Until they can produce an EV that doesn’t feel like a massive downgrade in connvience, performance, cost, basically all the ways normal people measure the decision of buying a car, I’m not sold.
I like the fact it takes a few minutes to refuel my car, and it’s the same process regardless if I’m traveling 5 miles or 500. I don’t need to deal with charging stations, and if I run out of gas I can take a gas can to the car and problem solved. I can also store as much excess gasoline as I want just by having an extra container and if I take it with me, I can basically define whatever range I want.
I also don’t mind stopping at gas stations and it’s part of my routine where I like to talk to the people there. Sitting alone for an hour in a parking lot where I have somewhere to be isn’t my cup of tea.
I don’t want a vehicle that gradually looses half of its range over time, then has to have over $10k invested (sometimes quite a bit more) in a new battery every 100-150k miles. It’s like buying a gasoline car where the engine not only wears out and performance greatly degrades, but is virtually guaranteed it will always need a complete engine replacement.
I don’t want to worry about greatly reduced range in the winter. I don’t want to worry about a battery fire. When’s the last time you have seen a gasoline car spontaneously combust just sitting in a garage? Despite having a lot of flammable liquid it just doesn’t happen.
I also expect the resale value of the car to be reasonable, at least consistent with a good quality gasoline car.
Then there’s Elon Musk. His toxicity is reason alone for me to delay any EV purchase (not just Tesla) for as long as possible.
Outside of the tech echo chamber, I think I represent the majority of people who aren’t interested in EV’s and likely never will be. I wouldn’t care if they had a full self driving car, or make the car out of glass, or put a giant screen in it, I’m not buying it.
Have you stopped to consider that I don’t have a garage? That many, many drivers don’t have a private garage and their own EV charger? Basically anyone who lives in a regular apartment doesn’t have a garage and thus can’t charge their car at night.
If EVs are to succeed they need to work for the masses as good or better than what we have now. Not just your rich techie with a Tesla parked in their private garage in Palo Alto.
Less than half of all vehicle owners have access to a garage or carport with an electrical outlet.
If EV’s are to have mass appeal, how do you reconcile that? Most apartments have few (or none) EV chargers. I can barely get my apartment to follow through with maintenance requests, let alone install an EV charger.
Why bother with that hassle when my Honda Civic that already gets 35 mpg that I bought for $12k cash works just fine?
48% already have access to a charging outlet. You're right that's less than half, but that's pretty dang close to half. I'd say 48% of drivers being able to handle charging right now is mass appeal. I mean that's many millions of cars.
34 percent had private, off-street parking but no access to electric outlet. I wonder what percentage of that 34% could add an electrical outlet for <$1,000. That outlet will last 20+ years, not exactly a big cost over that time frame.
> I can barely get my apartment to follow through with maintenance requests, let alone install an EV charger.
Have you stopped to consider the majority of car owners don't live in apartments?
I'm not telling you to buy an EV today. I'm not saying EVs are a perfect fit for everyone. But they're a fine fit for a huge percentage of drivers today. And for a lot of people these hassles pointed out above are actually bigger hassles with ICE vehicles such as refueling time. It's a much larger market than just rich techies in Palo Alto.
You’re right, they are a good fit. If all you do is commute short distances, have a garage, own your home, and want to install an EV charger. And have terrible resale value and have a paper weight once the battery goes.
There’s a reason the used car market for EV’s practically doesn’t exist: people who want a car but don’t care if it’s EV or not see all these drawbacks. How else do you explain terrible EV resale value?
The people who are buying EVs are basing the purchase decision on the fact it’s an EV and don’t care about the drawbacks or differences, so they’ll buy new. These are not price sensitive consumers. An EV to them is more than a car, it’s a part of their personality and persona. Which is fine, to each their own.
> How else do you explain terrible EV resale value?
