Answers from Tesla

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(efusco @ Mar 12 2007, 12:38 PM) [snapback]404220[/snapback]</div>

Ok I see what you mean. I'm just glad it works for me. My goal is to have the people that are like me find me so I can help them in anyway. That's all. I know there are people who are in a simular situation as me and would be able to be satisifed with a cheaper electric vehicle. I'm also proof that you CAN drive an electric vehicle in a cold area. I know what options you really need and ones I feel your wasting your money on. I guess maybe Priuschat isn't the best place to find people to help being that a Prius is a luxury car and a cheap electric vehicle won't be. I love to help people and was thrilled to have the buyer of the RV I just sold tell me he paid $2K for a Prius warranty and RIGHT AWAY telling him about Priuschat and the cheaper warranty. I was never much into cars but once I found out about electric vehicles I'm all into those! B)

And actually I won't get to worried about the price of electricty going up because 79% of my house/warehouse is paid for by my by my business. I'm more worried about the high cost of heat I'm paying now. My heat bill doubled last month with it being SO cold here. Wish I could figure out something clever to do about that. <_<

 

Oh man. I simply don't have time to do all of these justice. I'll try to touch on them before I head to bed. Hey, it beats starting my taxes. These will be quick without much flowery language. I'm not trying to be rude!

Crap - after all that, why don't the quotes work? I missed some bracket or slash. I can't find it!

Since 1996 the Rav4EV was for lease only - to fleets. A Toyota guy made a speach one day about how nobody wanted to buy the vehicles. He was challenged publicly, and had no clue that the vehicles were lease only. To save some face he made it is mission to see that the cars were available for sale. They built enough for a two-year sales program, and sold out of all of them in eight months. Couldn't close the program fast enough, and had to actually build about 12 more up to satisfy the orders that had already been replaced. These are the very few 2003 models that are on the road - they lack some features of the 2002.

Well, there are ten's of thousands of EVs on the road in the US today. The vast majority of them are home-brew. I dare say that if a factory EV were available and advertised for its benefits - and if drivers were actually charged the non-subsidized price for their fuel, that there would be a large market for EVs. Obvoiusly we feel differently about this. One big difference is that I have experience in owning/driving/talking about them to interested individuals. Most non-EV owners don't realize the awesome benefits of electric drive - even if they've heard about them in passing.

Wasn't a marketing idea. The Prius was built to comply with the emission requirements that Toyota knew would be coming in the US. While the American companies spent their time crushing those requirements, Toyota spent their time and money building the car that satisfied the inevitable requirements.

If gas were $15/gallon and electricity the equivalent of $2/gallon? You still think they never would? Or are those prices a "never" as well?

The crux of public resistance is ignorance - and a fair dose of oil subsidies. This is clear when you talk to them as much as I do. And even reading here I see it. I hear about the fear of running out of charge all the time. Can it happen? Sure. Will you be stranded like when you run out of gas in a regular car? Nope. And unlike the Prius, you know exactly how much charge you have in your EV. And driving slower increases your range exponentially - unlike an ICE. An EV isn't the best fit for every situation. But there are millions of cars in the US that do NOTHING but commute. Many families with two cars (and by many, I mean millions) have one car that commutes, and another car for "trips." Just swap that commuter for an EV, and we've helped. Yes, people will just pay for the current cheap gas to drive what they want. Let's charge people what that gas actually costs and see how things go.

An EV is currently an excellent fit for a commute. I would not suggest it for long trips, though with modern EVs having ~300 mile range and fast charging, that could change. But we have to start somewhere! And if not now, when? We haven't just "made it work." The EV is our car of choice, and is driven seven days/week. The Prius is taken on long trips, or when we need to go different directions in a car at the same time. Otherwise, the EV is the car taken. Out of choice.

We'll have to start with something higher than the lowest common denominator. Make the cars available and see how it goes. I have no desire to force EVs on anybody. I simply know they can be made, and I know they're better for us is many ways, for many of our trips. Making them available is all I ask (well, and maybe take the oil subsidies away). Owning an EV isn't a hurdle in lots and lots of situations. In others it is. But for that first set, an EV is a HUGE benefit. No oil changes. No tuneups. No driving to the gas station. Just ask your wife how much she enjoys driving to the gas station and filling up. My wife drives 40 miels/day, and for seven years now has not visisted a gas station and pumped gas. This is the part she likes the best about EVs. The way to get over the hurdles is to stop thinking of EVs has something to suffer with, and to start thinking of the many benefits. So far the public doesn't understand them, and in fact are afraid of many of the huge benefits - like plugging in.

Yes. I was speaking of the sig 100 not being after 2008 - not about any car ordered now.

I'm guessing very late 2008 for the sig 100.

