[HN Gopher] I'm ready to trade in my electric car
___________________________________________________________________
I'm ready to trade in my electric car
Author : bookofjoe
Score : 47 points
Date : 2023-04-23 17:18 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.latimes.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.latimes.com)
| the__alchemist wrote:
| I had assumed the intent is that until infrastructure changes,
| electric cars are for people who live in houses, and have 2+
| cars. You use the electric car to commute, make errands etc, and
| use the other car to travel etc.
| Gibbon1 wrote:
| I read a report from an insurance outfit. People that live in
| urban areas drive about 6000 miles a year average vs
| suburbanites that drive 12000. That matches my living in SF
| experience. Bonus about 1/3 of that 6000 miles was long
| distance.
|
| So I think not having a dedicated charger in the city isn't as
| much of a problem as one might think. Probably can charge here
| and there or every two weeks if needed. Hassle yes. But living
| in a city with a car is a hassle.
| obloid wrote:
| Once newer high density batteries make it into cars and we can
| get 500+ mile ranges I think it will help with a lot of these
| concerns. When your car's range is longer than most people are
| willing or able to drive in a single day then you can charge
| overnight at your destination without worrying about finding
| charging stations on the road.
| jaclaz wrote:
| But you still need finding charging stations at your
| destination.
|
| This sounds a lot like an intentionally exagerated article, but
| the underlying issue might be real, if the (publicly available)
| charging stations do not increase in number according to the
| increase of number of EV's circulating there will be problems.
|
| On the other hand if many more charging stations are created
| than what is needed, there might be a waste of resources.
|
| I don't think that is an easy task to "balance" (at a
| state/country level) the amount of infrastructures as a
| function of EV's increasing adoption and - besides the numbers
| - deciding where exactly they are to be placed is another non
| trivial problem, there is the concrete risk of having many
| little used or unused charging stations while having queues in
| many others.
| ericd wrote:
| Thick extension cable and mobile charger on a 120V outlet has
| been generally enough for us at eg cabins.
| lm28469 wrote:
| > and we can get 500+ mile ranges
|
| Huge waste when the average driver goes for < 40 miles a day
|
| The 200+ miles of range are more than enough for most people,
| lugging 1000%+ of the average range "just in case" is crazy,
| epecially given the weight of these things
| whitepoplar wrote:
| Eh, let the customer decide what is/isn't wasteful.
| lm28469 wrote:
| It worked so well in the past...
| xrd wrote:
| Last week found myself in Palm Beach with my hybrid mini. Driving
| down was almost out of gas but thought, I'll just get there, meet
| my partner and buy gas later.
|
| Next day found a place to charge but only have 17 miles on a good
| day. But assumed that would be enough to get me to a gas station.
|
| But the gas shortages because of flooding in port everglades
| extended even up to Palm Beach. They only got four inches of rain
| not the two plus feet that they got in Miami and no flooding.
| But, still were affected. I went to a dozen gas stations and
| called a few, and they had no clue when they would have gas.
|
| We circled around different charging stations within ten or
| fifteen miles heading north. It was crazy.
|
| We checked again a few hours later and there was a station that
| had gas.
|
| Feels like climate change might make it complicated for both EV
| only and gas only. Hybrid seems like the right option but even
| that was complicated. My mini doesn't use the same plugs as the
| Tesla chargers. Oh well.
| anecdotal1 wrote:
| Get a TeslaTap. I used one with my Leaf so I could charge off
| my Tesla charger at home.
|
| http://www.umc-j1772.com/index.php?route=product/product&pro...
|
| When I sold my Leaf and moved across the country I gave mine to
| a guy charging his Leaf near a supercharger. He was so excited
| cypherpunks01 wrote:
| Can he use this at the Supercharger? I didn't think that was
| possible.
| xrd wrote:
| It says no, but this is still really useful. We got
| multiple chargers that didn't work because of the plug, not
| the voltage.
| shrimp_emoji wrote:
| She traded it in for an Infiniti QX80
| https://youtu.be/31csVVqWzSM?t=3519
| bookofjoe wrote:
| https://archive.ph/xnMG8
| turtleyacht wrote:
| Author complains of issues related to charging stations.
| bookofjoe wrote:
| I like this one-line summary. I'm seeing more and more of
| these on HN. At first I went into "Get off my lawn" mode,
| i.e., "Just read the article!" But then I thought about the
| fact that for one reason or another -- paywalls/technical
| issues/time constraints/language barriers/etc. -- many people
| can't, or can't at the moment. These brief descriptions serve
| many.
| turtleyacht wrote:
| I'm grateful you post the non paywalled links. I could use
| a non-JS browser, or disable JS via extension, etc--but
| it's just easier in the moment.
|
| If I leave a comment, I can look in /threads more easily
| than /new or navigating to profile > upvoted.
| avalys wrote:
| Yes, electric cars are not viable unless you can charge at home.
| Meaning, in your garage / driveway.
|
| This means they're not that useful for people who live in
| apartments, and most people who live in a city like SF and park
| on the street(*).
|
| They're also not viable for road trips. Teslas can make it work
| but you still have to be willing for your trip to take 20 - 30%
| longer than it would with a gas car.
|
| For people who have a garage or driveway, and don't need to take
| a road trip that often (or can own a second car for that
| purpose), they're fantastic! A better experience in almost every
| way compared to a gas car.
| kbos87 wrote:
| I have a Tesla, no home charging, and I can't underscore how
| much of a non-issue it is. I charge once or twice a week at a
| shopping plaza I'd be visiting anyway.
|
| When I roadtrip (I regularly do 150-250 mile road trips around
| New England), I'm usually stopping at a supercharger within a
| mile of the highway at a location equivalent to one I would
| have stopped anyway. Most times I only need to charge for 20
| minutes to finish my trip with plenty of range to spare. I
| would have stopped at some point anyway so it's adding 5-15
| minutes max on a 3 hour trip.
|
| Obviously location and situation dependent, but for me it
| couldn't be any less of an issue.
| akmarinov wrote:
| I charge about once a couple of weeks when using it around town
| on a Tesla supercharger while shopping in a mall.
|
| Having a garage is definitely the best way, but I wouldn't say
| it's necessary. Driving it like an ICE car where you go to the
| gas station to fill up every couple of weeks is perfectly
| acceptable.
|
| And on longer journeys, yeah it's annoying to have to stop
| every 2ish hours, but I find that by the time I get back from
| the bathroom, I usually have enough to continue.
|
| Is it perfect? No. Is it an adequate substitution for ICE -
| definitely.
| stryker7001 wrote:
| we had a chevy bolt, lived in condo, parked in a parking garage
| in Cow Hollow in SF. Had no problems charging either at work,
| or at a charging station down by the marina. We drove it to
| Yosemite a couple times, drove to Paso, and Napa all for fun.
| Got rid of it because we didn't need a car while working from
| home.
|
| Long story short, it was useful and viable even though we
| didn't have charging.
| noogle wrote:
| The question is not whether you can make it work, but how
| much effort do you have to put into using an EV.
|
| Vehicles are bought to make life more convenient. To
| introduce constraints and time waste you can just use public
| transportation.
| frumper wrote:
| You're not using effortless public transportation to take
| day trips to Napa or Yosemite. Not having a car has
| constraints too.
