.
Everyone who purchases a Tesla understands the limitations of its autopilot system at this point. So no, that is definitely not a big part of what is driving their success.
My sister works in car sales. She’s no idiot, but she talks about self driving cars as if it’s all fully developed. Last time I talked with her, she didn’t know about the SAE levels 0-5.
Almost everyone else I talk to outside of software seems to pigeonhole AI as magic — either they’re believers who think it can pass the Turing Test, or they’re non-believers who refuse to accept it can do what is in 2020 the AI equivalent of Hello World.
So no, I don’t think most people do know; rather, I think most people either think it’s impossible or perfect already.
In the original article, the comparison between i3 and Tesla boils down to range and the supposed advantages of the autopilot software.
So at the very least, the authors of that article were unaware that the limitations of Tesla's autopilot make it effectively equal to the i3's assistance systems for everyday use.
> screwing customers with exploitive dealer networks,
Not sure if Tesla's approach to that is more customer friendly. Their cars are basically iPhones on wheels, they are locked down to the same extent. iirc you cannot even get replacements for the most car parts.
With traditional cars however, you can basically go everywhere and get your car fixed. No matter if it is a brand dealer or third party repair shop.
> screwing customers with exploitive dealer networks
Haha.
My buddy just waited for Tesla to finish repairs on his Model 3 for 4 months and in the mean time had to have a rental.
The reason? They couldn't acquire certain bolts.
Give me "exploitative dealer networks" that can source parts properly to Tesla's outrageous incompetence of a service network.
I don’t think traditional car manufacturers benefit from dealerships. That’s just some classic US regulatory capture, where car manufacturers can’t sell directly to the consumer to help protect the consumer. Because when you think of someone trying to protect you, you think a car salesman.
Exactly. I work in automotive and it's important to understand why traditional automakers have dealers and why Tesla doesn't.
The first mass market Tesla (Model S) came to market in post app store world. By that I mean, not only is it possible but it's obvious that vehicles can and should be diagnosed and firmware should be updated over the air. The only reason they were able to throw away the dealer model is because they could collect analytics, perform diagnostics and firmware flashes over the air. Without this advancement, Tesla would need significantly more physical presence akin to dealerships (and in fact, they kind of are building a light showroom/repair network as they grow so the dealer model isn't all that crazy in some respects).
Traditional automakers have been around since before OTA was possible or practical or anyone had even thought of it, so dealers were at least necessary at one point in time to perform these tasks. Now that it is possible, and many new vehicles even have wireless internet, very few traditional automakers actually perform remote diagnostics and even fewer update more than a couple ECUs (Electronic Control Units) over the air.
There are a number of reasons for and against this, but at the end of the day they were forced into a situation where they needed dealers and for that reason they also have the luxury of offloading many of these tasks onto the dealers. This luxury is actually very important because a major OEM has hundreds of models of vehicles that they need to support. Tesla obviously has far fewer so they can afford to take on some of those diagnostic tasks and of course they have to because they don't have franchises with technicians in them.
As for success, I believe Tesla is very successful for a variety of reasons (too many to list, but I'll mention some of the major ones):
1. They care about design. They're not the flashiest or most radical designs, but the designs are very thoughtful, tasteful, elegant and minimalistic -- all of these are qualities that are fashionable at the moment.
2. The cars are technology first... they come with a lot of useful technology that people want because it seems obvious to have these things in contemporary cars. Most other vehicles in the Model 3 price range are technology last -- the technology that seems obvious is a paid upgrade.
3. They are optimistic and progressive. Even when someone knows that some model 3s are built outside in a tent and there are mounting quality and repairability concerns, they don't care because they want to support the flier that just might make a difference in the world.
The dealer network was the auto industries way of not having to incur the huge cost of carrying a large inventory. Tesla solves that problem a different way by mostly only building cars as they are ordered.
As far as I know Tesla is not so nice if you ever need parts to repair something. I agree that car dealership suck but I wouldn’t call Tesla the good guys.
With other brands, you can source alternative parts and get by fine.
With Tesla, a lot of the parts are still standard, but you can't replace it with same or better part that isn't sourced from Tesla supply. Even if it's the same part.
> With Tesla, a lot of the parts are still standard, but you can't replace it with same or better part that isn't sourced from Tesla supply. Even if it's the same part.
What stops you from replacing standard parts?
There are quite a few off-brand repair shops here in Norway for things like wipers, brake calipers, regular service etc.
Knowing someone in a Tesla authorized service partner I can confirm the practices are... not great. According to the agreement they signed to become an authorized partner and under the threat of withdrawing said authorization, they have quite a few limitations that make for longer wait times and more expensive repairs.
For example they are not allowed to order extra parts for stock (they have to "tie" them to a car in service) and they are not allowed to use aftermarket replacement parts even if compatible. I am specifically referring to car parts, not consumables. So break pads yes, break calipers no. Light bulb yes, headlight no. For example you will not find aftermarket headlights for Tesla that you can install in an authorized shop, get warranty, and ideally not discover that the car already logged the use of an AM part. In this case most (all?) aftermarket headlights begin their life as an OEM part that gets modified and this pretty much bypasses the restrictions, technical or administrative.
These restrictions may be lifted as Tesla becomes better at making cars and can dedicate resources to making more spare parts, and as they start to allow others to take a bite out of their profit by manufacturing compatible parts but we are not there yet.
>screwing customers with exploitive dealer networks
Having watched Rich Rebuilds' attempt at buying a second-hand Tesla Model X directly from Tesla, I'm not convinced that a) dealerships are bad b) Tesla are the good guys.
>The dinosaurs have been refusing to innovate in many areas, screwing customers with exploitive dealer networks
Yeah, cars have had no innovation over time...wait, when's the last time you've been in one?
And for the most part dealers are independently owned, not some scandalous way to rip off customers. I have owned many new cars in my life (I like tech, so I lease). I've never had an issue with the dealer that wasn't pleasantly resolved. I realize that isn't the case for every person, but dealers are not universally bad, or any worse than any other business. In fact, my wife likes the brand dealer so much that she continues to purchase her cars from them based on that alone.
>The dinosars deserve to get their ass handed to them until they wake up and serve customers.
You should look around the Tesla forums and Twitter at the complaints. The 'dinosaurs' may be bad, but the idea that Tesla service is somehow better is laughable.
> The dinosars deserve to get their ass handed to them until they wake up and serve customers.
Who are the dinosaurs? Volkswagen sells 10 million vehicles a year. Toyota sells 10 million vehicles a year. Are you claiming that Volkswagen and Toyota are somehow not serving customers? If they're not serving customers then why are they selling so many cars?
Cars are one of those markets where emotional marketing is more important to some fraction of the customer base.
Some people just want a generic econobox that brings them from point A to B, and others are swayed by other things, such as leather seats, ads that show a single car driving by the ocean or in the mountains, fast acceleration, an appealing paint color, high tech looking HUDs, cup holders, moon roof, etc.
> making everything miserable about cars for decades
well at least we used to have some diversity in design - these days it's mostly variations on the shapeless blob theme. Yes I know, safety regulations etc etc...
How many <$20,000 new cars do you think are sold every year? Only the very insignificant subcompact segment even has an average selling price in that range. The average selling price of new vehicles is nearly $40,000. There's a lot of room for today's "boring" EVs in the $40,000 segment.
I've been in Europe since early December. There are a ton of cars here, and very few of them are flashy. Small, practical cars everywhere. Very popular models: Citrooen C3, Skoda Fabia, VW Polo, Renault Cool, Opel/Vauxhall Corsa, Honda Jazz, Seat Ibiza, Ford Fiesta, etc. In the USA we have companies like Ford saying they are going to stop making cars for the USA market. It wouldn't surprise me to here a European company say they'd only make a small range of practical cars. One big reason is a lot of the roads are too darn small for anything big & their isn't as much money sloshing around here. Smaller is how they roll (pun intended) here.
Seems to be changing. At least here in Belgium SUV's, seem to be getting more and more common.
It's definitely not a trend to be encouraged given our massive but still oversaturated roadnetwork & lack of parkingspace in the bigger cities but it's happening.
This article was about Tesla in the EU, and more specifically in Germany, where cheap SUVs start at €12,000. And where you can buy a family-friendly combi car for as low as €10k in new.
So Tesla is exclusively in the top 5% premium segment here. Most normal people won't even consider a car for half that price.
Norway is clearly an exception to the usual situation in Europe, due to the very high taxes on purchasing (registering) a car, and the exemption to that tax for electric cars.
Denmark also has the tax, but much less (if any, I don't remember) exemption.
The exception in Norway is really only the VAT (25%) which is still a lot. But they will never have the CO2/NOX/cylinder volume tax that the fossils have.
The VAT might come in a year or two but not the pollution tax. And the pollution tax will increase until 2025 when the sale of new fossils will be banned.
However the article claims that the model 3 came in third in all of Europe behind the Golf and Clio, so it's selling well all over Europe not just Norway and the Netherlands. Norway is actually a smallish market now compared to what it used to be in market share for EVs.
You do a procedure called "re-import" to optimize taxes. With that, my sister bought her almost fully upgraded 7-seat Dacia minivan for roughly €10k.
It does feel more like a workhorse than like a fancy toy, but you can nicely fit 2 parents, 2 grandparents, 3 kids, and enough luggage for a weekend trip in there.
Right, but... how many $1,000,000 dollar cars get sold with how many $20,000 cars, for "Industry Average" to be $40,000? :D
I notice average for Honda, Kia, Nissan etc in your linked article is $30,000... and that's explicitly exclusive of incentives and whatnots. AND inclusive of their luxury brands (Lexus, Infiniti, etc). That leaves room for lots of $20k cars, given that each of the brands has luxury models skewing the average as well.
It would be interesting to see either median, or # of cars in some representative brackets.
For 2020 Honda only has a single model in the US that starts below $20,000, the Honda Fit. And that is only for some trim levels of the Fit. In 2019 Honda sold 35,414 Fits, out of 1,450,785 total Honda vehicles sold[1] (384,168 CR-Vs, 325,650 Civics, 267,567 Accords, being the top sellers).
So roughly 2% of Honda vehicles sold in the US cost less than $20,000, and that is without taxes and other fees. The Ford F-150 is the best selling vehicle in the US, and the average transaction price of an F-150 (as sold) is around $50,000. New cars under $20,000 basically don't exist in the US.
There's two statistics I really want to see when it comes to car sales that never get posted.
1. Average income of buyer vs car price
2. Average loan totals vs car price
Because, I can tell you that those statistics will probably be absurdly horrifying.
Best example is I was sitting in a dealer and the sales guy was guiding a buyer through getting 3 separate loans for a Honda minivan because the credit union and Honda Fiance deemed him uncreditworthy for one direct loan. And that was one of the many really disturbing things I've directly listened in to.
Next recession is going to result in a complete implosion of the auto lending industry.
> I can tell you that those statistics will probably be absurdly horrifying.
Absolutely. I know a guy who runs a few dealerships and they don't even sell cheap cars yet they buy tons of leads each month for people with bad credit who want new cars. The leads cost $50-$150/each depending on how bad their credit is. So you know that those buyers are still buying brand new cars or they wouldn't keep buying these leads. Sure, there are people with bad credit who can afford these cars, but extenuating circumstances are not the majority.
I know it's another anecdote, but from spending a lot of time on car forums, I can't count the number of discussions I've seen around what kind of car people think they can afford. There are people making $35k/yr buying $80k pickup trucks. I don't even know how that's mathematically possible unless they still live with their parents.
Don't forget average length of loans too. A lot of people are using up to 8 year loans to spread the cost even longer.
Incomes haven't kept up with car prices so the only way people have been affording the same types of cars is with extending the loan payback period and paying a lot more in interest.
I'm in Canada, in particular Toronto, one of the couple of priciest spots up here. Not only do we have plenty of cars under $20k, we have cars like Nissan Micra that are bordering on $10k - Canadian.
https://www.nissan.ca/en/cars/micra
In terms of Honda, Fit starts at $18k, Civic Sedan at $20k - again, this is Canadian, MSRP.
To have a median of $36K implies there are some pretty cheap cars out there. Say my $20,000 is hyperbole. What would be more reasonable? the median, or say.. $30,000? Why?
$30k isn't the average either. The average is higher than the median value of $36k. You're confusing things by comparing one manufacturer to all auto sales.
And I'd say, sort of definitionally, that the median is the most reasonable figure to use here, precisely because it excludes all those insanely expensive hypercars driving the average up.
ok. so instead of $20k, lets say $30k or $36k. If I translate that into AU$ the Tesla is $70k. Its twice that price on-road costs. its one and a half times the median wage in australia.
