Electric Vehicles

[Martinjlm]

Originally Posted by Wyzz Kydd

It seems to me EV trucks will be novelties unless they do something like that. I could see commuters who like big vehicles using them, but not people who want to do any kind of serious truck work.

Tomorrow I’ll drive 300 miles, haul 3 people and a couple of hundred pounds of gear, in my Camaro. Gas up when I start out and be good until I return. No worries. Typical Saturday other than sometimes we take my son’s Mustang.

I wouldn’t be comfortable doing that in an EV truck.

EV’s available today wouldn’t work for you. Maybe a Rivian, maybe not. But looking at what’s coming in the next five years there will be double digits of options that could handle what you just described without blinking.

As far as EV trucks go, in half ton trim, the vast majority of trucks sold each year never tow a thing. At least for the original owners. They are used like bigger taller fully loaded cars. For those that do need to tow, 3/4 ton trucks will be among the last vehicles to convert to EV. You and I might be expired or too vegged out to drive when that occurs. But at the same time, commercial EV vans are a big freakin’ deal right now. As I type this I just finished a bunch of meetings with a vehicle brand that you would recognize if I named them. What were we discussing? Very large EVs that they will be bringing to market in a few years. Very large.

[Martinjlm]

Originally Posted by Wyzz Kydd

I feel the same way. They certainly went a better way than the Banshee with a fake transmission and fake exhaust sounds.

Hybrid’s make sense to me. All wheel drive, lots of torque, efficiency of recapturing energy from the brakes rather than losing it to heat, good range, lower emissions, I thought this would be the winning tech, except for the cost of two powertrains.

I feel the need to defend Dodge on this one. We all saw the Banshee launch and the fake sound was a HUGE mistake. Wish they had never done that, because the technology the car will really have is actually kinda cool.

There will be sound with the Banshee, but it’s not faked. Why they chose to try to “simulate” it for the reveal is beyond me. To improve the handling of Banshee, Dodge has engineered baffles under the car to direct the air and keep the car planted. Very similar to what Chevrolet does with C8. They also channel the sound of that air flowing through the baffles to generate an engine-like sound. That sound changes in pitch and tone as the vehicle increases speed, so it naturally sounds like an engine revving. At highway speeds it’s as loud as a Hemi.

Because the car they showed at the reveal could only crawl at about 5 mph, they piped in the sound. I still can’t figure out who would have ok’d that plan. The result was very predictable and now they have to dig out of a hole to get anybody to take the real sound seriously.

[Wyzz Kydd]

Originally Posted by Martinjlm

I feel the need to defend Dodge on this one. We all saw the Banshee launch and the fake sound was a HUGE mistake. Wish they had never done that, because the technology the car will really have is actually kinda cool.

There will be sound with the Banshee, but it’s not faked. Why they chose to try to “simulate” it for the reveal is beyond me. To improve the handling of Banshee, Dodge has engineered baffles under the car to direct the air and keep the car planted. Very similar to what Chevrolet does with C8. They also channel the sound of that air flowing through the baffles to generate an engine-like sound. That sound changes in pitch and tone as the vehicle increases speed, so it naturally sounds like an engine revving. At highway speeds it’s as loud as a Hemi.

Because the car they showed at the reveal could only crawl at about 5 mph, they piped in the sound. I still can’t figure out who would have ok’d that plan. The result was very predictable and now they have to dig out of a hole to get anybody to take the real sound seriously.

To me the fake sound coupled with a fake transmission point to a major disconnect between the manufacturer and the target audience. Not surprising given a large portion of the target audience don’t want an EV anyway.

Originally Posted by Martinjlm

EV’s available today wouldn’t work for you. Maybe a Rivian, maybe not. But looking at what’s coming in the next five years there will be double digits of options that could handle what you just described without blinking.

As far as EV trucks go, in half ton trim, the vast majority of trucks sold each year never tow a thing. At least for the original owners. They are used like bigger taller fully loaded cars. For those that do need to tow, 3/4 ton trucks will be among the last vehicles to convert to EV. You and I might be expired or too vegged out to drive when that occurs. But at the same time, commercial EV vans are a big freakin’ deal right now. As I type this I just finished a bunch of meetings with a vehicle brand that you would recognize if I named them. What were we discussing? Very large EVs that they will be bringing to market in a few years. Very large.