| dade_ wrote:
| One day, the infrastructure will arrive, and I think gov'ts
| should worry 80% about infrastructure, and 20% EV incentives.
| Until then, PHEVs are often a great choice in the current (pun
| unintentional) situation.
|
| Also, I wish all level 2 chargers cost money, a reasonable rate
| of course. Tesla owners are part of the problem. A large
| contingent of them are annoying cheap bastards. Typical parking
| lot: Paid level 3 charging, vacant. Free level 2 charging beside
| it, filled with Teslas.
|
| Unlike this author, I did research before buying an electric car
| and determined PHEV was by far the best choice for me. It was
| 2016, the car has been perfect for me and literally the most
| trouble free, and low maintenance vehicle I've owned.
| gumby wrote:
| What is the reason for a failing charger? When one fails do all
| the ones in an installation fail (common failure?)
|
| I wonder if the cars could help here: if you plug in and are
| unable to charge the car could report that a la waze. Though
| there is a possible false positive if your credit card is
| declined.
| TheLoafOfBread wrote:
| From my experience it is often software incompatibility between
| charger and a car. I can often see that charging company will
| charge my debit card for charging credit (20-50EUR) and then
| charger will refuse to charge my car.
|
| Good luck getting those money back, loser.
| wcoenen wrote:
| That's just the "pre-authorization" on your card. It gets
| released again when you end the charging session, minus the
| charging cost for the kWh you used. Same thing as gas
| stations where you use your card before using the fuel pump.
|
| If you didn't end the charging session (e.g. by pressing a
| button or presenting the same card again), you may have given
| the next person a free charge?
| jmclnx wrote:
| This is the chicken and egg issue. No one will build and/or
| maintain chargers unless there are lots of EVs. No one will buy
| EVs unless charging stations are easy to find/use.
|
| I do not know why the US Gov did not choose to subsidize existing
| Gas Stations to build these. Instead they are putting these in
| places that are close to impossible to find.
|
| I have said this before, until charging is as convenient and fast
| as getting gas, EVs will only be niche.
| iknowstuff wrote:
| Charging is more convenient than going to a gas station to get
| gas. 90% of charging happens at home.
| jmclnx wrote:
| Maybe in Calif, the whole world does _not_ live in Calif.
|
| The closest charging station to me is about 20/30 miles away.
| So EVs are out of the question. And this is true or even
| worse for many places.
| iknowstuff wrote:
| A charger being 20 miles out does not make EVs unviable,
| because all you need is an outlet at home or at work.
| jmclnx wrote:
| Not if you live in an apartment :)
| avalys wrote:
| Charging at home, means charging in your driveway.
| jseliger wrote:
| I've had an EV for two years and in that time alone charging
| infrastructure has massively expanded. Just the growth of
| Electrify America has been phenomenal. Beyond that, charging
| stations are easy to find and use: PlugShare is probably the
| most useful app.
| vegetablepotpie wrote:
| > That means mapping out charging stations in a comprehensive,
| thoughtful way ... not leaving it to the whims of the commercial
| sector, ... It will require cities to develop plans for how and
| where to locate public chargers
|
| I spoke at public hearing last year in favor of an EV ordinance
| that my city passed. I believe that if we are to involve
| government with EV adoption, which is necessary, we need to be
| prepared for backlash and controversy, and it will require non-
| insignificant effort to arrive at consensus required for
| government action. After the ordinance was passed I exited the
| council chambers and I was approached by a middle aged woman who
| identified her self as a property developer. She told me how
| unfair the code amendments were because of how much it was going
| to cost her business. I told her that solutions like this are
| necessary because people are concerned with range anxiety. She
| responded that she was concerned with "regulatory anxiety" and
| the encroachment of government, and briefly grabbed my shoulder
| during her tirade. After that I quietly and uneventfully left the
| area.
|
| I realized that if people are edging into getting physical with a
| small city ordinance that requires developers to provide limited
| charging stations for EVs, our civilization is woefully
| unprepared to address climate change, which will require reforms
| to many institutions, and the retirement of others. We need to
| make big changes in a lot of areas, and I don't see the
| leadership, technical expertise, and outreach required to do
| that.
| DangitBobby wrote:
| Serious question, why is this person bearing the cost? If it's
| society's problem, why does it seem like it's actually her
| problem?
| mkozlows wrote:
| A thing to think about is: Do we in fact need top-down
| government mandates to do this? People with gas cars have range
| anxiety, too, and you need to be strategic about placement of
| gas stations to ensure that they don't get stuck in a place
| where they can't charge. And yet... this turns out to be a
| problem that largely solved itself without a centralizing
| authority, because "people want to buy gas/electricity for
| their car, and they want to buy it more in certain places, and
| there is money to be made by serving that demand" is where the
| market does well.
|
| Market failures are real, the need for regulation is real
| (there are, quite sensibly, piles of regulations around how you
| can store the tanks of toxic chemicals needed to fuel a legacy
| gas car, and there will be regulations around EV charging as
| well), but in terms of making sure EV charging places exist
| where needed, this is probably a place where just "get out of
| the way, and don't let zoning regulations block necessary
| construction" gets you 90%+ of the way to where you need to be.
| sp332 wrote:
| Threatening someone's livelihood is not a good way to get them
| on your side. It has a real "some of you may die, but that's a
| risk I'm willing to take" feel. On the other hand, if you
| really are willing to leave these people behind in your march
| of progress, be prepared to defend tourself.
| johnea wrote:
| A) Live in a place where you can charge at home B) How often do
| we really go "road tripping around the state"? Rent a car for
| these trips...
| TheLoafOfBread wrote:
| A) 50% of EU citizens lives in apartment
|
| B) When ICE cars are banned, then what? Get a horse?
| bandersnitch wrote:
| [dead]
| ShakataGaNai wrote:
| The problem here is one of someone not doing their research,
| electric charging challenges, and apparently not knowing how maps
| work.
|
| Is CCS charging unreliable today? Yes, compared to gas station or
| Tesla Super Chargers... CCS has a ways to go. They are the weak
| link.
|
| The author doesn't discuss ANYTHING positive, like how its super
| easy to have a fully charged vehicle all the time because you
| charge at home overnight. This was just a rant on a few specific
| points.
|
| Speaking of, plugshare? Is very handy and very decent. Yes,
| sometimes chargers are hidden away in slightly odd locations, but
| plugshare has generally had _VERY_ accurate maps. Zoom in and you
| will see the pins on the map on are on a specific side of the
| map, or in a very certain location of the parking lot - and in
| reality that 's where the chargers are.
|
| The descriptions also say things like "I-80 exit 156. Four
| stations along the side of the building.". And the comments will
| include useful statements like "April 21, 2023 - Still only one
| (Amelia) of the four is working.". Do you want to read sub-
| optimal news like that? No, but at least you can plan
| accordingly.
|
| Also also, Last road trip I did in my Tesla Model Y (about 250mi
| each way), I stopped more for food/drink/bathroom/etc than I did
| for charging. Yes, I probably could have drive the entire way
| (one way) on an ICE vehicle without stopping for gas, where I did
| have to stop for a charge... but that was an extra 10mn or so.
| Wooptydo. Keep in mind that during the average week (of non-road
| tripping) I stop at a gas station exactly never, so I'd say I
| still stop less with an EV overall.
