OT: Talking Cars Tuesday - It's electric
Better late than never!
Anyway - on to our topic for the week. The big Auto news (somewhat befuddling to me) is the Tesla Model 3 and how excited folks are for it. So - electrics. Do you think you'd buy one? What would it take to get you to buy electric? Are you waiting for something? I'll answer in the comments as per normal...
Well, sure. I don't know which cars those would be, but yeah. But touchscreens are not a good idea. With regular old buttons and dials, you can drive a car for a couple months and know where they are by feel. Don't have to take your eyes off the road to operate them. With a touchscreen you have to actually look down, read it, and make sure you poke just the exact right spot. Very unsafe, IMO. Makes it absolutely imperative to have voice commands. Yeah, I know. Don't do that and drive at the same time. We all know how well "don't text and drive" campaigns work.
Yes, it has voice commands, but embarassingly I've never used them. So can't speak to how well it works. Most of the touch screen stuff that you'd use while driving is on the first page with only a click or two. so it's not much more distracting than looking over to change the AC with a knob or adjusting a touch screen radio. It took me a couple of weeks to get used to where everything was, but i don't find it distracting.
I really enjoyed the car for the two years I had it, but as I live in Michigan, I found it to be more of a curiosity than anything. Since it's not all-electric (it's powertrain is much like a Chevy Volt's, in that it can run for about 25 miles on pure battery power and switch to a gas-electric mode like a Prius for about another 400 miles) it offered great flexibility. But like all hybrids, it was an exercise in compromises for Ford.
All-electric range topped out at around 25 miles; but in the winter, battery efficiency dropped by around 40%, so I'd be lucky to get 15 miles on a full charge (usually 12-14 miles). Additionally, the gas engine would start automatically whenever the heater ran, further diminishing overall efficiency.
There aren't many electric vehicle charging stations in Michigan and popular locations that do have them (like the airport) don't have enough of them to meet demand. I was only able to charge my car at the airport a few times. Cities like Ann Arbor have charging stations in abundance; but they are still rare in most places around the state. Tesla doesn't have any except at the supplier it bought on the west side.
Due to the extra-large battery pack, truck space was only big enough to fit maybe one golf bag and not much more. On the other hand, it was a great vehicle to have around town for a family of four. It was quiet, stylish, very spacious, and offered lots of creature comforts. Except for the powertrain and lack of truck room, it was otherwise a typical Ford Fusion.
When my two-year lease was up, I chose not to get a new one. On the whole, the cost of ownership is higher than a similarly-sized vehicle with a conventional gasoline powertrain. Now that gas prices are back to around $2/gal, even the price incentives offered by DTE Energy for my 220V home charging station didn't make up enough of the difference.
My overall experience, however, was positive. I went a full month before I had to fill the gas tank for the first time. When I turned in the car, my MPGe was around 75. Until my first winter with the car taxed the battery efficiency, that figure was north of 100 for more than six months.
It gave me confidence that a vehicle like the Tesla is entirely practical. Now that the Model 3 is available, I'll give it serious consideration.
This is a timely thread for me. In order to be totally transparent and hopefully emphasize that my opinions are mine, I've mentioned several times in these threads that I get my paycheck from the Blue Oval. Prefer not to be too specific about where, but one nice little perk about my current position is I can at times take home electrified manufacturers-plate test cars. The company gets free miles put on its test cars and I get a toy and don't have to burn my own gas. Tonight's the first night I've been able to take advantage, and I now have a C-MAX Energi for the week. I like it, by the way, it drives nicely and has plenty of room, and I could see myself owning one, except that the C-MAX is all utility - it's got the dumpy sex appeal of a spinster librarian. If this drivetrain appears in an Escape, or better yet, an MKC, then we'll see.
There's a lot to get used to. For example, there was a mystery light which I had to look up in the manual and found out it means "ready to drive." I channeled my inner old man and thought "who the hell needs a light to tell them their car is ready to drive?" Then I started it back up to move it around in my driveway, wondered whether it was running, and thought, Ohhhh.
Is the same one used in the Fusion Energi.
It is, but the Fusion Energi has no dang trunk. I mean, it has one, but the battery intrudes on most of it and you can barely fit anything in it. The C-MAX has some useful space, not nearly as much as the Escape I have, but at least you can put stuff in it.
Also, and I am in a very small minority here, but the Fusion's looks don't do anything for me. The 2017 is an improvement, but still.
Exactly. While it was admirable of Ford to use a high-volume platform in order to keep the costs down, it also meant making compromises that a pure-bred hybrid may not have required.
I test drove a P85D with a very attractive "sales consultant" or whatever Tesla wants to call its salespeople at the store. Nice car. Very fast. Scarily quiet. However, I just couldn't pull the trigger on buying a car that would end up costing close to $100K even after tax credits. It didn't seem like I was getting a tremendous amount of value for that kind of money. For that money, I'd rather purchase a M5. With the Tesla 3, however, that seems more to be in the sweet spot.