I am sure the median car cost in Australia is nothing like that much compared to salary.
Tesla cannot compete with 'boring' cars until it can deliver 'boring' prices. If the price in the USA is within reach of boring, great: Its not yet in the UK, or Europe, or most of Asia, or Australia or New Zealand. It requires substantial support in most economies, and there is no price support for EV in Australia right now.
Why are you comparing the median cost of a car sold in the US with the average Australian wage? If you want to make that comparison, go find the median cost of a car sold in Australia. Start making valid comparisons.
Anyway, yes, it's true, EVs are not yet as cheap as the cheapest gasoline-powered cars. They're a lot closer over their lifetime in fuel and maintenance, but the up-front purchase cost is more for now. And yet they're selling like gangbusters, because people clearly want them, and the more they sell the more they can benefit from economies of scale and go further downmarket. Remember, the first Tesla targeted the expensive luxury market, and they've now managed to bring the price down by more than half. Just wait.
If you spend any amount of time perusing new car prices in the United States, it should be pretty clear that typical prices for economy sedan cars are around $22k-$30k, with $30k and more typically being the higher tier trims of economy sedan car models.
So $40k is clearly not the right comparison. And it should be pretty obvious why that average is misleadingly high: it includes pickup trucks, minivans, vans, SUVs, and sports cars.
Why shouldn't more people have enjoyable cars? If they can afford an enjoyable house, and they drive regularly, they should treat themselves to an enjoyable car too.
The idea of buying a nice car fell into some disrepute starting in the late 70s, when the major manufacturers stopped making actual nice cars and just added some extra plastic to their economy cars to sell as the premium brand. So people buying Cadillacs in the 90s seemed like, well, chumps. But that shouldn't be a permanent indictment of nice cars! The nice cars of a former era sucked, but now we have nice cars that are actually pretty sweet.
As more people realize that well-designed cars can actually make you and your family happier while driving, there'll be a lot of demand for those cars even at high price points.
To my eyes (auto mech first job/into car/driving experience more than i can afford): There has not been an interesting new car (on my sub 6 figure radar) in around 15 years.
In Washington state subaru are pretty popular seeming (all wheel drive due to rare snowfall in the city). I hopped on the band wagon with an 04' wrx, with a sti conversion, suspension/bushings/motor/turbo etc changes). I'm having more fun with a deeper connection for 1/4 of the money than any porsche i've ever entertained on the freeway. I get that labels are cool, but at the mechanical level it's just a word for OEM perception.
SO yes enjoyable cars. But sadly no nothing to buy. I would love to be a 'normal person' with a car payment and something that is 'new' and fresh. I dont want to knock any newer popular cars but good lord. . i could.
Someone mentioned to me yesterday that the Tesla Cybertruck is a bit odd looking. To me everything is an ugly marshmallow these days (including my 04 i guess but it has a pleasantly stout looking rear). So dear Tesla, thanks for making new car life potentially interesting.
> To my eyes (auto mech first job/into car/driving experience more than i can afford): There has not been an interesting new car (on my sub 6 figure radar) in around 15 years.
AS i submitted this I anticipated being shown some good options. I've never driven an MX5 but had a wild good time in the Miata.
And i spent a solid 5 minutes feeling bad making a somewhat negative comment about nearly everyone else's car. It's really a 5050 thing. I guess cars are just appearing too big to me.
Dreamcar 1) datsun 510 with ~600hp
2) A 'disconnected' tesla.
(in other words i'd have one today, but i dont my consumer actions to mean that im suddenly married to some company. Regardless of my appreciation/supportive attitude of that company.
I've long dreamed about a project: rebuild a DS from the ground up but with a modern engine (or even electric), run the hydraulics using electronics rather than the system in use based on Mercedes S class parts. Use an original Chassis, make all the panels out of fibreglass. But that requires a lot of space and time to complete. Still, by far the most beautiful car ever made, I always felt that if Citroen had really caught the retro wave that gave us the New Beetle and the Fiat 500 that it would have been a best seller.
If you like seeing 1960s cars fitted with modern engines, you might enjoy Project Binky [1] where you can watch some mechanics fit (or at least, attempt to fit) a 200-horsepower rally car engine and drivetrain into a 1960s-era Austin Mini
> run the hydraulics using electronics rather than the system in use based on Mercedes S class parts
Why not just use the original hydraulics system? Its only downside is the old pipes, that can corrode. If you replace them with modern coated copper ones, leaks won't be a problem. I think you'd be introducing more problems than necessary if you replaced it with an electronic pump and height adjuster.
(Speaking as someone with a DS 23. And only to be slightly pedantic, I believe the DS19 is an ID19.)
Personally, I would love to buy a series 1 CX and replace its engine with an electric one. That will be my project, once I get to buy my house in the country and get my workshop. (I already have two cars that I need space for.)
The DS19 was the early, 1.9 liter engined version of the DS. There are also 2.1 and 2.3 liter versions, the 2.3 with fuel injection is the most sought after one.
The ID19 is the cheap version of the same car, it was sold with a manual gearbox, 'regular' brakes and a cheaper interior.
I would not use the 'green system' because the pumps, regulators, hydro computer and membrane based 'balls' are all way past their end of life. If you're going to upgrade the car you might as well take that bit along. And if the chassis you use as a base has the red system on it you're going to be spending a lot of money anyway. I'd rather use a 'supported' set of parts for something as important as staying off the ground and the S-class system works well and would easily manage a car with the weight of the DS, even when powered electrically. It would use a small fraction of the pump capacity that the DS requires.
I've restored two DS's in the 80's, lots of fun to work on and to drive.
Except the S-class system is just suspension, not shock absorbing like the Citroën-system. Plus it's just suspension, not steering and brakes either. How would you incorporate that if you replaced it with the S-class system? You're certain the S-class pump could handle that?
And while, yes, the LHM-system is technically not supported any more by Citroën, there are plenty of licenced manufacturers out there, particularly in the Netherlands, that can provide you with the needed parts.
An LHS-system, I'd rather avoid entirely.
Still, I'll wish you luck on that project.
(And you're right, the ID19 came later. And my DS 23 is with electronic fuel injection. And a 5 speed manual gearbox.)
As for replacing the suspension/shocks, that's not a simple job, but I've done far more complex stuff. Besides, it's only on paper and I highly doubt I will ever have either the time or the workshop + tools required to pull that off.
Likely your DS originally came with the half-automatic and the manual gearbox replaced a broken half-automatic. This was done quite frequently the failure rate on the half-automatics was quite high. I still remember the sound it would make in the last few hundred kilometers before failure.
By the way, that fuel injection system is made by Bosch, the same system was used in the Volvo's of that era, on the Volvo's there are absolutely no problems with the system whereas the DS ones were frequently plagued by failure and fire. Keep an extinguisher in your car please, just in case.
Well, should you ever get the opportunity, however, I wish you success!
My DS originally came with the 5-speed manual. The 5-speed transmission is special, and the engine was specially built to support it. If your half-automatic failed, you replaced it with a 4-speed manual. Both the half-automatic and the 4-speed could support a manual hand starter at the front, the 5-speed cannot.
I learnt this a few years back, when my engine had to go through a renovation, and it was apparent that only one transmission could fit on the engine; a 5 speed manual. So it would also have had to have its engine replaced, which I find a little unlikely. Although, someone had decorated it to make it look like a Pallas, even though it was originally not.
The problem with the fuel injection system in the DS is that power distribution is not electronic (while the rest is). But you can buy a replacement for that to make it electronic, which greatly reduces the risk of catching fire. Most people these days replace their power distributor to an electronic one. Although, more for the reason that you get a smoother ride, since it is better at distributing the fuel.
That being said, in all my time of owning a DS, I have not heard of anyone catching fire in their DS.
Yes, that's the tell tale, the hole in the front bumper.
Great cars. I really commend you for managing to keep one alive after so many years. I wished I could have justified keeping mine on the road, DE-70-72, if you can find out where it sits (it's been sitting unused for many years) you'll find a DS that looks crap but was technically completely rebuilt. It should sit somewhere near IJmuiden. There is an engine in there with about 2000 km on it, brand new steering assembly, suspension arms, hydraulics, the lot.
I hope whoever owns it makes sure to start it at least once a year. Such a shame for such a new engine to not be started at least infrequently.
Maybe I'll find it someday. I will admit, these days I have been doing the most to ensure that my cars are kept running, and that they are stored safely, i.e. dry indoor garages. But once I get my own workshop, I may get back into the business.
However, my first project, would be a series 1 CX with an electric engine.
Another concern for many people is charging. There are a lot of renters and apartment complexes in Europe. So the big question mark in people's heads is whether they can charge at home and have to negotiate with their landlord.
This needs government regulation that guarantees tenants can get charging infrastructure installed with some reasonable cost-sharing setup.
As an apartment owner, we missed mandatory charging in the basement by two years (its off-the-plan, the change came after we were built. Across the road have it.). The retro-fit cost of high power is going to come. Its a lot more than build-in during construction and goes to if there are sufficient transmission infrastructure investments in the local supply path to your apt. We expect to get 32 amp circuits to every 3rd, 4th parking spot which in principle will share with a long pigtail but the advantage of a park with power will now disadvantage some owners. It requires separate billing. It means having to move the entire apt complex (460 units) to separate billing models, smart meters.
It's likely we'll install the ring, the circuit, but not fit outlets unless the owner pays some quotient of the cost, and we will have to inform everyone there is a process, but not everyone can get one. It will be very unequal.
Retrofit is going to be a very painful topic for years, for apartments, which is also why their lovely high, un-obstructed roof line is not covered in Solar Cells: it makes perfect sense, but its like herding kittens to get the body corporate or condo committee to agree to spend money.
Or pool heating: the retrofit cost is $150,000 for something which could have been planned in for under $50,000. Insanely short sighted design decisions echo down the years.
> It means having to move the entire apt complex (460 units) to separate billing models, smart meters.
Isn't that coming anyway? "The EU aims to replace at least 80% of electricity meters with smart meters by 2020 wherever it is cost-effective to do so." -- although I don't know what cost-effective meant.
The building I live in has smart meters, and there are two parking spaces with 400V 3-phase sockets. (I assume the car owners just paid the installation cost.)
In parts of Europe, we're getting to the point where it's easier to find a charger than a petrol station. There are a lot of them and they are mostly not utilized a lot. Also, there are apps for finding them and lots of incentives for more to be installed.
I'm extremely interested to know in what part of Europe you live because this is the exact opposite as to how I see a close friend and his #EVlife. Allow me to elaborate.
My friend lives near Brussels, Belgium. I currently live in between the cities of Hasselt and Antwerp also Belgium. The distance covered in a single trip is 83.2 Km. He drives and I quote: "a full spec Nissan Leaf" whatever that may mean.
During winter times, my friend has to take a look at traffic flows because if he has a traffic jam he'll run his battery flat and be stranded.
During summer, he's hot because the car can't sustain AC and drive the distance without running his battery flat and be stranded.
When he arrives, he has to find a charging pole in the middle of the city centre. He checks this in advance on his application/website/... before he leaves because else, he is stranded.
If we go out in the evening he has to spend the night or his car isn't charged and he's stranded.
To start charging he has to select one of the three cables he has in his car because of "standards".
In the end, I pick him up in my ICE because he's not even at his destination.
We have done this dance for about 5 times now and I can assure you that -to me- the EV market seems to be doing everything it possibly can to make me as uninterested as possible in buying an EV.
I'd rather take Belgian public transportation than deal with this nonsense. A train might get cancelled, but at least I know I'll be home that same day.
Charging at work can only work if you can drive to work (... and your office has charging points for everyone that wants one)
In most European cities I am familiar with, the very concept of driving into the office is totally alien - no one does it because a) traffic, b) no parking, and c) there is usually a semi-decent public transport system that is usually quicker when you factor in traffic.
Certainly in London, there are some underground/multi-storey parking places you can just drive up to and use, but it is fairly uncommon and always hugely expensive. E.g. nearest one to my office is £38/day ($50) + £11.50 ($15) congestion charge , then it is a 18 minute walk on top of however long it took you to get to the parking (e.g. Google maps suggest 50 minutes for the 5 mile journey for me). Comparable tube journey is about 25 minutes door-to-door and £3.30/$5
Supercharge obviously only works if you own a Tesla.
also a London commuter, but mainline rail. my dormitory town has a 1800 space multi storey car park for the station which is full on week days. it probably represents 5% of the vehicles in the town. I think there will be a tipping point, maybe when around 30% vehicles are electric, where people realise there is good money to be made in charging points, and then every big car park will fit them
> There really is a sweet spot in most people's disposable income and on-road costs and range anxiety (also a highly irrational place btw) which is just around the corner
I often jump at the opportunity to talk EVs with common folks who aren't car enthusiasts but do own/operate automobiles.