I don't follow. None of what I said is supposed to assume these things. I gave a VERY simplified "what if" and I guess that's where we need to assume these things? Was just trying to be as simple as possible. And the reality isn't that simple, of course. What we assume is that car makers are not excited about throwing away investment money, nor are they excited about demonstrating that their core product is NOT all the good things that EVs can be.

The company that takes the risk has to build the market on its own, and shoots itself in the foot BECAUSE we won't switch to EVs overnight. They'll have to advertise EVs as being the greatest thing since sliced bread. All sexy because it is quiet and doesn't pollute as much. But wait... in the meantime, please also keep buying our SUVs that are NONE of the above? The first one to take the risk gets killed. They either all have to do it (like in the 90's) or they are wise to do what they are doing now - none of them doing it. It is the smart business decision. The PHEV is the perfect hedge to put your toe in the water, and still keep building ICE vehicles.

I'm gonna get shot... but most people know my feelings here. Hybrids offer very little different than what we can have with an efficient little ICE. The cars still run only on gasoline. You don't need to know anything different to drive them (The Prius quirks of power button and shifting aside) The big news with hybrids? They meet very strict emissions standars. And THAT, I believe was why the Japanese companies made these cars. NOT to take any great risk by making something all scary and new - like an EV. But to make a car that has all the warm fuzzies of an ICE, but make it burn cleaner - and meet emissions requirements that nobody else can achieve. Hybrids are with us because Japan saw the emissions writing on the wall. They did something about it. They didn't take a big risk here! Just jumped at the chance to stay ahead of the mandated curve.

I know very few (none, actually) radical environmentalists who drive EVs. Most of the radical enviros I know of show up at protests in their suburbans. I'm not kidding here. I know hundreds of EV drivers. Not a one of them is a radical - unless you count me as such.

This "small" group is huge. HUGE in numbers. Assuming that "limited range" is 100 miles. An no, I'm not going to provide a link. Some folks can't imagine that there are people who never drive more than 100 miles from home. Look at the cross-section of America, and you'll see this number is huge.

 

the inability to store very large amounts of electrical power will only allow EV's to help hydrogen cars take off. what many fail to recognize is that hydrogen will not happen unless EV's are up and running in the main stream.

what we need is a HUGE amount of solar and wind stations generating electricity that is put into a grid on demand, the excess used to create hydrogen that can be stored. transmitting electricity is not going to be practical for small local operations so each town, even small ones would have several dozen stations like this...(get the gas station correlation here?) they store the electricity as hydrogen, its used by hydrogen cars for transportation and storage conversions for people too far off the grid and for emergency storage.

but NONE of this is going to happen unless EV's take off and do it right now. i feel it will be far easier to get this infrastructure in place if the process starts now for viable technology we have now for not one company in this world will build a station like this for something that is 15 years off which btw, will not fly unless this power station infrastructure is already in place

now after all is said and done, with the limited range of hydrogen and EV's, having all these stations networked and redundant (as i mentioned, even very small towns of a few hundred would have to have a few dozen of these stations) and programing cars to recognize by integrated GPS which station is full (or is need of being emptied) insures no wasted trips to a station that is empty (something that has actually happened to me about 4-5 times in my LT with gasoline stations)

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(DaveinOlyWA @ Mar 13 2007, 08:22 AM) [snapback]404861[/snapback]</div>

I don't follow. There has yet to be a longer range FCV than BEV. FCVs are MORE range limited than BEVs - wven when the BEV is a 10th of the cost of the FCV. Spend the same amount on the BEV, and there's be no way to even compare the two, they'd be so far apart.

Most people THINK that FCVs will have longer range. That's the big, exciting *promise* of FCVs. But gosh, it just hasn't happened. And along with the greater range of BEVs, they can be refueled at WAY more locations than FCVs ever will... and that virtually extends the ranger even further.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(darelldd @ Mar 13 2007, 03:55 PM) [snapback]405067[/snapback]</div>

you shouldnt follow because i am in no way suggesting that Hydrogen vehicles will ever extend their range to much beyond a few hundred miles at best. that is why the multi stations would be needed and they can be put into place right now to service the EV fleet. adding hydrogen capacity thru electrolysis would be the next step and allows the hydrogen highway to be built in phases and serve a purpose fueling the local grid and EV's.

problem is... why build something that will not be in practical use for at least another 25 years (i dont care what gm says, i say FCV's are at least that far off). but building the charging stations for EV's which can be relatively mainstream in less than 5 years can start now. they can put energy into the grid and store energy via hydrogen that can be converted to provide charges for EV's.

many say that tens of thousands of small generating farms are not feasible because there is no way to store the power that we dont have a demand for and most of these stations are too far (or too small to be cost effective) off the grid to connect.