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I bought a Nissan Leaf, I'm proud to say I was one of the early owners who helped get this second coming of the electric car going.
I am 65 years old and have owned a lot of cars in my life. Today, sitting in Florida, I am getting ready to return to my home in Ann Arbor next week.
One of the things I am most looking forward to, is driving my Leaf again.
It is without a doubt, the best car I have ever owned and it gives me a kick every time I get to drive it. It has never been in the shop for any repair.
It is quick, deathly quiet, and at about 3 cents a mile to power, I laugh at the average $18.00 a month electric bill.
(Only about $5.00 of the $18.00 is electricity, the rest is taxes and fees tacked on to our electric bill)
I knew the Leaf would look like old technology one day and better electric cars would come, but I have no regrets.
One day, many of you will get your chance to buy or lease an electric car. I am excited for you!
Since we are not allowed to comment politically on this board, I can't tell you what I think of the Michigan Republican Legislature's road tax on electric cars. But, I do have a strong opinion about them.
When the Georgia legislature axed the state tax credit for plug-in vehicles, it also imposed a maximum $200 dollar "road user fee" or whatever on EV drivers, payable on license tag renewal (owner's/Lesee's birthday). We use the roads but don't buy any gasoline, which as you point out, the taxes on which are earmarked primarily for road maintenance. So yes, that's another cost of electric vehicle ownership, but one that everyone has to admit, however grudgingly, is fair.
perhaps you can help me understand where I have gone wrong.
Michigan gas tax is .19 cents a gallon.
Michigan Republicans impose a $200.00 road use tax on electric cars.
Deviding $200.00 by .19 cents means the law makers think I use 1052 gallons of gas a year.
Multiply that by an average 20 miles a gallon for a ICE car equals 21052 miles. So "to be fair" so that all drivers pay for our roads, I an expected to drive 21,052 miles a year. (Well that seems reasonable) /s
Now in my real world, I just turned 15,000 miles on my 2012 Leaf. So I drive about 4000 miles a year. Lets see, 4000 miles divided by 20 miles a gallon (for an average car mpg) that 200 gallons of gas. Multiply 200 galons of gas times my fair share of tax thats $38.00.
So I'm pissed but I shouldnt be, help me what am I missing?
Well, 21,000 miles a year is on the upper end of things, but it's not way way up there. Lots of drivers do that in a year. But you forget that the gas tax went up too, as part of the package that added the $200 EV fee. So you should divide the $200 by $0.263, not $0.19. The rest of those calculations gets you to 15,209 miles.
Which is very, very much within range of average, but this also doesn't include sales tax. If gas is $2.00 per gallon, that's 12 cents a gallon that you stopped paying. That would get you down 10,444 miles per year. That doesn't go to roads, so the EV fee kind of moves money from whatever the sales tax was paying for, to roads, but that's not too crazy of an idea. And since 12,000 miles a year is considered average, it starts to be more than fair, especially if gas prices go up.
It's not fair if you're an occasional driver, and 4,000 miles a year is pretty occasional and way below average, but I'd prefer that to having the state track how many miles we all drive and taxing us based on that.
I own a BMW i3. Love it, not a tree hugger I am a tech guy. It works for me and I have 37,000 miles with no gas so far.
It is our second car but I use it everyday for all the daily driving needs. The Toyota Highlander sits for weeks with no use, then we nee di for hauling people/stuff or a long trip.
I will trade it in on a Tesla Model X in 2-3 years.
I have about 8 months left on my 3-year Nissan Leaf lease. The car was extremely popular here in Georgia while both the federal and a $5000.00 state tax credit were available (the legislature recently axed the state credit). Still, many remain on the road and charging stations are widely available.
The Leaf is the ultimate commuter and grocery-getter vehicle. While I was still commuting I drove about 45 miles round-trip. The car has an onboard timer so I'm able to plug it in during the evening. At 3:00am it begins its charging cycle, and by 6:00am it's fully charged. The effect on our electiric bill, especially now that I'm not driving it as much as previously, is about $5-$6 per month, using Georgia Power's super offpeak rate. In terms of maintenance, when I leased the car I purchased a contract from the dealer that provdes me with free maintenance during the life of the lease. But the maintenance doesn't amount to much --- no oil and filter change, no fuel/water pumps, no timing belt, really, almost no nothing. Every 6 months the dealer checks the car over, rotates the tires, and gives it a wash and clean.
The Leaf's +/- 80-mile range is adequate for most driving in and around a large metropolitan area such as Atlanta. For commuting, errands, and maybe delivering/picking up schoolchildren it's ideal. But it's a second car: don't even consider long trips without extensive preplanning on where to find charging facilities. Personally I wouldn't drive it anywhere without knowing that, absent a guaranteed charging station en route, I had enough car juice to get there and get back.
Would I get another Leaf? No, but if I were still commuting I would consider it. The range limitations now rule it out for me. But a Tesla? Hell, yes. The advantages of driving a quiet, nearly maintenance-free, high-performance electric vehicle --- especially one with decent range --- are too good to pass up.