meh
Join Date: May 2004
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As to Tesla's response to the NYT's article, they are not helping themselves. The NYT's article may have lies, but Musk lied himself in his response. Batteries do perform worse in the cold. Electric vehicles range will go down in the winter. giggity Last edited by Quagmire : 2013-02-14 at 16:02. |
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careful with axes
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Hillsborough, CA
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EDIT: That 300SD is still in the family in fact, and still chugging along just fine. The engine has held up better than the rest of the car. So yeah, you guys can argue all you want that American cars sucked back then, I totally agree. |
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Formerly “AWM”
Join Date: May 2009
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What I was getting at is that diesels, both US and European, before direct injection and variable vane turbos along with ultra low sulfur fuel were a loud and messy affair that wasn't for most people during the time I was talking about. They deserved some of those reviews. I had a couple of Rabbits in the '80s. They were loud as hell at idle, smelled, and laid down a smoke screen like you wouldn't believe. Plus, they were a total bitch in the winter to start and once started there was very little heat. And only had 48hp to boot. Once the fuel crisis was over and gas was under a buck a gallon they were a tough sell. |
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careful with axes
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Hillsborough, CA
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I don't recall a massive price difference back in the early 90s here in SFBA, both fuel types were pegged right around $1.30/g. Diesel was pennies more expensive, but during the first Persian Gulf conflict, actually became cheaper.
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Formerly “AWM”
Join Date: May 2009
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LOL. I was talking about the fuel crisis of the late '70s to early '80s. Oil prices tanked through most of the '80s as did sales of diesels. I was buying gasoline for around 75 cents/gallon I think at one point in '86, diesel was even less. We were talking about this a page or two ago that diesel was always much cheaper than gasoline only getting near parity during the colder months when some of it was diverted for home heating oil which is still used around here. But for almost the past decade it has been much higher than gasoline. The commercial economy uses up most of the diesel here leaving little left over. Plus places like Europe use a lot and end up sending their gasoline here.
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BANNED
I am worthless beyond hope. Join Date: Dec 2005
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I have a feeling this isn't going to end well for either side....
http://www.theatlanticwire.com/techn...-fakery/62149/ That's an article debunking most of Elon Musks' claims. The NYT is also in damage control with the public editor releasing a status update on a blog with more to follow.... http://publiceditor.blogs.nytimes.co...ar-test-drive/ |
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Formerly “AWM”
Join Date: May 2009
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This ought to be interesting. I really don't care too much how it goes but Musk sounds a little defensive about any bad review. It seems like you either test the car exactly how he wants it or he'll cry fowl. In the end I don't see what the big deal is. Range estimates are just like EPA fuel economy numbers. They are vague and often optimistic. Check out the EPA ratings for your car and then see what you get in the real world or go to fuelly.com and see what others are getting. More than likely less than the what was promised. The difference here of course is your kind of SOL for awhile if you run an electric dry.
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BANNED
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The overall idea of the article remains true. Someone in Tesla's PR department needs to stand up to Musk and tell him to chill out. |
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Formerly “AWM”
Join Date: May 2009
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And now more people will want to do reviews and hold his feet to the fire regarding range. That could be a bad thing. Up until now he was getting glowing press in my opinion. He should've kept his mouth shut.