to me, the potential (no pun intended) improvement in charge storage can be much greater than what we have today. the limitation of hydrogen storage on a vehicle is already pretty much known barring a MAJOR technilogical discovery, so hydrogen will always be a vehicle that must be refueled daily for a heavy commuter and that is an active act. recharging an EV is pretty much passive. sure you gotta plug it in, but in the comfort of your home, it becomes convenient and a non-issue imm. building charging stations initially for EV's and eventually for hydrogen vehicles later will provide the snergy to get us off oil before its too late.

i simply feel that all our oil requirement needs will not be replaced as easily so the sooner we greatly reduce our oil needs due to personal transportation the better positioned we are for the long haul.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(daniel @ Mar 14 2007, 09:10 AM) [snapback]405444[/snapback]</div>

Ah! You contradict yourself here.

The guy who's Ferrari is not fast enough will SAVE MONEY and buy the faster Tesla. But at that point the REASON for the purchase isn't to save money, so I'm full of it. Never mind.

And I'm sure Tracy will come back to answer for herself, but in the meantime - she owns/drives a GEM pickup. (NEV).

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(darelldd @ Mar 14 2007, 01:54 PM) [snapback]405486[/snapback]</div>

Yes, I'm back! B) I wouldn't miss a change to talk about the great benefits of driving electric even with just my electric Gem truck!

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(daniel @ Mar 14 2007, 01:10 PM) [snapback]405444[/snapback]</div>

I didn't even need the EV switch in my Pruis to determine I bought a great car BUT I wanted FULL electric ANYWAY I could. I keep recalling back to when I was in Vegas drving around the strip in an electric car. I said back them (6 years ago) I wanted an electric car after driving it and the funny thing is I ended up getting exactly that electric vehicle I drove! :lol:


<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(daniel @ Mar 14 2007, 01:10 PM) [snapback]405444[/snapback]</div>

Nothing you would be interested in driving LOL I drive an full battery electric Gem Power Wheels. (The powerwheels is what my daughter calls my Nev truck No it doesn't go on the freeway. Yes it goes slow. Range is low etc etc. If I want to go fast I will jump in my gas car. If I want to drive on the freeway I will jump in my gas car. If I need to go far I jump in my gas car. I DON'T CARE! I drive electric EVERYDAY! Matter fact I drove ONLY electric for 26 days straight. I LOVE driving electric. I love how quiet my electric truck is. I love not having to go to the gas station. I love not having to pay for gas. I love that it's fun to drive. I love the attention I get driving in it. (People are very nice to me cause they see I'm cool cause I drive ALL electric B) ) I love I don't have to worry about getting a speeding ticket for having a lead foot. I just love EVERYTHING about driving electric. IF I wanted to drive electric on the freeway I would ALREADY be driving an electric Rav4. I don't go on the freeway except for a couple times a year. Buying an electric car has been the VERY best buy I have EVER made!

I don't have to buy a Telsa to get most of the perks for driving electric!

 

I would love to go EV, but have concerns about ability to hold charge in Illinois winters without reducing range so far as to be unusable (need 30 mile range). I also have concerns about their safety. For instance, their ability to fair well in side-impact crash with SUV.

If the next gen Prius isn't amazing, I'm hoping a commercial PHEV conversion for the 2nd gen Prius will be available and fit my daily driving needs.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(daniel @ Mar 15 2007, 08:41 AM) [snapback]405982[/snapback]</div>

No problem Daniel. I KNOW that a Gem is nothing compared to a Tesla. I think I would pass out if you got a Gem instead of a Telsa. :lol: I was just letting you know what I had (since you asked) and also letting anyone who might be reading this that would be interested know more info about it. I'm in your opposite situation. I would NEVER put out the money for a Telsa. I'm not saying it's not a nice car but I'm way to careful with my money to spend it on something that expensive that I wouldn't use much. I would feel guilty driving it. I would be scared it was gonna get dinged by other cars. I can have just as much fun in my Gem as I would in a Telsa. I get the same feelings about driving electric as someone would driving a Telsa. There is now an Xebra made by Zap that can go about 35mph. I will probably switching to that vehicle when they can get more range with them.

BUT I would love to at least drive the Telsa once. Or Even a Rav4 EV. (Wait maybe that might not be good to do cause I might get hooked and won't want to go back to my slow Gem :lol: )

 

The GEMs are a conundrum. They are so limited and slow that they will hold up traffic. I think in many ways they hurt chances for real EVs more then they help,

 

You could look at an electric recumbent bike... depending on the setup they go anywhere from 20 mph to 55 mph. I am waiting for my kit to come in... got one that would take my recumbent bicycle to at least 35 mph... I need that kind of speed for where I live - for my shorter-distance commutes.