|
| And yes, if you a doing a lot of long road trips. Going places a
| little more off the grid. Or generally hate stopping because
| you're ok peeing in a bottle... then please stick with ICE for
| now. EV's are still in the early adopter phase and they don't
| work great for everyone. Apartment dwellers are, for example,
| very hit or miss (if their garage doesn't have EV charging, it's
| not a great experience).
| kwhitefoot wrote:
| CCS is just the connector. Almost all European Tesla chargers
| now have CCS connectors, they are not less reliable than the
| previous Type-2 connector.
| freetime2 wrote:
| > The author doesn't discuss ANYTHING positive
|
| The article begins with:
|
| > I love how I never have to buy gas. I love how it glides
| quietly up the street. I love that it has so much pickup that I
| can easily blow past gas-powered muscle cars if I want to. I
| love having stickers that allow me to drive solo in the HOV
| lanes. I love that routine maintenance consists of little more
| than rotating the tires.
|
| The author states repeatedly that they love their EV, but the
| inconvenience/uncertainty around charging on longer road trips
| is enough to be a deal breaker for them.
|
| > And yes, if you a doing a lot of long road trips... then
| please stick with ICE for now.
|
| I feel like the tone of your comment is overly dismissive of
| the author's complaints, considering that you essentially end
| up agreeing with them at the end.
| MilnerRoute wrote:
| Specifically, the author's worried there aren't enough charging
| stations to travel all around the state of California.
|
| I know there's efforts to build more charging stations, so that
| may improve somewhat. But my question is how do you charge an
| electric car if you live in a small apartment building? If we're
| all going to drive electric cars in the future, we're going to
| need viable ways for everybody to charge them.
| OnionBlender wrote:
| My apartment building has charging parking spots but they cost
| an additional $50 per month, which is more than the money I
| would save on gas.
| barbazoo wrote:
| I'd probably still do it. It's not just about money and these
| cost will probably get cheaper in the future.
| tomatocracy wrote:
| Presumably the chargers are owned by a private company. Why
| would they lower their charges in future?
| cinntaile wrote:
| For most people it is just about the money.
| mixmastamyk wrote:
| Time spent at gas stations should be factored. One half hour
| per month would roughly equal that. Not to mention one less
| thing to worry about.
| linguae wrote:
| Indeed. I ultimately ended up purchasing a Toyota Mirai (a
| hydrogen fuel cell vehicle) for this reason; my apartment has
| no charging units and my landlord has no plans to install them.
| There is public charging about an eight minute walk away from
| me, however, which I did consider when evaluating my car
| purchase options last summer.
| iknowstuff wrote:
| Wow a Mirai owner in the wild. Hydrogen cars are hilarious!
| https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5lUkOHnjLsM
| weebull wrote:
| You were worried about electric charging infrastructure, and
| so bought a hydrogen car instead.
|
| I'm speechless.
| linguae wrote:
| It's actually working out; my job is located near hydrogen
| fuel stations, and while there were hiccups with the supply
| back in December and January, I've had no problems
| refueling my car since. Refueling takes about five minutes,
| compared to 30 minutes when using a fast charger with a
| battery-backed EV. Another thing that helps is Toyota has
| been subsidizing fuel costs for purchasers of new and
| certified used Mirais; I have a $15,000 fuel card valid for
| up to six years after purchase, though I anticipate the
| card running out of money well before then unless hydrogen
| prices drop substantially.
|
| Yes, long-distance drives that are outside the limited
| refueling network are out of the question, but Toyota
| provides 21 days of complimentary car rentals for owners of
| new Mirai models.
|
| So far I enjoy my Mirai. While I wish hydrogen prices were
| cheaper (prices went from a maximum of $19.70/kg in
| November to $26.75/kg in January and have remained at that
| level since), the Mirai is the best car I've driven in
| terms of its drive feel, comfort, and technology; it's a
| dramatic upgrade from the Toyota Prius c I used to own, and
| I even prefer it to the Subaru BRZ I had years ago.
| borski wrote:
| I'm on a road trip right now from Cupertino to San Diego and
| back, and have made this trip three times; have yet to have an
| issue charging.
|
| Moreover, in the Lucid, I only have to charge once (maybe
| twice, if it's convenient) to make the trip.
| elihu wrote:
| I think part of the problem here is that the public and
| government officials don't treat lack of charging infrastructure
| and broken chargers as an emergency.
|
| If a tree falls across a major road, you can bet there will be
| work crews showing up within hours to cut it up and move it aside
| to restore access, because a road with a tree across it doesn't
| function as a road anymore.
|
| We should treat lack of working charging infrastructure the same
| way: a road without the necessary infrastructure for EVs to
| traverse it with the confidence that they can charge when they
| need to isn't a road either.
|
| If EV owners really wanted to press the issue, they could protest
| by blocking roads. If, say, there's a dozen or so EVs all stuck
| at one charging station because the chargers are down, they could
| move their cars to the middle of the adjacent highway and form a
| roadblock. Unfortunately this isn't safe, as it would probably
| lead to violence from angry ICE drivers.
| peyton wrote:
| Ideally EV owners would obtain a permit before blocking a
| highway. I would expect the violence to come from the state.
| elihu wrote:
| I'm actually not sure what the legal criteria are around
| blocking roads. I mean, it's not unusual for protests to
| block roads, but there's usually some amount of rule-bending
| when it comes to protests -- that's often the point. I don't
| know if you can literally apply for a permit to have a
| protest that blocks a highway in most jurisdictions. I'd
| imagine in most cases you'd have the police come and give
| everyone a ticket and/or tow their vehicles.
|
| There is a significant recent precedent when it comes to
| vehicles blocking roads: there was the
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canada_convoy_protest
|
| > "Beginning January 22, hundreds of vehicles formed convoys
| from several points and traversed Canadian provinces before
| converging on Ottawa on January 29, 2022, with a rally at
| Parliament Hill. The convoys were joined by thousands of
| pedestrian protesters. Several offshoot protests blockaded
| provincial capitals and border crossings with the United
| States."
|
| ...
|
| > "Between February 17 and 20, a large joint-operation police
| presence in Ottawa arrested organizers and protesters,
| removed parked vehicles, and dismantled blockades from Ottawa
| streets. By February 21, most of the protesters had been
| cleared from Ottawa."
|
| So, if you're right wing, you can shut down major cities for
| weeks with minimal consequences. I don't think EV owners
| protesting the sorry state of infrastructure would get the
| same treatment.
| azinman2 wrote:
| Do gas stations get treated the same?
| elihu wrote:
| Come to think of it, that's probably going to happen
| eventually. There's no future for internal combustion ground
| transportation, and eventually most of those gas stations are
| going to be closed. I wouldn't be surprised if, when parts of
| the country begin to be unreachable by ICE vehicles because
| of lack of gas stations, some irate ICE truck owners block
| the roads in protest.
|
| It doesn't happen now because petroleum is available
| basically everywhere. "I had trouble locating an open gas
| station" is a problem that's happened to me I think once
| about twenty years ago, and even then we didn't have to go
| all that far to find an open gas station. (That I remember it
| at all had to do with the circumstances of the event. I was
| on a road trip through the deep south, and the police showed
| up at the second gas station and questioned us because
| someone apparently thought we were trying to rob the first
| gas station we stopped at which was closed.)
| _xerces_ wrote:
| She's not blowing past any muscle cars in her Kia Nero EV with a
| 0-60 of 6.5-7 seconds. I guess everyone in an EV assumes their
| vehicle is superfast?
