Who's smarter?

[IDIBRONCO]

Then there's one more thing to consider. He claimed to have designed some pretty far out there things that (supposedly) worked in a lab. After his death, the CIA (I believe) confiscated all of his papers and that's the last time they were seen in the light of day. That tells me something.

 

[ISPKI]

I really like the idea of EVs but ive never been a fan of the cybertruck. Ugly, too large for not enough work, too expensive. In concept it makes sense since electric drive systems have insane torque numbers for how small they are but I think it has a long way to go for heavier duty work and I honestly doubt that it will ever get there. They have done those "tests" with a cybertruck pulling a v6 F-150 but its a terrible comparison. You can buy a fully kitted out F350 crew cab, long bed, dually PSD with all the bells and whistles for significantly less than a cybertruck and it will do many orders of magnitude more work than a cybertruck could ever dream of doing, and last a heck of a lot longer doing it.

Also - they preach how efficient the cybertruck is but if you really calculate the electrical cost of charging it vs how much work it can do, vs what an actual work truck could do, the cybertruck will actually cost you more to "fuel up". Yeah I may only get a whole 12mpg in a newer PSD while towing something heavy, but its doing the work of 3 cybertrucks for 5-6x the distance AT THE SAME FUEL COST. If it costs around 168$ to fill up a F350 dually (48 gallon tank) and 50$ to charge a cybertruck (heavily varies on the area) then it will cost almost 1,000$ in charging costs to perform the same work as the F350. I shuffled the Cybertruck into the rich kid status symbol but otherwise useless zone a long time ago. It is exactly what no one needed.

Now, as a daily commuter vehicle, totally different story. The Tesla Model 3 is actually not rediculously heavy, similar in weight to most mid size passenger cars. They are extremely safe in accidents, and they are extremely efficient. over 85% of working class people in the US commute a total of 30 miles or less per day for work and that is well within the comfortable range for the Model 3 or Y or whatever passenger vehicle. You can plug the thing into your house's outlet over night when electrical costs are off peak and it will be fully charged every day for your commute. Plus, you can land one for about the same cost as a Toyota Camry. Other benefit is the EV has far less maintenance. No fluids, no filters, far fewer mechanical moving parts to have to fix, brakes last alot longer, etc. Bonus points for the prevalence of solar charging systems becoming so cheap now, a huge% of american working class people can charge these for free. Keep one for 5ish years and trade it in for a newer version since thats what most people do anyways and you have a perfect commuter vehicle. Big plus of these things being built entirely in the USA - Tesla, as much as people can choose to hate them, they do employ TONS of american workers, the most out of any other automaker.

 

[rreegg]

Was doing a carpet install install last week and had the material on top the truck rack. Passed a cyber truck and realized it’d be near impossible to carry anything on top due to the angles. Likely very difficult to get a rack to fit in the bed too. They’re incredibly designed for vanity but we all know that.

 

[The_Josh_Bear]

I really like the idea of EVs but ive never been a fan of the cybertruck. Ugly, too large for not enough work, too expensive. In concept it makes sense since electric drive systems have insane torque numbers for how small they are but I think it has a long way to go for heavier duty work and I honestly doubt that it will ever get there. They have done those "tests" with a cybertruck pulling a v6 F-150 but its a terrible comparison. You can buy a fully kitted out F350 crew cab, long bed, dually PSD with all the bells and whistles for significantly less than a cybertruck and it will do many orders of magnitude more work than a cybertruck could ever dream of doing, and last a heck of a lot longer doing it.

Also - they preach how efficient the cybertruck is but if you really calculate the electrical cost of charging it vs how much work it can do, vs what an actual work truck could do, the cybertruck will actually cost you more to "fuel up". Yeah I may only get a whole 12mpg in a newer PSD while towing something heavy, but its doing the work of 3 cybertrucks for 5-6x the distance AT THE SAME FUEL COST. If it costs around 168$ to fill up a F350 dually (48 gallon tank) and 50$ to charge a cybertruck (heavily varies on the area) then it will cost almost 1,000$ in charging costs to perform the same work as the F350. I shuffled the Cybertruck into the rich kid status symbol but otherwise useless zone a long time ago. It is exactly what no one needed.