What I've come to appreciate is that range anxiety isn't even the primary anxiety anymore. There's enough EVs out in the wild and just general evidence of their being usable as daily drivers that it seems to be a thing of the past.
What does seem to be a major source of anxiety is battery lifetime and serviceability/cost.
And I think that's a perfectly rational thing. Consider what most people experience with laptops and smartphones when it comes to modern rechargeable battery technology. They swell up, they catch fire, they lose capacity, they're not even standardized on EVs so you're locked into a specific vendor, it might not even be made by the OEM anymore so you're stuck with shoddy reverse-engineered replacements (classic thinkpad owners know this experience all to well). With volatile companies like Tesla you can't even be confident they'll still be around to service the electrics/battery in 5-10 years.
What I wish companies like Tesla would do is define some standard form factors for things like batteries, motors, motor controllers, and charge systems. If they'd just get things to where EVs are very much like oversized electric RC vehicles, where we can buy the vehicles potentially without any battery at all with a competitive market of battery vendors to choose from fulfilling requirements of an open standard, a lot of these sources of anxiety completely vanish.
Imagine a world where you could have a Tesla delivered to your local mechanic without a motor, motor controller, or battery. It's a roller conforming to a set of standards for those components. Then you buy those to your liking from whatever vendors you prefer in the size/capacities/costs you prefer.
I'm pretty confident such a situation would have EV adoption explode everywhere, nobody would be worried about having an unmaintainable rube goldberg machine of proprietary electronics collecting dust on their driveway in 10 years.
It's really ironic that you bring this up because Better Place burned through $850 million in capital building out the infrastructure and intellectual property for hot-swappable batteries before they gave up the ghost. Their model was based on car owners not owning the batteries, instead paying Better Place per distance driven, and in return getting free battery swaps at special stations that would swap out depleted batteries for fresh ones in two minutes, plus "free" charging at branded charging points that were built into parking spaces. Under such a model, Better Place was on the hook for battery health - not the car owner.
They failed because Renault didn't deliver in the quantities needed and they tried to make up the cash shortfall by over-pricing the distance fees (more expensive than gasoline costs unless you regularly drove huge distances). Too many ducks needed to line up and investors stopped ponying up. It's fair to say that they were before their time - they probably could have gotten SoftBank to throw them another ten figures, but the Vision Fund didn't exist back then.
Tesla looked at battery swapping after Better Place proved feasibility and passed, probably due to the cost of retrofitting to the existing design and various engineering compromises (specifically related to speed and acceleration, which Musk prizes) that would be needed.
> Tesla looked at battery swapping after Better Place proved feasibility and passed, probably due to the cost of retrofitting to the existing design and various engineering compromises (specifically related to speed and acceleration, which Musk prizes) that would be needed.
The Model S demonstrated battery swapping technology. There was no retrofitting to the design needed, as it was designed to support it from the beginning.
I think the parent comment was talking more about battery swapping in lieu of charging to save time, not as a "once in a while" kind of thing. As far as I know, swapping a battery for a Model S will take quite a while at a service center.
Not at all, it was demonstrated as taking 5 minutes on a production Model S. They also built one swap station.
Some say it was all done for show and they never had any intention of following through. From the interviews with Musk at the time, I got the impression that it was more of a defensive move in case the concept started to gain traction.
Either way, though, the vehicle was built for it and it literally took the same time as a gas fillup. I'm sure the demonstration videos are still on Youtube if you are interested.
> What does seem to be a major source of anxiety is battery lifetime and serviceability/cost.
Battery lifetime is way more of a concern for cars with small batteries.
For an original leaf with a 20kwh battery pack, you have to charge it to higher levels and discharge to lower levels just to get your daily range. For a tesla model 3 you can charge for battery health and still have convenience and longevity.
Basically, to predict car lifetime calculate battery cycles * range for one cycle.
If a battery will survive 2000 cycles, a leaf @ 50 miles range will get 100k miles, a tesla model 3 @250 miles range will get 500k.
And service seems to be working out to significantly less than gasoline cars.
I do dislike that teslas are not "open" cars, tesla carefully hoarding service procedures unless the law requires it.
With increasing range battery replacement is no longer a significant issue. Averaging about 250 mile range and 800 charge cycles you get 200,000 miles. That range may go up or down a little, but cars are with such a small fraction of their initial value at 150+k makes that it makes little difference for a new car buyer.
A much larger issue is the loss of range as a car ages. Used cars are more noticeably degraded which is going to seriously impact the used car market over time. That may eventually be a non issue if range keeps increasing, but it’s a real consideration.
This kind of degradation impacts cars with bad battery thermal management systems (the early Leaf) much much more than cars with good liquid cooling systems (Tesla, others). I think Tesla’s degradation curve is supposed to keep it usable well past 250k. They’re targeting 1MM miles, not sure if they’ve demonstrated that they’ve hit it.
On the flip side, in the used Tesla market over here it's surprisingly common to see "battery replaced last year under warranty" on cars that have done ~80k miles.
> What I wish companies like Tesla would do is define some standard form factors for things like batteries
The Fiat Centoventi (aka the electric Panda) is closest to what you want for batteries. It has a battery system with modules which are easy to install and remove. The idea is you can buy the battery capacity that suits your needs and then you can buy or rent extra capacity as needed:
Being able to rent some extra battery capacity for the occasional road trip is an interesting idea. And the modular system makes it easy to replace modules that fail over time.
The battery pack kind of has to be an integral part of the structure of modern passenger EVs. So I doubt we will see a standard form factor anytime soon.
Leasing is probably a better approach for customers concerned over battery life.
The range issue isn't necessary irrational if you look at fuel logistics. Current gas stations just lack the infrastructure to support as many EV-vehicles.
A modern (non-Tesla) EV-Vehicle can be recharged to 80% within half an hour or so. That works without issues as long as very few people have electric vehicles. If everyone had one, we would get into problems with recharging. You can assume the infrastructure to scale with sold vehicles, but there are other requirements that suddenly become an issue. Many gas stations just don't have enough electrical power for example.
You cannot look at one trip and call it irrational since it isn't applicable for your commute or short trips. I think these issues will be solved, but there are still changes needed.
Putting chargers in gas stations may end up being the casualty. They would make more sense in diners, for example, so you can charge-and-coffee. And that distributes the load much more evenly.
Petrol stations in Norway haven't made money on the petrol for the last 20 years at least. They make all the profits on hot dogs and buns and the people charging spends more time at the station = more sales.
When they don't cost $AU70,000 or more. its likely a Tesla will always be "cool" but so was a VW beetle.
In truth, no car is boring. they're amazing machines. But something which takes more than the median wage ($AU50,000) to acquire, when substitutable vehicles are $AU30,000 or less (excluding luxe from the equation) puts them into a different category than a boring car.
I WANT to say that a Citroen DS's adjustable suspension could be genuinely useful in some situations. But presumably nowadays DSs are so old that they break down all the time, and the fact that I want to forgive them nicely illustrates your point!
I rode in a DS19 as a child, the owner doing adjustments in time to us singing. I also rode in the steel finish new model as a small child puked over the outside: Citroen wouldn't replace the door and he drove his luxury vehicle around for years with a rather nice blemish in the finish..
A friend had an ex-diplomatic corps DS19 which had a glass barrier between the driver and the PAX. Now that is stylish.
The best I had was the Lesney toys "safari" DS19 model car in zebra stripes.
Sideways open rear door on the wagon.. Death trap for non LH side parking.
If the DS has been taken well care of, they don't break down. My 1974 Citroën DS 23 has been running several years now without issue. While the engine isn't great, it's a sturdy one. And the hydraulics system, while complex, isn't that difficult to maintain. Just don't park it on the street during winter.
I think it's rational to want to reduce ones co2 footprint. Thats why I bought the first EV that I could afford that had enough range to cover my commute + an errand or two. Which was a model 3.
Is there a research to back your statement? I always thought that car purchases are highly rational, and even read some compelling research about it (cannot find it right now).
Yes, decision to buy particularly expensive car is very rational, with lot of time, choices and your personal preferences are of course part of it. Old cars do have their merits, and cost premium associated with them is real, economical fact.
Very very little of price of car cannot be explained by market forces at work.
> When EVs are in the segment of rational-decision bound purchases, when they are "boring" I will deem them to have succeeded.
Do you see something preventing or slowing this from happening? Why would society not adopt EV?
Unless you’re discussing degree or rate of adoption, which I don’t care about, but your comment seems to imply doubt that EVs will ever succeed... which seems extremely short sighted and naive.
Absolutely not! I think EV's will succeed. The real signal to me will be effective competition across all segments of the car market. At the moment, the non-tesla cheap alternatives are drastically range limited in many cases, and also undersold and under-available. I've been reading blogs for 2 years waiting for the AU market to bust open, to no avail.
My dream is an ioniq, or for Nissan to wise up and fix the problems with their battery model (rental?) or for a european manufacturer like VW to make good on the promise of their common-design chassis and break open the market. They aren't doing this yet for very good reasons, not dissimilar to why oil companies include a small number diversifying into Solar and Wind, and a lot who are selling as much oil as they can before it becomes a stranded asset: Most of the car production line is sunk cost around ICE. re-making ito EV implies a huge re-fabrication of the plant around EV not ICE and lots of sunk costs go up in smoke. If I was a BMW or VW or Toyota or Mazda exec, and my annual bonus depended on volume profit sales, standing up to propose a giant hole of capital be dug now, to save 15 years hence is .. well.. sensible but also not in my gene pool.
The current generation of auto execs have no motivation to compete right now. They'd rather buy off the Californian clean air taxes by investing in Tesla shares to green-wash their needs, believing they can rush in at the end and steal the market.
There is a tension between first mover advantage and second-system effect.
Most Europeans are highly concerned about the climate. If you have the money, then buying a Tesla is not so irrational in that context: they still have the best EVs.
Agree that they're still too expensive for the average consumer to afford, and that the specs on the low-end EV models aren't yet competitive with traditional ICE cars.
Most car purchas are a fundamentally non-rational decisions in the current climate crisis, if you have humane values and place some weight in the common good.
I don't know if it's just me, but I find most non Tesla electric cars to be incredibly ugly. If BMW made an electric 3 class sedan with > 350 miles of range for a reasonable price, I think that would be hugely successful. Instead they made the i3.
The VW ID.3 looks like it would have the same problem. I know this is very subjective, but why not make a car that looks more like their already successful models?
I'm the opposite, I find Teslas to be (externally) ugly. In general I find any large sedan to be ugly. I don't get the sedan form factor, it seems to waste a lot of space. I've always owned hatchbacks because I like the way they look and they seem much more practical to me how I can bend the seats and carry a ton of stuff in the back (which I take advantage of at least once a month).
>I'm the opposite, I find Teslas to be (externally) ugly.
I'm 100% with you. The X is one of the most awkward looking SUV's ever made, and the 3 looks awkward past the C pillar. In my opinion their best looking vehicle is the S because it looks correctly proportioned, and also because it has the semblance of a grille, even though it's just black plastic and doesn't actually function as a ICE car's grille.
Similar thoughts on the Model S. And I find the Model S facelift much worse than the original design due to the "look, it's not a grill design", where they don't have a grill, but they have an awkwardly shaped flat spot anyways. Porsche Panamera is a much better example of a grilleless design.
As for the upcoming Roadster, that looks smashing. Too bad it's massively expensive.
> how I can bend the seats and carry a ton of stuff in the back
I don't think I've ever been in a sedan that doesn't have this feature, but you usually get a little more space out of a hatchback if the roof-line doesn't taper down.
A lot of newer hatchbacks seem to have a sharp taper to the roof and it really reduces the amount of space gained vs the sedan form factor.
The Honda Fit and a few others are the exception but I assume the reason is that the SUV form factor has gobbled up most of the market for “hatchback with a lot of space for cargo”. E.g. Toyota discontinued the Prius V and is instead offering an electric RAV4.
All upcoming electric cars seem to follow that route. It just took them a while to catch up. The Audi e-tron and Mercedes EQC are recently released SUVs that are hardly distinguishable from their combustion engine counterparts. The upcoming BMW i4 is essentially an electric 4 class sedan with >350 miles of range.
Most cars are ugly these days; Tesla is not an exception. Cars used to be beautiful and peak car design was in the 1950's and 1960's. I find it interesting that people are retrofitting a lot of old cars from that era with electric; looks like a lot of fun to drive in those things.