You can check them out at www.electric-bikes.com or at www.ecospeed.net.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(SomervillePrius @ Mar 15 2007, 11:27 AM) [snapback]406046[/snapback]</div>

I have been driving a Gem for 9 months now and I don't hold up traffic. Yes people go around me and I stick to 2 lane roads so I they can. BUT I have to say 8-9 times out of 10 I catch up with them at the stop lights. They just get there a few seconds earlier than me.

AND MOST importantly IF I did feel like I was holding up traffic I would just modify my Gem to make it go faster. I know some guy out in NY who has his Gem going 42mph. So IF I felt I needed to go faster I certainly would. I just can't see doing it though when 8-9 times out of 10 I'm catching up with everyone at the lights anyway. Matter fact our traffic lights are timed for 25mph.

So if I could get a chance to drive on the same roads as you are and I knew you felt that way I would just keep catching up to you at the lights, wave and ask you what your hurry is. You obviously aren't getting anywhere faster than me! (and if you do it's within a few minutes of me)

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(daniel @ Mar 15 2007, 11:41 AM) [snapback]406055[/snapback]</div>

Daniel, Actually I can give you even more info. I know a dealer now that is offering modified Xebras to even go faster than 40mph. I can give you his e-mail address if you want.

Actually to be honest the stock Xebra won't work for you. Zap says it goes 40mph BUT it doesn't. (max I have heard is 35mph) However they JUST announced a updated version of an Xebra. They are offering a different controller and different batteries. If and when I switch to an Xebra I will definatly want these upgrades. They 35mph is fine for me BUT I want the high 50 miles of range.

Daniel I also think a modifed Xebra would be a good thing for you for now. You can make changes to it to get it to do more of what you want. It can go on the freeway since it's registered with the DMV as a motorcycle. The ONLY bad thing about the Xebra are they are made over in China. BUT that's what Zap choose to do in order to be able to keep their price down.

I'm just happy I have a electric vehicle I can drive TODAY! I'm not picky about what it is. I can always switch later on if I decide I want something more. I have been happy though that I can work with the cheaper electric vehicles. Yes I do make some sacrafices to do that but I'm ok with them. I rather save the money and go cheaper. B)

My feelings about the Xebra is that you either need to be able to tinker around with a vehicle yourself or know of someone who can for you. When your buying an motorcyle that is made over in china there are going to be some things that need to be addressed. Luckily if/when I move to an Xebra I have someone who can fix or modify anything I would need done.

 

It's could if they could do 40 (and get there reasonably fast). That said it wouldn't be legal to drive a NEV at that speed as they are by law limited to 25mph (STUPID!). Not sure any cop would care to stop one though.

The Zap Obvio could be interesting but their website seem to have been dormant for a long time.

Another possibility would be http://www.vectrix.com/ they have an interesting electric scooter. Their head office is close to me, but they seem to slip a year for every year!

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(SomervillePrius @ Mar 15 2007, 11:52 AM) [snapback]406067[/snapback]</div>

Yeah my feeling is that IF I'm allowed by law to drive on a 35mph road with my Gem I should by law be able to move my truck 35mph. I know gemcars would love to be able to manufacturer their Gems to go 35mph but then that would be a whole new deal because of the stupid laws. (crashtesting requirements etc)

I doubt any police officers are going to car if you make your Nev go faster. They only issue that some would be concerned with is their insurance if they got in an accident and it was proven they were going faster than 25mph.

After driving mine for 9 months now I promise you I haven't had any issues. I mean people just go around me if they want to. It's been no big deal. I know people drive fast so I have always made sure they can just easily get around me. I couldn't even drive my Prius 25mph. (I have tried) but it doesn't feel like I'm just going 25mph in my Gem. Not sure why but I know I tested driving y Prius 25mph and it was just so hard to do.

I'm just happy that there IS something I can drive TODAY! That's ALL that matters to me. B) If someone wants to call me an old lady driving a slow car so be it. I'm 42 but act/look close to 27 so I know I'm cool B) I do want to add an American flag to my Gem. IF someone has an issue on my speed I will just show them my American flag and salute to them! :lol:

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(daniel @ Mar 15 2007, 11:41 AM) [snapback]406055[/snapback]</div>

Cathether? Are you sitting in the hospital talking about electric cars :blink:

Hey Daniel don't go to Zap about their cars. Come over into the Xebra yahoo group. The people in our group know more about the Xebras than Zap does LOL The Xebra group has lots of fun people who know the vehicle inside and out. (literally since most have had the vehicles from the beginning and have gotten through all the minor issues of being the pioneers of the vehicle.) Also they can assist you in getting you what you need. Sean in the group is a great dealer who works with the people who want MORE out of the vehicle (range/speed wise)

I belong to the group even though I currently have a Gem. They allow me to since we are cousins and I have plans on getting the XebraPK truck.

I think many of us in the Xebra group are going through a midlife thing! :lol: