Tesla, the absolute best car!

The thing about the Tesla is that it's not just a great electric car - it's a great car, period. I think it's worth every penny.

I just don't want to spend that many pennies right now! :D
 
kayoh190 said:
The thing about the Tesla is that it's not just a great electric car - it's a great car, period. I think it's worth every penny.

I just don't want to spend that many pennies right now! :D
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Did you know that when/if you lose the battery in a Tesla it cannot be moved? The factory has to come out and move it, it called the 'dead brick' situation.
 
Dav8or said:
Really? I suppose you think the gasoline you put in your car naturally bubbles out of the ground right at the gas station. Stop and think about the enormous amount of energy it takes to suck crappy crude out of the ground, transport it half the way around the world, refine it into something your car can use, then truck it to where ever you are. Combined with the usual terrible 25-30% efficiency of the ICE and you get what? Maybe 5% efficiency?

Electric powered vehicles are a good thing. They are the future. The ICE needs to get it's tired ass to the museum.
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Exactly...but some people can't be convinced.
 
CTLSi said:
Did you know that when/if you lose the battery in a Tesla it cannot be moved? The factory has to come out and move it, it called the 'dead brick' situation.
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And this happens often?
Actually, I don't know the stats...do you have them?
And if this is true, I highly doubt that they would fly a representative out to the car, I'm certain they would contract a tow service for aid.
 
I'm not a Tesla fanboy because they're environmentally friendly, I just like them because I think electric is the future. It drives me nuts that when I sit still in traffic with my old car, still burning gas and making heat. So inefficient. When you're not moving, the car should be off.

And even more so for aviation - just imagine all the cr*p we wouldn't have to deal with:

Carb icing
Less need for constant speed props (as electrical motors have linear power output and no sweet spot).
Mags.
Hot starts.
No TBO - only limited by bearing life.
No CO poisoning.
No shock cooling.
No rich cut.
No loss of power at altitude, no need for turbos etc.
Built in Fadec (brushless motors you set a RPM setting and it keeps it through the controller, no matter what).
No need to check oil.
No dirt.
No vibrations.
No noise.
No leaning at altitude.

Etc, etc. I can't wait.
 
CTLSi said:
Did you know that when/if you lose the battery in a Tesla it cannot be moved? The factory has to come out and move it, it called the 'dead brick' situation.
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I call BS, there's nothing (that fits) I can't drag up a flat bed tow truck and drive off with.
 
When Tesla introduces their $35K car, it's gonna be epic. I mean, they're gonna sell those things like nobody has ever seen. It's the prefect marketing plan - introduce an awesome product at a price point that most can't afford, and get just about everyone salivating. Then roll out a product that's within reach of the masses, and watch the money roll in.

It's friggin' genius.
 
kayoh190 said:
When Tesla introduces their $35K car, it's gonna be epic. I mean, they're gonna sell those things like nobody has ever seen. It's the prefect marketing plan - introduce an awesome product at a price point that most can't afford, and get just about everyone salivating. Then roll out a product that's within reach of the masses, and watch the money roll in.

It's friggin' genius.
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It's an old trick. Volvo introduced the 760 2 years before the smaller engined 740 etc. That way they build in an sense of quality and the lesser models get it by association. It's like hanging with the cool kid in school.

A reverse trick is what every Asian car manufacturer has done since the 50's. They come on the market offering cheap cars with lots of extras and good quality. That's how Toyota started out, that's how Huyndai started out. Then once people get invested in them and the quality and word of mouth spreads, then they slowly start raising prices and go more upmarket. Look at Kia. They used to be laughed at when they came, the lowest of the low. No one is laughing anymore - now they have a nice full range of quality cars and even introduced a luxury car this year (K900). And today Toyota is the biggest car maker in the world. Who'd have thunk, huh?
 
kayoh190 said:
When Tesla introduces their $35K car, it's gonna be epic. I mean, they're gonna sell those things like nobody has ever seen. It's the prefect marketing plan - introduce an awesome product at a price point that most can't afford, and get just about everyone salivating. Then roll out a product that's within reach of the masses, and watch the money roll in.

It's friggin' genius.
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Yep, and here's how smart he is in the face of conventional wisdom. He has put all the Tesla patents into the public domain and will help anyone with an electric car program. He's going to give how much R&D $$$ to his competitors? Plus technical expertise and assistance?

This is a man who understands that to make the biggest gains you help everyone up. Plus since he's going to open up his battery 'gigafactory' he will be building a customer base for that.
 
CTLSi said:
Did you know that when/if you lose the battery in a Tesla it cannot be moved? The factory has to come out and move it, it called the 'dead brick' situation.
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CTLSi said:
The 'dead brick' Tesla http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/02/22/teslas-electric-brick-problem/

Also, the 'pants on fire' Tesla '

Another Tesla Caught On Fire While Sitting In A Toronto Garage This Month

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Yep, like I said, BS, Tesla does not have to come out and move it, any tow truck will do just fine, yes, batteries go junk and are expensive and toxic, that is why hydrogen fuel cells will replace them.
 
Here's a new poll for ya- Which is greater in internet membership, the Tesla fan boy club, or the Tesla hater's group?
 
I'd ride my bike to work if I lived close enough.

An hours' drive makes for a much longer bike ride.
 
Henning said:
Many places you can also specify green energy.
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You can do that here. In the fine print it says they don't have to actually do it. They still get to charge you more for choosing the option. (This is on Xcel in the city. Out here the Co-op isn't as willing to lie to people and act like this state has a real alternative to coal. Not also that most green energy execs make roughly 4x their peers in the same industry. All those cost benefits? Going into their pockets, not yours.)
 
stratobee said:
It's an old trick. Volvo introduced the 760 2 years before the smaller engined 740 etc. That way they build in an sense of quality and the lesser models get it by association. It's like hanging with the cool kid in school.



A reverse trick is what every Asian car manufacturer has done since the 50's. They come on the market offering cheap cars with lots of extras and good quality. That's how Toyota started out, that's how Huyndai started out. Then once people get invested in them and the quality and word of mouth spreads, then they slowly start raising prices and go more upmarket. Look at Kia. They used to be laughed at when they came, the lowest of the low. No one is laughing anymore - now they have a nice full range of quality cars and even introduced a luxury car this year (K900). And today Toyota is the biggest car maker in the world. Who'd have thunk, huh?
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Something about being in business for the long haul and not just the next quarter comes to mind.
 
CTLSi said:
Your electricity comes from the 'grid' not one specific plant.
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CC PUD produces enough power from its three dams to power almost a million households. Why on Earth would they import electricity from somewhere else when there are less than 100,000 people in the county???

Besides, I've been in the operations area of the dam. Via their status board that shows the transmission lines heading out from the dam to the substations (and a couple that feed INTO BPA's lines), and the 'maps' that go from there, they showed the route from the dam to my house.
 
This fire business is just FUD spread by Tesla's competitors. As I mentioned earlier, my Honda Accord caught fire while I was driving it. It didn't make the interwebs. Cars catch fire all the time.

Tesla's very rarely catch fire. It can happen, for example if you steal a Tesla, run from the cops using the full force of the magic hand, crash into some cars, and then hit a steel light pole that cuts the Tesla neatly in two. This did cause a fire.

The Tesla does have a fatal flaw, but it's nothing to do with safety, it's probably the safest sedan you can buy.

The cup holders won't hold a Big Gulp. :(
 
ktup-flyer said:
I'll stick with my Camaro...
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What if there were an electric Camaro? I personally would buy that in a heartbeat! (of America!:D) I have no use for a four door sedan and prefer my cars to be sporting. The Tesla roadster is ideal for me, but nobody is building anything like it anymore and the used Roadsters are still to expensive for me. It will likely be a good long while before anybody temps me to buy another new car.
 