I'd love to see some old designs from that era reproduced with electric. I'm not talking about monstrosities like BMWs mini (anything but mini) or VWs attempt to revive the beetle. They basically lost the essence of both designs and turned them into pompous monstrosities with a lot of plastic, leds, and ugly loud colors. The current mini especially is offensive to me compared to the original. Completely misses the point of the original in every possible way.
For the North American market; what about some old school muscle cars, Cadillacs, etc. Those were awesome design classics. Their modern descendants are not even worth mentioning. It's not like a modern SUV is in any way efficient or practical. With EVs, aerodynamics matter a lot less because the fuel (i.e. electricity) is cheap.
But it seems like designers these days insist on rubbing out all the little details in the original that made them so nice.
When BMW designed the i3 about 10 years ago, one couldn't make a 3 class sedan with > 560 km at a reasonable price. So instead they took their low fuel consumption city car concept with a futuristic look and made it electric. They never planned to sell it a lot, it's a carbon fiber body on an aluminium frame with a rear-wheel engine block. It's not designed to be mass produced at a cheap cost, it's designed to make money from low numbers as a premium EV.
They should have made more electric models since, but their different CEOs that succeeded were only looking at the current numbers. Hopefully for them, they will catch up.
Many people dislike the look of the i3 but that's just a matter of tastes. Personally I think the tesla model S and model 3 are very boring looking cars. They look okay, but I much prefer the i3.
In current cars models, The Renault Zoé looks very normal, the Volswagen Golf is a Golf, the Peugeot 208 looks exactly the same as a BEV or ICE, the Jaguar I-Pace looks like a ICE car too, the Audi Etron cannot look more normal, same for the Mercedes EQC.
"If BMW made an electric 3 class sedan with > 350 miles of range for a reasonable price, I think that would be hugely successful. Instead they made the i3."
This.
"I know this is very subjective, but why not make a car that looks more like their already successful models?"
Carmakers: We don't want your electric car. We want your car, electric.
I don't want to buy your iMobile or your eCar. I want a Volvo v90, but electric. I want a BMW 7-series, but electric. I don't want your Tron-mobile.
The ID.3 still looks a bit too funky compared to regular VW models, but BMW, Audi, and Mercedes are just launching models that look a lot more like their regular lineup:
Traditional carmakers are obviously capable of making electric cars that look like any other of their cars, it's annoying that it took them this long to get on that train...
I want to get a closer look at the Mach-E before I settle for a Y (already have a 3 as well). Saw the Mach-E in person at the auto show a couple weeks ago and it's quite good looking.
Good design can take a while to be accepted, particularly in automotive. Some Ford of Europe cars were radical enough to be deemed ugly when they were new, for example the Sierra and the Focus. In time people got used to them and the rest of the market borrowed the design principles.
Some of the excesses of the trend setting designs got dropped, for example the huge double spoiler on the sport version of the Sierra, however, the aero shape gave fuel efficiencies important to the fleet buyer so that stayed. Nowadays all saloon cars have a little bit of Sierra 'jelly mould' in their design.
With EV design the fake grille that Tesla started out with has been dropped. Tesla also don't do the funny blue lights 'because it is electric' styling that other marques sucker themselves for.
Some people do not want an EV car that has retro, e.g. the grill, or the inane, e.g. the funny blue lights. A different future is sought, more along the lines of the second generation Nissan Leaf that is 'conventional' rather than the first, which had the silly blue lights styling in abundance.
Now your suggestion of a BMW 3 series with the ICE replaced with batteries is a non-starter. Sure you can do what MINI have done and just shove batteries where the ICE bits would go, but it always feels retro-fitted. It would not be the 'ultimate driving machine' or offer the passenger luxury that EV is best at (3 series BMW's have miserable rear legroom because it is a driver's car). There would be this stupidly large bonnet for an ICE that did not exist. And you would not get your 350 miles range with ICE grade aero and weighty steel.
> If BMW made an electric 3 class sedan with > 350 miles of range for a reasonable price
Would they do this internationally? They are a luxury brand in America and moving downmarket doesn't seem to be their strategy or good for their brand.
The Hyundai Kona Electric looks decent, and has an actual instrument panel instead of a weird iPad thing. You can't buy a Tesla with a standard charging port in the US, though I think Europe managed to solve that problem.
> why not make a car that looks more like their already successful models?
Most auto manufacturers are limited to making things that are profitable. I'm sure any one of them could have easily sold a million electric cars if they were willing to sell them at cost-$10,000 and burn up a couple 10s of billions of dollars.
I find it a very strange coincidence that the recent law in France to update the tax incentives against CO2 emitters and towards EV placed a new, previously nonexistent limit precisely right below the base Tesla price, excluding everything above (and thus every Tesla car) from the incentive.
As it turns out, local EV cars such as the Renault Zoe are below the threshold, not the least because you buy the car but rent the battery, so the price appears much lower to the consumer, and the price of the battery is magically not factored in against the threshold.
France is well known for lawmaking to help companies with french values outcompete rivals.
Airbus wanted to build a new freeway through a protected forest to deliver planes on, but EU rules prevented it. Instead they built the road and put a thin surface of gravel on top so they could claim it was a "forest track", and it became legal.
And the US state of California is the first government to discover cheat devices in German cars, and the FAA is last to ban Boeing 737 MAX from flying. That's no coincidence. Countries are often very biased towards helping their own industries.
> "I find it a very strange coincidence that the recent law in France to update the tax incentives against CO2 emitters and towards EV placed a new, previously nonexistent limit precisely right below the base Tesla price"
This isn't necessarily a bad or evil thing to do. A price threshold increases the incentive for manufacturers to reduce their costs and bring their pricing under the threshold. Subsidy or not, EV prices must come down before they can fully displace combustion as the mainstream technology.
(In Tesla's case, EU import tariffs are included in their prices. Once the Berlin factory is up and running, they'll be more competitive in Europe)
It's a non-issue for most French people like myself. In France, the Tesla cars are in the luxury price segment. There's no need to incentive the car that only wealthy people can afford.
Realistically, only wealthy people can afford new cars in general. It's not clear that an incentive is any less valuable to someone who can pay 40k for a car instead of 20k, money is money, saving it is going to skew decisions for anyone.
A "bluecollar salary" in Europe is enough to qualify as "wealthy"; that's why a significant number of people from my country have moved to Europe to work as waiters and kindergarten teachers and whatnot. There are lots of cars on the road here but they all belong to wealthy people or taxi drivers. And this is a middle-income country; in poor countries access to cars is even more limited.
Definitionally a person who can spend 20K on a car when something serviceable is available for 2K is wealthy by some description. They have a good amount of disposable income.
I don't mean to claim that anyone who buys a new car is financially independent.
Actually a new gas car for 20k EUR is definitely more expensive than a 40k Tesla over the years. Gas cars burn a lot of money over the years. And those expensive cars also then get cheaper to buy on the used car markets.
Then again Tesla is not hurting, they sell just about everything they can build.
In Germany there was (is?) a rule that for receiving a government incentive the "base model" of a car without "extras" had to below 60k. Tesla quickly offered a model on that price point ... people bought this in the version with extras (as one always does ...) later they had to repay the incentive as it was rruled that the base model didn't exist, as Tesla wouldn't sell.
This time it seems different. The BAFA explicitly lists even the long range and performance models as base price of less than 40k. Listed under Model 3 2020.
The french state holds a 15% stake in Renault according to Wikipedia so I doubt it's any coincidence.
The government likely wants to give local manufacturers an advantage even if it means not playing fair. I don't know if it's right but I understand why they do it (jobs & tax revenue).
I wouldn't read too much into their stake into Renault, they give a lot of money to PSA also.
On the subject matter, Tesla cars are a problem, they are too big and heavy for Europe. And European car makers should stop increasing their car sizes too.
You do realise that a battery is very heavy? Also, just because you don't want a bigger car, doesn't mean that others don't, there are still lost of smaller cars around.
Well, with the whole push for more environmentally friendly transportation, a bigger car will need more energy to be taken places.
Unfortunately, I can't comfortably sit in my current D-segment vehicle because I am taller than average (and there is no room in the back behind me), and any seating in buses or trains is even worse (not to mention airplanes).
So while I'd love to get the smallest car possible, I am a bit restricted if I want to actually fit my family in.
I want a small electric car for city driving though! My back will manage for short rides (I hope)!
Yes. Compact cars are usually 1.8m wide, subcompacts are usually around 1.7m, and bigger cars are about 1.9m. 2m puts a Tesla Model S in "midsize van" territory. Thats the size where you start having problems in some spots. For a private car, that's impractical.
It was the same thing with the previous bonus in Germany that was limited to cars costing 60.000€ or less, blocking out the Tesla Model S.
There also was a delay in the increase of the "Umweltbonus". Some people said it was on purpose to get closer to the release date of the Volkswagen ID.3 electric vehicle which will be slightly cheaper than Teslas Model 3.
The increased Umweltbonus of 8000€ (4000€ of which are paid by the car companies) will be interesting to see in the context of the upcoming Dacia K-ZE low cost electric car.
If they offer it for, say, 13000€ the price after Umweltbonus will be 5000€.
This title is highly misleading. Tesla isn't incredibly successful 'in Europe'. It's very successful in VERY few European countries (Netherlands, Norway). And it's due to local incentives mostly. You aren't going to be blown away by a number of Teslas in Italy or Greece or Poland or France. But when you walk through Amsterdam - yes, there are a ton of Teslas parked everywhere.
Here in Belgium you also see a lot of Tesla's. 4 colleagues own a model 3 and 2 friends own a model S... I live in a quiet neighbourhood, where most people have at least 2 cars, and you see quite a few driveways with the model3/S + luxury SUV combo (BMW/Merc/Audi/...). Very few model X's though...
You have to take into account that Tesla's are relatively expensive cars, and you see them mostly where there's quite a bit of money and you see a lot of luxury vehicles in general. Cars with a 100k+ price tag are pretty damn common here (Porsches and high-end BMW/Audi/Merc SUV's), and cars in the 50-60k range are even more common. The Model S was for a long time competing in the latter segment due to fiscal benefits, which are now disappearing, but now Tesla has the Model 3 to compete in this segment...
In the Netherlands Tesla sales dropped from ~12000 in December 2019 to ~36 in January 2020 because those 'incentives' where dropped in 2020. So the article is a kind of old news.
And what also is a kind of misleading is that overall cars sales went up in Europe.
Personally I think Tesla is going to have a hard time in the near future now all big brands start producing EVs. The Porsche Taycan for example made a lot of Tesla owners switch to Porsche. I believe the same will happen when the new BMW i4 launches next year.
And most European people don't care much about range. Distances are very different here. In the Netherlands you can cross the country with a 400km battery.
> In the Netherlands Tesla sales dropped from ~12000 in December 2019 to ~36 in January 2020 because those 'incentives' where dropped in 2020.
October 2019 also had almost no deliveries due to no vessels delivering Tesla's to Europe (think they arrive in Zeebrugge Belgium). One car carrier has 4000+ cars on it. They're then delivered quickly after that.
> The Porsche Taycan for example made a lot of Tesla owners switch to Porsche.
They must be walking then.
The Taycan has had a lot of deposits put down, but we are way off significant numbers of deliveries. The factory isn't debugged yet. I would be surprised to see a Taycan in the wild on the streets any time this year, even in Knightsbridge or the Silverstone car park.
Tesla cars are quite common (if still unusual and therefore noteworthy) even in provincial towns.
Very much this. I think I’ve seen a single-figure number of Teslas here in the UK, ever. (I presume there are more in London but I don’t live there...)
>This title is highly misleading. Tesla isn't incredibly successful 'in Europe'. It's very successful in VERY few European countries (Netherlands, Norway). And it's due to local incentives mostly.
That's just because Tesla remains production constrained. All the car delivered to Netherlands or Norway couldn't be delivered to any other European country.
Just watch the UK deliveries for the 1rst quarter of 2020.
It makes sense for Tesla to prioritize by markets with big EV incentive, but this shouldn't be interpreted as a lack of demand.
You just validated my argument: Tesla ships European car early in the quarter and it takes weeks for the cars to cross the ocean.
This is made very clear in the official reports[0]:
>Although it is possible to deliver a higher number of vehicles, we believe it is important to begin unwinding the "wave" approach to vehicle deliveries, where overseas cars have been made in the first half of the quarter and North American cars have been made in the second half. This puts extreme stress on Tesla, negatively affects our working capital needs and adds to our cost structure.
