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Pep Boys blew a customer's engine doing a fuel system service.
Audi
German engineering at its finest
Question...can someone explain to me why you should buy a Tesla...LOL
Another Chinese cheap EV landed on the European market - The MG4 manufactured by SAIC.
It's another small EV crossover that goes head to head with the Corolla HEV (same price, 3.2" shorter, 320 lbs heavier).
It's rated at 220 - 280 miles (depending on configuration) with pretty good efficiency (160 Wh/km)
But with cheap fuel it still does not make too much sense 100 miles would cost $2.4 on the MG, and around $7 on the Corolla Hybrid (at 50mpg) based on US average fuel and electricity prices as of april 2023 - so over a 150,000 mile lifespan that would be a $6,900 difference.
With good enough performance in crash tests (5 stars, but 'only' 83% adult occupant safety category, 2% less than a Corolla Cross, 6% less than a Civic [all tested under the 2022 crash test standards])
And it has been a best seller over the last few months since its release.
https://cleantechnica.com/2023/04/06/saics-mg4-ev-is-the-2nd-bestselling-ev-in-the-uk-in-q1/
Which is not suppressing considering MG has made quite a few EVs and they're generally associated with up-market PHEVs.
Electric car drivers frustrated over lack of charging stations in Nevada
LAS VEGAS, Nev. (FOX5) - Finding an electric vehicle station is not something you want to wing here in southern Nevada. For visitors and locals alike, a trip in an electric car has to be planned and outlined in advance. Some EV drivers tell FOX5 what we’re missing in the state.
”It’s kind of a hassle, there are some stations around town but most of them are down,” said Jesse Barker who’s lived in Las Vegas for two years. He says he makes frequent trips to California, “I have to stop every 150 miles to charge,” said Barker.
For him, the pros outweigh the cons.
“I don’t mind spending extra time on the road if I’m going to save 600 bucks on a road trip for an hour to an hour and a half, I’m fine with the wait if they want to dart there and come back, I could see it being an inconvenience,” he said.
Electric charging stations are few and far between in Nevada.
“We came from Phoenix two days ago, we stopped in Kingman which is pretty much the only stop down from Phoenix to Vegas,” Caroline Clay.
“Sometimes the lines are difficult sometimes people aren’t so nice when vehicles are fully charged,” said Clay.
Tourists say that’s the theme they’ve noticed.
“When I went to my first electrical charging station, nothing was working and people were waiting, calling to see what happened,” said Stanley.
From San Francisco, Stanley says it’s been a pain trying to find one that works.
“Luckily I got this one out of the four and that one’s not working either,” said Stanley.
In 2015, the Nevada Electric Highway was born, making dozens of charging stations along U.S. 95.
Terry from Surprise, Arizona says he loves traveling to Vegas in his EV despite the stop in Kingman.
“I used to have a high-speed Camaro in my younger days and I sold it went to this electric car,” said Terry.
For him, it’s just a little bit of work but it’s all worth it.
“It’s softer and easier to drive the only difficulty is learning how to use these charging stations, you just have to be patient we’re in a learning curve,” he said.
Hello,
I recently saw a video (posted below) that might interest the community.
It is about car dealerships and EVs.
(I hope I am not breaking rules by posting it, sorry if I am)
-Toyotaholic
Transmission fluids tested on Project Farm.
Is your automatic slow to shift in the morning when cold? Maybe some Redline will help.
Project Farm's testing methodology is first class, great channel!
VW patented assembly process
Do you know about the patented volts wagon assembly process that they have now?
VW should forget about assembly. They need to fix their design and manufacturing quality, cuz it aint pretty.
Not car news, but definitely something worth reading if you're a do it yourselfer.
it's behind a paywall, and there's no way I'm giving the WSJ any of my money.
Hey scotty, I got one for you from the story of electric car bollocks. This is the second ship to be burnt to the sea and the first lost of life.
And yet the UK GOVERNMENT want to get more electric cars on the roads, but yet they have gone back on the 2030 mark, as I like to say they do not know the elbows from there own arses.
Anyway on that note I have a chrysler 300c 2008 estate V6 deisel which is a 0M642 Mercedes
Still going strong with 119k on the clock.
The Hagerty Drivers Foundation youtube channel has a great series of automotive historical and technical videos that some here may find of interest.
For example, the following Hagerty documentary illustrates that as hard as it may to be believe today, at one time Chrysler was an engineering powerhouse - even though some of the technologies they pursued turned out to be dead ends:
More GM shenanigans.
This is the 5th generation L87 Ecotec3 engine. (direct injected, cylinder deactivation). Seems to have been plagued since the beginning.
these engines are part of an ongoing lawsuit which seems to keep growing to more and more vehicles.