Now, as a daily commuter vehicle, totally different story. The Tesla Model 3 is actually not rediculously heavy, similar in weight to most mid size passenger cars. They are extremely safe in accidents, and they are extremely efficient. over 85% of working class people in the US commute a total of 30 miles or less per day for work and that is well within the comfortable range for the Model 3 or Y or whatever passenger vehicle. You can plug the thing into your house's outlet over night when electrical costs are off peak and it will be fully charged every day for your commute. Plus, you can land one for about the same cost as a Toyota Camry. Other benefit is the EV has far less maintenance. No fluids, no filters, far fewer mechanical moving parts to have to fix, brakes last alot longer, etc. Bonus points for the prevalence of solar charging systems becoming so cheap now, a huge% of american working class people can charge these for free. Keep one for 5ish years and trade it in for a newer version since thats what most people do anyways and you have a perfect commuter vehicle. Big plus of these things being built entirely in the USA - Tesla, as much as people can choose to hate them, they do employ TONS of american workers, the most out of any other automaker.

I'm with you here! Well said.

Another few considerations are the massive subsidies paid out by governments for the EV's that are really the main driver in the EV explosion, which I disagree with completely since it's basically a tax on the rest of us not driving them. I get that it helps with adoption and all that, but I'm generally against bigger government, which includes those programs in most instances. Interestingly Musk says he's also against government subsidies, which aligns with his overall philosophy; and of course at this time benefits him greatly since he's the only profitable EV maker in the US and most of the world.
The next and most obvious issue is the batteries. Ones they begin to go south you basically have to throw away the car, it's not worth replacing the battery. My friend showed me the price tag of a F-150 EV battery, and you could buy a nice Toyota car with the same money.
There's a company in China, Nio, that has a modular battery-swap system that it's shared with other platforms and that is probably the future for sustainable EV's. Being able to swap the batteries out doesn't ruin the car when it goes downhill. That right there would be a big upgrade for the consumer.

All that said, I paid $1,000 for my F250 almost 20 years ago. Sure I've put some money into it over the years, maybe $4k? Probably not even that much. And now it's turbo-charged, after-cooled, has the axle gearing I want, better brakes, bigger tires, 32 gallon rear tank, tow hitch, backup landing lights, etc. Oh, and I can get fuel for it nearly anywhere.
I got my Volvo S40 for about $1800 with a blown headgasket(undisclosed). Lots of work, but fixed that for about $600. Can get fuel anywhere.

In the spirit of this thread, I'm WAY happier to own the above two vehicles and my XC90 family car, than I would EVER be with a fancy new car/truck and a monthly payment. Just say "no" to monthly payments!

 

[ISPKI]

I'm with you here! Well said.

Another few considerations are the massive subsidies paid out by governments for the EV's that are really the main driver in the EV explosion, which I disagree with completely since it's basically a tax on the rest of us not driving them. I get that it helps with adoption and all that, but I'm generally against bigger government, which includes those programs in most instances. Interestingly Musk says he's also against government subsidies, which aligns with his overall philosophy; and of course at this time benefits him greatly since he's the only profitable EV maker in the US and most of the world.
The next and most obvious issue is the batteries. Ones they begin to go south you basically have to throw away the car, it's not worth replacing the battery. My friend showed me the price tag of a F-150 EV battery, and you could buy a nice Toyota car with the same money.
There's a company in China, Nio, that has a modular battery-swap system that it's shared with other platforms and that is probably the future for sustainable EV's. Being able to swap the batteries out doesn't ruin the car when it goes downhill. That right there would be a big upgrade for the consumer.

All that said, I paid $1,000 for my F250 almost 20 years ago. Sure I've put some money into it over the years, maybe $4k? Probably not even that much. And now it's turbo-charged, after-cooled, has the axle gearing I want, better brakes, bigger tires, 32 gallon rear tank, tow hitch, backup landing lights, etc. Oh, and I can get fuel for it nearly anywhere.
I got my Volvo S40 for about $1800 with a blown headgasket(undisclosed). Lots of work, but fixed that for about $600. Can get fuel anywhere.

In the spirit of this thread, I'm WAY happier to own the above two vehicles and my XC90 family car, than I would EVER be with a fancy new car/truck and a monthly payment. Just say "no" to monthly payments!

Awesome to see another member here who appreciates Volvo's offerings.

Yeah alot of the battery issues and costs stem from the older battery tech that is starting to decay and needing replacement. These were NCA batteries I think. Extremely high energy density but also more volatile and tended to be more sensitive to charge decay.

They went to NMC at some point which was a bit of an improvement but the most recent was a total redesign to LFP which are A: Cheaper to manufacture, B: significantly more stable, C: more resilient to decay. These dont experience thermal runaway that the older NCA cells could experience, thats where those flashy EV car fire videos come from. LFPs are also not made with cobalt and are manufactured in the US out of mostly US sourced raw materials which is great.

