Test drove a Tesla today....

Swampfox201

Swampfox201

Line Up and Wait
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Todd W.
The salesman said next month they will release a software upgrade that will allow the car to drive itself. All you do is enter the destination and the car will take you there.

In our sue happy culture and seeing how GA has suffered in the face of lawsuits how will this company survive when someone gets hurt by a car that is driving itself?


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I thought the new release was to introduce some autonomous features, like parallel parking, highway cruising (possibly including lane changes) but the majority of the driving would still have to be done by a human.
 
driving.png
 
Fredbob711 said:
I thought the new release was to introduce some autonomous features, like parallel parking, highway cruising (possibly including lane changes) but the majority of the driving would still have to be done by a human.
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I believe you are correct. However the system has a lot of potential. This video shows the chip Tesla uses.

MobilEye
 
Wow, another lawsuits and lawyers thread. This one should be just as fascinating as the rest of them.
 
Swampfox201 said:
The salesman said next month they will release a software upgrade that will allow the car to drive itself. All you do is enter the destination and the car will take you there.

In our sue happy culture and seeing how GA has suffered in the face of lawsuits how will this company survive when someone gets hurt by a car that is driving itself?


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Google puts out a monthly report on their self-driving cars and recaps accidents. While there have been a number of them (mostly the Google car getting rear ended), they've all been the other car's fault. (See, they are just like human drivers! :D)
 
Archammer said:
I really like this upcoming feature too:

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I probably watched too much Sci-Fi when I was young, but that's just creepy looking. (But cool, none the less.)

John
 
But they are losing $4,000 for each car they sell. I only have a CPA but something tells me that is not a long term business model.
 
Getonit said:
But they are losing $4,000 for each car they sell. I only have a CPA but something tells me that is not a long term business model.
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They'll make it up in volume :goofy:

Of course, that sounds silly on it's face, but it's actually true. There's a lot of fixed costs amortized in there.
 
They are not losing money on Model S. That calculation was idiotic. Take profit report and divide by cars sold to get 4000 loss... They are "losing" money(profit) in general based on their expansion and investments. It's not uncommon to operate at a loss for a young and aggressively expanding company.
 
What is the attraction of an electric car? Just curious.
 
Anthony said:
What is the attraction of an electric car? Just curious.
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if you discount all the negatives of EVs (mostly cost, weight, range, and slow re-fuel), theoretically there are a lot of attractions.

1. Thermodynamically, it is far more efficient.
2. Dead simple drive: Way less maintenance and reliability issues
3. Faster(can be)
4. Cheaper fuel(for the moment anyway)
5. Easier upgrades and more integrated system(I may not like that much, but lots of people do)

Probably a few more things that I'm missing.

Not a fan of EVs in general, btw.
 
What's interesting about EV vs ICE is that it is very easy, reliable, linear, and efficient to make EV faster. Just add more battery and more powerful(yet cheap) motor, or more motors. Tires and weight are your only limit.

With ICE, after 500-600hp, you need to start employing complicated, exotic and progressively expensive systems to keep increasing power efficiently.

This is why Leaf makes no sense as it is so expensive compared to it's ICE rivals that it is completely not worth it. Tesla, otoh, makes a lot more sense as compared to its main competitors(Panamera, M5, AMG Merc)
 
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Matthew said:
EVs are really coal powered. But it's good old American coal.
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it is, but it is still more efficient from coal in the ground to drive to a supermarket.

Environmental impact, otoh, is more complicated issue with all those toxic batteries
 
genna said:
if you discount all the negatives of EVs (mostly cost, weight, range, and slow re-fuel), theoretically there are a lot of attractions.

1. Thermodynamically, it is far more efficient.
2. Dead simple drive: Way less maintenance and reliability issues
3. Faster(can be)
4. Cheaper fuel(for the moment anyway)
5. Easier upgrades and more integrated system(I may not like that much, but lots of people do)

Probably a few more things that I'm missing.

Not a fan of EVs in general, btw.
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Thanks, I didn't realize many of those. It doesn't make Vroooom, Vroooom noises, however.
 
Anthony said:
Thanks, I didn't realize many of those. It doesn't make Vroooom, Vroooom noises, however.
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Funny you should say that. An increasing number of "performance" ICE cars now fake the "Vrooom" with cars' sound systems
 
I saw one driving around town a couple weeks ago. It's a nice looking car.

It seems like so many people already have two cars anyway - a commuter and a hauler (truck, SUV, whatever). An electric commuter makes sense, you drive it to/from work and plug it in at the end of the day. Some companies have charging stations in their parking lots, too. One of our local grocery stores has one in their lot.

But a Tesla, to me, seems like the equivalent of a BMW. Yeah, you can use it as a grocery getter, yeah, you can use it to take the dog to the vet, but you really want it for other reasons. One reason might be for a long road trip. And that's where I wonder about EVs: I'd be worried about getting stranded between charging stations, or having to spend a long time at a charging station instead of a couple minutes at a gas pump.

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By the way, something I've wondered: how much juice do they use for heat/defrost?
 
Matthew said:
I saw one driving around town a couple weeks ago. It's a nice looking car.

It seems like so many people already have two cars anyway - a commuter and a hauler (truck, SUV, whatever). An electric commuter makes sense, you drive it to/from work and plug it in at the end of the day. Some companies have charging stations in their parking lots, too. One of our local grocery stores has one in their lot.