I don’t see an EV truck capable of hauling a medium sized RV on road-trips ranging from a 3-400 mile one way trip that my wife and I want to make in a day to 1,000 one way mile trips we want to do in three or fewer days. We compete in matches every Saturday and in retirement I plan to extend our range from just the southeast all the way up to the Great Lakes and at least as far west as Phoenix.

Solar panels on the RV and an RV specific PowerWall would be nice though.

Then when I’m home I’ll roll out the Camaro or a GT500.

[Martinjlm]

Originally Posted by Wyzz Kydd

To me the fake sound coupled with a fake transmission point to a major disconnect between the manufacturer and the target audience. Not surprising given a large portion of the target audience don’t want an EV anyway.



I don’t see an EV truck capable of hauling a medium sized RV on road-trips ranging from a 3-400 mile one way trip that my wife and I want to make in a day to 1,000 one way mile trips we want to do in three or fewer days. We compete in matches every Saturday and in retirement I plan to extend our range from just the southeast all the way up to the Great Lakes and at least as far west as Phoenix.

Solar panels on the RV and an RV specific PowerWall would be nice though.

Then when I’m home I’ll roll out the Camaro or a GT500.

That just means you’re keeping whatever you use now or replacing it with another heavy-duty gas or diesel unit. That is the whole purpose of the new V8 GM just announced. The tooling for that engine is going into the Flint V8 engine plant. Know what else is built in Flint? The 2500 and 3500 series trucks that this engine drops into.

[Wyzz Kydd]

Sorry, but I’ve resolved not to purchase vehicles from manufacturers that have committed to an all EV lineup.

I’ve always preferred Ford trucks over GM trucks anyway, so that’s an easy decision. They may commit to all EV in the US at some point but so far they’re only doing that in Europe.

[mlee]

Originally Posted by gtstorey

Spammer

Please use the report button so we can get rid of them.

[90503]

Originally Posted by mlee

Please use the report button so we can get rid of them.

One can only hope, but alas, the report button obviously has it's flaws....lol

Originally Posted by Rob3D

I don’t even care if the forum gods bam me for life. I can just make another account.

[mlee]

Originally Posted by 90503

One can only hope, but alas, the report button obviously has it's flaws....lol

For spam... the report button has no flaws... sometimes it's better to sit back and let you all go at it.

[Idaho2018GTPremium]

Originally Posted by Martinjlm

I feel the need to defend Dodge on this one. We all saw the Banshee launch and the fake sound was a HUGE mistake. Wish they had never done that, because the technology the car will really have is actually kinda cool.

There will be sound with the Banshee, but it’s not faked. Why they chose to try to “simulate” it for the reveal is beyond me. To improve the handling of Banshee, Dodge has engineered baffles under the car to direct the air and keep the car planted. Very similar to what Chevrolet does with C8. They also channel the sound of that air flowing through the baffles to generate an engine-like sound. That sound changes in pitch and tone as the vehicle increases speed, so it naturally sounds like an engine revving. At highway speeds it’s as loud as a Hemi.

Because the car they showed at the reveal could only crawl at about 5 mph, they piped in the sound. I still can’t figure out who would have ok’d that plan. The result was very predictable and now they have to dig out of a hole to get anybody to take the real sound seriously.

That tone generator with the wind under the car sounds like a terrible idea. The way you describe it, it sounds like it winds up similar to a jet engine and doesn't "rev" back down, which is obviously how an ICE works, rev up, then down, and settle in a quiet thrum on the highway that sort of blends in with the road noise, or quieter in a regular passenger car.

That reveal and the subsequent fake engine revving sound on the Banshee was one of the worst ideas I've ever seen, way worse than the S650 Mustang reveal where they were bragging about remote rev and an electronic handle parking brake and drift mode. Both were cringe-worthy, but the Banshee definitely takes the cake.