Yeah the government subsidies thing was interesting and Elon was a huge proponent of them, despite preaching that he actually wasnt. Of course hes now a politician so I wouldnt be surprised if those subsidies continue and/our increase in some way - and why shouldnt they? China does that to EXTREME levels for the sole purpose of hurting US industry. They actually recently got in alot of hot water in the solar industry because they came in and forced Chinese manufacturers to sell their products in the US and Europe at a massive loss to try and put US and Canadian manufacturers out of business. In exchange, the Chinese gov. would cover their losses. They do the same thing with their EVs, to try and steal US technology and sell it back to us at a cheaper price to put our domestic manufacturers out of business. The Fed leverages Subsidies and import tariffs to combat those methods and honestly I dont see anything wrong with it. If american people would stop buying foreign made products then we wouldnt have such an issue and besides its not like they are increasing our taxes to do it, the feds have plenty of money for exactly this purpose. If they didnt use those tactics then most of our big consumer businesses would go out of business pretty quickly and all we would see on the road are new BYD chinese made EVs.

 

[IDIBRONCO]

Just say "no" to monthly payments!

And now that I just found out today that I'll probably be out of work in a few months, this part makes even more sense to me. No vehicle payments and, in May or June, no more house payments either. That will certainly help out the lower wages that I be making by starting a new job.

 

[The_Josh_Bear]

And now that I just found out today that I'll probably be out of work in a few months, this part makes even more sense to me. No vehicle payments and, in May or June, no more house payments either. That will certainly help out the lower wages that I be making by starting a new job.

OH MAN! You'll pay off the house this summer?! NICE WORK BROTHER!!!

 

[IDIBRONCO]

OH MAN! You'll pay off the house this summer?! NICE WORK BROTHER!!!

Thanks. Maybe a little sooner with a tax return that will be coming. Not much sooner, but a little helps at this point.

 

[ISPKI]

Thanks. Maybe a little sooner with a tax return that will be coming. Not much sooner, but a little helps at this point.

My wife and I were just talking about how nice it will be once we pay our house off. I wont have to work OT on the regular, can just focus on my laundry list of hobbies. Its going to feel like an early retirement. Just another ~16 years to go...

 

[MadMac]

So, are you smarter if you have an electric "truck" (TINO, truck in name only) that uses big expensive tires and lots of battery, that you don't use as a truck? Or should you just get the little car that can spontaneously start on fire and burn endlessly? Feel free to thrash my unusual logic!

Northern California - The Tesla Truck is not rare any longer, but rather a once a week thing if you drive every day (urban). The only impressive thing about them - is using folded stainless steel for skins - ok, thats novel, cool, and a bit nuts. So What. My new neighbor has a Rivian - he uses it constantly to tow a 12 foot light duty tandem - and loves it. I consider the Rivian to be a Truck, and was on the list to buy one, but my needs changed... so a '16 F250 CCSB rec'd a 60g retrofit instead... And not exactly a fair comparison b/c its a completely different class of truck.

Impressive as it is, the Rivian is an "in-town truck", but too pretty and needy for my uses... I'd say the same about the F150 EV. The Tesla Truck will remain.. a novelty in my book. Nothing wrong with it, but it just doesn't strike me as something which can do work without thinking about it. If I have to think about something other than good maintenance - its just not a viable truck.

As to Nicola Tesla - He's a Newton class stud in my book.

 

[IDIBRONCO]

The only impressive thing about them - is using folded stainless steel for skins -

Since you mentioned this, I wonder what happens when one hits 88MPH? I mean, Elon could have found Dr. Brown's long lost notes.

 

[MadMac]

Since you mentioned this, I wonder what happens when one hits 88MPH? I mean, Elon could have found Dr. Brown's long lost notes.

At 88,I wonder what happens to all the detrius I continue to haul around in the bed...

 

[IDIBRONCO]

Have someone video it and let us know!

 

[Old Goat]

At 88,I wonder what happens to all the detrius I continue to haul around in the bed...

Reminds me, at our Church they have a bunch of Maple trees
planted around the Parking lot. We get a lot of wind here, and
usually blows them away for the most part.
This one year they were pile up high.
I got this idea to load up the truck, then right turn, and next 3/4
mile houses on 3 - 5 acres so not heavly populated. get past them and open it up with the Tail gate down and blew out the leaves. had to stop once and push back the ones up at the back of the cab, and cleaned out the bed. It`s 2 lane and wide open and Sage Brush. Sure beat raking, and Wheel barrowing to the Dumpster.

Goat

 

[IDIBRONCO]

I may or may not have done something similar before.