And they're practically brand new, so it's not like we can wave our hands and say it's due to bad maintenance this time.
http://www.carcomplaints.com/news/2021/gm-lifter-recall-class-action-lawsuit.shtml
Parked 'strategically' after the fire.
I thought you weren't supposed to put water on lithium fires.
They were busy showcasing their new tool before someone noticed they'd used 11,000 gallons of water.
That is insane. Are EV’s even profitable if the battery cost that much?
Tesla and BYD (Chinese car company) are the only ones making a profit on every EV they sell. Everyone else is losing money on every EV sold.
@daywalker Respectfully, why is “everyone else losing money on every EV sold”?
It’s official: the UAW strikes as of 9/15 and for the first time they hit all 3 of the Big Three at once in a targeted strike.
union leaders need new yachts
A new Reuters report details that Tesla, the world’s leading electric vehicle maker, is gaming the EPA system to vastly overstate its vehicles’ range and also diverting claims from drivers who are seeing as little as half the range.
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The Reuters investigation uncovers a lot of details on the inflated numbers that EV experts have known about for years, charitably calling Tesla’s range estimates “optimistic.”
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Link:
https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/tesla-batteries-range/
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Also, Tesla faces a class action lawsuit in California over its false EV range claims.
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https://www.reuters.com/legal/tesla-faces-california-class-action-its-ev-range-claims-2023-08-03/
Getting only half of an EV’s claimed range makes it almost useless for road trips, doesn’t it? Here, we are talking about a 350+ Tesla getting <200 mile range.
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I know several Tesla owners who own Model 3 and Y and can corroborate they get 100 mile less than the advertised range. So their Teslas really only get in the low 200s, which is still plenty for my everyday commute (admittedly) but for road trips not so much. Plus, they paid for the claimed 300+ range.
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On the flip side, I have seen reports that other EV makers (that’s NOT named Tesla) are more conservative with their range claims and the owners end up getting actually more. I like that much better! And perhaps those are the EVs to get in the future.
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Anyways, I have seen enough from Tesla (who is the top EV seller in California and in the US and amongst the top in the world) to avoid them like the plague.
it probably varies, right? There are a lot of different factors that go into EV range. The people who are actually getting half are probably very few. You also have to take into account how the media likes to sensationalize everything, and leave out important context. But yeah, I would expect it to be like EPA fuel economy ratings, VW dieselgate, or even the HP/torque specs that manufacturers publish.
Well, it doesn’t help Tesla is a shady company and the guy running the company is a nut job. And like I said I know several people with Teslas who got actual range a lot less than claimed. These “300+ mile” range Teslas are $50,000+. Who wants to pay that much and get only low 200-ish? Sure, ICE mpg will be less than EPA but even alot of those legitimately get more than 300 mile range. Some easily get >400 mile range and more!
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Anyways, I expect other manufacturers to build better EVs than Tesla. If someone wants a EV, those are the ones to research and consider. Screw Tesla.
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EV range is volatile and more sensitive than ICE due to terrain, temperatures, speed/aero, having accessories on inside the EV, etc.. Overtime, once they figure out the optimal battery chemistry and they keep making it better I am sure this will be behind us.
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Anyways, these are the growing pains of new technology and early adopters have to expect it.
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Probably best to lease these things.
I think Elon is just a normal guy with human quirks like most people. He's very smart, but very awkward socially which doesn't mix well with the constant hawk-like media attention. His image gets twisted a lot. He also tweets too much for his own good.
Leasing is expensive. It might be smarter to just drive an EV, and set up a fund using the money you save on fuel to eventually go towards a battery.
. @mmj I don't think it's the manufacturers lying.
Perhaps a case of "confirmation bias" as the article REBUTED the claims of "half the miles" it self!
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It clearly states:
- "Recurrent found that Tesla’s four models almost always calculated that they could travel more than 90% of their advertised EPA range estimates regardless of external temperatures."
- "The research found that, on average, the cars fell short of their advertised ranges by 12.5% in highway driving"
So they make it sound inserting only to then come clear and say that the claims that they stated previously are unbased.
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Although Reuters does like to do that from time to time, they love cheap and dirty sensationalism.
They have a title that reads "Failed tests and false advertising" and when you read what they're on about they mean "the audits resulted in Tesla being required to lower all the cars’ estimated ranges by an average of 3%." - what a sensationalist title for an article about... laterally nothing.
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Honestly? It's possible to make any car underperform, I have no doubt I can take a Corolla down to 10mpg for example and complain about its range - and I'd have as much of a basis to complain as that random guy in the 2nd article.
Reminds me of how Top Gear managed to test a Prius in such a way that in had worse fuel millage than a BMW M-series car.