| CamperBob2 wrote:
| It's enough to blow past a late-70s Ferrari. Car enthusiasts
| don't appreciate how good we have it today.
| ncr100 wrote:
| 0-60 is not a 1970's Ferrari thing.
|
| Ferrari of most eras, until recently, were a "go fast slowly
| and in the style of a Ferrari" type of car.
| RajT88 wrote:
| She may have never driven a properly quick car. I would say,
| most people have not driven cars which can do a sub-7 time off
| the line.
|
| My hatchback does 0-60 in about 7ish seconds, and that's pretty
| fun to do. I'm not likely to win too many drag races, though.
| tomatocracy wrote:
| My car does a sub 4 second 0-62mph; my wife's car is probably
| 8 seconds. Where I actually notice the difference though is
| the 40-70 speed when overtaking - accelerating hard from a
| standing start basically never happens in real world driving
| in my experience.
| jwr wrote:
| Well, there is also the instant response to the gas pedal. A
| gasoline-powered engine, especially with a turbocharger, takes
| a while to respond, and the gearbox might need to switch gears.
| That could be up to 2 seconds until you start accelerating, and
| another 2 seconds until you reach top power output. In an EV,
| you press the pedal and everything happens instantly. Instant
| torque. All this makes a big difference in practical driving.
| shrimpx wrote:
| Still, you can't bear a muscle car in 0-60. Maybe 0-30 tho.
| bobleeswagger wrote:
| > All this makes a big difference in practical driving.
|
| It really doesn't, it's just a side effect. We already have
| massive tailgating issues across the US, and most folks have
| zero idea what the limits of their commuter EV are. Kind of a
| recipe for disaster.
| Yoofie wrote:
| MKBHD did a recent video on this [1]. The car charging
| infrastructure is just as important to the electric car
| experience as the electric car itself.
|
| [1]:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BA2qJKU8t2k
| indymike wrote:
| I just spent a week with a Chevy Bolt while one of our family
| cars was in the shop. The good: nice small car, everything is
| pretty easy to use. The meh: without hardware installed in my
| home, keeping the car charged up for regular family use is
| problematic. Sometimes there is just not 2 hours to swing by a
| charging station, and so we spent most of the week with the Bolt
| showing under 40 miles in range. The bad: hitting the charging
| station for 70 miles in range costing $13 (this was consistently
| the deal for the week). My Subaru Crosstrek has a lifetime
| average of 27Mpg, so at $3.80 per gallon of gas, the cost to get
| the same range would have been $9.86. I was pretty surprised that
| it was 25% more expensive to charge the Bolt. Note: I was
| charging between 4pm-6pm, and my understanding is charging rates
| are lower in the evening... but, apples to apples, the Bolt was
| more expensive to fuel.
| TheLoafOfBread wrote:
| Exactly my experience with Enyaq in Europe. Now add unique and
| stupid applications for each charger which were probably made
| by a guy with phd in Crappiest UX design and regularly broken
| or incompatible chargers (yep, same CCS plug but car will
| refuse it...) and I am really skeptical to any BEV future.
| k8sToGo wrote:
| Yes same happened to me. After about 3 years I went back to a gas
| car. After the vanity / hobby enthusiasm diminishes, charging and
| the current limitations become just very frustrating to deal with
| every day. To be fair I made the frustrating experience mostly in
| non-Tesla cars. However, Tesla has other things that can be
| frustrating.
| shireboy wrote:
| This to me is still the weak link. It's not just chargers, it's
| 30+ minute charge time. As great as electric is, an extra hour in
| the car on a road-trip with 3 kids is a tough sell. More chargers
| would help but it's really battery tech and charge times that
| need a few more innovations before I'd consider for a car I might
| take a road trip in.
| bryanlarsen wrote:
| I made 4 3000km trips in a Tesla with young children. (Ottawa
| to Saskatoon and back, twice). The battery lasts longer than a
| child's bladder, and a restroom stop with young children
| requires at least 20 minutes, enough time for a substantial
| charge.
|
| Only twice in the four trips did we ever have to wait for the
| car to finish charging. IOW it added 15 minutes to a 3 day
| trip.
| xyzzy_plugh wrote:
| I recently went on a trip where the power was out at our
| destination for over 24 hours due to a storm. The nearest town
| was ~20 minutes away and likely did not have any fast charging
| infrastructure. Even if it did, it's a pretty bad spot to be
| in, especially if you have young kids.
|
| I have been considering getting an electric car but that trip
| made me realize I'd have to reserve the EV for urban travel
| only. Otherwise I'd be uncomfortable with the risk. Even with
| my gas guzzling SUV I can always bring _more gas_ just in case.
|
| I spoke to someone who has an EV and brings a generator with
| them on long trips so they can charge their car. This seems so
| wildly impractical to me.
|
| I really look forward to the day EVs exceed the range and
| energy capacity of combustion vehicles -- without having to
| stuff batteries in the headrest. But it's just not there today.
| aksss wrote:
| I don't know that it's wildly impractical. Some people carry
| battery-powered emergency jump starters for their ICE car.
| This just seems like the reciprocal backup power solution.
|
| Carrying a generator seems _very_ practical to me if you are
| putting yourself in situations where it could be not just
| useful but the difference between you being stranded vs self-
| sufficient.
|
| Nobody said that owning an electric vehicle requires a head-
| in-the-sand refusal to acknowledge the benefit of liquid
| fuel. Plus, a generator has all kinds of other benefits in
| the situation you describe.
| cronix wrote:
| Maybe conceptually they're kind of the same, but not
| practically. Something that fits in your hand is different
| than something that fits in your trunk.
| aksss wrote:
| Yes, they are conceptually the same - backup power source
| to get you out of a situation that would otherwise leave
| you stranded.
|
| Practically? Generators come in pretty small packages
| these days. They'll fit on the floorboard of your back
| seat (or in the back seat), or easily in the trunk just
| like another piece of luggage.
|
| I mean all of this assumes a particular context - the
| steps you take to be prepared for risks that are medium
| probability and high impact are not the same steps
| necessary when, on a daily basis, those same risks drop
| to a very low probability and low to medium impact.
|
| If it's the choice between being the guy who, after miles
| on the road, arrives in a storm-stricken town as GP
| related with his EV near dead and the townsfolk gathering
| around to point and laugh at a stereotype of luxurious
| thinking, or being someone with an inefficient yet
| practical solution to the lack of chargers, I'd take the
| latter.
| alistairSH wrote:
| How are you going to carry a generator in a typical sedan
| or crossover? In the trunk, next to your luggage? Now your
| clothes smell like fuel. On the roof? Now your range took a
| 15% hit. On a trailer? Range hit, plus you have to store
| the trailer at home.
|
| As a one-off thing, like driving into a town after a storm,
| might work. But it's not a solution to range anxiety
| generally.
| aksss wrote:
| Re: size - you can buy 2kW generators that are scarcely
| bigger than a regulation piece of carry-on luggage, so
| yeah, store it in the trunk.
|
| Worried about the smell of fuel from the empty generator
| you never use? If so, wrap it up in garbage bags.
| Remember - it's there for emergencies. Odds are good
| you'll rarely ever use it. And don't transport it with
| fuel - get the fuel when you can't find a charger but can
| find a gas station. Let's be sensible about it.