So far, they have been unable to unwind the waves so this means European deliveries will continue to take place at the end of the quarter. And, as explained in my earlier comment, Tesla is focusing on the UK for this quarter anyway, so your stats for NL, NO and SP are even less significant. All car delivered in the UK can't be sold in any other European countries, as long as Tesla remains production constrained (i.e until the Berlin factory is up and running).
It seems the first deliveries will be March 10th, the last deliveries were quite a while ago. Tesla in Europe isn't something you should track per month due to the deliveries not being like a production line.
The same thing is happening to traditional automobile manufacturers now as what happened to the likes of Kodak and Xerox when the digital revolution came. They'll deny that the change is happening until it's way too late, and then become obsolete. Even when any outsider can look at the industry and say it's obvious that the future is electric and any manufacturer that hasn't already seriously dived into making EVs is being stupid.
GM has announced what, 22 EVs in the next couple years? I don't think they're in any danger of becoming obsolete due to Tesla. If anything, Tesla should be getting worried. When competition heats up people will start caring more about reliability, features, and looks.
Did GM announce a charging network? Most people may be able to charge at home, but they also want peace of mind the 1 time a year they travel on a road trip.
I picked Tesla for my next EV because of the charging stations. Level 2 and even CHAdeMO and CCS are just too slow, and there’s not enough of the latter two.
I don't think the vast majority are buying electric cars with it being their only vehicle. Aren't 80% of Tesla owners also homeowners? Likely living with a spouse, who has a non electric car for those longer road trips. And maybe a Tesla owner uses the Tesla network for road trips but I think the majority of electric owners without a network have a gas car too.
Even then, I think those buying an electric can afford air travel.
As I recall, the largest DC fast charging network is no longer Tesla's, and that will only accelerate over the next couple years. I'm hoping that soon Tesla will make an adapter available so I can use that network too.
Source? Last time I saw this claim, it was some manufacturer that was also compatible with Tesla's charging infrastructure, and including Tesla's own network as part of its claim.
EVGo is the nation's largest provider of DC fast charging. It has 800 stations to Tesla's 443. Tesla can use EVGo and L2 stations through ChargePoint. But, EVGo usually has 1-2 chargers per station, whereas Tesla has 10-30. Tesla's onboard computer routes to the Tesla stations and prepares the battery to be charged, something that I haven't seen in other EVs.
Lots of companies rushed smartphones after the iPhone; like GM with EVs, Nokia also was the inventor/original smartphone producer.. in fact, it was more advanced in the field than GM is with the EV. Yet here we are, with Nokia being a shadow of its former self.
I wouldn't be so quick to claim "Tesla should be worried" - Tesla should only be worried about its own execution, and should be ignoring competition altogether (which I think they do).
Everything you mentioned is dependent on them rolling out EVs in volume reliably, which is probably going to take another 5 years. Meanwhile, Tesla's vehicles have a massive lead on efficiency, range, brand, and performance. GM simply makes lackluster vehicles and I dont see their quality improving to rival Tesla or its huge tech lead.
I'm not exactly a Tesla fan, I think their cars are pretty bland, certainly the interior is pretty spartan for the price you're paying, and I'm not convinced of the entire infotainment system/massive screen in the middle.
But... Other manufacturers allowed Tesla to become an established brand, and right now if you tell someone you have an electric car, their response will be "oh a Tesla?" 9 out of 10.
On top of that, Tesla is learning quality/finish faster than other manufacturers are learning how to mass produce electric cars properly. The newer model 3 from one colleague is miles ahead build-quality-wise of the one from another, who got one of the first to arrive in Europe.
And lastly, Tesla has a massive head-start in battery production capacity, and I would not be surprised if they'd start selling batteries to other manufacturers soon. Battery supply chains are currently the limiting factors for many car models (the Hyundai Ioniq has a massive waiting list for this exact reason for example).
Most classic car brands also give priority to direct battery supply towards their more mass-market lineup where they're now offering hybrid solutions. They can make what - 10 hybrid cars with the same amount of batteries it takes to make a single-electric-one? Choosing between selling 1 or 10 cars limited by a strained supply chain is an easy choice. Sure they'll offer electric versions for a premium, but the hybrid-ones are the ones they're really producing and driving sales.
I would be surprised if GM has more models available than Tesla in the US at any point in the next 5 years. Tesla will have 7 once all the currently announced models are in production.
Why take risks where you can fail when you are getting paid a fat check every month. It’s a “no one was fired for keeping the company running” kind of thing.
I'm an American, but I live in Germany, specifically Munich, the home of BMW. Been seeing more and more Teslas around lately for sure.
While Musk has said and done some dumb things, I'm still rooting for Tesla. Beyond the fact that electric cars are cool and good, I like the fact that Tesla is shaking the industry up, especially that they don't use dealerships, which are frequently scummy and often outright predatory. That we've tolerated them exploiting the ignorant or unwise for so long is a black mark against us as a society.
Leaving aside (and I know this hard) the controversy of Tesla's valuation, Elon Musk and the environmental virtues of electric cars, think what a historic success Tesla is as a car company. There have been dozen(s) of car companies started in the US since WW2 and you could argue that not one of them has been a success. The biggest Kaiser Motors, has probably been surpassed.
For decades American and Japanese manufacturers have tried to compete with European luxury brands. American companies had almost no success and Japanese very little. Lexus does well, but it never displaced German car sales the way Tesla is now. I am not a Tesla fanboy, but I do like cars. You have to respect the product.
And that’s to say nothing of what they’re doing to drive down battery costs through economies of scale and basically creating the energy storage mass market. $100kWh is revolutionary. Every home in sunbelt America can have decent backup or go off grid with solar for mere thousands of dollars. I still think few people grasp the paradigm shift that’s on the horizon.
The bottleneck is no longer fuel costs and delivery. It’s technology cost and it’s declining rapidly. Look at Enphase’s IQ8X grid forming micros. The future is coming fast.
Just getting people to think differently about these things is extraordinary. Making the Powerwall an accessible consumer good, is an important step forward. Tesla single-handedly changed the public's perception of electric vehicles.
Some people obsessively, maniacally try to deny Tesla the credit they deserve for changing the auto market (for the exact same reason some people try to deny Apple the credit it deserves for entirely changing the phone market). Nobody else did it, which is also why they're so far ahead of their peers. The giants of the industry handed them a decade headstart.
AFAIK when I was in Europe I would have loved to be able to buy Japanese cars but they were the top taxed cars, some crazy >20% amount or so. So there was no choice but to buy "local". With Tesla it seems a lot of countries are giving out serious tax breaks so I wonder how much of that will continue once those incentives stop.
> With Tesla it seems a lot of countries are giving out serious tax breaks so I wonder how much of that will continue once those incentives stop.
My understanding is that gas is quite expensive in many European countries compared to the US, so even if there are purchase incentives that expire, I think there is probably still strong economic pressure to buy electric.
Until someone else comes out with a strong electric vehicle offering, that means Tesla.
Just like a big percentage of Japanese cars destined to the US market are assembled in the US or Mexico, Tesla will probably build their highest volume cars in the EU the moment it makes sense. They've broken ground for a large factory in Berlin already.
The intense focus on robotic assembly seems to make sense in this context. Once streamlined, it makes it relatively cheap for Tesla to open up a new factory if supply chain allows for it.
From what I've heard, if you buy Toyota in France, your car is more likely to have been assembled locally vs any of the local brands (Peugeot, Renault, Citroën). So buying a Japanese car in Europe can mean buying a local car.
In a recent podcast interview, Musk claims there have been thousands of new (EDIT: American) consumer car companies and that every single one has failed besides Tesla (if I recall correctly). Presumably this counts every incorporated team that made a rudimentary prototype.
BYD - been around for an eternity by silicon valley standards, few other genuinely new Chinese brands (ones which are not subsidiaries of BAIC or FAW,) Vinfast, Peroda
Third Row. Can't remember if it was part 1 or 2, but probably 2. It's very fanboyish, but there are some good stories on there about the early days of SpaceX and Tesla.
Toyota is the most profitable large car manufacturer on a per-vehicle basis and they make under $3,000 per car. Tesla needs to manufacture a few million more cars and not lose another penny before they recoup that investment.
Tesla charges $7,000 for full self-driving vaporware, and has already recognized a huge portion of it, even though they haven't delivered practically any of the value of it (they claimed your car would appreciate by over $100,000 when it entered the robotaxi fleet this year). More than Toyota's whole margin, they spent a lot on it but recently cut R&D significantly even though they aren't close. Maybe with the latest fundraising round they will increase R&D again and deliver before the cars that were bundled with it are falling apart.
Cheap money is great for new companies. Whether it be Amazon, netflix, uber, lyft, Airbnb, lets face it: they all get a ton of cheap money to finance their technical coding and R&D. This is not a bad thing inherently, what we are describing is how you get hard technology to scale much faster.
I've sort of wondered about that. Governments should foster entreprenuers, the most important source of economic growth, and cheap money might be more successful and egalitarian than fingers-in-the-pie subsidies or other methods.
As a sidenote, it's easy to get lost among the "how many hundreds of thousands of model 3s can tesla produce in a year", but I just saw an overall production stat and noticed they're over 900,000 cars lifetime, and hadn't heard it mentioned elsewhere. 1 million vehicles sold will be a real milestone.
I stumbled upon a comment online, recently, from a guy who went on and on about peak oil for years. In 2008, he made a joke about "Tesla will have surpassed the US car industry". I don't remember the time horizon, but the first Roadster was delivered to Elon in February 2008. It just made me reflect on what we'd think of that prediction/joke and how it turned out, if we were to go back in time.
Tesla's 10-K shows an accumulated shareholder deficit of $6B. That's over and above money spent to buy factories which are still operating. That's $6k a car at 1M cars sold. Add to that the $7500 rebate the US was providing until recently. That's $13.5k, on average, they lost per car they sold through the end of 2019.
Saying nothing about Tesla cars versus other companies, that's a huge financial advantage against other car companies. This is particularly true given that most of those car sales happened post-Q1-2018, when Tesla had already established a strong brand.
I'm not sure any established player could, at that point, compete with a company that gets to lose $13.5k per car they sell. That would be like if Nissan started building base-model Sentras and selling them for $4500. Yes, they would sell a lot of them.
As markets normalize and Tesla has to compete on a level playing field, my guess is their product is viewed more and more as what it is: a luxury car. Nothing wrong with that, but it's hard to see them owning more than a few percent of the market, especially considering established companies have gone all in on electric at this point.
And, nothing can justify a price-sales multiplier of 20 for the company. Nothing.
> Tesla's 10-K shows an accumulated shareholder deficit of $6B. That's over and above money spent to buy factories which are still operating. That's $6k a car at 1M cars sold.
The money was spent on things like R&D and product development. That means you amortize it over the total number of cars they're ever going to make using that technology. They've made 1M already, but why would you expect them not to make any more?
Some of that money went into developing models that haven't been released yet. If you break it down per model using existing sales numbers then those models would have cost infinity dollars per car, but that's now how it works.
Let’s hope. The question is how relevant the 13.5k subsidy is to whether others can compete. The top comment about luxury cars being irrational purchases is probably the best commentary here.
The 7.5k is available for anyone selling electric cars in the US, well except Tesla themselves at this point so right now they are actually fighting an uphill battle and still winning.
Is it a battle when almost all the other competitors are just producing California compliance cars? They've barely survived financially without competition, I'd be deeply concerned with their ability to compete going forward.
Yeah, there was an article the other day interviewing James Dyson about his new flatiron. The first part of the article asked him about their EV, which was basically ready for production (they spent years on it), but he said there was no way to make it profitably.
That said, Tesla is still selling cars with no federal rebate. So, actually, while you're right about $13.5k (historically), that's no longer correct. (of course, they've lowered prices, so perhaps that $6k number goes up?)
I don't doubt a more efficient automaker could shave thousands off that $6k number. And people would still buy it for a couple thousand more; making up the pricing difference.
Of course, that still brings us "only" to $0 unit profit.
Fiat Chrysler and GM used to build compliance cars. Fiat's CEO was famous for saying not to buy theirs [1] because they lost money on it, but were required to build them to meet emissions mandates so they could sell their polluting combustion cars (fun fact: Fiat has to pay Tesla $2 billion now to continue selling non-EVs in Europe, they are effectively funding Gigafactory 4 in Berlin [2]). These companies have enormous existing manufacturing capacity, and capital market resources. If they didn't have spineless management, or short term shareholders, they could've been the ones to capture the gains from the transition to electrified transportation. Instead, Tesla came along, doing the hard work for a decade performing R&D, building their own manufacturing capacity (GF1, 2, 3, and now 4) and Supercharger network, and most importantly, a desirable and sexy brand. TLDR Tesla spends crazy money on capex but everyone funding Tesla is onboard with it, legacy automakers cannot do so.
Polluting and emissions have a very real cost (climate change, particulate pollution). I am astounded when someone complains that this cost must be paid for, and that it was in some way wrong or economic fraud for Tesla to take advantage of intelligent public policy (ZEV credits, tax credits, etc).
Disclaimer (bigger one in profile): I am a TSLA shareholder, and willing to wait until the heat death of the universe for any return on capital. My investment is in fixing climate change.
[1] https://www.reuters.com/article/chrsyelr-ceo-evs/fiat-chrysl... (“I hope you don’t buy it because every time I sell one it costs me $14,000,” he said to the audience at the Brookings Institution about the 500e. “I’m honest enough to tell you that.” -- Sergio Marchionne)
It’s fine that Tesla is a compliance car manufacturer for hire. Just don’t claim buying a Tesla is good for the environment, because it is not. Every Tesla sold just allows for one more gas guzzling SUV to be made. Instead, focus your energy on lobbying the government for stricter emissions regulations.
> Instead, focus your energy on lobbying the government for stricter emissions regulations.
I focus on solvable problems. Tesla solves problems today that the United States Congress might never solve (a carbon tax is extremely unlikely to pass with the current legislature configuration). Every Tesla sold gets us closer to a zero emissions future. You go to war with what you have, not what you want. Dysfunctional government? Those factories still churn out EVs that generate revenue to scale up battery manufacturing across the world.
Are you kidding? People here can actually afford Teslas and your idea to support EVs is for HN tech workers to not buy EVs but rather try to convince climate denying Trump administration to tighten regulations they already slashed and wanted to slash even more? That's just silly, the best climate solution may not be EVs but let's not pretend the current admin will listen to climate lobbying.
Except that's not how public policy works. It's not like Tesla just happened to luck into these policies. They actively lobbied for them. There's a significant amount of "greenwashing" involved there. I think it's instructive to realize that both of Musk's companies have, as critical elements of their success, government policies which favored them at just the right time.
I have nothing against Tesla as a luxury car brand. I do get tired of fanboys suggesting they'll take over the entire industry. Normal people can't afford a $60k Model 3 (and that's what they actually cost). Other companies will do fine in the electric space. I'm quite happy with my used Nissan Leaf. Price? $8500. Let's see Tesla beat that.
That's hyperbole. I paid a little less than $60K out the door for my Model 3, and it is the Performance model. You can order a $40K Model 3 right off the web site that is substantially identical aside from being slower and having a few miles less range (though in practical terms it's probably about the same because the P3D doesn't get anywhere near rated range). AFAIK you can still special order the $35K model.
The ITC tax credit for solar and storage, the EV tax credit, and the electric vehicle charging station credit all existed before Tesla (and all other solar, storage, and vehicle manufacturers are eligible for these credits, not just Tesla, you just have to build the product). Tesla did lobby for vehicle manufacturers to be allowed to sell directly to consumers, which I cannot see any reason that shouldn't be allowed in a free market. Can you prove they lobbied for these policies?
A Nissan Leaf is a glorified golf cart with an air cooled battery that has no longevity and no fast charge network. There is a reason they are so cheap used. It is not a realistic competitor to an internal combustion vehicle, such that a Model 3, Y, S, or X is. That is why Tesla is successful and has sold their millionth car, and is running at a 400k unit/year run rate (based on Fremont and Gigafactory 3 production data). There is no need for Tesla to meet unrealistic expectations such as your example ("I'm quite happy with my used Nissan Leaf. Price? $8500. Let's see Tesla beat that.") when there is an entire worldwide auto market with consumers ready to pay top dollar for the cars Tesla builds (in the US, average sales prices of a new car in the US is $35K and 17 million cars a year are sold), and Tesla commands roughly 1/3rd of the Chinese EV market as of February 2020.
But 40k is still unaffordable for a non small amount of people. And buying "old" ones cheap has problems "because batteries" (and Tesla might just recently have found a way to solve that).
To take over they would need to:
- Release a sub 10k car which is focused on in-City only use case but can also handle your grocery shopping and pre-planned inter City treveling to close by cities.
- Solve the logistic problem that everyone wants to charge theire car. (Note: I don't mean the whole bs. about power grid crashing, all this are technically problems with existing solutions).
- One way to solve that would be batteries with a capacity so large that you only charge once in four days _for the cheap sub 10k version_.
- Another would be batteries so small that they are easily exchanged instead of charging. (Tesla did implement that but the way it currently is, is just to unpractical. It would need a industry wide standard solution and a really easy to maintain exchange station.)
So could Tesla take over: yes.
Will Tesla take over: most likely not, they will just probably become well established for the mid/upper marked segment.
Will battery powered electric cars take over: likely but not necessarily. The often overlooked truth is the race is still on and the winner not yet clear as neither batteries not full cells have yet reached a level at which they can widespread replace fossil fueled cars.
Also let's not speak about current battery tech and fire...
>But 40k is still unaffordable for a non small amount of people.
The average price of a new car in the US is $37k which gives Tesla access to half the new car market. Used car buyers are meaningless in the metrics as they make car companies no money. Tesla is far far from saturating that part of the market so there's little incentive for them to move to cheaper cars (and dilute the brand in the process). In fact, it's probably better economically for Tesla to let other brands make cheaper electrics, annoy customers due to shortcomings and then swoop in with a superior product down the line (having learned from the mistakes of other companies).
A new Leaf is $30k base. A car which depreciates that much is going to look really bad to new buyers versus one that doesn't. And without new buyers there are no used cars to sell at $8500. Tesla is affordable to something like 50% of new car buyers and if it sells for $20k more used then paying $10k more is an easy decision if you can afford it.
edit: Or in other words, used cars are irrelevant in terms of market adoption since their supply is limited by the supply of new cars. So you need to look at the demand and sales of new cars.
You lose credibility when you try to call Tesla supporters "fanboys", but then you artificially inflate the price of the car by 50%. This is not a mundane detail.
That didn't leave the controversy behind at all, most of the controversy is far past their valuation. Tesla is only interesting as a car company to people who are willing to lower their expectations below those placed on the actual car companies.
They market themselves as environmentally friendly while representing a comedically small percent of global emissions reduction. And within the auto industry itself the increasing efficiency of ICE vehicles has reduced emissions by far more than Tesla and their electric car hype.
At the same time, they advocate infrastructure expansions to accomodate their vehicle's needs while handwaving away the emissions and environmental consequences this process would create. And every time this is mentioned people just blubber some line about the long term while covering their ears to the tide of environmentalists saying that we need change /now/.
They might conquer Europe through legislation but the only reason that's practical is because European countries are tiny so the range issue is less relevant to them. Tesla hasn't actually cleared their hurdles, they've surrendered to them.
Meanwhile, they drum up this idea that Tesla's can be more than toys for rich people even though no one blue collar who isn't already a hard fan chooses a Tesla. In fact, speaking of legislation, they're so uncompetitive that Europe has to ban ICE engines for them to gain ground.
Even you framed this as Tesla competing against luxury brands, key word being luxury. This world where they've paved the way for cheap mainstream electric vehicles is a fantasy. They've paved the way for novelty in the luxury market and since doing so have shown little aptitude beyond their ability to wield that accomplishment as a shield to deflect criticisms.
> They market themselves as environmentally friendly while representing a comedically small percent of global emissions reduction. And within the auto industry itself the increasing efficiency of ICE vehicles has reduced emissions by far more than Tesla and their electric car hype.
You have to start somewhere. Tesla is increasing their manufacturing capacity about as fast as you can reasonably expect any company to do it. Just because high-volume manufacturers like Ford or Honda or Volkswagen can have more impact on CO2 emissions by reducing fuel consumption slightly on many more vehicles is no reason to disdain what Tesla is doing on a smaller scale.
Tesla is no longer a novelty. They just manufactured the millionth car. I own a model 3 and people ask me how do I like it. My usual answer is that I have "no compelling reason" to buy an ICE car - ever. Despite all the free marketing that Tesla gets, I don't think people grok how good the car actually drives in real. You really need to experience living with it to appreciate why it's a game changer.
You think it's more of a game changer than the $8500 used Nissan Leaf I bought (which, before you start, is perfect for me because I use it around town, and yes it works fine for 95+% of my car trips, including 100% of my commuting miles)?
I'll tell you something. I'm sure enjoying having that extra $60k in my bank account that I saved by not buying a horribly overpriced depreciating asset.
Because they're better cars than the Leaf and thus maintain resale value better. The Leaf isn't coming out on top in this comparison. There's a reason some things are worth more than others.
Friend of mine is a Leaf enthusiast and even he concedes it's pretty awful. It could have been great, but the batteries degrade so fast you can practically watch the range decrease with every drive.
What's the range on the used leaf you bought? Maybe 100 miles without AC/heating? There's a reason why the Leaf didn't succeed in the way Tesla did, and it's not all because of Musk.
Also, a new model 3 is 40k, and Teslas depreciate a lot less than a Nissan. But I do agree that buying brand new is generally a bad idea imo
Define "didn't". The 1st generation Nissan Leaf in 2011 was was pretty terrible, but they kept making them, and brand new ones (since 2017) are actually quite nice, with more power and 200 miles of range. Definitely not Model S nice, but luxury cars are a totally different segment. There's room in the car industry for Nissan making the economy electric car and Tesla in the luxury or up-market segment.
Buying a used Tesla might not be a great choice, because they've locked it down so you're forced to use their repair shops instead of 3rd party. That's going to increase your cash outlay in a way you weren't expecting.
If you have common ICE car, it is very inexpensive to keep it running when you can wrench yourself. I spent less than $600 in 15 years and 160k miles for all parts to repair 2005 Malibu. I had to go to dealer once, because ABS control module is locked. You need dealer codes and 'programming'. $240 for 15 minutes work.
For 2005 Malibu:
Oxygen sensors: one is $19, still running on originals.
Catalytic Converters: one side Carb Compliant $319, still running on originals
Spark plugs: Iridium NGK 6*$5, took me 1 hour to replace
Thermostat: $4 + $3 shipping, 15 minutes to replace
That's equivalent to replacing an ICE engine/transmission, how often does that happen, and how much does that cost? It's a moot point, ICE cars lose that one by default.
Secondly, it's not just the pure monetary value. We have four cars in a family of six, and despite my brother being good with the wrench, ICE manufacturers have made it incredibly time consuming and difficult to do even the most basic maintenance work outside of maybe oil changes and brake pads. HUGE dealership service costs are practically unavoidable with modern ICE cars despite improvements in reliability to previous eras. The peace of mind and reliability gained from having fewer mechanical problems is invaluable. I'm gladly willing to pay MORE for electric cars in their current state to not have to deal with dealerships and mechanics. They're only going to get better.
Thirdly, I've been in the market for a new car for the past year. Driving assistance on motorways and London like traffic where you spend hours daily are a huge help. Virtually every viable option right now is a baby compared to Tesla's autopilot. Although this could be improved upon, I have no trust in ICE manufacturers to make any meaningful strides to catch up anytime soon. They're still figuring out android auto (which is a must because their proprietary tech is equivalent to a kick in the balls). The new kid on the block is just doing it better.
Lastly, a decade-ish old company/tech here warrants serious discussion in its CURRENT state compared to giants that are decades old, and they have no answer so far. ICE Vs electric is a forgone conclusion at this point, but I wish other manufacturers catch up to the trend sooner rather than later because that's ultimately better for us consumers. I'm not a fan of Tesla's Apple like views on product ownership in regards to repairs etc. But sadly, their current offering is far better than competition so we have no choice.
You missed my point completely. The comment I responded to cherry-picked a large list of items that didn't apply to electric cars, so I cherry-picked an example that didn't apply to ICE cars. Neither example is really relevant to the point I started with, which is that Tesla in particular is locking you into their repair centers in a way that is new to the car industry.
I like my Model 3 pretty well, but maintenance cost is a losing argument at this point, still. So far, the real world numbers show that Teslas cost more to maintain than a similar ICE car. It may eventually be true that the simplicity of an EV means lower maintenance costs, but we are not their yet.
Tesla has spent $20B so far. All of that money created a burst of carbon emissions which they haven’t yet offset though EV sales: especially since they sell pollution credits to other manufacturers. They’re still deeply in the hole.
I'm not following this logic. That $20B created a million vehicles (and counting) that release much less pollution over their lifetime than $20B spent making ICE vehicles.