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The article however does make the point that in freezing temps older technology EVs have lower range, according to studies it's by just 17% on newer model years of the Tesla model 3.
Source: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/sudbury/electric-vehicle-cold-range-1.6738892
the EVs that do have the issue,
like absolute garbage GM products do so because of a RESISTIVE battery heating system (like early 2000s junk)
Source: https://www.gm-volt.com/threads/bolt-ev-a-resistive-element-or-heat-pump.260073/
And in the case of some other very specific cars like the Toyota bz4x, It's clear why Toyota has decided it needs BYD's tech.
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For the most accurate results, the Norwegian Automobile Association has tested the cars in their cold winter climate.
And they have discovered that the Tesla model Y long range only droped by 11% of the WLTP estimate, the EV6 by 11.5% and many others have performed well.
Notably some of the best performers are BYD with the best car in the test (BYD Tang) dropping by just 10%
https://nye.naf.no/elbil/bruke-elbil/test-rekkevidde-vinter-2022
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If the claims of the original article would be true, they wouldn't be the best selling cars in some of the coldest countries.
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In regular weather, looking at performance tests, all expect one (the Skoda Enyaq) performed within 10% of spec on the highway at 65 mph on hilly terrain with climate control in auto set to 22C
https://www.icar.co.il/%D7%A8%D7%9B%D7%91_%D7%97%D7%A9%D7%9E%D7%9C%D7%99/%D7%9E%D7%91%D7%97%D7%9F_%D7%94%D7%A9%D7%95%D7%95%D7%90%D7%AA%D7%99:_%D7%9E%D7%94_%D7%91%D7%90%D7%9E%D7%AA_%D7%94%D7%98%D7%95%D7%95%D7%97_%D7%A9%D7%9C_%D7%94%D7%A8%D7%9B%D7%91%D7%99%D7%9D_%D7%94%D7%97%D7%A9%D7%9E%D7%9C%D7%99%D7%99%D7%9D/
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So the claims of that guy from the second article seem to crap, good late model EVs perform well.
Otherwise Sweden, The Netherlands, etc. wouldn't be flooded with them.
thanks for looking into it @dan. I was too lazy to do it.
A new paper published by SAE (Society of Automotive Engineers) International looked at highway (75 mph) fuel economy of ICE versus EV vehicles. It used data from Car and Driver who, starting in 2016, added an on-road highway fuel-economy test, conducted at 75 mph.
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The results: EVs underperform on real-world efficiency and range relative to the EPA figures by a much greater margin than internal-combustion (ICE) vehicles. While the latter typically meet or exceed the EPA-estimated highway fuel economy numbers, EVs tend to fall considerably short of the range number on the window sticker. Buyer beware!
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Source: https://www.caranddriver.com/features/a44676201/ev-range-epa-vs-real-world-tested/#
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https://www.sae.org/publications/technical-papers/content/2023-01-0349/
BYD overtakes Ford, becoming the 4th biggest selling car brand worldwide in August.
(BYD is within 0.1% of the top 3)
https://cnevpost.com/2023/09/28/byd-replaces-ford-4th-best-selling-aug-trendforce/
There are huge lots of BYD cars just sitting around to inflate sales numbers. The Chinese love faking stuff.
@mmj
Yea, I have no doubt that smaller cheaper less successful internal market cars may have trouble selling in the current economic climate,
But what they can not fake is registrations abroad:
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Abroad BYD's siltation seems to be quite good:
- BYD is in a position were most of their cars are in super high demand, a BYD ATTO3 gets sold where I live in moments, there are huge waiting lists and they're #1 in sales of any vehicle type - if they had those laying around they'd just sell them here.
- Same for MG, in Europe they're absolutely killing it - despite their falling sales in China they're sky rocketing in Europe.
(They're also in a position where an MG4 that sitting in a lot would be sold almost insatiately)
So it really doesn't seem like they have an issue selling their cars.
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ALSO,
The cost of faking deliveries for an established car makers is very high -
A typical EV costs at least $20k just to produce per unit.
So faking just 10% of deliveries would cost $2.6 BILLION just in H1 '23
BYD is a public company their H1 earnings were $1.50 billion,
These costs are just too high for a public company to fake.
(and no gov wouldn't've be able to inflate numbers that much sustainably)
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Again, I want to say that there's no doubt that some smaller companies using investor capital can do that,
And no doubt that there are lots of unsold vehicles (on the internal market with cheap cars)
But - I doubt that a major brand such as Geely or BYD would be able to afford inflating their numbers regardless of how much subsidies they're able to get out of it this way as the associated costs are very high (this isn't a $500 bicycle bough by a startup using investor capital after all)
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And I really see why sales could be strong for Chinese car makers,
I recently was looking into some legacy car makers and I do not know what they're even doing.