|
| The comment is in reply to someone describing their
| experience driving to a town that was without power for
| 24 hours due to a storm. This "road tripping into the
| unknown" is where taking a generator is applicable, not
| general range anxiety.
| baremetal wrote:
| Just tow a diesel generator behind you.
| avalys wrote:
| If the power is out at your destination you're unlikely to be
| able to operate the gas pumps either.
|
| Who brings emergency gasoline supplies with them on a family
| trip with young kids? The suggestion is ludicrous. Is your
| typical vacation, like, traveling to Florida to experience a
| hurricane making landfall?
|
| If you do a lot of travel to remote locations and camping and
| hiking and things like that, yes, an EV will probably be a
| stretch for that use right now. But most people in the US
| live and travel between major population centers.
|
| Even if you are into the remote/outdoorsy stuff, an EV is a
| perfectly viable second car.
| kbos87 wrote:
| I've been in my Tesla on a 2hr road trip with a planned
| stop at a supercharger along the way. A message popped up
| on the screen of my Tesla that there was a power outage at
| the supercharger I had planned to use - I was seamlessly
| rerouted to a different supercharger. Not an ideal
| situation, but very well handled by Tesla.
| Marsymars wrote:
| > Even if you are into the remote/outdoorsy stuff, an EV is
| a perfectly viable second car.
|
| This has been my conclusion - the main problem at that
| point being the sheer cost. My household's current
| secondary car is one that cost $10k a decade ago. (Two
| years old at the time of purchase.) There's no EV that's
| even in the same ballpark for cost-per-km or cost-per-year.
| (And for a second city-only car, they almost all come with
| far more battery capacity than is required, adding weight
| and expense. The Mazda MX-30 EV is probably closest from a
| technical standpoint with 160 km of range, but still has a
| cost problem, starting at $40k locally after taxes and
| credits.)
| SoftTalker wrote:
| If the power is out the gas pumps aren't working either,
| though it's possible some fuel stations have standby
| generators.
|
| I have _never_ taken extra gas along on a trip in the USA (I
| don 't do long offroad treks or safaris, and neither do 99%
| of drivers).
|
| The range and charging time issue with EVs are issues
| regardless of weird one-off events like the power being out
| for a day.
| gumby wrote:
| > an extra hour in the car on a road-trip with 3 kids is a
| tough sell
|
| You point out a problem with the IRA law, which subsidizes
| charger build out _at service stations_ , precisely the wrong
| place for them. They should be building out in shopping areas,
| various roadside and destination attractions etc.
| alistairSH wrote:
| Maybe, but the last thing I want to do mid-trip is get off
| the highway and go shopping or whatever else. I want to top
| up the car, use the restroom, grab a drink, and get back on
| the road. I want to get wherever I'm going ASAP.
|
| Chargers should be at full-service stations. Places with a
| deli or cafe, where it's somewhat pleasant to rest for 20-30
| minutes. Not someplace that the kids want to stay for hours.
| gharman wrote:
| > it's 30+ minute charge time. As great as electric is, an
| extra hour in the car on a road-trip with 3 kids is a tough
| sell.
|
| I dissent! Just did a 2-day (each way) road trip with young
| children and those charging breaks are pretty great and well-
| spaced for letting them run around and blow off steam. It's not
| such a bad idea for the adults either...
| buggythebug wrote:
| [flagged]
| guhidalg wrote:
| Superchargers are normally built in retail areas that are
| popular enough to be safe.
| buggythebug wrote:
| There are no designated "safe areas" to run around in lol
| xboxnolifes wrote:
| Do you only allow children to run around in areas that
| someone designated as safe?
| [deleted]
| PragmaticPulp wrote:
| > As great as electric is, an extra hour in the car on a road-
| trip with 3 kids is a tough sell.
|
| If you're doing road trips frequently and you absolutely cannot
| find a charging station that coincides with a lunch break spot
| and you cannot afford a single extra hour, then sure, this
| seems like a reason to wait for things to improve.
|
| But I've lost count of how many times I've heard this argument
| from people who are more afraid of the possibility than the
| reality. People who do a road trip once per year or less, for
| example.
| tashoecraft wrote:
| People way over estimate how often they do 300+ miles in a
| day. I think it's partially them not realizing that every
| time they leave the house with an ev, you're leaving with a
| full tank.
| alistairSH wrote:
| A very specific example... I live outside DC. I like to visit
| Canaan Valley WV to go camping. There is no charge
| infrastructure anywhere nearby. So, it's a 2 hour detour on
| the return leg to recharge on what is normally a 2.5-3 hour
| trip (each direction).
|
| But, from my house, that's about the only trip I've found
| like this. Any of the beaches are reachable. Most cities
| within a day or two Drive are reachable.
| iknowstuff wrote:
| The Model 3 can travel that distance without charging.
| There is also a supercharger right in the middle.
|
| https://abetterrouteplanner.com/?plan_uuid=9daba0ea-
| ad2e-449...
| alistairSH wrote:
| Sure and that's the best case. Just about anything else
| needs a multi-hour detour.
|
| Anyway, my only point was there are still some gaps, even
| in the relatively dense eastern seaboard. But not many.
| oh_sigh wrote:
| I have family in SLC and live in Denver(520 miles), so I've
| done that road trip probably a dozen times in an ICE and EV, so
| I'm speaking from experience.
|
| 30+ mins at a supercharger doesn't need to be a thing. You get
| the fastest charging 0-50%, which takes about 15 mins, so that
| is like 180 miles range, or about 2.5 hours in the car.
|
| So you can get about 700 miles with 2 15 minute stops, assuming
| you do 300 miles on the first charge if you start at 100%. With
| a gas car you'd be stopping once for maybe 10-15 mins to refuel
| and use the bathroom(or twice if you're driving with my
| partner), so it's really only 15 mins lost over 10 hours in the
| car.
|
| I'll say that's not my natural way to do a road trip, I would
| previously go on longer legs with less time stopped, but I
| actually like taking more little breaks and would probably
| start doing that if I went on a road trip with an ICE.
| TheCondor wrote:
| What route do you take to SLC? 70? or 80?
|
| Last summer we drove the i80 route on our way to Oregon and
| after Laramie (which I suspect has some super chargers) it
| looks like a wasteland until Rocksprings and I have no idea
| if they have them there either. On the southern route, after
| Grand Junkyard (which I imagine has super chargers) it looks
| like quite a spell before more. We go play in Moab
| periodically and it's pretty sparse out there. The distances
| seem manageable but if you mismanage things a little bit, you
| could have some trouble. I think I'd top off in Laramie and
| then probably think about it in Rocksprings, I assume they
| have chargers there. Even with an ICE out there, there are
| some pretty long distances between stops, seems like every
| time our range got below 100miles we were starting to get
| serious about planning a stop.
|
| FWIW Southern Idaho and Eastern Oregon might have been worse.
| I think there were more people and it looked like more help
| if you were to have an issue but it might be farther between
| realistic charging stations. It's coming, it'll get there and
| most people aren't road tripping that much but it's still a
| factor.
| cs702 wrote:
| At the moment, ONLY Tesla has decent supercharging (i.e., fast-
| charging) infrastructure in the US:
|
| https://www.tesla.com/findus
|
| I regularly go on ~300-mile drives that need only a single
| charging stop, lasting 15-20 minutes, on my Tesla EV. By the time
| I've gone to the bathroom and gotten a drink, the supercharger
| has added 100-150+ miles of range and the EV is ready to go. All
| the stalls always work.
