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Cockmaster posted:Hell, the Tesla Model X is rated to tow 5000 pounds, and it's based on the same chassis as the Model S. This is true. It's true in some form for all electrics at present I suppose. But if you need long range towing once in a while, frequent charging stops can compensate for the shorter range. Perhaps a nuisance, but if it's once in a while it doesn't matter. The 20-80% time on a supercharger is pretty amazing. Donut, cup of coffee and nature break, you're good to go. 100 km of charge in 12 minutes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cU_otU6BuwM Bjørn Nyland, the guy making all the videos, has posted a lot about driving strategies. You don't charge as much as you can and drive as long as it'll go, you charge what you need to get to the next charger + some margin.
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# ? Dec 24, 2015 13:40 |
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# ? May 16, 2024 15:45 |
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Throatwarbler posted:I wonder why Toyota hasn't done a hybrid Tundra, given that they've got the IP to a lot of hybrid technologies. Could be capacity constrained. Ford has a deal with Toyota where they are allowed to use essentially the Prius drivetrain in their hybrids, because Ford was also contesting the ownership of that IP, maybe that's why they are going ahead. In the mean time I wonder how much more lightweighting there can be for trucks. Carbon fiber roofs and hoods perhaps. I'd like to see a "4 engine, 1 per wheel electric/CNG hybrid" someday.
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# ? Dec 25, 2015 07:09 |
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Ola posted:
The general rule of any LiIon battery is that you want to keep them between 20 and 80% especially for charging; they charge slower above 80 (and below 20) and this is true even for your smartphone. If we kept our smartphones longer than like 3 months it'd be a good idea to only charge them to 80% and then make sure they're recharged before hitting 20 as sitting above or below that for extended periods is bad for the battery, but not so bad you'll notice in the current phone lifespan cycle. It gets more obvious with the gigantic battery packs on EVs.
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# ? Dec 25, 2015 09:54 |
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Collateral Damage posted:Volvo and several other commercial truck (cargo, not pickup) manufacturers make hybrids already. Apparently they're great for heavy loads because they remove the need for the transmission to shift a dozen times in the first 100 meters of travel from a standstill, so you can have a much simpler (cheaper) transmission without all the super low range gears. I am a volvo truck hybrid trained technician, and for volvo at least, the transmission is the same 12 speed auto they put it everything else. All of volvos hybrid trucks and buses are parallel hybrid and only use electric power to pull away with diesel engine kicking in after you change out of first gear. The range on battery power alone is measured in hundreds of metres and not miles, but they cut the engine from 8litre 6 cylinder to 5 litre 4 cylinder (regular ole' turbo diesels) Hybrid commercial trucks were a bit of a flop because it adds a hell of a lot of weight (2 extra seperate cooling systems, electric air conditioning pump, electric air compressor etc) for minimal fuel gains for something that spends most of the time at full speed not using the electric motor. For a bus hybrid makes absolute sense with all the stopping and starting. There are a poo poo ton of them in london and the surrounding areas.
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# ? Dec 25, 2015 14:35 |
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warcake posted:I am a volvo truck hybrid trained technician, and for volvo at least, the transmission is the same 12 speed auto they put it everything else. All of volvos hybrid trucks and buses are parallel hybrid and only use electric power to pull away with diesel engine kicking in after you change out of first gear. The range on battery power alone is measured in hundreds of metres and not miles, but they cut the engine from 8litre 6 cylinder to 5 litre 4 cylinder (regular ole' turbo diesels) Even in my part of Florida has a whole fleet of hybrid buses, and we hate public transport!
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# ? Dec 25, 2015 16:52 |
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Chicago Transit Authority also has a very comprehensive hybrid bus fleet. I'd say 90% of the buses that I see are hybrid.
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# ? Dec 26, 2015 00:53 |
99.9% of people who buy trucks don't care about fuel efficiency. At all.
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# ? Dec 26, 2015 20:59 |
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Pryor on Fire posted:99.9% of people who buy trucks don't care about fuel efficiency. At all. Do utes count?
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# ? Dec 26, 2015 21:08 |
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Pryor on Fire posted:99.9% of people who buy trucks don't care about fuel efficiency. At all. Maybe they don't care, but would they complain if mileage were better? Actually, maybe they would...
