EVs

nsaspook

Joined Aug 27, 2009
16,330
https://arstechnica.com/cars/2024/1...re-puts-kibosh-on-sale-of-3300-fisker-oceans/
Bankrupt Fisker says it can’t migrate its EVs to a new owner’s server
That was the plan until the end of last week, at least. Last Friday evening, Fisker informed American Lease that the Oceans "cannot, as a technical matter, be 'ported' from the Fisker server to which the vehicles are currently linked to a distinct server owned and/or controlled by" American Lease.

American Lease says it "cannot overstate the significance of this unwelcome news," particularly since it had already paid Fisker the vast majority of the agreed price. American Lease is also more than a little unhappy that the news was delivered a few days before a court hearing scheduled for today and says it's unclear how long Fisker has known that its cars cannot be ported to a new server.
 

Thread Starter

crutschow

Joined Mar 14, 2008
38,522
So, in spite of (mostly) everyone's excellent advice to the contrary, I've gone full electric and just leased a Hyundai Ionic 5 (since this is somewhat of an experiment I didn't want to be tied to it for more than 2 years).

I had two main reasons to get a new EV:
One - I wanted a car with all the latest safety features, since at my age, my driving skills are not quite as sharp as the used to be.
Two - I wanted a practical car (SUV) that was likely more fun and interesting to drive than the typical infernal-combustion engine powered ones (the economics or possible reliability issues were lower on my priority list).

It's a blast to drive with instant acceleration and, of course, no shift bumps or hesitation. By far, the fastest accelerating car I've ever possessed.
And the main sound is just the tire road noise.

One neat feature is that you can get instant interior heat or cooling without the engine running, so no delay in getting heat until the engine warms up (which used to occur about the time I got to the grocery store on a cold day), or having to keep the engine running while waiting in the drive-thru line on a hot day.

I'm also looking forward to never having to go out to gas up (with my fueling station now in the garage), get annoyed when the price of gas suddenly jumps a buck a gallon, or having to get the engine oil changed, or take a smog check.

I calculated that, if I charge at home, it will cost me ≈U$0.05 per mile of travel to charge the battery with my off-peak energy rates of U$0.12 per kilowatt-hour.
I'm just going to use the supplied 120V charger (12A max.) from my garage AC outlet, as I don't normally drive very far (usually <30 miles, one-way).
Since I'm retired, off-peak charging (that's 7pm to 1pm the next day on week-days, and all day on weekends) will be more than sufficient for the few short trips I take in a week, or even with an occasional longer trip.
I added a smart plug to the 120V outlet, so I can limit the charge time to the off-peak hours.
And I added a smoke detector in the garage connected to my alarm system, just in case.

As some point we will be taking the 390 mile trip from Denver, CO to Santa Fe, NM, which will involve a couple stops for a fast recharge, which should be interesting.
I conceivably could do it with one-stop, since the Ionic has about a 250 mile range, but that could be pushing it, depending on the distance between charging stations.
Interestingly, the Ionic came with 2 year free charging at Electrify America charging stations, and there are several on the way to Santa Fe.

So I'll add posts of anything new as my experiment continues. :cool:
 
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MikeA

Joined Jan 20, 2013
447
or having to keep the engine running while waiting in the drive-thru line on a hot day.
I found this feature incredibly pleasant after getting a Toyota hybrid. The A/C compressor is variable speed DC drive and never turns off when stopped.

Now, when driving gasoline only vehicle with engine shut-off, even very luxury ones, they feel like dinosaurs in comparison when you get that warm stale smelling air at every traffic light.
 

Thread Starter

crutschow

Joined Mar 14, 2008
38,522
Short upate:
Neat feature I just discovered -- The Iconq 5 has selective degrees of regenerative braking such that you can adjust it to basically drive in normal traffic without ever hitting the brakes (expect for emergency or very rapid braking of course).
The more the accelerator is released, the faster it slows down, and when you fully release it, the car stops and stays stationary.
I drove it to the store and back while having to stop at some traffic lights, and never once touched the brakes.
 