|
| No other EV brand offers a comparable fast-charging experience in
| the US.
|
| For city driving, I charge at home for around 1/3 the cost per
| mile compared to filling a comparable ICE vehicle with a
| poisonous combustible liquid.
| datadeft wrote:
| I am not sure when the car industry reaches that iteration
| where you can swap out batteries. It already happened for the
| electric rollers and it is freakin amazing. I think many of the
| electric car skeptics would convert if there was a way to "re-
| charge" the car within 5-10 minutes. The batteries would be
| also happier.
| Isolus wrote:
| NIO ist doing this with it's Power Swap Stations. But there
| are too few to really use them.
| jfengel wrote:
| Battery swap seems unlikely. It's just an excuse for
| "skeptics".
|
| The use case for swaps is small. The vast majority of trips
| are short. Trips long enough to require a recharge often
| require a long stop for the driver.
|
| People have priced in the notion of spending some time each
| week pouring flammable liquids into their vehicle. If we had
| started with electric cars everyone would find it disgusting
| and far too frequent. The speed of it for rare use cases
| would not impress.
|
| Swappable batteries will not change that. They are too
| expensive and they limit design too much. Reducing the charge
| time to five minutes or even zero minutes would not change
| the minds of people who would simply swap to their next
| excuse.
| yarg wrote:
| Never - Tesla's gone the opposite way and started
| structurally integrating its batteries.
| Psychlist wrote:
| https://www.vehiclesuggest.com/what-happened-tesla-
| battery-s...
|
| Tesla tried it. There was no point Tesla building more swap
| stations because so few people paid the premium to get a
| swappable battery. It turns out that people who won't buy an
| electric car unless they can swap the battery will find some
| other reason not to buy an electric car if that reason is
| removed.
| synaesthesisx wrote:
| Agreed. I never have issues predictably charging my Tesla on
| long trips. Range anxiety is non-existent. The supercharger
| network is glorious.
|
| When I tried to charge my previous EV (a non-Tesla) at public
| chargers, half they time they didn't work, or charged at
| unpredictably slow rates.
| cs702 wrote:
| > Range anxiety is non-existent. The supercharger network is
| glorious.
|
| Yes, that's my experience too. I _never_ worry about range.
| mangosteenjuice wrote:
| This was the only reason I got a Tesla instead of literally any
| other EV brand. I make frequent trips between the Bay Area and
| Los Angeles. Electrify America is now an alternative, but it's
| not as reliable when it comes to availability and uptime.
| cs702 wrote:
| > This was the only reason I got a Tesla instead of literally
| any other EV brand.
|
| It was a key reason for me too. I considered BMW, MB, and
| Audi EVs, but ruled them out due to horrendous state of non-
| Tesla charging in the US.
|
| Another reason was software. Tesla's UI has a lot of issues,
| but it's the only car UI that feels smooth and responsive to
| me. And now I'm looking forward to this:
| https://www.notateslaapp.com/news/1362/tesla-
| update-2023-12-...
| borski wrote:
| I've had zero issues charging either my Lucid Air or my Ioniq
| 5.
| iknowstuff wrote:
| Happy for you, but your experience is not the norm.
| https://twitter.com/RateYourCharge
| borski wrote:
| That is not necessarily true. The outliers are widely
| reported, because successful experiences do not generally
| cause people to post online about how great their
| experience was.
|
| You're going to hear about the negative experiences because
| that is what people commiserate about. It's human nature.
| lIl-IIIl wrote:
| I wonder if they can combat that by only incorporating
| the user data once they posted 5 reviews or so.
| borski wrote:
| That's a good idea.
| comte7092 wrote:
| The norm is honestly that over 90% of the time, there are
| no issues.
|
| The thing is, when there is an issue, it's at minimum a
| huge pain in the ass, and a complete nightmare at worst.
| jackmott42 wrote:
| I have been to electrify america stations twice. One had
| a broken charger at once of the two super fast stalls.
| The second time I had to wait in line because it was
| full, and then when I got in the card reader wasn't
| working. I had to install the app to be able to pay and
| get electricity. It was very stressful as we thought we
| might be totally effed.
|
| Compared to Tesla, where you just pull up and plug in. No
| app, no card reader. It just works. I've encountered 1
| bad stall out of like 50 visits to superchargers, and
| since there are typically 10 to 20 stalls it wasn't a big
| deal.
| iknowstuff wrote:
| If you have better data than them feel free to post it.
| Only 50% of attempts to charge at EA succeed without a
| problem according to their chart.
| comte7092 wrote:
| I'm talking about personal experience.
|
| Is my experience universal? Of course not.
|
| However, the data on that page has _massive_ sampling
| bias.
| borski wrote:
| Precisely this.
| jackmott42 wrote:
| if you aren't doing road trips much you won't. When you don't
| do road trips you don't need any infrastructure at all except
| your own house
| hn_user2 wrote:
| With most rental cars giving you unlimited miles, I'm very
| much of the opinion that when you factor in mileage and
| wear and tear on the car plus vehicle depreciation due to
| the long miles on the road trip--that renting a car for
| long trips is the way to go.
|
| Especially when compared to owning a second care with an
| ICE just for the occasional trip.
| noogle wrote:
| 1. Flexibility. For a rental car you need to plan ahead,
| pick it up on time and return it on time. Traffic jam
| delaying you? too bad. You now pay a surcharge.
|
| 2. Cost: the rental cost is actually only a small portion
| of the cost. Extra insurance and other fees end up more
| than the rent itself.
|
| Your car will depreciate regardless of that road-trip,
| just by virtue of time passing. Rental companies won't
| subsidize the wear and tear for you, so you have to pay
| that anyway.
| borski wrote:
| The catch here is _I really like my car_ , and I have no
| reason to own an ICE for road trips. I rent when I can't
| bring my car (flying, overseas, etc.)
| Gibbon1 wrote:
| I know a lot of women who own a beater and when they want
| to drive long distance rent a car. I think because they
| know it's cheaper and the idea of being stuck on the side
| of the highway makes them anxious.
|
| And then there is my friend on a fixed income that's
| realized it's cheaper to rent a compact car for long
| drives. Same as above because having the car break down
| in nowheres is expensive quick.
| edbaskerville wrote:
| Non-Tesla supercharger pilot:
|
| https://www.tesla.com/support/non-tesla-supercharging
| cs702 wrote:
| As soon as the charging experience is as good as Tesla's for
| other EVs, including BMW, MB, and Audi, I _will_ consider
| them :-)
| ZeroGravitas wrote:
| America seems really bad at basic infrastructure things.
|
| They're in some weird kind of panglossian mindset where, if it's
| not working in the USA then that proves that it is in fact
| literally impossible.
|
| So rather than sort themselves out and install some more plugs,
| they just shrug and give up.
|
| I imagine a Chinese General pointing to this article and saying
| "see, their army will topple like Russia's in Ukraine did, it's
| all bluster, as a failing nation they can't even install plugs"
| cronix wrote:
| Yeah, we did things like standardize the size of a gas nozzle
| so they're universal in all cars and trucks (and lawnmowers,
| and...) regardless of make/model or brand of gas. Then we just
| allowed anyone who wants to make an electric to have a
| proprietary system.