[Idaho2018GTPremium]

I don't mind the idea of EVs for daily driving in town, assuming houses and apartment complexes have adequate charging stations and obviously, the infrastructure is there to support it all. I am against governments phasing out new ICEs. This is causing manufacturers to mostly abandon new ICE development, so we are at peak ICE efficiency but probably won't get any better. Whereas, if gov't wasn't phasing out ICEs, then we'd continue to get modern ICE development and better and better fuel mileage and efficiency. That said, EVs still aren't ready for the big leagues:

http://https://www.motortrend.com/re...ric-test-cars/

I think the hold-up is many people only compare greenhouse gas emissions of EVs vs ICE. Sort of how the EU went on the diesel bandwagon a while ago and then discovered that diesels are so much dirtier than ICEs in every other measure besides carbon emissions, that they aren't improving air quality at all. EVs are so much more efficient than ICEs, that even with 50% coal, they are better from a greenhouse gas perspective than an ICE when comparing a new EV car to a new ICE car. That said, I think the jury is still out on overall environmental impact of BEVs vs ICE, which factors in way more than just greenhouse gas, which very well could be worse than ICEs, due to the huge battery packs. 2000+ lbs worth of batteries in a Rivian is nuts.

Overall, I am very sad to see the end of modern ICE development drawing near, as EVs have no soul. Sure, a Model S Plaid is fast in a straight line, and I've ridden in one, but its soulless.

[ChevyRules]

Originally Posted by Idaho2018GTPremium

I don't mind the idea of EVs for daily driving in town, assuming houses and apartment complexes have adequate charging stations and obviously, the infrastructure is there to support it all. I am against governments phasing out new ICEs. This is causing manufacturers to mostly abandon new ICE development, so we are at peak ICE efficiency but probably won't get any better. Whereas, if gov't wasn't phasing out ICEs, then we'd continue to get modern ICE development and better and better fuel mileage and efficiency. That said, EVs still aren't ready for the big leagues:

Problem is cost. Martin has said it before, the cost to add technology that improves efficiency and emissions to the ICE keeps on going up along with the complexity of the vehicle/engine. Cost of developing EV's are on the opposite trend. Especially the costly part of the EV, the battery.

The Volt was $1,200/kwh

The Bolt is $246/kwh in 2017 then down to $145/kwh

The Ultium batteries are down to $100/kwh.

And governments aren't forcing the abandonment of ICE development. Playing a factor? Sure, but already posted here that GM went full EV back in 2017 well before CA's ban of new ICE sales by 2035. Automakers are moving in that direction on their own.

But you're right, we are not ready to go full EV today. 15 years from now? 20 years from now? A lot can change with the proper investments.

[Wyzz Kydd]

Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago economists estimate that in the short run an increase in the CAFE standards costs US consumers $6.5 billion in value even after accounting for improved fuel efficiency. Over that same period the change reduces US manufacturers profits by $9.1billion. In the long run those costs rise significantly and are shifted more to the consumers. They also found that foreign manufacturers profits are largely unaffected by increased CAFE standards.

They also found that increased fuel efficiency due to CAFE standards incentivizes Americans to drive more resulting in increased negative externalities (pollution, congestion, accidents etc.) amounting to almost $2.10 of negative externalities per gallon. Increased accidents due to more frequent driving by itself offsets 95% of the benefits of CAFE standards.

So yes, government is not only very much A factor in the shift to EVs, it is overwhelmingly THE primary factor.

The CAFE standards alone cost US manufacturers and citizens billions of dollars every year while at the same time making us less competitive, increasing the number of accidents, increasing congestion and yielding negligible to zero benefits.

Don’t believe me? Here’s the study.

https://www.mackinac.org/S2022-06

There’s tons more data proving the point. It’s dense, and I’m a bit of a data nerd, but this is what I used to do for a living.

[Wyzz Kydd]

All the name calling and telling me to shut up and go away doesn’t change the facts.

[Wyzz Kydd]

We can address what lighter vehicles and increased driving does to fatality rates later, and no, the increased weight due to batteries doesn’t make you safer.