For example, a Ford lightning has a 131 kwh battery but it can only use 98 kwh (under 75%)
A BYD ATTO3 has a 64 kwh battery of which 60kwh are usable (93% utilization, 18% delta)
Basically in a Ford you're paying about ~$5,000 for batteries that are flat out unused - that's insanely bad...
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And the lightning is a similar shape to a regular F-seires, only a 4% lower coefficient of drag, but according to their CEO, "can engineer an extra 75 miles of EV range in next-generation F-150 Lightning pickup trucks from better aerodynamics alone" - so not only are they not able to use 25% of their battery the aerodynamics are also crap.
Legacy car makers current generation products are offensively bad...
The Chinese EVs feel almost mature, whatever Ford and others are doing really does not...
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To get the full picture, we'll have to wait for the:
- EU report on Chinese car maker government subsidies (looking at MG, BYD, Geely)
- BYD's euro market launch in Q4 2023, but we'll probably only see results in H2 2024.
So I guess we'll just have to wait and see.
and yet those are fields of crappy Geelys and BYDs , and nobody wants them
@mmj
Those videos are showing real images but not the real data,
There's a good video from a person that went to explore then and found that they're used cars from bankrupt businesses who are not building cars.
Here's an article, from TheDrive - who are a legitimate news source.
https://www.thedrive.com/news/the-real-story-of-that-chinese-ev-graveyard-isnt-what-you-were-told
Even the 2nd video slowly admits these are from failed ride sharing companies.
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And the BYD situation is just "BYD inventory flooded, 600 cars waiting to be processed", and from what I could gather those are previous generation cars waiting to be shipped and sold at discounts.
(As the BYD e3 update added necessary stuff like a heat pump, 100kms more range, and finally decent power - so the old ones are just undesirable as a new car)
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Doing research I found cases in which inflation happened but they're not too widespread (small companies producing tiny things to pull in investor money, like Kandi), as again, a public company can not afford it no matter the subsidy sizes and that generally they're in demands.
Oh please, Dan. As if we didn't know the Chinese are masters of deception.
We already had to deport one "Princess of Huawei" for conspiracy and fraud.
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On their website "The Drive" describes itself as "influencer marketing" and " editorially-driven" (opinion). That's all I need to know.
Bottom line: "Biggest selling electric car brand" ... but where are the cars? Not on the road.
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China Daily (local media): " The plants assemble poor-quality vehicles and sell them to their own car rental companies, which have no working fleets, but exist only to obtain the subsidies."
A pure electric car buyer in Guangzhou, for instance, is eligible for up to 117,000 yuan (16,300 USD) in subsidies from the national and city governments, while buyers in Shanghai can obtain up to 114,000 yuan from central, municipal and district governments. The buyer of a pure electric bus would receive up to 300,000 yuan as a national subsidy.
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It's no secret. The fraud is so bad the Chinese government had to launch an investigative probe.
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Yale Zhang (general manager of Automotive Foresight (Shanghai) Co.)
- "there is subsidy fraud in many small cities, mainly covering electric buses and commercial vehicles."
- "There are a large number of small vehicle makers who obtain government manufacturing permits, then they sell the permits to even smaller plants, who are only concerned with the subsidies," Zhang said."
- "some permit holders are simply selling batteries to small plants, without manufacturing working vehicles."
- "there's no specific punitive measures on those who fail to meet standards on quality or safety."
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It's the same scam as in the United States:
Chen Qingtai (vice-director of the China Development Research Center of the State Council):
- "The present sales volume is driven by government policies, rather than the market. The sales number does not indicate that Chinese pure electric vehicle makers have competent technologies.".
" The nation's NEV makers still don't have the competence to rival international companies"
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Nielson (data & analytics) - Chinese branch report:
Chinese people don't want NEVs for the same reasons the rest of the world doesn't ... "too expensive" and "immature"
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It's all a fake facade. Just like their fireworks and drone displays. Nothing new for China.
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Biden is pushing ahead hard with BILLIONS more dollars in subsidies which will serve to make America's motorist more dependent on China than ever before. That's a scary thought. Not only do they already make everything, but now we won't be able to get around without them. What if things get shaky with China? Who is going to call the shots?
We already know China is sending us millions of phones and TV's with malware on them. Now imagine millions of internet connected cars.