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I think Tesla did have to respond... their stock certainly took a major hit and they definitely don't want order cancellations right now. But I think it would have been more appropriate to respectfully point out some flaws in the test and focus on what Tesla is doing to address the shortcomings of that review. Only having 2 Supercharger stations along a 300 mile route is not smart. They opened themselves up to these types of reviews by not having the proper infrastructure in place and basically inviting people to challenge the limits of the car. |
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annnnd as expected.... Musk looks like an idiot:
http://wheels.blogs.nytimes.com/2013...hat-it-doesnt/ About the only thing you can really call out the NYT reporter on is being stupid with the last leg and the trickle charge. His defense is that Tesla told him it would take an hour. After charging for an hour and seeing the range only at 32 miles he still opted to take it off the trickle charge and attempt to drive 90 miles. He claims he did as Tesla told him. Tesla thought it would charge faster. He left the last charge knowing the range would not meet his destination. I'm not exactly sure I would have made the tire dimension argument and its normal for a car to speed up going downhill argument. Last edited by Brave Ulysses : 2013-02-14 at 21:02. |
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careful with axes
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Hillsborough, CA
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Both of them are treating it like a usenet argument, but Broder was clearly slanted in one direction from the very start. Last edited by Eugene : 2013-02-14 at 22:45. |
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Musk was clearly slanted in one direction. And as CEO he should take the highroad and make sure to address any complaints about the customer experience. Right now he is simply being an obnoxious dad who thinks his child is god's gift to the earth and does no wrong. Last edited by Brave Ulysses : 2013-02-15 at 11:30. |
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Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2004
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That just seemed daft to me. "Put a full tank of gas in to get to where you need to go." "Oh, well, I'll just stop at 3/4, I'm sure it'll be fine..." O.o |
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Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Paris, France
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I know why diesels flopped in the US, but my point is about France and Europe generally, where car buyers were already choosing diesels in large numbers twenty years ago despite the disdain of every motoring journalist in the country.
Just ten years ago the situation hadn’t changed much, except even more buyers were choosing diesel cars. Even today, the majority of magazine reviews for normal family cars like the Ford Focus are for petrol models, while the overwhelming majority of new sales in that class are diesels. Electric cars will face the same reactionary antagonism from the press for decades. Having read Broder’s rebuttal, I’m convinced his original write-up was malicious. You could argue that the average real-world driver (though not the average Tesla buyer in 2013) would act as dumbly as he did, but I can’t believe he acted so stupidly at every opportunity just because some PR rep from Tesla misspoke. He knew he was being told to do stupid things, and he did those stupid things with relish. For example, Broder says the PR reps told him to “slow down and speed up to take advantage of regenerative braking” to extend the range. Would he also have followed their instructions to build a perpetual motion machine? Driving around with a range of zero to find the parking spot is also stupid. A range of zero is a dire emergency: get your lazy ass out of the car and walk around the tiny parking lot to find the charger before driving straight to it. You’ve already sustained idiotic behaviour for hours to get to this point, so don’t compound it by stubbornly driving the car into the ground. Cars don’t speed up to 83 miles per hour because of a decline in the road. Sheesh. They hit that speed because you’re pumping 40 friggin’ horsepower into the drivetrain, i.e. acting like an entitled idiot. Etc. The long and short of it: Broder acted maliciously and he’s quite possibly an idiot in addition. The average real-world car driver is an idiot. Electric cars in 2013 aren't ready for idiots (sadly). |
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It definitely sounds as if Tesla staff suggested that. It also doesn't really sound unreasonable to the average person that is use to seeing battery levels fluctuate based on temperature. The fact that he believed that, that he believed stop and go traffic would conserve battery and that driving like a yo yo would be better for the battery is not excusable for the NYT 's chief energy writer. |
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careful with axes
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Hillsborough, CA
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I don't think it applies to all-electric vehicles, but many 'hypermilers' employ this tactic on some hybrids because the combustion engine is allowed to shut down completely while coasting.
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ಠ_ರೃ
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Minnesota
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I mean, I'm all for buying a car based on your actual usage. It pains me to see people disparaging electric cars for being useless for road trips when they take maybe one road trip per year and have two cars anyway. But at the same time, there are very real problems with electric cars. I would agree with those who say that both parties are partly at fault - they have both twisted the facts to suit themselves to some degree, and it casts doubt on their credibility as a whole. |
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Not sure why battery swapping hasn't been taken more seriously. Drive in to service station, automated battery swap of a fully charged battery for your dead battery, and drive on.