But a Tesla, to me, seems like the equivalent of a BMW. Yeah, you can use it as a grocery getter, yeah, you can use it to take the dog to the vet, but you really want it for other reasons. One reason might be for a long road trip. And that's where I wonder about EVs: I'd be worried about getting stranded between charging stations, or having to spend a long time at a charging station instead of a couple minutes at a gas pump.

--


By the way, something I've wondered: how much juice do they use for heat/defrost?
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People have different reasons for owning luxury performance cars(Tesla, BMW, etc). Not all of that is for long trips.

Tesla is building(and already has lots of them all along major roadways) supercharging stations that get you 80% range in 30 min. And it's free to use. The car knows where these are and routes you to them on long trips or when it thinks you can't make it to destination.

A regular 120 plug is pretty much useless, however.
 
Audi actually invited me over to their facility to drive what I thought was their electric car. When I got there they wired me up with a wireless microphone and had me test drive and comment on a Tesla S they had. The car is a hoot to drive. If it weren't three times what my Volt costs. They put a camera man in the right seat along with a gopro on the hood and another on the side of the car and told me to follow a pace car (an Audi A8) while we headed around on local road and highways.

After 45 minutes they made me drive the A8 (gas powered) and asked me about that. They asked if I thought it would be a good platform for an electric car and with a little coaxing they got footage of me saying, "The Audi A8 would make a good platform for an electric car."

I left the place with a whole bag of Audi swag (several pens, a jacket, a water bottle, a note book,etc...) and a real interest in Teslas.
 
Matthew said:
By the way, something I've wondered: how much juice do they use for heat/defrost?
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Probably none for heat and not a lot for defrost. Batteries require cooling, so the car is liquid cooled and my guess has a heater core like a normal car.

Heating, AC and accessories do not affect EVs all that much.. it really is peanut power use compared to moving 4-5000lb vehicle at 60mph or so :)
 
A Tesla super charger can give you a couple of hundred miles of charge in 30 minutes. Tesla has been lining the interestates with them. I noticed one of the local wineries has both a more traditional L2 charger as well as a Tesla sitting on the crush pad (me thinks the owner got a model S or something).
 
Instead of buying a $100k car that drives itself, commute with Uber for a fraction of the cost. Then you're only paying $7 or so per trip (for UberXL depending on your commute), no car payment, no insurance payment, no garage needed. And just as boring/interesting as being in a car that drives itself.

I know a few people who have done just that.
 
narchee said:
Instead of buying a $100k car that drives itself, commute with Uber for a fraction of the cost. Then you're only paying $7 or so per trip (for UberXL depending on your commute), no car payment, no insurance payment, no garage needed. And just as boring/interesting as being in a car that drives itself.

I know a few people who have done just that.
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You've got me. A $7 uberX (let alone XL) ride around here isn't much further than I can walk in short order. In fact, despite the hype, uberX isn't substantially cheaper than cabs here.
 
My bad, I read a news article from a widely distributed news source, I assumed it was correct. A little further research clarified the issue.

genna said:
They are not losing money on Model S. That calculation was idiotic. Take profit report and divide by cars sold to get 4000 loss... They are "losing" money(profit) in general based on their expansion and investments. It's not uncommon to operate at a loss for a young and aggressively expanding company.
Click to expand...
 
Matthew said:
EVs are really coal powered. But it's good old American coal.
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Maybe in Wyoming but in reality an EV can be powered by whatever you choose, coal, natural gas, solar, wind, hydro or even nuclear. You're not locked into a single source for the electricity. There are lots of other advantages and viable applications. Think of an off road vehicle - an indipendent electric motor on each wheel, ungodly amounts of torque, built in traction control.

The biggest disadvantage is what's the trade-in value of one with ten year old batteries?
 
As you clean up the electric grid, EV's get cleaner. As for oil, don't forget extraction, shipping, refining, and shipping again. No, I don't drive a Tesla. I have driven them though and I am very impressed. You can go here and see the emissions comparison including the generation of electricity.
 
Silvaire said:
Maybe in Wyoming but in reality an EV can be powered by whatever you choose, coal, natural gas, solar, wind, hydro or even nuclear. You're not locked into a single source for the electricity. There are lots of other advantages and viable applications. Think of an off road vehicle - an indipendent electric motor on each wheel, ungodly amounts of torque, built in traction control.

The biggest disadvantage is what's the trade-in value of one with ten year old batteries?
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Sure, we can make the move towards other sources of electricity generation. But for now, coal is king:

https://flowcharts.llnl.gov

The part I'm surprised by, and I probably shouldn't be, is the amount of rejected (lost) energy.
 
Actually, here in the coal belt, the generation is still only 40% coal. Still when you balance the carbon scrubbing of modern coal plants (there's a major one just miles from us) and the other power generation, you have to have a car that does better than 60 MPG to have a better carbon footrprint than even TODAY'S electric.
 
Matthew said:
By the way, something I've wondered: how much juice do they use for heat/defrost?
Click to expand...


The Tesla salesman I talked to said it takes a lot more energy to warm the batteries in the winter than it does to heat or cool the interior.


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I just got an invite today to a Tesla event to drive one. I think I'll go.
 
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