Rumours are saying its a EV news outlets are saying diesel anyway big fire over in the UK with a car fire destroying a carpark/lot keep an eye on it I know how much you love EVs.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12618033/started-London-Luton-car-park-fire-moment.html
Scotty, I found today’s article in today’s Wall Street Journal titled “China Tightens Chokehold on Graphite Needed for EV Batteries”
In the article it said that car manufacturers actually prefer “artificial graphite” It went on to say that artificial graphite is made out of, you guessed it: Petroleum Coke, Coal Tar and Oil. 😀
Regards
Jim from Rochester MN
Coming next: Quantum Engines?
what kind of coolant do you need to cool your engine to near absolute zero?
Liquid helium, of course!
That's interesting one
Oct 18, 2023: Abandoned Ford Dealership In Germany Still Has Brand New Escorts And Sierras
Another video
Scotty and Toyota Chairman Akio Toyota, you were right all along!
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Article from Business Insider sheds some light on EV sales:
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Source: https://www.businessinsider.com/auto-executives-coming-clean-evs-arent-working-2023-10
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With signs of growing inventory and slowing sales, auto industry executives admitted this week that their ambitious electric vehicle plans are in jeopardy, at least in the near term.
Several C-Suite leaders at some of the biggest carmakers this week voiced fresh unease about the electric car market's growth as concerns over the viability of these vehicles put their multi-billion-dollar electrification strategies at risk.
Among the surprising hand-wringing is GM's Mary Barra, historically one of the automotive industry's most bullish CEOs on the future of electric vehicles. GM has been an early-mover in the electric car market, selling the Chevrolet Bolt for seven years and making bold claims about a fully electric future for the company long before their competitors got on board.
But this week on GM's third-quarter earnings call, Barra and GM struck a more sober tone. The company announced with its quarterly results that it's abandoning its targets to build 100,000 EVs in the second half or this year and another 400,000 by the first six months of 2024. GM doesn't know anymore when it will hit those targets.
"As we get further into the transformation to EV, it's a bit bumpy," she said.
While GM's about-face was somewhat of a surprise to investors, the Detroit car company is not alone in this new view of the EV future. Even Tesla's Elon Musk warned on a recent earnings call that economic concerns would lead to waning vehicle demand, even for the long-time EV market leader.
Meanwhile, Mercedes-Benz — which is having to discount its EVs by several thousand dollarsjust to get them in customers' hands — isn't mincing words about the state of the EV market.
"This is a pretty brutal space," CFO Harald Wilhelm said on an analyst call. "I can hardly imagine the current status quo is fully sustainable for everybody."
EVs are getting harder to sell
But Mercedes isn't the only one; almost all current EV product is going for under sticker price these days, and on top of that, some EVs are seeing manufacturer's incentives of nearly 10%.
That's as inventory builds up at dealerships, much to the chagrin of dealers. While car buyers are in luck if they're looking for a deal on a plug-in vehicle, executives are finding even significant markdowns and discountsaren't enough. These cars are taking dealers longer to sell compared with their gas counterparts as the next wave of buyers focus on cost, infrastructure challenges, and lifestyle barriers to adopting.
Just a few months after dealers have started coming forward to warn of slowing EV demand, manufacturers appear to be catching up to that reality. Ford was the first to fold, after dealers started turning away Mach-E allocations. In July, the company extended its self-imposed deadline to hit annual electric vehicle production of 600,000 by a year, and abandoned a 2026 target to build 2 million EVs.
In scrapping plans with GM to co-develop sub-$30,000 EVs, Honda CEO Toshihiro Mibe said the shifting EV environment was difficult to gauge.
“After studying this for a year, we decided that this would be difficult as a business, so at the moment we are ending development of an affordable EV," Mibe said in an interview with Bloomberg this week.
For some, this pullback is no surprise.
"People are finally seeing reality," Toyota Motor Chairman Akio Toyoda said at the Japan Mobility Show, the Wall Street Journalreported. Toyoda has long been skeptical of his peers' pure-electric blueprints.
Right about what?
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This article talks about how the legacy automakers are whining about EVs and their inability to sell the crap they make.
In reality EV sales jumped 50 percent in Q3 in the US.
https://arstechnica.com/cars/2023/10/tesla-is-losing-market-share-as-ev-adoption-grows-and-prices-fall/
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Reading the article companies like GM, Daimler (horrible corporations, we can both agree they have been absolutely incapable of designing a decent vehicle in the past deacde) are admitting that to them the EV market has been a "pretty brutal space".
Which does go along with my, and some others' predictions that they will not survive switching over to EV vehicles as these manufactures are inept.
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Reading further into that WSJ article (a questionable news source), they mention that the slowing demand is due to "Higher interest rates are making them more unaffordable for many buyers" - this seems to be the only real explanation they have, and yet this is true for every premium car.
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And as far as the claims about inventory, it's true of any car.