Thread Starter

crutschow

Joined Mar 14, 2008
38,522
After driving my EV some more, I've decided it's the most responsive and fun to drive of any other vehicle I've owned, besides the motorcycles I've had (which I no longer do).
I actually look forward to driving it as opposed to the gas cars I've owned, which have mostly been just a convenient mode of transportation.

Too bad Baker Electric didn't have better batteries available way back then to better compete with the gas engines.
(I read that even Henry Ford bought a Baker Electric for his wife to drive until Ford finally offered a self-starter option on the Model T in 1919).
 

nsaspook

Joined Aug 27, 2009
16,330
After driving my EV some more, I've decided it's the most responsive and fun to drive of any other vehicle I've owned, besides the motorcycles I've had (which I no longer do).
I actually look forward to driving it as opposed to the gas cars I've owned, which have mostly been just a convenient mode of transportation.

Too bad Baker Electric didn't have better batteries available way back then to better compete with the gas engines.
(I read that even Henry Ford bought a Baker Electric for his wife to drive until Ford finally offered a self-starter option on the Model T in 1919).
It's so good that it's hard to understand why governments are (trying to and failing) mandating the EV for all of us.

Let the market decide.
https://www.carpro.com/blog/a-look-back-to-my-thoughts-on-electric-cars-from-2017

  • I pointed out in 2017 that there were many answered questions about EVs, and I contend that all those questions and even more of them exist today. In spite of billions spent by the government, the public charger situation is still dire. I experienced that personally this past weekend myself. One charging station I visited had 4 chargers of which 3 were broken. This is not uncommon. We know now that temperatures are wreaking havoc with some electrics in extreme hot or cold. What I did not see in 2017 was the risk of fire with electric vehicles. There are numerous reports coming out of Florida about the risks of saltwater starting fires in EVs during recent hurricanes, and other cases I’ve brought you about parked EVs catching fire. I predicted by 2023, there would be a glut of electric vehicles today, and wow, did that come true. Incentives are huge and dealers have by and large quit ordering electric cars because they have too many.

  • Finally, I advised automakers to slow down on electric vehicles. Clearly, they did not listen. I’ve called out Ford, GM, and Stellantis this year about pushing electrics too hard and urged them to let the market decide what people wanted to buy. You just can’t push a market that does not exist. The other issue I did not foretell was the massive depreciation people who bought EVs would suffer. Some lose as much as 50% in the first year, and I’ve backed that up in this newsletter with auction examples.
 

Thread Starter

crutschow

Joined Mar 14, 2008
38,522
It's so good that it's hard to understand why governments are (trying to and failing) mandating the EV for all of us.
No need for sarcasm.
I'm just relating my initial experience with the one I have, not whether they should be mandated.
It's way more pleasant and fun to drive than any other vehicles I've owned (expect for the motorcycles I've had).

I'm well aware of the negatives of EV's (as you have so enthusiastically documented, along with patting yourself on the back for your great EV prognostications), just as I'm aware of the many negatives of the infernal combustion vehicles.

I have no problem with letting the market decide (as I think it will).
 

joeyd999

Joined Jun 6, 2011
6,305
No need for sarcasm.
I'm just relating my initial experience with the one I have, not whether they should be mandated.
It's way more pleasant and fun to drive than any other vehicles I've owned (expect for the motorcycles I've had).

I'm well aware of the negatives of EV's (as you have so enthusiastically documented, along with patting yourself on the back for your great EV prognostications), just as I'm aware of the many negatives of the infernal combustion vehicles.

I have no problem with letting the market decide (as I think it will).
I think the point is that you may not have bought one if you had to pay the full market price for the car.

Instead, I paid a portion of the price for you.

Again, you're welcome.
 

nsaspook

Joined Aug 27, 2009
16,330
No need for sarcasm.
I'm just relating my initial experience with the one I have, not whether they should be mandated.
It's way more pleasant and fun to drive than any other vehicles I've owned (expect for the motorcycles I've had).

