Posted on 02/09/2019 12:16:08 PM PST by Hojczyk
Are electric vehicles the wave of the future, or expensive toys? This shocking news story–shocking if you live in the North, anyway–suggests the latter *** Many owners discovered the range limitations last week when much of the country was in the grips of a polar vortex. Owners of vehicles made by manufacturers including Tesla, the top-selling electric vehicle company in the U.S., complained on social media about reduced range and frozen door handles during the cold snap.
Frozen door handles are an annoyance not unique to electric cars, but reduced range can be life-threatening.
At 20 degrees, the average driving range fell by 12 percent when the car’s cabin heater was not used. When the heater was turned on, the range dropped by 41 percent, AAA said.
Of course, at 20 degrees you pretty much have to turn the heater on. T
Also, AAA tested the vehicles at 20 degrees above zero, a balmy temperature that we haven’t seen for a while here in the Twin Cities. What happens at 20 below, a temperature we have seen several times in the last week or two? Or eleven below, which it is at this moment where I live? A car whose range is severely compromised at such temperatures could be a death trap.
Advocates of “green” energy say that giant batteries will overcome the intractable problem of the intermittency–i.e., unreliability–of wind and solar energy. Of course, while batteries can power my laptop for six or eight hours, or a vehicle for a relatively short distance, no batteries exist that can power a city for six months, nor is any such technology on the horizon. But I wonder whether green energy advocates who toss around the word “batteries” much as they might say “magic” have considered the impact of cold weather.
(Excerpt) Read more at powerlineblog.com ...
If I was going to spend that kind of money for a car, I would pick something that I can get into and drive anywhere I wanted to go. Daimler-Benz makes many products that you can fuel anywhere, and be on your way.
” A Tesla is a great car for some people; for others, it’s not.”
Exactly. All the Tesla hate makes no sense. No one is forcing them to buy one.
I have a friend who owns one of the hydrogen fueled Toyotas. One who owns a natural gas fueled van. Some have nitro-fueled rice rockets. One who owns a 4 wheel drive Jeep that has more money sunk in it than these Teslas sell for.
I wouldn’t buy any of these, but I don’t have the compulsion to trash their choice of vehicles either. They like them for a variety of reasons.
I don’t have a Tesla. And I don’t live in New York State.
If I did live near Buffalo I might buy something with 4WD and a gasoline engine instead of a Tesla. One size doesn’t fit all.
Yes, I have driven a Tesla, I found it to be very well made, comfortable, handles well (I spent many hours behind the wheel of a race car) and they go like hell. That being said, I find them a very impractical car to own.
“That’s a marketing disaster, missing your price-point by a margin like that”
Not judging by the number of Model 3s I’m seeing on the road here. Not sure that the first wave of Model 3 buyers are all that price sensitive. The biggest complaint I heard was the delay in getting a car delivered. But if Tesla intends to make the Model 3 available to a wider market they are going to need to hit that price target.
“Forty below, actual temperature, yesterday morning southwest of Minot.”
I think the motto of Minot AFB was something about Minot being where cold was perfected. Nothing between Minot and the North Pole except a strand of barbed wire.
Where do you recharge a Tesla on a cross country road trip? Is there enough infrastructure of charging stations along the way?
I’ve owned plenty of M-B cars. The only one which compares at all is the S-Class, and the Model S is a better car. By the way, I have no trouble finding places to charge.
You said, “Beyond that, they’re useless.” I’d like you to explain why you find it to be a useless vehicle. Note that you didn’t say you find it impractical for yourself, you said they’re useless for anyone to own.
Yes, absolutely no problem finding chargers. Driving coast to coast is no problem at all.
not to mention ac in Florida
The author of the study I read didn’t know a whole lot about how corn was grown, how ethanol was made or that the spent grain was valuable as a protein.
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“Frozen door handles are an annoyance not unique to electric cars, but reduced range can be life-threatening.”
More than probably this writer thinks. If you have half a tank of fuel, as one always should when driving in questionable weather, you can probably run the engine for 3 days or so to keep warm before running out of gas. If you have half a battery charge - figure 12 hours. There’s simply a LOT MORE energy in fuel.
Never seen a Prius in Fairbanks.
Just saying.........
My Uncle and Aunt just ferried an S model from Nashville to Florida for a friend. Loved the car, but hated the fact that they had to plan the drive, and go places they didn’t want to go, based on charge station availability. One station in Georgia was in the ‘hood. Always had to wait at least a half hour for a charger, then a half hour to charge
My Uncle and Aunt just ferried an S model from Nashville to Florida for a friend. Loved the car, but hated the fact that they had to plan the drive, and go places they didn’t want to go, based on charge station availability. One station in Georgia was in the ‘hood. Always had to wait at least a half hour for a charger, then a half hour to charge
I’m with you on that one my FRiend, when I lived in Colorado, I worked for a construction company that had business all over the state. I had a 4WD Bronco that would take me wherever the work was.
I agree, just a caution.
I know of a time when a block heater somehow set a car on fire.
Darn near burned the house down.
Completely serious.
“People have it wrong if they try to reason and debate with people like nazi, fauxohantas, aoc etc....Do you or anyone else think that you could have changed Hitler’s mind about the Jews or anything else? How about Gobbels, Tojo, Mussolini, Stalin etc.?”
VERY WELL PUT. The thing to understand is that the leaders of this crap know FULL WELL that what they’re doing will destroy Western society. The followers, not so much...but that doesn’t matter, they’ll trust the leaders long before they’ll trust any of us.
What we really need to do is humiliate them - laugh at them, point out that even if they’re right, China will have NOTHING to do with ‘saving the planet’. But don’t try to debate them on the merits of what they’re saying - the leaders know we’re right, the followers simply do not (or cannot) think for themselves - that’s not winnable.
There's an oil boom in between now lol.
Besides, 40 below keeps the riff-raff out!
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