Prius vs. Tesla Roadster vs. VW Touareg in Denmark
this makes me strangely happy
Posted on 02/16/2013 10:33:20 AM PST by Vince Ferrer
You may have heard recently about an article written by John Broder from The New York Times that makes numerous claims about the performance of the Model S. We are upset by this article because it does not factually represent Tesla technology, which is designed and tested to operate well in both hot and cold climates. Indeed, our highest per capita sales are in Norway, where customers drive our cars during Arctic winters in permanent midnight, and in Switzerland, high among the snowy Alps. About half of all Tesla Roadster and Model S customers drive in temperatures well below freezing in winter. While no car is perfect, after extremely thorough testing, the Model S was declared to be the best new car in the world by the most discerning authorities in the automotive industry.
To date, hundreds of journalists have test driven the Model S in every scenario you can imagine. The car has been driven through Death Valley (the hottest place on Earth) in the middle of summer and on a track of pure ice in a Minnesota winter. It has traveled over 600 miles in a day from the snowcapped peaks of Tahoe to Los Angeles, which made the very first use of the Supercharger network, and moreover by no lesser person than another reporter from The New York Times. Yet, somehow John Broder “discovered” a problem and was unavoidably left stranded on the road. Or was he?
After a negative experience several years ago with Top Gear, a popular automotive show, where they pretended that our car ran out of energy and had to be pushed back to the garage, we always carefully data log media drives. While the vast majority of journalists are honest, some believe the facts shouldn’t get in the way of a salacious story. In the case of Top Gear, they had literally written the script before they even received the car (we happened to find a copy of the script on a table while the car was being “tested”). Our car never even had a chance.
The logs show again that our Model S never had a chance with John Broder. In the case with Top Gear, their legal defense was that they never actually said it broke down, they just implied that it could and then filmed themselves pushing what viewers did not realize was a perfectly functional car. In Mr. Broder’s case, he simply did not accurately capture what happened and worked very hard to force our car to stop running.
Here is a summary of the key facts:
When Tesla first approached The New York Times about doing this story, it was supposed to be focused on future advancements in our Supercharger technology. There was no need to write a story about existing Superchargers on the East Coast, as that had already been done by Consumer Reports with no problems! We assumed that the reporter would be fair and impartial, as has been our experience with The New York Times, an organization that prides itself on journalistic integrity. As a result, we did not think to read his past articles and were unaware of his outright disdain for electric cars. We were played for a fool and as a result, let down the cause of electric vehicles. For that, I am deeply sorry.
When I first heard about what could at best be described as irregularities in Broder’s behavior during the test drive, I called to apologize for any inconvenience that he may have suffered and sought to put my concerns to rest, hoping that he had simply made honest mistakes. That was not the case.
In his own words in an article published last year, this is how Broder felt about electric cars before even seeing the Model S:
"Yet the state of the electric car is dismal, the victim of hyped expectations, technological flops, high costs and a hostile political climate.”
When the facts didn’t suit his opinion, he simply changed the facts. Our request of The New York Times is simple and fair: please investigate this article and determine the truth. You are a news organization where that principle is of paramount importance and what is at stake for sustainable transport is simply too important to the world to ignore.
The upset appears to involve the newsmedia fabricating certain aspects of a report in order to fit a predetermined narrative, something FReepers almost uniformly condemn.
You know, sort of like fitting an explosive charge to a gas tank to get a vehicle to explode, then reporting how dangerous it is?
I guess it really is the seriousness of the charges instead of the facts that matter.
Dan Rather, is that you, lol?
Looks like Tesla tried to get a million bucks in free advertising, but the product failed miserably. So now they are engaged in shooting the messenger.
No wonder Obama likes these scammers.
I’m glad that a lot of Tesla buyers are in Norway. Up here in Alaska, it’s -23 degrees right now outside my window, a temperature that normally sucks the juice right out of a battery.
In any case, electricity is running about 90 cents a kilowatt hour - which means that $7.80 per gallon price we’re paying for gasoline is still a bargain, relatively speaking.
I agree with the post about packing enough energy to drive 300 miles into the size of a suitcase, then being able to recharge it in five minutes. It gets cold up here, but it’s never been too cold to burn something.
What sort of engine block heater y’all using up there these days? Electric?
Actually the gas tank fraud was NBC.
They were busted by a tip from an honest fire fighter here in Indiana (where the collision was filmed).