|
| It's a standards problem, not infrastructure, per se.
| jseliger wrote:
| NEPA is the big problem: https://noahpinion.substack.com/p/the-
| big-nepa-roundup, not "mindset." NIMBYism more generally is
| also a problem.
| peyton wrote:
| The article states the federal government is installing 500,000
| more plugs. Who is shrugging and giving up?
| ZeroGravitas wrote:
| Well the author for one.
|
| "The government is finally getting round to the basics and
| will probably fuck it up" is not the attitude that put men on
| the moon.
| CarbonCycles wrote:
| To make things worse, the neighborhood crack heads have
| discovered that the charging cables can bring in some decent
| money.
|
| Neighborhoods are having problems with theft, and from what I've
| been told, those charging cables aren't exactly cheap to
| constantly replace.
| speedgoose wrote:
| In Europe we bring the cable to AC chargers. DC cables are
| stolen once in a while but it's a lot more rare, it's not that
| much copper in them now that they are liquid cooled.
| harshaw wrote:
| I have an Ioniq 5 and a PHEV pacifica. I love the ioniq5 and do
| new england road trips with it for skiing. I only have to hunt
| for fast charging on these longer trips so it's kind of a fun
| route planning game. I also love having the minivan to take 6
| people anywhere and not worry about charging. I have the luxury
| of picking the right tool for the job. Not everyone else does.
|
| After owning an EV I have come to appreciate that gasoline is
| frigging magical and convenient. You just fill up in a couple of
| minutes and go. I think people are *way* over estimating the
| middle majority's appetite for EVs. Once you burn through the
| early adopters (which we haven't done yet) I think it is going to
| be a long hard slog to convince most folks to move. I think this
| is going to be a super huge political issue. If the republicans
| take up the ICE vs EV battle they will move to quickly turn over
| this 2035 mandate because their constituents love driving these
| super convenient, cheap, and powerful ICE vehicles, especially
| trucks. I hope I am wrong.
| Psychlist wrote:
| My expectation is that one combustion car owners have to pay
| more of the cost of that fuel choice they'll change over. Lots
| of people already drive 20 minutes to save $10 on a tank full,
| or queue at the gas station ditto.
|
| What we're really waiting for is second hand EVs in real
| numbers, or the political decision that small, electric cars
| are the only ones allowed on most streets. That would
| dramatically cut the death rates from both pollution and
| vehicular homicide.
| mkozlows wrote:
| In 1997, I bought a DVD player, and didn't have a VCR.
|
| You couldn't rent DVDs at Blockbuster, or indeed anywhere. Most
| movies weren't available on DVD, so you could watch only the few
| that had made it to the format (and had to purchase them for full
| price, at that). Being a DVD-only owner was limiting and annoying
| in a bunch of ways, even though the DVD experience was a lot
| better than the VCR experience.
|
| If in 1997, I had written a blog post about how having just a DVD
| player kinda sucks, and I want to have a "hybrid" VCR + DVD
| experience, it wouldn't have been a super hot take -- but at the
| same time, it would have also been clear that I wasn't saying
| there's any big problem with DVDs, I was just having normal early
| adopter problems, and pretty soon they'd all be solved. (By 1999,
| Blockbuster offered hundreds of DVDs for rental, pretty soon
| studios were cranking out their entire catalogs on DVD, and not
| long after that Netflix broke big.)
|
| And... that's about where we are with EVs. If you have an EV
| today, you're an early adopter, and you're going to suffer early
| adopter pains. In 2-3 years, things'll be better. In five years,
| they'll be better yet. At some point, EVs will be so normal that
| only a few EV OGs will be like "man, remember when it was a whole
| big thing to find a working charger? Haha, wow, that sucked back
| then."
| cs702 wrote:
| _> If you have an EV today, you 're an early adopter, and
| you're going to suffer early adopter pains._
|
| Today, that's true only for non-Tesla EVs. Five years ago, it
| was true for Tesla too. But not anymore.
|
| Speaking from experience as someone who regularly goes on
| ~300-mile trips on a Tesla EV:
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35678905
| noogle wrote:
| So the article seems to be right - wait with EVs until they
| improve. Why suffer the pains of an early adopter?
| mkozlows wrote:
| I think it is absolutely true that people who don't want to
| be early adopters shouldn't be. At the same time: I had no
| regrets about being a DVD early adopter, because (hot take
| incoming) DVDs were in fact better than VHS tapes, and not
| dealing with VHS's badness was really nice, even if it was
| also annoying in some ways. Similarly, there are going to be
| people who are happy being EV early adopters because the
| (very real) wins of EVs outweigh the early adopter
| annoyances.
|
| "This technology is still relatively new, and if you buy into
| it, you're going to have some early adopter pains" is a fine
| message that will help people sort out what they personally
| want to do, but isn't the same as a blanket "wait until they
| improve."
| noogle wrote:
| It's a different risk: if your novel DVD player did not
| work, you could just watch something else. If your novel EV
| doesn't charge, you may be left stranded, miss a flight or
| fail to reach medical care. Moreover, no government planned
| to ban VCRs using those early problematic DVD players as a
| justification.
| Thorentis wrote:
| > and I want to have a "hybrid" VCR + DVD experience
|
| To be fair, that's exactly what I had. You could buy these two
| in one VCR/DVD players that had a cassette reader on one side
| and a DVD drawer on the other. Super handy for quite a while.
|
| Hybrid cars will make sense economically for a while yet in my
| opinion.
| d_burfoot wrote:
| How about we just give up the very American concept of "road
| trip"? It's bad for the environment, bad for your health,
| dangerous, and increases the burden on the already overloaded
| highway system. If you want to visit somewhere farther than your
| EV can take you, ride a bus, plane, or train. When you arrive,
| try walking, biking or ride-sharing apps to get around.
| jandrewrogers wrote:
| > If you want to visit somewhere farther than your EV can take
| you, ride a bus, plane, or train. When you arrive, try walking,
| biking or ride-sharing apps to get around.
|
| You must have missed the part where a great many places in the
| US are not accessible this way. People often go on road trips
| because it is the _only_ way to travel. This is especially true
| if you like to spend time in the great outdoors that is the
| western US. Some of these highways don 't even have cellular
| service.
| benjamoon wrote:
| Within the next 10 years I think we'll have 1,000 mile ranges and
| ~30 min charge times. CATL just announced a doubling of the
| current best energy density, that alone could get a Tesla Model 3
| to over 600 miles on a charge. At that point I think this
| conversation will stop and people will all switch. I agree
| though, at the minute if you don't have the ability to charge at
| home you're missing out on one of the absolute best features
| (always leaving the house with a full tank).
| tgma wrote:
| Specifically the author is talking about a non-Tesla EV, one that
| had the known defect of lack of a proper charging infrastructure
| at point of purchase. Nothing to see here.
|
| [Talking about Teslas and "EVs" as if they are the same category
| is like talking about Computer Science and "STEM" in a single
| category. Often disingenuous and draws the wrong conclusion.]
| elihu wrote:
| Of course there's something to see here. Lack of reliable,
| open, vendor neutral charging infrastructure is a major
| problem.
| MuffinFlavored wrote:
| > one that had the known defect of lack of a proper charging
| infrastructure at point of purchase.
