EV Cars/Trucks

[RedRaider56]

Originally Posted by HemiEd

Electric vehicle startup Fisker cuts base price of Ocean SUV to $24K as part of efforts to avoid bankruptcy; move comes after its stock was delisted this week from the New York Stock Exchange

Fisker Puts Its All-Electric Ocean SUV on Fire Sale, Slashing Prices By Tens of Thousands
An incredible 39 percent drop in price enrages current owners, but could newfound affordability intrigue potential ones?

https://www.motortrend.com/news/fisk...ice-cuts-sale/

Not surprising about Fisker. What is this, there third incarnation as a car company and the two previous versions bankrupted as well?
I'm surprised they have lasted as long as they have.

[mlyonsd]

EV's should have an extra charge added to their annual license registration to account for their lack of paying a gasoline tax. Or is that already a thing?

[DaFace]

Originally Posted by mlyonsd

EV's should have an extra charge added to their annual license registration to account for their lack of paying a gasoline tax. Or is that already a thing?

It's almost like that's what the past ~15 posts in this thread have been discussing.

[mlyonsd]

Originally Posted by DaFace

It's almost like that's what the past ~15 posts in this thread have been discussing.

It wasn't clear to me that the registration fee discussion was an annual fee or one time charge.

[DaFace]

Originally Posted by mlyonsd

It wasn't clear to me that the registration fee discussion was an annual fee or one time charge.

Ah. In Colorado at least, it's an annual fee.

[HemiEd]

Tesla's Internal Shake-Up

Tesla is planning to lay off over 14,000 employees—more than 10% of its global workforce—in its first large-scale layoffs in over a year, according to an internal memo this week. The company's electric vehicle sales have begun to stagnate amid a decline in demand and increased competition from Chinese carmakers. Tesla's shares fell over 5% on the news.



CEO Elon Musk said the layoffs are part of cost-cutting measures as the company prepares for its next phase of growth. Also yesterday, two top executives at Tesla announced their departure: engineering executive Drew Baglino and policy and outreach executive Rohan Patel.



The shake-up comes after Tesla earlier this month posted its first year-over-year decline in quarterly sales since 2020. The report came after China’s BYD briefly overtook Tesla as the world's top seller of battery electric vehicles last year. In January, Musk said Tesla would soon release a cheaper, $25K model rumored to compete with BYD. That plan has now reportedly been tabled, with Musk prioritizing the debut of a robotaxi fleet in August

[Sassy Squatch]

Originally Posted by HemiEd

Tesla's Internal Shake-Up

Tesla is planning to lay off over 14,000 employees—more than 10% of its global workforce—in its first large-scale layoffs in over a year, according to an internal memo this week. The company's electric vehicle sales have begun to stagnate amid a decline in demand and increased competition from Chinese carmakers. Tesla's shares fell over 5% on the news.



CEO Elon Musk said the layoffs are part of cost-cutting measures as the company prepares for its next phase of growth. Also yesterday, two top executives at Tesla announced their departure: engineering executive Drew Baglino and policy and outreach executive Rohan Patel.



The shake-up comes after Tesla earlier this month posted its first year-over-year decline in quarterly sales since 2020. The report came after China’s BYD briefly overtook Tesla as the world's top seller of battery electric vehicles last year. In January, Musk said Tesla would soon release a cheaper, $25K model rumored to compete with BYD. That plan has now reportedly been tabled, with Musk prioritizing the debut of a robotaxi fleet in August

Oof. That's a really good way to get unionized.

[MagicHef]

Originally Posted by Sassy Squatch

Oof. That's a really good way to get unionized.

I didn't realize they were ionized.

[DaFace]

I'm starting to be a little worried about how much progress Chinese EV companies are making. We'll probably end up regulating them out of having much of an impact in the U.S., but they could take a real bite out of U.S. manufacturers' global car sales. Based on sales trends outside the U.S., other countries don't seem to have as many aversions to EVs as U.S. consumers do (some of which makes sense given how much more spread apart people are here).