"YTD US inventory levels are up 14% from 2022 and volume has climbed to 1.9 million units. Days' supply remains suppressed at 36 but has risen from 28 days a year ago."
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Anyhow, reading through the article I also see that GM and Honda have given up on a sub-30k EV. This is quite funny considering that just 10 days ago STELLANTIS corporation went all in and launched a new super affordable EV.
https://www.media.stellantis.com/em-en/citroen/press/citroen-reveals-the-all-new-e-c3-the-first-european-affordable-electric-car
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The Citroen Ë-C3 standard range set to begin deliveries cost just $24,660,
And additionally there will be a short range version for $21,150.
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This car is series is likely coming to the USA under a different brand under the STELLANTIS umbrella.
(STELLANTIS announced that this car will get at least 7 sister models, so far they only revealed 3)
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Article TLDR:
1. Legacy car companies admit they're obsolete and can not compete in the new energy field.
2. Pricy car's sales slow and inventories keep building up as interest rate remains high.
Roughly 1 out of new 13 cars sold in the US are EVs.
Last year, this number was roughly 1 out of every 17 new cars sold.
This is solid growth.
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Also Geely’s Volvo brand had over 650% increase in EV sales in the US -
which proves what I’ve been saying, when they will sell Geely EVs in the US, they will be bought up even without any US gov incentives.
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Meanwhile those CEOs complaining about EVs ain’t showing much growth,
Hardly anyone is buying Volvo’s in the US.
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I live in Southern California and hardly see any Volvos on the road, let alone a Volvo EV. Plenty of Teslas, however.
If you look at the numbers, last month, Volvo sold 10,946 cars in the US (65% growth)
For reference, during the same period Mazda sold 28,031 cars in the US (17.9% growth).
- So this niche luxury brand is growing fast and now has about 40% of the sales of a major non luxury brand.
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Geely expects Volvo to grow through EV sales, but not yet.
Their first Sustainable Experience car for the US market will only ship in late 2024
So they expect to become an even more major player in 2025
(maybe by then they will overtake Mazda)
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But Volvo is just one company with particularly insane growth.
Hyundai, Mercedes, Nissan all also experianced over 200% growth in the EV space.
Tesla also faired decently, 419,074 cars delivered in Q3 2023 - 29% compared to Q3 2022.
The overall 50% growth is industry wide.
Volvo sales will hit a plateau in the US just like Tesla will. There’s only so many EV early adopters and people excited about EVs they can attract. It becomes much more difficult to translate into sales once you move beyond that and hit more of the mainstream population here in the US, especially as you move AWAY from the Coastal states (where you have more EV-friendly buyers).
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You may say otherwise for the rest of the world, but I don’t care. I live here in the US and am only concerned about this market.
Welp, I am talking about your market and:
Tesla is on track to out sell Ford, and the Chevy brand next year,
Over 400,000 cars in Q3 - this is as mainstream as it gets.
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The Tesla model Y outsold the Camry, CR-V and is the 5th best seller in 2023.
The Tesla model 3 outsold the Corolla, Accord, and Civic.
What's more mainstream than that?
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With such sales, it's clear they have moved beyond early adopters and enthusiasts.
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Y'know, calling the 5th best selling car in the US - "non mainstream" is odd...
Dan, the 400,000+ in Q3 is for the whole world! In the US, it’s much less than that - come on, man, you are smarter than that. Remember, their forecast is 1.8 million sales by end of 2023 globally, which comes out to about 450,000 vehicles on average per quarter, again globally.
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In the US, they still lag the Big Three and Toyota in total number of vehicles sold. There’s just no getting around that.
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So far in 2023, they have sold less Model Y’s than RAV4’s:
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https://www.caranddriver.com/news/g43553191/bestselling-cars-2023/
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Keep in mind, too, demand for Teslas are dropping in the US which is why the company resorted to many price drops this year (in order to boost demand). But even with those price drops, Tesla sold less vehicles in Q3 2023 than analysts expected, so it was disappointing for them.
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And keep in mind if it wasn’t for Biden’s IRA sales of EVs would be much lower. His administration artificially propped up sales with the $7,500 credit rather than let the market decide. Hopefully, when President Trump resumes office in 2025 he will rescind the IRA.
Yes, in the US, they sold YTD 458,000 Model 3 and model Ys.
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As far as the RAV4 being the only non-Truck to outsell the Model Y, it is true.
Yet, how come a "non mainstream car" outsold all other non-Trucks except one?
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Tesla blamed not reaching some analysts expectations sales on "planned downtime to upgrade its factories." Which can make sense as the model 3 went through a facelift and the Cybertruck entering production with deliveries slated for November 30th.
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A thing that needs to be cleared up is EV pricing being inflated by US policy not reduced!