|
| Is the charger adapter that you plug in on a Tesla or a non-
| Tesla not standardized like USB-C to the point where you can go
| to any station (as long as you have any brand of EV and not an
| internal combustion engine gasoline/diesel car or whatever) and
| benefit from it/use it/plug it in? Sorry, out of the loop, I've
| dodged electric cars.
| borski wrote:
| Tesla uses a proprietary plug, for now; they are moving to
| support CCS (and already ship CCS cars in Europe) because
| they want federal funding for their chargers, and because in
| Europe it's the law.
|
| You can buy an adapter to use destination chargers (hotels,
| etc.) but not super chargers.
| borski wrote:
| Nonsense. Superchargers are packed; while they work, you're
| waiting in line for a charge.
|
| Meanwhile, while some folks have had issues with EA, I haven't,
| and even if I did, I'd just use a Chargepoint, EVGo, Shell
| Recharge, or any number of other chargers as needed.
|
| Not to mention that I can buy a Tesla charger adapter for like
| $60 that lets me use destination chargers at hotels, and that
| Tesla is opening up to CCS charging because they want that
| sweet federal money.
|
| Basically: a Tesla is an EV, and Tesla is no longer on top of
| the EV game, as evidenced by the recent six price drops in the
| last year, because they are outinnovated and now trying to
| outprice their competition instead of innovating.
|
| You let me know how your FSD, which is "coming by the end of
| the year," does for you. I've got some bridges to sell in
| Brooklyn.
| mangosteenjuice wrote:
| Maybe I'm exceedingly lucky, but I've only had to wait in
| line once. I make frequent trips between Oakland/SF and Los
| Angeles, and charge at stations nearly exclusively since I
| live in an apartment.
| borski wrote:
| This is what's hard about it - personal experiences vary.
| We need an outside entity somehow keeping track of uptime
| and availability of chargers, and the infrastructure bill
| will hopefully help with that.
| kbos87 wrote:
| I've had a tesla for over a year, I exclusively charge at
| superchargers, and I've waited for a stall at a charger a
| total of one time.
| borski wrote:
| Cool. I think what this shows (your experience at
| superchargers vs mine, and my experience at EA vs the
| article) is that personal experiences vary, and we need
| better stats.
| tgma wrote:
| Anecdotally, even in Tesla heavy Northern California
| supercharger wait times are often zero or close to zero
| unless you consistently hit the peak times. I don't know if
| you have stats or bad first hand experience or simply
| generalizing reports from holiday peak times off hand.
|
| The expansion of superchargers to non-Teslas may indeed cause
| problems. So far I have seen perhaps one total non-Tesla
| vehicle. If anything, that should be a new point in favor of
| EVs compared to the time the author purchased their vehicle,
| which makes the article even further disingenuous.
|
| I don't know why you brought FSD into a very specific
| argument about EV ownership experience. I don't disagree.
| Sounds like a canned message from a Tesla hater though.
| borski wrote:
| The implication that Teslas were somehow superior and
| outside the category of other EVs. I don't hate Teslas; I
| just consider them another EV, with some pros (the
| supercharger network) and some cons.
|
| Elon and the FSD nonsense is one such con. I only brought
| it up because he _just promised it again_ by the end of
| this year, and it set off a spate of people going "Tesla is
| the best" when we've all seen this story before.
|
| I credit Tesla with kicking off the revolution; I don't
| even dislike their cars. I've enjoyed when I've rented
| them.
|
| I just think they've stopped innovating in recent years,
| and frankly, I wish they would. More competition is always
| good.
| aik wrote:
| Are you arguing that FSD will never come? Or just that it
| will likely be delayed again? Or that they're not even
| working on it? If you've seen any of their AI
| presentations in recent years, I'm a little confused by
| your comment. I know some of it is marketing but it is
| incredibly impressive what they're building. I would be
| surprised if anyone else is even close to how advanced
| they are. I just think the problem, the last 5% anyway to
| get it fully working and reliable, is 10x+ harder than
| anyone thought.
|
| Now when it comes to specific physical features on the
| car or something, I don't know, haven't been following
| that very closely.
| borski wrote:
| I'm arguing that Tesla is no longer the obvious leader in
| EVs. That's all.
|
| FSD may or may not come eventually. I'm doubtful. But as
| it stands, other makers are improving rapidly and Tesla
| has produced little innovation to compete with them in
| recent years, instead choosing to focus on touting
| features that seldom come (2016 was the first year FSD
| was coming "by the end of the year") and cost-cutting
| measure to improve profits at the cost of customer
| experience.
|
| That's not a jab on Tesla as a company as much as it is
| just disappointment. Their lead is dwindling, and I wish
| they'd focus on innovating instead of whatever else is
| happening right now.
| tverbeure wrote:
| FSD is a disaster and Elon an AH, but it's a simple fact
| that Tesla supercharger are their biggest competitive
| benefit, and superior to anything else on the market?
| borski wrote:
| Yes. But that lead is dwindling, and soon opening to CCS
| cars as well. That's my point.
|
| Tesla needs to start building something new again, or
| improving their cars in meaningful ways, or their lead
| will dwindle.
|
| And the cybertruck ain't it. (I have a reservation for
| one, but there are better options now)
| ericd wrote:
| I think their innovations are mostly going towards
| scaling supply and manufacturing now. They've scaled
| their large-can batteries, they're finally starting in
| earnest on Semi and Cybertruck. And FSD has been
| improving.
|
| To your earlier point, I have literally never once had to
| wait to get a supercharger, the route planner takes
| number of open stalls into account. The non-Tesla
| experience, idk, and we only use them on road trips, so
| we're generally not going to any inside big cities, so
| maybe that's the difference. Also not in the Bay Area, so
| they're not the local "Camry" yet.
| borski wrote:
| FWIW, the Lucid and Ioniq navs also take stall
| availability into account.
| ericd wrote:
| Ah cool. Not sure why you've been hitting waits at
| superchargers, maybe it's just a Bay Area thing?
| borski wrote:
| could be!
| erik_seaberg wrote:
| How do destination chargers at hotels work? It seems like
| only seedy motels have parking spaces right outside the room
| where you could use its outlets. Are nicer hotels starting to
| build a few dedicated chargers somewhere in their parking
| lot? Do you reserve one when you book a room?
| quijoteuniv wrote:
| I think the attitude of the CEO trickles down in the kind of
| people that buy Teslas. This translates in the way the drive
| their car around. Not everyone of course, some just are
| interested in the EV, But is almost that like buying a car
| allows you to have the CEO attitude, is maybe that what they
| are selling?
| Night_Thastus wrote:
| For ~95% of people, there's no issue.
|
| For the few that do very long trips, and where a route planning
| app says it's genuinely not possible, then I'd definitely say go
| back to hybrid or gas.
|
| But for most city drivers just going to work and back, overnight
| charging and basically never fast charging is the way to go.
| Zanni wrote:
| Or ... trade it in for a better EV (i.e. a Tesla). The
| Supercharger network is much denser and more reliable than the
| patchwork of non-Tesla chargers. My anecdotal experience matches
| the author's of roughly a quarter of all public (non-Tesla)
| charging stations simply not working.
| jwr wrote:
| If you live in the US, that is.
| Marsymars wrote:
| I don't think I could, in good faith, buy a Tesla product or
| service as long as Musk has an ownership stake.
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