I'm waiting for the charging infrastructure of available stations to become more widely available and purchase price to drop as well as better range between charges then I'd consider one.
 
I'm hoping they put in lots and lots of chargers and you guys buy them so I can put some nice vehicles in the garage for peanuts. Then laugh heartily when parking at a "charging meter" suddenly costs $10/hr in some urban hellhole somewhere. :)

Business people will ALWAYS figure out how to charge a premium for whatever is most popular. Bottom line. Run with the herd, please! I'll be on the lookout for your wheels on the used lots. Heh heh.
 
denverpilot said:
Run with the herd, please! I'll be on the lookout for your wheels on the used lots. Heh heh.
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How many used sedans and SUVs do you need? Sometimes, just sometimes, the herd makes pretty good choices. The herd bought iPhones, iPads, flat screen TVs, broadband internet and even GPS. Not a huge market now for used flip phones, CRT TVs, dial up and paper maps.

Just sayin'...;)
 
Yeah I'd love to pick up a low mileage Bentley as soon as ecars take off as long as petrol does not climb to $8 a gallon.
 
Dav8or said:
What if there were an electric Camaro? I personally would buy that in a heartbeat! (of America!:D) I have no use for a four door sedan and prefer my cars to be sporting. The Tesla roadster is ideal for me, but nobody is building anything like it anymore and the used Roadsters are still to expensive for me. It will likely be a good long while before anybody temps me to buy another new car.
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I got the SS partly for the sound lol.
 
Dav8or said:
What if there were an electric Camaro? I personally would buy that in a heartbeat! (of America!:D) I have no use for a four door sedan and prefer my cars to be sporting. The Tesla roadster is ideal for me, but nobody is building anything like it anymore and the used Roadsters are still to expensive for me. It will likely be a good long while before anybody temps me to buy another new car.
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There is a SMART roadster over here available in electric.
 
The one thing I don't see how they fix is the speed of charging. (Unless Henning is right about fuel cells.)

There's really no way to transfer that much energy as quickly as putting chemicals in a tank. If you only drive for a day and can park overnight or park mist of the day while you work or shop fine. If you're going cross country it's a problem.

John


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD
 
jsstevens said:
The one thing I don't see how they fix is the speed of charging. (Unless Henning is right about fuel cells.)

There's really no way to transfer that much energy as quickly as putting chemicals in a tank. If you only drive for a day and can park overnight or park mist of the day while you work or shop fine. If you're going cross country it's a problem.

John


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD
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The other technology to deal with it is the capacitive charge storage devices.
 
jsstevens said:
The one thing I don't see how they fix is the speed of charging. (Unless Henning is right about fuel cells.)

There's really no way to transfer that much energy as quickly as putting chemicals in a tank. If you only drive for a day and can park overnight or park mist of the day while you work or shop fine. If you're going cross country it's a problem.

John


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD
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The Supercharging stations kind of make that a non-issue.

20 minutes to charge is pretty close to the same amount of time you spend pulling off the freeway on I-5 and filling gas, using the bathroom, and buying a soda.

On a drive from SF to LA, that doesn't seem to be a big barrier to travel.

http://www.teslamotors.com/supercharger
 
Cpt_Kirk said:
I'd ride my bike to work if I lived close enough.

An hours' drive makes for a much longer bike ride.
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In six weeks our new downtown home will be ready for move in. Goodbye 50min commutes, hello 3mi bike ride. Can't wait!
 
I'm think I'm going to order one of these next week. I've been thinking about it for a while now. I don't own the stock nor will I ever. I'm not buying it because it's cool and green. It just seems to meet my mission really well. I have a garage with 220v so charging is easy. I never need to drive more than 150 miles in a day. I can fit a bike in the back with the seats folded down (a critical mission requirement) and I believe it will be really fun to drive. The only thing I can't do with it is take a long road trip. This may come as a shock to many people on POA, but I have a plane and so rarely take long road trips. I also have a second car that isn't worth selling that I can use for trips. Am I missing something with the Tesla? I have this nagging feeling that if you're not some sort of fanboy there isn't a rational reason to buy it.
 