First year production cars run $80k minimum. Some may be in the $60k range by special order.
The trick is they offer three different battery packs. In other words, you get what you pay for. And guess which battery packs are in test drive cars for the media.
I recall that Tesla once admitted they would have to sell for $100k to break even.
I suspect the whole operation is just a scam.
Just a wild guess, but I’d say vehicles like Porsche, BMWs and Tesla’s are not the type of vehicle ya want in Alaska...Ya better stick to pickup trucks.
Well they got a ton of dough from the Fedgov in loans.
They moved into the former GM/Toyota factory in NorCal that had closed -(Pelosi district?).
Yeah follow the money...
Beware of those here who completely evade this fact and ignore what the article is actually about.
There will be some who fight against electric vehicles, right up to the day they buy one.
It's like when microwave ovens came out, and those invested in traditional ovens mocked and warned against them....Up until they all bought one.
The photo of the aftermath doesn’t quite tell the story. The Tesla was stationary behind the VW SUV when hit at speed by the Prius, shoving the Tesla under the VW. The passenger compartments of all three remained intact afterwards. Minor injuries.
I’m defintely not a NYT fan... but I side with Broder on this one.
The Tesla has some great perfomance in some areas, but is a pain practicality-wise.
Elon Musk is a salesman, first and foremost. I don’t trust him at all.
Broder has at least one witness. The tow truck driver who confirms Tesla tech may not know how their car actually works:
http://jalopnik.com/tow-truck-driver-at-center-of-tesla-controversy-unaware-202391288
...But Ibsen, a veteran tow truck driver, was kind enough to take time out of his day to tell me more about his rescue of the stranded Model S. And for the record, he told me he didn’t get the sense that this was something Broder wanted to happen, or tried to make happen.
On that late January day when the Model S required a tow, it was “somewhere between 0 and 10 degrees outside,” Ibsen said, so both of them were cold and miserable.
“It didn’t appear that the gentleman driving the car wanted it to not work,” Ibsen told me. “I don’t think he had any desire to stand freezing on the side of the road.”
Much of what Ibsen told me echoed what his towing company coworker said earlier today. When he arrived, the Model S was stuck in park and its electric parking brake was on, making it very hard to get onto the flatbed. There was a way to jump the car’s 12-volt battery, but that wasn’t working, he said.
Now, the car’s touch screen center console was working, and Ibsen was on the phone with a Tesla employee in California who was walking him through a process to get the brake off, but he wasn’t getting the messages or menus on the screen that the employee said he was supposed to...
Owners’ reports of problems with their new Teslas:
Elon Musk just needs to go pucker his lips at Obama some more.
Anytime a bad report comes out over his little taxpayer funded green fantasy he smears the people reporting the info.
Musk is little more than a confidence man slurping money from us instead of risking his own money.
No tax dollars should be involved with this. How many millions of tax dollars did they get for every car sold?
Tesla got around $500 million up front, but I suspect there’s more in hidden subsidies and tax breaks.
They won’t say how many cars they’ve built, but it is certainly less than 5,000 and may be less than 4,000.
Any reporter who would “cook” an article should be fired and permanently barred from jounalism. But that would pretty well end the New York Times, wouldn’t it?
Any reporter who would “cook” an article should be fired and permanently barred from jounalism. But that would pretty well end the New York Times, wouldn’t it?
Too late, Tesla got a $465 million loan from DOE.
Fisker is having serious problems.
“Teaming up with Dongfeng could help Anaheim, Calif.-based Fisker solidify its turnaround and give it the funds to pay back loans from the U.S. government. The maker of the Karma luxury rechargeable car had to halt production last year after battery supplier A123 Systems filed for bankruptcy and said last week that it would begin making vehicles again “fairly soon.””
I’ve followed this market segment with curious interest.
—Toyota has a huge advantage with their Hybrid experience. Gas plus electric hybrid is proven technology, and the marketplace has deemed it a viable option. Toyota, Ford, Honda, GM,VW-Audi and others are increasing the numbers of models for sale in the US. Fisker is in this market, not all electric.
—All electric with only batteries is a very limited market, and evidence points that Toyota is leaving it, or cutting way back. The prices are high, and the reliability-usefullness is questionable. Tesla is in this market.
Trouble with both Tesla, and Fisker does not surprise me, as prices are high and is is not likely wither would reach a volume whereby potential buyers would feel confident about service, etc.
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