Better Place is doing this internationally, but it doesn't seem to be gaining much momentum. |
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Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2004
Location: oaktown
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That makes the range equivalent to a family sedan with a 13 gallon gas tank that gets 23MPH. If the industry and/or feds gets their act together and start deploying standardized, high speed charging stations in large numbers (Tesla has gone their own way here, much like Apple believing they have a better solution, so hopefully something can be worked out in that case), electric cars start to seem nearly as convenient and flexible as gas cars-- at which point, the industry may explode. That which doesn't kill you weakens you slightly and makes you less able to cope until you're completely incapacitated |
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Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Paris, France
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What they do is take advantage of the fact that today’s car engines are greatly more efficient at high power outputs than low power outputs (mostly because they have lower pumping losses when the throttle is open; this is also the main reason small engines are more efficient than large engines at typical cruising speeds, where low power outputs (e.g. 30 horsepower) are needed: the small engine has lower pumping losses because its throttle is more open). Allowing the car’s speed to vary (e.g. between 40 and 60 mph) consumes more energy than driving at the steady average speed (e.g. 50 mph), because air drag varies as speed squared. The increased energy usage at 60 mph isn’t offset by the reduced energy consumption at 40 mph: total energy usage is greater. But this truth is masked in today’s cars by the fact that their petrol engines work most efficiently at high power outputs. Hypermilers add energy to the car at the engine’s most efficient power output, i.e. at a high power output. Naturally, the car accelerates strongly. When the speed gets to some calculated compromise value, they cut the engine (or its fuel usage) and coast, consuming the energy that was efficiently added. When the speed decays to a predetermined point, they repeat the cycle by adding energy at the engine’s most-efficient power output. If the increased efficiency of running the engine only at high power outputs offsets the reduced efficiency of driving at variable speed, you use less fuel. The closer you stick to an average speed, i.e. the more frequently you repeat the on-off cycle, the less fuel you use. But of course no-one wants to repeat the cycle once a second, not least because of the serious wear caused to engine mounts, gearboxes, etc., from the backlash of reversing the torque twice per cycle. In an electric car there is no gain in efficiency at high power outputs (often there is a slightly reduced efficiency, from heat lost at high currents in batteries and motor windings). So if you go faster you quite simply use more energy – since drag is proportional to speed squared, i.e. power required varies as speed cubed. Regenerative braking is a different matter entirely, and it obviously wastes energy in all cases, since motors and generators aren’t 100 % efficient. The reason some cars (including some hybrids) use less fuel in stop-and-go traffic than they do in highway traffic is not that they stop and go – that wastes fuel – but that they go at slower speeds. That we’re accustomed to using more fuel in city traffic is just a sign of how incredibly inefficient petrol engines are at low power outputs (and idle, obviously, where their efficiency drops to zero). Any decent motoring hack understands all of the above, and in a good deal more detail than I’ve described here. I’m certain Broder knows it. He just preferred to drive the Tesla badly, push his luck with the charging, and get a good story out of it. The Tesla reps are obviously to blame for their bad advice, but I’m certain Broder knew he was being given bad advice. For the same reason, but more so, that Apple doesn’t use swappable batteries anymore. The packaging flexibility, cooling, and safety of the battery pack is tremendously important in an electric car, and using standardised or swappable battery packs (or worse, both) compromises those things in ways that are unacceptable when the battery is already borderline unacceptable at the best of times. |
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http://www.betterplace.com Seems they have the same website designer as Tesla |
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Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2004
Location: oaktown
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Anyway, I see they currently have a single car model from a single manufacturer signed up for their program. That would give me pause, because if it doesn't take off I'd be left with a car with kind of a leased battery that I would end up probably having to purchase, should Better Place go under. And without a wide range of manufactures and models to choose from, it seems unlikely that Renault can put enough "Fluence Z.E."s on the road to make it a viable business. Also, for them to become ubiquitous, they would need electric car manufacturers to all agree to a single battery form factor, with a standardized enclosure that would allow for the robotic swap. I can't really see that happening, since some manufacturers (like for instance Tesla) use custom batteries as a part of the all over design, allowing them to fine tune the cars center of gravity and where and how much luggage space can be carved out. It's tempting to think of a battery swap as making the electric car experience more like just filling up with a tank of gas, but a battery isn't strictly analogous to petrol. It's a physical part of the car, one that is likely to have been designed to achieve the best possible tradeoffs (much like Apple, as Dorian points out). Standardized battery swap schemes take that away, and I'm not sure how many manufacturers really want that. It's a cool idea, mind you, and at the right price with some selection of cars to choose from that can utilize the service might be a winner. But there seem to be some real sticking points. That which doesn't kill you weakens you slightly and makes you less able to cope until you're completely incapacitated |
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BANNED
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Sure. All good questions....