I'm well aware of the negatives of EV's (as you have so enthusiastically documented, along with patting yourself on the back for your great EV prognostications), just as I'm aware of the many negatives of the infernal combustion vehicles.

I have no problem with letting the market decide (as I think it will).
There is a need for sarcasm (to humorously convey thinly veiled disapproval or scorn) when so much effort has been spent as a wealth transfer to the well-off using our tax dollars (most manufacturers are still losing tens of thousands of dollars per EV) to push the EV market on people that don't have a desire, need or being poor, with no money in the bank for them.

It's not me to you personally, it's the market patting itself on the back for waiting a bit to see how things workout. It's in the long term good to let some of the IMO grifters in the current EV market fail. Hopefully that will put some sanity back into the ludicrous EV goals (mandates in reality with federal 100% Zero-Emission Vehicle Acquisitions by 2035 via executive orders) currently being pushed.
 

nsaspook

Joined Aug 27, 2009
16,330
That's a political response.
You quoted me and answered my post directly, so how was it not personal?
Sometimes your hubris gets in the way of the message.
Hubris is a microcontroller operating environment, that I don't personally use. :eek:

It's not about you as I don't care what you do with your own money and am glad you have something that fits your needs as I liked your first post about the lease as soon as I saw it.
 

WBahn

Joined Mar 31, 2012
32,871
While this might be heavy on the EV side of the house right now, it really isn't an EV phenomenon. It is a common situation in new (and late-year) purchases and leases of all kinds of cars. There can be a significant depreciation the moment you drive a new car off the lot, so you start out with negative equity that can take years to catch up to. If you sell, turn-in, or get the car repo'ed before then, you are on the hook for that negative equity. The exact mechanism that the article describes with dealers adding the negative equity of the car being traded in onto the loan for the next car makes the situation immensely worse. There are people that just have to have a new car every two or three years (even some that just have to have a new car every year) and they just keep trading it in and getting the residual loan balance carried over to the new car. They only look at whether they can make the monthly payment. When they finally are forced to confront that they can't afford it anymore, it's not uncommon for them to discover that if they if they sell the car to get out from under the payments that they are still on the hook for a residual balance that is actually more than the original sale price of the car because they carried such a huge balance over from their prior loan.

The solution, of course, is trivially simple. Don't buy cars you can't afford. If you have to take out a loan, you can't afford it.
 

nsaspook

Joined Aug 27, 2009
16,330
https://techcrunch.com/2024/10/30/r...s-in-car-buttons-are-an-anomaly/?guccounter=1
Rivian’s chief software officer says in-car buttons are ‘an anomaly’
The trend of big touchscreens in cars has left many yearning for the not-so-distant days when most user interactions happened with physical buttons. But Rivian’s chief software officer Wassym Bensaid believes using buttons in a car is an “anomaly.”

“It’s a bug. It’s not a feature,” Bensaid said Wednesday at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024. “Ideally, you would want to interact with your car through voice. The problem today is that most voice assistants are just broken.”
No, buttons are not an "anomaly", touch screen or physical.
Buttons are the established engineering solution for a number of _very_ good reasons. This person seems to be clueless about good physical design.

Pulling/pushing the trigger/button vs saying 'pull the trigger' in a emergency during maybe a high noise environment, something as mundane as adjusting climate controls when the baby is sleeping or listening to loud music when cruising with your friends.
 

joeyd999

Joined Jun 6, 2011
6,305
https://techcrunch.com/2024/10/30/r...s-in-car-buttons-are-an-anomaly/?guccounter=1
Rivian’s chief software officer says in-car buttons are ‘an anomaly’


No, buttons are not an "anomaly", touch screen or physical.
Buttons are the established engineering solution for a number of _very_ good reasons. This person seems to be clueless about good physical design.

Pulling/pushing the trigger/button vs saying 'pull the trigger' in a emergency during maybe a high noise environment, something as mundane as adjusting climate controls when the baby is sleeping or listening to loud music when cruising with your friends.
Physical buttons and switches. Only!

Everything else is a distraction.
 
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