Presumably they mean Tesla have spent $20B on laying cement for new factories, filling them with robots, buying computers, building paint shops, flying managers to China, etc. All that activity has an environmental impact.
It's a reasonable point, our economy is energy based and so the more you spend the bigger the environmental impact. We are trying to decouple it but we have a long way to go yet.
I don't think you understand. The $20B isn't the cost to make the cars, it's how much they've lost doing it. There's nobody in the world that is losing $20B making ICE vehicles, and even big daddy elon might have trouble convincing investors to blow that money on such a traditional product.
What? How have they "lost" $20B? They may currently be carrying that much debt, but plenty of other auto manufacturers are carrying significantly more debt than that (e.g. $155B for Ford). Debts that you invest into growing a business faster aren't lost money. Tesla makes money on every car sold. It made sense for them to take out debt to enable that scaling.
And what does this have to do with whether their products are good for the environment anyway? Whether it makes sense to take on debt to establish a new business seems completely orthogonal.
Compared to used cars and public transit though, it doesn't nearly look as good. I like Tesla, but there is a lot more to be done before I consider their work truly environmentally friendly.
Sure, agreed. Another problem is that cars are quite deadly, and EVs don't improve on that any. Then there's the whole issue of tire/brake dust (it's the majority of local pollution even for gasoline-powered cars).
E-bikes are a much better environmentally friendly solution for most trips. The problem is the road infrastructure isn't there for them to be safe enough yet; we only build roads for cars, and anyone else (pedestrian or cyclist) is at high risk.
Here (PDF warning) is a link to a study done (in 2018) that shows that an electric car produces less co2 emissions than an ICE car over 150,000km.
It takes into account different types of ICE cars, it takes into account the environmental impact of building the batteries, it takes into account the emissions produced by the power plants for several European countries, and it even predicts how things can improve or change if current trends continue.
With the exception of Germany (where lifetime EV emissions are very similar to an "efficient" ICE due to their more "dirty" power generation), an EV produces less CO2 over it's lifetime.
In fact the higher upfront emissions in manufacturing an EV are "paid back" within 2 years on average.
And because the environmental impact of an EV is so dependent on how "green" the power generation is, investments in green power can lessen the impact of cars already sold!
> They market themselves as environmentally friendly while representing a comedically small percent of global emissions reduction. And within the auto industry itself the increasing efficiency of ICE vehicles has reduced emissions by far more than Tesla and their electric car hype.
The emissions reductions attained by manufacturers have been done while fighting tooth and nail against them; also, it's good that they're reducing emissions, but you just eliminate them completely by driving a Tesla.
What about the emissions involved in mining lithium, making the batteries, dealing with the batteries once they're exhausted, and in generating the electricity. Also, what about the emissions involved in building and maintaining the road infrastructure?
Necessary and solvable (if we've decided cars as a transportation method are here to stay, which appears to be the case in most countries). Lithium is evaporated in ponds, transport of which can move to electric. Lithium batteries can be recycled. All heavy vehicles (including for road infra work) can be electrified. Electricity is ubiquitous, and batteries will only decline in cost. This is not my opinion, these are facts.
As long as we keep ramping battery and renewables production, we'll get ahead of the emissions. To reduce emissions, you must displace combustion in all its forms, and destroy demand for fossil fuels. Renewables push out coal and natural gas on the grid, utility scale batteries push out natural gas due to price volatility (hat tip to Saudi Arabia on their current efforts to destroy the US fracking industry through pumping at full capacity, utilities desperately require stable prices for their fuels which is unlikely to happen if shale production declines due to low oil prices, which will prompt more rapid battery uptake), cheap/clean energy drives demand for EVs due to lower cost per mile than internal combustion (EVs are roughly half the cost per mile to operate as an internal combustion vehicle).
> Seriously, you consider the Saudis preferable to the Americans?
It does not matter to me if you're the House of Saud or US frackers, if you're pumping oil I want you out of business. My agenda is the end of fossil fuels, and I don't much care how we get there. Saudi Arabia requires $80/barrel to fund their state (Russia is ~$40/barrel), a highly unlikely long term market price for oil even with Saudi Arabia increasing their market share. So, if they can drive US shale (which is heavily leveraged using debt [1]) out of business before they decline, kudos. The planet, nor carbon emissions, care not about geopolitics.
Not buying oil from an authoritarian regime who funds terrorism is also an option if you're not a fan of Saudi Arabia (see: tariffs and embargoes). Why getting off oil is never the first option is always strangely not prioritized. Can't complain they're terrible folks (which they are!) but do nothing to migrate away from depending on them. It's been almost 50 years since the 70s oil embargo, and the US is still pathetically behind (compared to resources available) electrifying transportation. We have only ourselves to blame.
With this logic, you would've expected Steve Jobs to introduce a non-luxury iPhone and expect it to compete mass market from day 1. Tesla's plan was always to start at the high end with early adopters, show an EV can be great, and slowly scale down prices, which they have done. I can't envision them doing it a different way successfully.
> no one blue collar who isn't already a hard fan chooses a Tesla
My friend is a Master electrician in the IBEW union. He is in no way a “hard fan” of Tesla. He put down a deposit on the new truck that they are making because he thought it was better than his other options.
>Elon Musk and the environmental virtues of electric cars
this is arguably a pretty big red herring and despite good intentions the focus on electric cars will probably be a disaster by prolonging the broken American car-centric development.
Mind you an electric vehicle is only as clean as its primary source of energy (at the moment its lifetime emissions are about 70% of a traditional car), and the production of particular the batteries is ecologically problematic to say the least.
How are electric cars prolonging the car centric system? Were we on the verge of overhauling our transportation infrastructure and I just didnt hear about it?
I'm not going to pretend to be optimistic about the capacity for large scale social transformation in particular in the US I'll give you that, but there have been increasing voices for revitalizing rail.
I think electric cars will prolong the situation by giving influential people in the managerial and political class, in particular, the illusion that EVs are a big enough step towards changing our lifestyles and that it will induce a sort of "I've done my part" complacency.
Basically a Tesla is the car equivalent of a biodegradable Starbucks cup. I've even heard people like Zuckerberg say the 'future' is autonomous vehicles in hyperloops carrying people from or to ever larger suburbs. If that's the future I hope spacex works out so I can be shot to Mars at least
Not social — geographic and historical. With the exception of the Acela corridor, where rail actually thrives, it’s just not viable in America. The distances involved are too vast, and the development took place in a way that is incompatible with rail. Nowhere is this more evident than the farce that is the LA-SF HSR. The situation in Europe is quite different. Cities are much closer together, and they have been building railroads for close to two centuries. European style rail travel will never be viable in the US.
You're forgetting spewing emissions into cities which worsen childhood asthma and worsen development of dementia. Local emissions matter and EVs are much much better than ICE for urban air quality; this point matters if you care about kids with asthma and grandparents with dementia.
Further, you're totally ignoring how much greening of the grid will occur. Some places like Scotland, Iowa, Texas, california, Iceland, etc. Have very clean grids due to ample renewable power generation. Sure an EV in west virginia or Wyoming will be charging with dirtier electrons, but most EVs in the US are in California which has a ton of solar and more all the time.
How much of a head start does Tesla have over traditional ICE-based auto manufacturers? It feels like a 10-year head start from my uninformed opinion. It will take a lot of work to change engineering ops, supply chains, and deal with pensions.
> Tesla has ... like a 10-year head start from my uninformed opinion.
In some ways yes, in other ways the incumbents are a decade ahead. Both sides are racing to replicate the other's competence.
Tesla has just shipped their 1 millionth vehicle ever, after 17 years. (1)
VW ships around 11 million vehicles per year. Every year. (2)
Tesla needs the scale with reliable high build quality that VW has. VW needs to make more of them electric vehicles, and to that end make them comparable to Teslas.
Not really. German car companies buy most of the parts from suppliers. Those suppliers often have decades of experience with electric motors and batteries, see Bosch. If a supplier only does ICE components, they are out and the car company will find a new supplier.
There's a technology race on, and Tesla are clearly pretty aggressive in pursuit of innovation. I don't think the possibility of them having a lead over German companies as regards batteries is far-fetched at all.
Tesla seems to be somewhat ahead in technology - their range is currently higher than in the Porsches/Audis/... and the software seems quite a bit more advanced.
Tesla can use this to their advantage to sell more cars while the traditional automakers play catchup. But eventually they will get closer.
And Volkswagen alone can introduce dozens of new models every year, based on their building blocks (MEB) and numerous brands. There will be cars this year from 15.000€ (VW e.Up and friends) to 150.000€ (Porsche Taycan), and a few others in between. VW alone plans to introduce 70 electric models in the coming years.
How will Tesla, who did 4 models in ten years, compete with the sheer breadth of this market? Looking at what’s parked in the street, people choose lots of different types of cars, there’s no one-fits-all.
> How will Tesla, who did 4 models in ten years, compete with the sheer breadth of this market? Looking at what’s parked in the street, people choose lots of different types of cars, there’s no one-fits-all.
Imagine this argument:
"How will Apple, who only has one phone model, compete with the sheer breadth of this market? Looking at what’s in people's hands, people choose lots of different types of phones, there’s no one-fits-all."
Yet here we are. Having so many car models is frankly exhausting.
One of my silly little hobbies is trying to spec out cars online I dream of buying and everything becomes a chore after the first 10 seconds. Options that I don't want to think about being nickel-and-dimed for, features that should come standard but require an upgrade 'package' I dont want etc.
Until they change how they think about cars, Tesla will keep beating them in the market in the price ranges Tesla competes in. And shit will hit the fan if Tesla ever figures out a way to make a much cheaper car for the mass market
This. Cognitive load is largely ignored when it comes to these arguments on HN, which is ironic given the demographic's profession. Traditional manufacturers have made it so unnecessarily difficult to feel good about your purchase. They offer "choices" rather than choices. No matter what configuration I choose, I just know I'm being screwed over somehow, just not sure how exactly. You make a decision based on reviews of a particular model only to find there are 300 sub models and everything good you read is dependent on very specific trim choices. Choose the wrong suspension configuration and the car is far from what it could be.
You can't expect normal people to keep up with the minutae of every combination of trim levels to make the best decision. And we can't rely on dealerships for their expertise to get correct info because they have proven themselves to be scam artists over the decades. I have a hard time believing that companies could be this bad at organising and categorising their offerings unintentionally. This experience has to be intentional.
Tesla makes this process much simpler. I'm a motorcycle enthusiast, I don't care to keep up with boring car minutae. I need something that works, and is simple to deal with so I can focus on other aspects of life with its utility. Virtually every other big manufacturer lags behind Tesla in this department.
Yep, but they didn't launch with all 6. In fact, they added each one after tremendous market pressure (larger phones, multiple sizes, a one-handed budget-friendly model).
Tesla might very well have 10 cars in the future but for now, buying a Tesla is an easy decision:
1. Do I want a big sedan? Model S
2. Do I want a big suv? Model X
3. Do I want a smaller sedan? Model 3
4. Do I want a smaller suv/crossover/cuv? Model Y
And just like apple, you get very similar experience across the entire lineup. Autopilot, automatic updates, etc. Not "Well, you can buy the lexus/bimmer/merc if you want a more luxurious experience but the base model is honestly just okay so you should probably get a specced out mid-tier car instead unless you have the $$ to spend on a top trim"
Yes, Apple made a lot of noise about the original lineup being simple because that was all they had. Commercial pressures will always lead to lots of choices because that's how the company extracts the most value it can from each customer.
The problem everyone has is producing enough batteries. Tesla secured supply early when people thought they were crazy for wanting so much capacity. As it turns out, they need much more and they are building their own cells and factories. VW recently announced they have enough batteries to build ~1 million cars until 2023. Tesla might be hitting that as the annual production before that time. Other manufacturers are struggling to secure access to batteries and are supply limited even if they have interesting models that people want to buy (like some Honda or Hyundai models).
IMHO, most manufacturers need another five years to straighten out their supplies and then another five to scale down their legacy business. That's why you see the likes of Toyota talking about hybrids a lot because they simply can't scale up EV production right now even if they wanted to. Because they lack access to enough batteries.
Some manufacturers have wisened up. It looks like VW and GM have pretty solid plans and are expanding production as fast as they can. But they are talking about keeping up with and not overtaking Tesla. At least VWs CEO is.
It's a simple process conceptually but involves a lot of technology, some of which is patented, all of which involves access to a lot of lithium and other scarce materials and there's only so much of it on the market that isn't already locked up in contracts with people that got in early. And that's just the hardware; it involves software too. So no, it's neither simple nor a commodity.