Does the data actually show that? I've got a 2021 Mach E Premium that was ~$54k new at the time I bought it (prices were all over the place). I got a $7,500 tax rebate on it. That's $46,500 cost. I see used ones listed for ~$39,000. That's 84% of it's value retained over soon to be three years. Is that really poor resale value? A lot of cars I've owned in the past had way worse resale value after a similar length of time.
And for the longest time Teslas had positive resale value, and the had some of the highest held value in the auto industry. It wasn't until Tesla started aggressively cutting prices this became untrue.
There's certainly some EVs of there with poor resale value, but they're also generally some of the worst EVs out there.
> If all you do is commute short distances, have a garage, own your home
I'm not sure. How long does it take you to plug in and unplug every day? Sure it is only a few seconds, but those add up. The ICE is a few minutes every week or two.
I don't plug in every day, only a couple of times a week.
So maybe 20-30 seconds total every week or two. Compared to 5+ minutes every week or two, which is how long I spend with my ICE. That's at least 10x longer.
Lots of FUD in this post, but this one sticks out:
> When’s the last time you have seen a gasoline car spontaneously combust just sitting in a garage? Despite having a lot of flammable liquid it just doesn’t happen.
I’ve never seen an ICE or an EV catch fire. I can count the number of car fires I’ve seen on one hand, but ICE cars do spontaneously combust:
Hyundai/Kia:
> Some of the fire risk issues were so severe, vehicle owners were encouraged to park their vehicles outside and away from their homes or other structures in case the car spontaneously caught on fire.
Ford:
> Ford issued a fire safety recall for over 39,000 vehicles, urging vehicle owners to park their cars outside due to the increased fire risk. Drivers reported fires while their cars were unattended and a burning smell and smoke from the front passenger area while driving.
Mercedes:
> This defect allows water from external sources to get into the electrical connections of the wiring harness. Water on electric components can cause short circuits, leading to an increased fire risk if the ignition is turned off for long periods of time.
> and if I run out of gas I can take a gas can to the car and problem solved.
Fair. IMO there should at least be an emergency slot for a short-range battery to get you a few miles.
> I don’t want a vehicle that gradually looses half of its range over time, then has to have over $10k invested (sometimes quite a bit more) in a new battery every 100-150k miles. It’s like buying a gasoline car where the engine not only wears out and performance greatly degrades, but is virtually guaranteed it will always need a complete engine replacement.
Sure, but also the engine doesn't need (so much) servicing in the meantime. You can pick your poison — and yours preference is of course valid, and I suspect the norm — but there's no perfect answer.
> When’s the last time you have seen a gasoline car spontaneously combust just sitting in a garage? Despite having a lot of flammable liquid it just doesn’t happen.
I like the fact it takes a few minutes to refuel my car, and it’s the same process regardless if I’m traveling 5 miles or 500. I don’t need to deal with charging stations, and if I run out of gas I can take a gas can to the car and problem solved. I can also store as much excess gasoline as I want just by having an extra container and if I take it with me, I can basically define whatever range I want.
I also don’t mind stopping at gas stations and it’s part of my routine where I like to talk to the people there. Sitting alone for an hour in a parking lot where I have somewhere to be isn’t my cup of tea.
I don’t want a vehicle that gradually looses half of its range over time, then has to have over $10k invested (sometimes quite a bit more) in a new battery every 100-150k miles. It’s like buying a gasoline car where the engine not only wears out and performance greatly degrades, but is virtually guaranteed it will always need a complete engine replacement.
I don’t want to worry about greatly reduced range in the winter. I don’t want to worry about a battery fire. When’s the last time you have seen a gasoline car spontaneously combust just sitting in a garage? Despite having a lot of flammable liquid it just doesn’t happen.
I also expect the resale value of the car to be reasonable, at least consistent with a good quality gasoline car.
Then there’s Elon Musk. His toxicity is reason alone for me to delay any EV purchase (not just Tesla) for as long as possible.
Outside of the tech echo chamber, I think I represent the majority of people who aren’t interested in EV’s and likely never will be. I wouldn’t care if they had a full self driving car, or make the car out of glass, or put a giant screen in it, I’m not buying it.