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Who has or is planning to get an electric car / EV Talk
- Thread starter PracticalMac
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There is a sales rep who I know in my area, and he works at a Toyota dealership where I ordered a RAV4 Prime, and he said they’re not slow, if anything, they have been working with customers with online orders, scheduling test drives with demo vehicles, Service is booking out at least a month in advance. There’s less foot traffic for sure, but; dealerships are having to re-strategize, re-tool for the future. Because online ordering is the new ‘norm’, especially if you want anything electric.
A lot of dealerships have cut sales representative, saving money and some have transitioned away from commission, to just to net pay.
Direct from the factory, they just can’t get vehicles made fast enough, therefore the demand is high, which translates to rising cost of vehicles,Chip shortages, supplier issues, ect. That’s where I think the inflation is coming from, not just loss of sales, when some dealerships actually might be saving money.
For the record, there hasn’t been any markup on the Ford Lightning, at least not in my region.
However, it appears almost every dealership has mark up right now on used inventory and some new inventory.
I think if there’s one part of this industry that is struggling, it’s the luxury car segment. I think consumers are being more conservative, and retaining previous lessee’s seems to be the only real staple luxury cars have right now.
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I haven't had to go to a gas station in 9 months now, I wake up to a "full" charge everyday. My commute is also further than most I think (~45 miles round trip) and I'm still fine with a regular 120V/15A outlet. Unless you need to make that 300+ mile trip every month, I don't see why people worry about range anxiety. If you don't have access to charging at home and/or work then it does become a bit more difficult.
I have a 60 mile commute. In the summer, I charged to 60% and would consume about 15-17% of the battery( including sitting unplugged for ~4 days). With the colder temps and the increase in energy consumption, I have seen it increase to 20% consumption. I have bumped it up to 65% to ensure I get back home still at around 45% SoC. As the temps continue to drop, we shall see how it goes.
When you say cold, how cold we talking? It’s about 1-2 degrees Celsius in the morning when I leave for work.
A lot of EVs have heat pump so power usage for heat isn’t as high as it used to be (PTC Heater gang!!). You are going to have more of an issue with rolling resistance and speed in winter weather.
Yes I’m aware of that. Another guy I know has the jaguar i-pace. Nice looking car if your into an SUV body. Drives okay, but lacks the range and fast charging of the Tesla.
Yeah the e-tron charges faster than the i-pace. But iirc both still use PTC heater.
So far the lowest I have driven it has been around 0 degrees Celsius in the morning. Though this has been after the car charges the battery( thus a warm battery upon departure). When driven home, it has been around 5-10 degrees C during the day though again after pre-conditioning the battery( though this time uses battery power to heat itself since it is unplugged).
So similar temps to here. Worth warming up the interior on those cold Monday mornings though! Heated seats are a godsend.
Yep and with my Model 3, don't have to worry about opening the garage and backing it out to warm it up! Just keep it plugged in, uses house power to power the heat pump, warm the battery, heated seats, etc.
Opening the garage? Lol. My cars never in there in the first place. When it’s not full of crap I put Mrs AFB car in there.
I checked out an ID4 when our local dealership got its first one, and that would probably be my choice at this time. There are a fair number of Teslas zipping around where I live, but the styling of them doesn't really interest me. To each their own.
I own a tesla model S (have since 2013) and am on my second BMW X (an X3 which replaced an x5). It’s absolutely clear that the BMWs are built better.
That’s great! Feel free to elaborate on your EV experiences over the years, since you’ve been a long term owner.
It’s fantastic not having to stop by a gas station ever, and I never have to get the car smogged. You do want to keep the battery at around 60-70% so that you have enough power to handle unexpected emergencies but aren’t shortening the battery life unnecessarily by overcharging it.
On the other hand, some mornings it decides it doesn’t want to turn on, or that I don’t have a sirius radio, or that my sirius radio isn’t activated, or that it just doesn’t want the speakers to work at all, or that it doesn’t want to close the garage door, etc. The body panel gaps are huge and uneven, an axle nut came loose pretty soon after I bought the car, I had to have the MCU replaced after a few years, every software update makes the interface screen crappier and less responsive, the screen turns yellow and you have to bring it in every few years for them to re-cure the glue, etc.