Henning said:
The other technology to deal with it is the capacitive charge storage devices.
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That only deals with the ability of the "battery" to take the electrons. Do the calculations on current to put the electron in that fast and thens see what wire size you need plus the amount of electricity to the charging stations (picture a Racetrac or Flying J size station with 16 places to "fill-up") at once.

The Tesla Roadster had/has an 85kWh battery pack. To fully charge that in 10 minutes (Which is frankly too long as far as I'm concerned. It usually doesn't take more than 3-4 minutes to fill my tank in my mini van, less in my mini.) you'd need 85x6=510kW of power. At 480V that's 1000 Amps. Even if you assume 3 phase power, that's still 333 Amps. That's 4/0 wires x 4. The conductor diameter in 4/0 is larger than a dime. (See attached pic. 4/0 is the second from the top. x4 in this application.)

It takes enormous infrastructure to move that much electricity that fast. And if a substantial number of these cars get on the road all that infrastructure has to scale to match.

There is really nothing so far that matches the energy transfer/time of dumping chemicals (which have the energy already captured) in a tank. That's why the fuel cell idea is good. That's why hybrids which were designed as primarily electric powered vehicles (1st gen Prius, for example) have a small engine to generate their own electricity. And plug in only electrics are commuter cars. There's nothing wrong with commuter cars and I hope they get really popular. It's much easier to build efficiencies into a large, fixed generating station than a bunch of portable ones. But it's not a full solution to what we use cars for.

For me, it would take a pure electric for my daily driving plus either having or renting a conventional car for long trips.

John
 

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JoseCuervo said:
The Supercharging stations kind of make that a non-issue.

20 minutes to charge is pretty close to the same amount of time you spend pulling off the freeway on I-5 and filling gas, using the bathroom, and buying a soda.

On a drive from SF to LA, that doesn't seem to be a big barrier to travel.

http://www.teslamotors.com/supercharger
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So here's the graph from the link. Attached. (I have insufficient POA fu to embed.)

170 miles worth of charge in 20 minutes. As opposed to 350-400 miles worth of gas in 4 minutes.

It's nice. I'm glad they're working it. But it's not the same. When my family travels, we generally stop when we need gas. It takes about 10 minutes to fuel the car and empty everybody else. Usually done in tandem because I'll start fueling while my wife & kids go inside and visit the rest room. When she's done she comes out and takes over-if I'm not already done with fueling-so I can go inside. There are exceptions and some trips take longer than others. But based on the above numbers, in a Tesla (nice car btw, don't file me as a Tesla hater) we'd be stopping every 2 to 2 1/2 hours for an absolute minimum of 20 minutes. (What if the charging stations are currently full? How long does it take to maneuver in and hook up? Not a lot, but still some.) This way we usually stop about every 4 for maybe 10 minutes.

And Tesla is still a very small minority of cars on the road. How does this scale if 50% of the cars are electric and they take 20 minutes connected to get a 1/2 fill?

John
 

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Wingsofglass said:
Am I missing something with the Tesla? I have this nagging feeling that if you're not some sort of fanboy there isn't a rational reason to buy it.
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You're not missing anything. If you want a new car, you want a new car. You don't need a rational reason to buy it.

Forget it's electric powered. Pretend you're buying a new Jaguar, or Mercedes. If you came on this forum and told everyone you were ordering a new 7 series BMW, do you think you would get much criticism, or economic accounting analysis? No, you would just get a big thumbs up from nearly everyone and a few would point out that you're crazy to buy a new car and you should buy it used. That's it.

It's just a new car. One that you will likely enjoy and fondly remember more so than the Jaguar, Mercedes, or BMW. The fact that you won't be going to the gas station much anymore is just a big bonus.:thumbsup:
 
Like another poster said, I think most of us have airplanes. Consequently, my need for a "road trip" car is very very minimal.
 
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