This brings me back to days of the old
Pacer versus Gremlin debates:
WHICH of the two is (was) the uglier car?
Personally, I never could decide which...
Posted on 05/06/2022 10:18:16 AM PDT by fireman15
Major U.S. automaker Ford blamed its sizable investment in electric vehicle (EV) company Rivian for its dramatic revenue decline in the first quarter of 2022.
Ford reported revenue of $34.5 billion between January and March, a 5% decline relative to the same period in 2021, and a net loss of $3.1 billion, according to the company’s earnings report released Wednesday. The Detroit automaker said its large investment in Rivian accounted for $5.4 billion in losses during the first quarter.
“A net loss of $3.1 billion was primarily attributable to a mark-to-market loss of $5.4 billion on the company’s investment in Rivian,” Ford said in the earnings report.
Ford maintains a roughly 12% stake in Rivian, CNBC reported in November.
Rivian has posted massive profit losses of its own and its share price has plummeted nearly 70% over the last six months. The value of Ford’s roughly 102 million Rivian shares has fallen from about $17.5 billion to $3.2 billion since November.
In the final three months of 2021, Rivian reported a net loss of $2.5 billion.
Automakers have increasingly turned their attention toward manufacturing electric vehicles as governments push aggressive green energy plans. President Joe Biden has promised to craft policies to ensure 50% of new vehicle sales in the U.S. are emissions-free by 2030 and every addition to the federal government’s 600,000-vehicle fleet is electric by 2035.
However, Rivian CEO RJ Scaringe recently suggested that the supply chain for EV batteries is still far behind where it needs to be to achieve many of the goals pushed by Western governments, the WSJ reported.
“Put very simply, all the world’s cell production combined represents well under 10% of what we will need in 10 years,” Scaringe said last week. “Meaning, 90% to 95% of the supply chain does not exist.”
(Excerpt) Read more at thestarnewsnetwork.com ...
WHICH of the two is (was) the uglier car?
Personally, I never could decide which...
I get what you mean, but...how many things have we thought (as humans) over the ages that would never be overcome, and...science found a way.
I just keep in mind we don’t know everything, and who knows, if they figure out room temperature superconductors or things like that, or some other mode of generating electricity, anything is possible.
That is the optimist in me...:)
Heheh, my dad bought one of those back in the Seventies...that cheesy plastic dashboard was the cherry on top of the ugly cake!
They also want to force suburbanites into high-rise cracker boxes. That will make it easier to lock us all down during the next “crisis.”
Not only that, but there simply are enough rear earth metals and cobalt to supply a country the size of England, much less the whole world.
More likely it is due to not being able to MAKE enough vehicles to sell.
What do you mean “oil pump job”? If the oil pump goes out, it usually trashes the entire engine. A rebuilt engine shouldn’t cost halt that.
All part of the Great Reset.
They did indeed. Their designers came up with some interesting concept vehicles, too. Pity this one didn't see production, it might've led the minivan trend.
Yep, chip problems. Can’t keep their production up.
Let’s say it has 1/2 the density. as you may know, you can get a gas vehicle with a 25 gallon tank - has a range of 500 miles @ 20 MPG.
So, the battery “compartment” will be 2x the size of the gas tank, but a lot of savings from engine/trans etc.
Now, if the cost to operate/mile is based on what I pay currently for electric (10 cents/KWH) and gas is average of 3$, you can see why it’s getting a close look.
Oh, and the batteries are designed to last 300-500k at least, if not 1M miles (goal that I think can be hit).
BTW, i am a car performance enthusiast, and drive a Mustang GT 5.0 California Special, previous car Supercharged Roush.
A friend of mine has a Tesla Model S, and I have ridden in it. His only complaint - the supercharger is not near his house (he gets free charging still i think).
You have taken a fact (energy density) and made it more than it is...how much more volume does all the mechanical stuff to convert the gas into go does it take (that takes space and weight, too).
I bet you are hoping the solid-state battery is not going to happen soon. As you know the energy density is higher than current LiON, and it’s SAFER than gasoline or LiON.
The real problem I see is the supply of Lithium to make these batteries, where are they going to find enough. Possibly in the rough mountains of Afghanistan, the investment to out in the necessary infastructure will be in the 10’s of Billions before one ton of ore is mined.
The last diesel vehicle we purchased was a school bus, actually a school van. I got it at a state auction for $1300. It was in really good shape and had low miles because it was used for a head start program for special events. It was a 1993 E350 Ford 1 ton van with a school bus chassis. It had the pre-Power Stroke normally aspirated 7.3L diesel engine that was manufactured by International Harvester. It didn't have as much power, but was arguably a better engine than some of the "Power Stokes that came along afterwards.
It was an amazing vehicle. It got exceptional fuel economy on the highway and had plenty of torque. The transmission was a heavy duty beast with auxiliary cooling. I have a CDL with a passenger endorsement and with the seats in it... it was legal to drive it in the HOV lane. I commuted to work in it for quite a while. I eventually took the seating for 24 kids out and used it for a work truck. I could open the rear doors and stack long lengths of lumber in it... I left one seat behind the drivers seat so that my wife or a friend could ride around with me. Actually the seats didn't weigh much so it was not difficult to bolt them back in place.
Despite the long length between the rear axle and the back of the bus, I put a class 3 hitch on it and towed a full size car hauling trailer with full size vehicles on it. I was afraid that it might be a little bit of a challenge for it, or have some stability problems but never had any problems.
I was very tempted to convert it into some type of motor home. Instead, after a few years I polished it all up and sold it for a lot more than I paid for it... I have regretted it a lot over the years. It was super useful.
We had the 350 Oldsmobile diesel in our 1982 Cutlass. They came out in 1978 and had some severe reliability issues for the first couple of years. By 82 they had those issues resolved and ours was very reliable, got good fuel economy, and had excellent torque. But the bad reputation caused people to avoid it like the plague. So, it was discontinued. You could basically bolt it into pickup that had a Chevy 350 gasoline engine in it for a cheap conversion to diesel, but ours had over 200,000 mile on it when we bought it and we put another 100,000 miles on it. It just didn't seem like a good idea... unless we were going to keep it for a long time, and I always have too many irons in the fire.
Bullsh!t fantasy EV batteries have 1/50 the energy density of gasoline by weight - they will not reach 1/2 in your lifetime or mine if ever. the physics and chemistry just aren't there. save your EV cheerleader fiction for the feeble minded who might be willing to believe in tinker bell and unicorns.
Yeah man. $ 4,800 for an oil pump?
No freakin’ way.
No. The solar system we have will operate continuously in the event of a grid failure. Plus we still have the 6000W generator.
My bad. Your comment was about the truck powering the home.
The truck obviously is a few days of smart use.
Our solar system is continuous use. It has a battery so it works overnight.
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