This morning, for example, I got in the car and was greeted with a message telling me the car needed me to step on the brake for 30 seconds to start it (it’s done that twice now in the last few months). After that didn’t work, I got out of the car and back in. That seemed to get it going. But then the car wouldn;t make any sounds - not even the turn signal would “click.” So I started on my way while rebooting the console, which takes about 5 minutes. When the reboot finished, it decided my wheel needed to be in “entry” mode instead of driving mode (I was driving the car). It also decided that when I changed my sirius/XM station that I was no longer authorized to use sirius/XM. Triggering a reauthorization didn’t work, but parking the car later on, waiting an hour, then asking for a new sirius/xm signal several times eventually got it to work. Which is better than the few times when the car decided that no radio was actually installed. When I called Tesla about that one, they told me it was a known problem and they did something remotely to give me my radio back. Which is nice, because most of the time getting an appointment at the service center takes several weeks, and good luck getting an appointment at the most convenient service center if there are multiple around - tesla decides which one is your “home” center and makes it very hard to get an appointment at another.
My BMWs, on the other hand, are very solid - only problems have been with plastics on the interior. On the other hand, they do require gas and belch out pollutants.
So your saying the German car has a better build quality than the Tesla? That supports everything I’ve seen and read.
Oh, definitely. I love my Tesla, but build quality is worse than even the Oldsmobiles I drove as a kid.
Elon seemed quite proud of the fact Tesla saved money with the first runs of the Model S since they used normal computer-grade screens vs screens meant for automotive use. We see how well that turned out......
Early S's also seem to have a defect in the rear drive unit leading to failure as well. The handles also seem to be a common issue.
The 3 seem to be holding up better with the common issue being control arms needing replaced around the 80,000 mile mark or so.
But I would say initial build quality, BMW is definitely better than Tesla. My 3 had the seat frame trim clips broken on the drivers door( which mobile service fixed). Factory worker installed a paint chip when installing the doors and there are some rattles that I am trying to nail down being common places being the seatbelt mechanisms seem to have rubbing points and the rear seat anchor where it latches to stay upright also have a point where it rubs. But BMW's become maintenance hell after 70,000 miles. And of course they are not without their common issues( N54 hello.....)
I still love my 3 and I would buy it again( would have said avoid Tesla to my parents that have a Y on order if I didn't like it). But Tesla needs to step up their game. Tesla's have a lot going for them that make it easy to look past some of these issues, but once the competition gets going with EV's, it won't be so easy anymore. They claim going single cast for the front and rear frame assemblies will improve quality so lets see what happens once Austin comes online.....
Oh, yeah, I;ve had to replace handles multiple times. Forgot how often. Also the 12V battery (which they did at my house but required them pulling what seemed like half the front end out onto the driveway
If I had to buy another car today, it would probably be a model Y (since the model S price keeps going up and I really don’t need the space), but i’m hoping Apple does something competitive here by then. Maybe I’d buy something else with CarPlay instead of a tesla, though - I haven’t kept up with what else is out there.
You could get a Mach-e!! It has CarPlay.Oh, yeah, I;ve had to replace handles multiple times. Forgot how often. Also the 12V battery (which they did at my house but required them pulling what seemed like half the front end out onto the driveway
If I had to buy another car today, it would probably be a model Y (since the model S price keeps going up and I really don’t need the space), but i’m hoping Apple does something competitive here by then. Maybe I’d buy something else with CarPlay instead of a tesla, though - I haven’t kept up with what else is out there.
Just to clarify, what Tesla model/year are you referencing here? Just the 2013 ‘S’ model you mentioned above through various years?
I have only owned the 2013 S. For a month I drove a 2015 S as a loaner (when the MCU was being replaced), and over the years I have had loaners from other years (all S’s), and the fit and finish is always suspect. My buddy drove a 2017 and now a 2020 S, and parks it next to mine at work every day, and it has the same issues. In fact, he is all upset that his 2020 S has the yellow screen issue already, as he also had the problem with the 2017 S.
I mean, Hyundai and Kia have to Ioniq 5/EV6 are also an option for a vehicle with CarPlay, along with id.4 and the Audi variant.