[HemiEd]

Originally Posted by DaFace

I'm starting to be a little worried about how much progress Chinese EV companies are making. We'll probably end up regulating them out of the U.S., but they could take a real bite out of U.S. manufacturers' global car sales. Based on sales trends outside the U.S., other countries don't seem to have as many aversions to EVs as U.S. consumers do (some of which makes sense given how much more spread apart people are here).

Your concerns seem well founded.

Their idea/procedure of the quick change batteries is a pretty big deal in my opinion.
I posted an article on it a while back, where it is similar to our system exchanging propane bottles. It is done quickly, similar to filling up with gas for ICE cars.

[DaFace]

Originally Posted by HemiEd

Your concerns seem well founded.

Their idea/procedure of the quick change batteries is a pretty big deal in my opinion.
I posted an article on it a while back, where it is similar to our system exchanging propane bottles. It is done quickly, similar to filling up with gas for ICE cars.

That plus just overall cost. You can point to a lot of things for the "slowdown" of EV sales (which, to be clear, is more of a slowdown in growth than a slowdown in actual YOY sales), but the biggest factor seems to be that EVs are still pretty damn expensive compared to their ICE counterparts. Meanwhile, BYD is putting out new cars that cost around $10k (albeit with severely limited range at that price).

[HemiEd]

Originally Posted by DaFace

That plus just overall cost. You can point to a lot of things for the "slowdown" of EV sales (which, to be clear, is more of a slowdown in growth than a slowdown in actual YOY sales), but the biggest factor seems to be that EVs are still pretty damn expensive compared to their ICE counterparts. Meanwhile, BYD is putting out new cars that cost around $10k (albeit with severely limited range at that price).

Offering one at $25k sounds like a good move in the right direction.

Back to the battery exchange thing.

I remember when I would not do that with propane tanks because my cylinders were pretty new (they have a date code) and didn't want an old piece of crap in exchange.

For the last few years I could care less and only care about it being full. The exchange is fully automated.

I can see that same attitude carrying over to EV batteries. You pull into a quick change place and snap, $20 and they swap in a fully charged battery in a few minutes.

This would make longer trips possible again without long charging delays.

[notorious]

Originally Posted by HemiEd

Offering one at $25k sounds like a good move in the right direction.

Back to the battery exchange thing.

I remember when I would not do that with propane tanks because my cylinders were pretty new (they have a date code) and didn't want an old piece of crap in exchange.

For the last few years I could care less and only care about it being full. The exchange is fully automated.

I can see that same attitude carrying over to EV batteries. You pull into a quick change place and snap, $20 and they swap in a fully charged battery in a few minutes.

This would make longer trips possible again without long charging delays.

It's the only way it will work.

Can't overcome the physics of charging with the current way of doing things.

[ScareCrowe]

Originally Posted by HemiEd

Offering one at $25k sounds like a good move in the right direction.

Back to the battery exchange thing.

I remember when I would not do that with propane tanks because my cylinders were pretty new (they have a date code) and didn't want an old piece of crap in exchange.

For the last few years I could care less and only care about it being full. The exchange is fully automated.

I can see that same attitude carrying over to EV batteries. You pull into a quick change place and snap, $20 and they swap in a fully charged battery in a few minutes.

This would make longer trips possible again without long charging delays.

Problem is a propane tank is a way different scenario than an EV battery. Hell you said you didn't want to trade in tanks because the ones you had were less scratched than the ones you were going to get back. They were going to work exactly the same, but just them looking nice made you want to hold on to them.

Batteries however, unlike tanks, degrade over time. The old scratched up propane tank you were going to get in return was going to hold just as much propane as the newer ones you traded in. And tanks tend to not really die like batteries do. Now you're trading in a brand new battery & could get one that may have been in use a while & down to 80% capacity of a new one.

Furthermore what happens when that battery completely dies & needs to be replaced, is it the responsibility of the car owner or the owner of the "battery changing station" to replace it? If it's on the shop, these shops are in essence providing EV owners with free battery replacements for life. If not you could trade in a brand new battery for one that dies on you & now you have to replace a battery in a brand new car. In the rare instance a tank would die, you just pull it out of your grill & reexchange it. The company won't notice it's not working until they go to refill it & then they will fix it. I'm thinking when you have to tow your EV back to get the dead battery replaced they're going to realize somethings wrong with it.