disclaimer... I have multiple friends who work at Better Place, some of whom were there from the beginning. But, my knowledge is very basic and only based on conversations with them and my own interest and time spent reading their web site and news articles. Quote:
From what I can tell.... In Israel, which is one of their biggest rollouts so far.... The car costs $32,000 USD. And a 4 year Better Place subscription costs $9,200 USD. So, about $192 a month for unlimited battery swapping/charging/"fuel". By no means cheap, but also not terrible based on the price of petrol either which is around $8/gallon in Israel I believe. I have no idea what the average consumption per month is in Israel but 24 gallons seems pretty conservative to me to match. If you drive more you actually save a lot. Subscription cost includes installation of one charge spot at your hose, all electricity (including your charge spot), unlimited use of better place charge spots, and towing and emergency roadside. Quote:
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Better Place's idea right now would not be successful everywhere though, and wouldn't even be successful in the above scenario. They are focusing on international markets where gas is expensive, distances traveled are small and cars are small. As I said, they are also trying to get taxi deals.... which seems like a great idea. I would love to see a NYC Taxi fleet of Better Place vehicles. Last edited by Brave Ulysses : 2013-02-16 at 01:48. |
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careful with axes
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Hillsborough, CA
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I didn't mean to imply that hypermiling was enabled by regenerative braking, only that those people actively pulse their throttle and coast to extend the range on their cars far past what you might see on a window sticker.
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Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Paris, France
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Yeah. Unfortunately Broder followed advice to deliberately use regenerative braking, when he must have known that to be harmful to extending the range, as anyone interested in car technology (or the law of conservation of energy) must know.
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careful with axes
Join Date: May 2004
Location: Hillsborough, CA
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So a bunch of other media outlets are jumping on the bandwagon and completing the exact same road trip effortlessly just by not being idiotic when using/looking for superchargers.
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Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Paris, France
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Although Broder made many errors, his error of not taking full advantage of charging opportunities sticks out because it’s one that real-world drivers wouldn’t generally commit. It’s analogous to charging your phone to 40 % hoping that will get you through the day. And who charges their notebook battery to only 20 % because they expect to use it for just an hour at the airport?
Electric cars can take advantage of existing national power-transmission networks to recharge almost anywhere. Even high-speed chargers are much cheaper to install than conventional filling stations. Eventually, owners of electric cars may never have to drive somewhere specific to recharge: they’ll just charge at home, at their place of work, at every hotel or bed-and-breakfast on trips, at every restaurant they stop at, etc. |
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Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2004
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http://www.slashgear.com/tesla-gets-...oves-18269784/
Well alrighty then. NYTimes issues apology of sorts to Tesla, calls Broder's reporting sloppy. Last edited by Kickaha : 2013-02-19 at 00:58. Reason: Obcommentary |
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Veteran Member
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Paris, France
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Alright.
The Public Editor’s response itself is here. I read this as really quite strong criticism of Broder, though obviously Sullivan has to stick up for her own, and especially the paper itself. The criticism is fully justified, I feel. In my own view, Broder’s bad judgement amounted to bad faith – but if I were the Public Editor I’d have to adopt a more charitable stance too, I suppose. However, isn’t it curious that Broder’s “casual and imprecise notes” were, in every case of disagreement with the computer log, to the detriment of Tesla rather than its favour? They remind me a little of my local supermarket prices. Every time there’s a pricing error on the shelves versus what I pay at the till, it just so happens that the till price is higher. This is purely coincidental, I’m assured (last time by the manager, when it happened three times in one week and my feisty girlfriend got really sick of it). I did find it amusing that Sullivan appealed to her brother, “a physician, car aficionado and Tesla fan”. Trust me: my brother’s a doctor? It’s crazy to think that Tesla’s share price allegedly fell because of this sloppy review. I hope the added publicity – any publicity is good, right? – helps Tesla sell a few more of these cars. |
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