The US has HUGE import taxes on foreign EVs and HUGE subsidies for locally produced ones.
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So mainstream foreign EVs pay 27.5% in tax and have to compete with cars that get 7 grand in tax rebates.
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The Hyundai iONIQ 5 (built in Korea) is a LOW ~30s car inflated by tariffs to over $40k,
if it would enjoy the same rebates, (it never will) it would be in the mid-20s.
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The Volvo EX30 (built in China) is around ~$25k inflated by tariffs to $35k,
if it would enjoy the same rebates, (it never will) it would be in the high-10s.
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This situation is pretty ridiculous and is the main barrier to price reduction.
This economic policy (tariffs and rebates) do not make EVs cheaper,
it inflates their price significantly - for now.
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It's really just a measure to keep US legacy automakers afloat.
(perhaps rightfully so, even with the prices of import EVs being inflated by ~$17k, import EVs still manage to offer similar values to US-made cars)
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But this may change,
as Chinese automakers are seeking to avoid this tax by building plants in Mexico.
https://insideevs.com/news/691889/china-evs-mexico-motor-trend/
The number you gave for Year to Date Tesla Sales in US combines their vehicles. Tesla does not give out the individual car breakdowns, conveniently. Anyways, for Model Year to Date Toyota has sold 165,693 Corolla’s, 217,975 Camry’s, 302,831 RAV4’s, and 138,178 Highlanders. And I will stop there: add those 4 models’ numbers up and it easily trumps Tesla’s. And again, Teslas are only affordable now because of all their price cuts this year to boost weakening demand as well as the $7,500 credit from the IRA. BTW, all those price cuts have hurt Tesla vehicles resale values.
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Teslas are rolling piles of that won’t hold up long. Even your beloved Consumer Reports does not give favorable reliability ratings for Teslas. They give Model 3 average reliability and it’s the only Tesla they recommend. They don’t recommend the Y, S, or X. I only bring up Consumer Reports because you cited it numerous times in the past for ratings.
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Once the Republicans control the Executive and Legislative branches of government in the near future they will hopefully eliminate the IRA tax incentives and get folks off the EV bandwagon.
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Even your boss Scotty is wholly against EVs.
Hi, Daywalker, as far as Toyota's abundance of models - is there a point to it?
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You said Teslas are not mainstream, I pointed out they are very much mainstream.
With the crossover SUV outselling all by 1 competitor (in the crossover segment),
and the sedan being outsold only by 1 competitor (in the sedan segment).
This does make them, and EVs, very much mainstream.
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Generally, I predict the next big shift in the US EV market to happen in 2025.
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In 2025 (as early as January), many foreign EV auto factories will begin producing modern EVs in the US - thus negating the 27.5% tax imposted on them and drastically lowering prices over 2025.
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Assuming avoiding the 27.5% tax will allow them to reduce the prices by just 20% (considering the additional expenses of manufacturing in the US) , prices can be reduced by around $5k-$10k.
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The fact the import tax will be no more, pretty much will overcome the primary barrier to EV affordability in the US.
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> "Once the Republicans control the Executive and Legislative branches of government in the near future"
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We will see, I can see why you make this prediction - yet I'm not sure on the accuracy.
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As I see it,
The future of the automotive industry will be decided next year by Brussels.
At some point during the year 2024, the EU will publish the results of their probe into the Chinese EV industry - From there, either they will have to decide if they're imposting tariffs on import cars or not.
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We do have some early indications in that space, as GWM's reaction to the probe was the decision to set up an EU factory, and Stellantis' was purchasing a large stake in Chinese EV maker LeapMotor.
In other words - European and Chinese automakers seem to set up connections that would allow them to operate in each others markets even in case of a trade war.
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If the EU decides to impose said tariffs - China is likely to react similarly probably perhaps damaging existing joint ventures and then we will enter a new era where each region (US, EU, China) will have their isolated car industry, unlike the current system where the industry is quite global.
I hope cloning doesn't include Tesla's reliability
@g-t I don't know which are worse, Teslas or Chinese cars. Probably Chinese cars.
Inserting post!
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First of all, this post talks about a study by TPPF - sponsored by gas, petrol, and chemical corps.
So it is obvious what their bias is when they post such a piece.
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It's shocking to see that "Ford (...) is losing over $70,000 on each EV it (...) Sells" (page 10)
While Tesla averages $5,328 NET profit per car! (almost $9k gross)
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Now, to what does not add up,
It is beyond any reasonable doubt that said study seeks to maximize the "cost".
They go above and beyond to include things like "Avoided Federal and State Gasoline Taxes".