It's still doable but just not in a hurry. Five years is not a lot of time to build this up from nothing. It took Tesla a decade plus to get where they are now.
A lot of manufacturers don't have the know-how, technology, factories, or access to raw material and are competing for contracts with the same sets of suppliers who are already shipping as fast as they can. The result is a lot of compliance and concept cars that were never even meant to be profitable and definitely not shipping in meaningful numbers because the manufacturer never planned to ship meaningful numbers and does not have the ability to fix that.
You can build huge factories to build batteries, but getting the raw materials becomes tricky when one manufacturer secured the supplies for that way ahead of you, and you'll end up in second place.
I haven't heard about Tesla/Panasonic securing any raw materials years in advance. Would that even be economically sensible? There's lots of investment in R&D to try to reduce certain ingredients (cobalt), but for now it's probably a level playing field, everybody is in the same position in fighting to procure the raw materials.
Most manufacturers with interesting EV models out aren’t able to make them in any appreciable volume, because they don’t have the battery supply. So they just basically do lots of paper launches, while Tesla competes by actually making a ton of the cars that they announce, extending their lead in supply and battery tech, and expanding one by one into their competitors’ popular segments. Model Y is coming for the enormous crossover SUV market, supposedly first deliveries on the 15th.
Which is hugely ironic given their old reputation for paper launches.
Tesla is the only company that has a Gigafactory producing batteries, and starting to build more.
A few others finally get it, and are starting to invest billions just like Tesla's Panasonic arrangement. However, Tesla will soon be moving to their next iteration, producing far more batteries faster, cheaper, and in much less space.
Actually Teslas vertical integration will be a disadvantage, I think. There are many independent battery manufacturers, and many new plants already in construction for a few years. China alone will produce in excess of 500GWh in 5 years, and Europe about 400GWh [0]. Batteries will be a commodity in the very near future, and the current supply crunches seem more to be about the metals needed, not the actual battery production.
Tesla will be able to buy those up as well, just like they are doing with CATL in China. As a battery manufacturer, your goal is to make and sell as many batteries as possible. Tesla wants a much larger number than the other players.
From what I read, Audi and Jaguar could have made a lot more cars but can't get enough batteries. The new e-Tron has been a big hit in Norway so far, but they can't deliver enough.
>> Audi and Jaguar could have made a lot more cars but can't get enough batteries.
This is exactly what Elon said was going to happen years ago: Car manufacturers do not have the capacity to build batteries in sufficient quantity and quality and will not for many years.
And this was obvious from the start. Tesla is in a unique situation where they basically build their own battery factories and get exclusive access to batteries. ICE manufacturers don't want to become battery manufacturers themselves but they also don't want to commit money to bootstrap a third party manufacturer (that may end up supplying their competition) if they can get away with selling ICE cars.
Whatever that one test says, the Porsche is still rated 100 miles under the Tesla in range and is twice as much in cost. That's not exactly tied in tech.
And that's just the Model S. Where is the competitor to the Model 3?
The Taycan is closer to the Tesla Roadster, except for the 3x range the roadster has. Similar price though.
Where Tesla is ahead is mostly battery production capacity and tech. This is what pretty much every manufacturer is struggling with. For Porsche this is not really that big of an issue since they're relatively low-volume (which is also how Tesla bootstrapped itself) - but for others this is a much bigger problem. Tesla can right now produce a lot more electric cars than Porsche could.
> One of the Model 3’s big selling points is its autonomous driving software
Is it really though?
It's not something I would ever want to use in its current form (which I understand is not safe enough to leave 'unattended', as it were, so so it seems to fall into a dangerous valley where it's autonomous enough that I don't have to pay full attention but also inadvisable not to)
I'm pretty sure the main selling points are all around the electrification - superior range to other electric competitors plus the running cost benefit of electric vehicles in urban areas with pollution taxation.
> But, while technically innovative, with a carbon-fiber body, the i3 is essentially a very expensive hatchback.
Yep. When people buy high performance or luxury cars, part of the mystique is that it is the latest evolution of some sort of classic. It's going to be hard for BMW et al to position electric vehicles as belonging to any existing lineage. This puts their brand at risk unless they can figure out how to make a remarkable electric car. But nobody really knows what that would be.
This is storytelling on the part of the automakers, so let me propose 2:
1) Porsche’s got 120 years of work since their first electric car [0]
2) I remember pulling the leg of some Tesla fans a long while ago (maybe when the first roadster came out) about how the “no radiator, front trunk, smooth underbody” sounded a lot like the air-cooled VWs we’ve all been enjoying since the 1930s.
They will just put a badge on it. I remember there was a survey of BMW owners a few years ago, most of the respondents didn't know their car was rear wheel drive.
I often wonder what would have happened to the American auto industry if the US Gov’t had not bailed them out. Would we have multiple Tesla-like electric powered automobile companies today? Probably not. But just a thought.
Keep in mind that the government bailed Tesla out too. Tesla took a hefty government loan before the model S roll-out. (It has been repaid now). So we might have had exactly zero Tesla like electric powered car companies today.
The government did not "bail out Tesla". They lent them $465 million, and Tesla paid it all back, plus interest, ten years before it was due. [1]
The government DID paid out GM, Chrysler and Ford. I.e. it lent $80.5 billion dollars and $10 billion will never be repaid. [2] Taxpayers paid for that so those companies can keep making private profits.
I wish this kind of misinformation would die, because it's so easy to google and it's factual.
A loan that the government makes when (1) it is not their business to make these types of loans and (2) the private market is not willing to make this type of loan is a bailout. So yes they did bail out Tesla. You can argue that the bailouts of the big three were far bigger and much more egregious and you would be absolutely right. But you cannot argue that tesla would have benefited if there were no bailouts, because they received a bailout and they would not exist now if they hadn't received one.
Note that the government didn't "bail out" Ford either:
The Ford Motor Company didn't need the funds since it had already cut costs. But it asked to be included so it wouldn't suffer by competing with companies who already had government subsidies. (from your link).
I can't find anything about the $10B that won't be repaid. Do you have further details?
>> Note that the government didn't "bail out" Ford either:
> OK sure. The government gave a private company taxpayer money that didn't need it so it's profits wouldn't suffer.
Agreed. Same as Tesla (in your words: "The government did not "bail out Tesla". They lent them $465 million, and Tesla paid it all back, plus interest, ten years before it was due.")
> Last sentance in the first paragraph of my link says "In the end, taxpayers lost $10.2 billion." (with a footnote to [0])
Thanks. Ironically that reference says "While the auto industry rescue resulted in a cost of $9.3 billion to the government". I guess maybe they are correcting for inflation?
> Agreed. Same as Tesla (in your words: "The government did not "bail out Tesla". They lent them $465 million, and Tesla paid it all back, plus interest, ten years before it was due.")
No, not the same at all. One was a loan (which was paid back plus interest), while the other was a gift that will never be paid back.
> No, not the same at all. One was a loan (which was paid back plus interest), while the other was a gift that will never be paid back.
From your linked article:
On June 23, 2009, Ford received a $5.9 billion loan from the Energy Department's Advanced Technology Vehicles Manufacturing program.... Ford will repay this loan by 2022.
If Tesla went bankrupt, would all the other manufacturers just stop producing / developing electric cars? Are they doing it now just out of fear of losing the market to Tesla?
If that were the case, for the sake of humanity and the environment, we should be obliged to support Tesla exclusively, otherwise we will never free ourselves from diesel / gas based pollution machines.
Sort of depends on demand. Extremely cheap petrol - which we just got courtesy of OPEC+ - and a recession - courtesy of COVID-19 - are not exactly a hot market for new vehicles, much less luxury EV vehicles.
On the bright side, this might be excellent for the environment because the best car for the environment is not a new car, it's to continue using the car you already have.
EVs still don’t make profits at the prices people are willing to pay.
They are building them because of government requirements. Some of them are instead buying credits from Tesla, so if Tesla stopped producing they would have to make more.
Personally, I don’t think the major move happening right now is from gasoline cars to EVs. The major move is from cars to no cars. Tesla will not be a great trillion dollar company in this scenario. It will be just another car manufacturer.
Not really. The trend is to not owning cars if you’re a yuppie. People still need to get around in cars of some kind and Tesla is fairly well positioned for electric fleet sales of ride share or rental vehicles.
Moving away from cars sounds nice, but we have billions of km of roads and millions of houses already built to support a car-centric economy. It's not going to be a quick fix; you can't just "git co" new transportation and housing layouts. I wouldn't expect this to become a serious problem for Tesla for a couple decades, although the car market will start to cool off. But EVs are already more suitable for city driving thanks to regenerative braking, simpler transmissions and reduced air pollution.
And panning over Europe with Google satellite view suggests that Europe is also populated with plenty of people living a suburban lifestyle. Cars are going to be the predominant mode of transportation indefinitely.
That's a tremendously short-sighted view.
Luxembourg recently made public transport free to use in an attempt to reduce traffic.
Privately owned cars and private transport will become a relic of the past soon enough.
Claims like "Cars are going to be the predominant mode of transportation indefinitely" sound an awful lot like "I think there is a world market for maybe five computers." (Thomas Watson, president of IBM, 1943) or "Nuclear-powered vacuum cleaners will probably be a reality within ten years." (Alex Lewyt, president of Lewyt vacuum company, 1955).
Just like Apple killed Nokia with a single product within two years, owning a car might become obsolete for the vast majority of people.
It's also the most US-American-centric things to say: there are A LOT of countries where owning a car just isn't the norm - even in rural areas (1.35 BILLION Indians would agree, for example).
I don't agree that it's shortsighted. Switching to mass transit for everything would be a regression. There is no way to make cars obsolete by replacing them with something functionally inferior.
No cars? How do you leave a city? I could imagine a world filled with an automated uber-like service of self-driving cars, but what would replace cars for going to work in a small town?
Depends on where you are, but in the Netherlands it'd be bicycle within the city, and trains between cities.
For me it's only the camping holidays in summer that I really need a car for, and renting one for that costs close to what owning an old car costs, so I still have one. But I'm constantly considering getting rid of it.
I went to pretty rural places in the Netherlands. You take a train to a town, and then get on a bus and wham, you are at some castle next to the ocean in a small tourist village.
Doesnt catch me off guard, europeans love modern, they love high tech, they love american brands as status symbols and they are very, very environmentally aware. Even if the Tesla isnt all that better than the really small engine's already in most cars here, it is perceived as a social statement and lifestyle. Not to mention it is unique compared to all the AUDI/VW/BMW's on the road here.
I told my dealer 2years ago that I'm going to postpone replacing my kia cee'd diesel till electric become available in that class. We aren't there yet, but it's promising, now Kia/Hyundai do have couple of BEV models.
IMO, Tesla needs to branch into 80% complete coachbuilder models and in a roundabout way, have a dealership in any town (or country) and shakeup the industry a little more for sh!TS and giggles.
Once their production hits its stride and has a surplus of models, they can bring oldworld craftsmanship to a modern canvas.
With the limited model lineup, who wouldn`t want a bespoke Tesla personalized just for them.
I would still pick the 7-speed dogleg manual in the Vantage S, but a personalized Tesla would be a close second.
What I don't conflate with "Iphone moment" is that European car companies are not Nokias and there are no Elop style saboteurs in them. All of them are used to "fight to bitter end" mentality, even though they haven't had such a moment when they really needed to for a very long time.
I wonder whether Tesla will survive the current global economic contagion. They are essentially a luxury novelty vehicle manufacturer that relies heavily on subsidies and virtue signaling consumers of which there are a finite amount.
They are the WeWork of the car industry and have interesting financials.
Despite all this they have been a terrific r&d and mvp creator for potential future electric vehicle production, although there is much work to be done scaling electrical grids and vehicle recycling IMO
EVs are in a segment with high discretionary spend. Choices in discretionary spending are notoriously bound up in non-rational choices: I could invest in diamonds, or snort it as coke, or fly to the bahamas in a helicopter is totally different lifestyle choices to "I need to get to Walmart at 3am for diapers, and I cannot afford to pay for more than basic AirConditioning"
When EVs are in the segment of rational-decision bound purchases, when they are "boring" I will deem them to have succeeded.
As long as the competition is Fiskar, not VW, and Not the Ioniq, or other Japanese low-end EV, its not baked yet.
The low-end EV have to get about 50% more efficiency and drop price about 30%. There really is a sweet spot in most people's disposable income and on-road costs and range anxiety (also a highly irrational place btw) which is just around the corner:
under $20,000 in any local economy over 300km range in real-life chargeable for usable amounts (10%? 20%?) in under 15min