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Furthermore, they're blaming the ENTIRE cost of ALL necessity infrastructure upgrade on EVs, " replacement and upgrade of transformers, circuits, feeders, and transmission lines, ..." is not directly link-able to EVs as this is a general trend. (although it actually may decrease in the US this year)
This is quite ridiculous.
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There are lots of other points where this study piles unreasonable factors to attempt and shot them as "costs to the public" and fails to show concrete subsidies to manufacturers other than the tax credit.
This is because all other studies point to the fact US made EVs get about 10% subsidized - which is not far off from the economical support these legacy manufactures get anyway from the gov.
(It is worth mentioning that a lot of manufactures world-wide do not get this support at all, looking at the information submitted by GMW following the EU probe - they do not get much subsidies)
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TLDR: Inserting study with lots of info, but from a biased source.
Their claimed "cost" includes consumer savings and blames an unreasonable percentage (100%) of electric grid upkeep and upgrade, electric metering, and other costs on EVs when it is obviously not the case.
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P.S: The main barrier to EV costs is still the US' protectionist approach - the EV import tax imposed under the previous administration as it artificially inflates EV prices by $10,000-$20,000.
This artificial price inflation will not hold for much as (1) recent developments in EV technology allow some manufactures to produce CHEAPER EV drivetrains than modern conventional ones (2) In 2025 multiple foreign companies (such as Hyundai, they're targeting Jan. 25) will open US production facilities and commence domestics EV production, thus negating and avoiding the import tax.
The California New Car Dealers Association (CNCDA) reported that through the first nine months of the year [2023] pure battery electric vehicle (BEV) sales accounted for 21.5% and were 22.3% in Q3. A year ago [2022] the figure stood at 16.4% year-to-date and was only 9.1% in 2021.
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When hybrid and hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles are included with BEVs, the figure jumps up 35.4% for all vehicles sold year-to-date in California. Not surprisingly this means gas-powered sales are falling in the state, with the CNCDA reporting ICE market share (including gasoline and diesel vehicles) was 64.6 percent so far this year, down from 71.6 percent in 2022 and 88.4 percent in 2018.
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when digging deeper into the sales data Tesla’s (TSLA) Model Y and Model 3 dominate BEV sales in the state, at 103,398 and 66,698 respectively, with Tesla’s overall market share of BEV sales hitting 62.9%. In fact the Tesla Model Y was the top selling vehicle overall in California, followed by the Model 3 and the Toyota (TM) RAV4 (40,622) and Toyota Camry (39,293).
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Rest of article can be found here:
https://www.autoblog.com/2023/11/02/california-ev-sales-tesla-model-y/
REVR plans to turn your ICE car into a plug-in hybrid for US$3,200
Scotty talked about it in today's video
wouldn't it make more sense to bolt it onto the flywheel/flexplate, so that it could perform the functions of starting the car, charging the battery, etc.
How would you do that on internal flywheels and on cars where there is hardly any space for regular maintenance? I guess mounting on wheels is cheaper option.
I doubt if this kit makes much sense.
This requires integration with the car, to work with the gas pedal.
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Plug in hybrids have rather large batteries (the mean battery size is 14.9 kWh, the median is 14kwh - that's 19-20 Prius batteries!) and of course it's going to cost a small fortune, I doubt $3.2k is a realistic figure.
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I just do not see them being available to fit such an absolutely massive battery, the AC-DC charger, the DC-DC inverter unit, the active thermal management system - all of these are quite large.
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It's one of those things that seams like a good idea until you take a deep look into what the execution would require.
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Also the integration on this is going to be horrible (between the car's ECU and control units and the electric drive unit the car never wished for)
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As a broad note, PHEVs are a novel idea - but they're only a stepping stone into the world of RxEVs.
If a vehicle already comes equipped with all of the required assemblies to run on electricity without a running motor - there's no need to add further complexity with a transmission, power split and combination mechanisms, and other unnecessary complexities and even duplicates (like having 2 cooling systems).
Honda and some others have already began building and marketing these RxEVs.
@g-t mount it in place of the starter
A new study from iSeeCars shows that cars depreciate less now than they did 5 years ago. Nevertheless, some depreciate faster than others. Here are the fastest depreciating vehicles (over 5 years) per iSeeCars:
- Maserati Quattroporte: 64.5% depreciation
- BMW 7 Series: 61.8%
- Maserati Ghibli: 61.3%
- BMW 5 Series Hybrid: 58.8%
- Cadillac Escalade ESV: 58.5%
- BMW X5: 58.2%
- Infiniti QX80: 58.1%
- Maserati Levante: 57.8%
- Jaguar XF: 57.6%
- Audi A7: 57.2%
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Source: https://www.autoblog.com/2023/11/07/worst-resale-cars-trucks/
big ticket cars. Makes sense.