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# ? Dec 26, 2015 21:26 |
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Pryor on Fire posted:99.9% of people who buy trucks don't care about fuel efficiency. At all. If you put two equal capability trucks in front of them with equal off-battery capability, but one has a lifetime cost of $10k less due to plug-in getting 30 miles and most short trips being essentially free because of it, they'll pick the plug-in. They just need to not give up any meaningful capability for it. If you put a big prius in front of them they'll deservingly laugh at you. And then drive over said prius just to prove a point.
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# ? Dec 26, 2015 21:52 |
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Yeah, it's an image and marketing problem more then anything. Sell it as an added torque boost, mobile power plant, and additional reliably and you might get somewhere. Sell it as eco friendly, inexpensive, or practical and you're SOL.
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# ? Dec 27, 2015 01:36 |
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blugu64 posted:Yeah, it's an image and marketing problem more then anything. Sell it as an added torque boost, mobile power plant, and additional reliably and you might get somewhere. Sell it as eco friendly, inexpensive, or practical and you're SOL. This was my argument earlier; GM tried exactly that, and got nowhere, because truck purchases are generally either mostly economic, and therefore will skip the expensive hybrid option, or mostly emotional, and will skip the less-masculine-green-granolamunching hybrid option.
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# ? Dec 27, 2015 01:57 |
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I did a pro forma a year or so back for my boss showing how much cheaper a tesla would be than my fully loaded 4x4 suburban over 5 years. He laughed and told me he'd never buy anything that gets better than 20 mpg. He bought me a 4x4 Yukon XL.
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# ? Dec 27, 2015 02:06 |
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Suqit posted:He laughed and told me he'd never buy anything that gets better than 20 mpg. Ah, the marketplace. So so rational.
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# ? Dec 27, 2015 02:11 |
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Suqit posted:I did a pro forma a year or so back for my boss showing how much cheaper a tesla would be than my fully loaded 4x4 suburban over 5 years. He laughed and told me he'd never buy anything that gets better than 20 mpg. See why do folks go for the loving gm trucks every time? Couldn't he get you like a nice 4runner or something? gently caress I don't get Americans and I've been one my whole life. Such retarded purchasing decisions. I get the hoorah let's burn gas because I'm a dumbass and a pussy who needs a big motor to make me feel like I matter but a Yukon? Jesus Christ people are dumb. wilfredmerriweathr fucked around with this message at 05:47 on Dec 27, 2015 |
# ? Dec 27, 2015 05:44 |
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Suqit posted:I did a pro forma a year or so back for my boss showing how much cheaper a tesla would be than my fully loaded 4x4 suburban over 5 years. He laughed and told me he'd never buy anything that gets better than 20 mpg.
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# ? Dec 27, 2015 08:24 |
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We rented a Yukon. It seemed nice if you want to really feel like king of the road.
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# ? Dec 27, 2015 14:34 |
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Well SUV used to be allowed for full depreciation in the year placed in service so managers may still be stuck thinking they still are or customers are expecting you to be in a huge SUV.
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# ? Dec 28, 2015 18:07 |
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Pryor on Fire posted:99.9% of people who buy trucks don't care about fuel efficiency. At all. A lot of trucks get sold to companies that use them, and they sure as poo poo care. Mange Mite posted:If they wanted low beltlines they would spend engineering budget on lowering them - especially now, as styling is getting a bigger and bigger cut of budgets these days in most automakers. Market research seems to show that people actually like high beltlines. Engineering isn't the only reason beltlines are getting higher. If you have a solution you could make some money on it, given the issues faced.
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# ? Dec 28, 2015 19:42 |
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Mange Mite posted:If they wanted low beltlines they would spend engineering budget on lowering them - especially now, as styling is getting a bigger and bigger cut of budgets these days in most automakers. Market research seems to show that people actually like high beltlines. Engineering isn't the only reason beltlines are getting higher. Side and pedestrian impact requirements like high belt lines.
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# ? Dec 28, 2015 21:48 |
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Ouch. Guy had good year at work, bought himself a Tesla. Lent it to friend, friend supercharged it, it caught fire and burnt to the ground. http://jalopnik.com/tesla-model-s-burns-to-a-crisp-during-supercharging-in-1750581400 No info on exactly what happened yet.
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# ? Jan 3, 2016 23:38 |
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Wow, what? I didn't know a normal fire could do that to a vehicle.
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# ? Jan 4, 2016 00:45 |
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Michael Scott posted:
That's a Tesla, so possibly not a normal fire. 480VAC at 100A is a poo poo ton of energy, if something went tits up and didn't open like it should have. (It was plugged into a supercharger.)
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# ? Jan 4, 2016 00:50 |
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That and also aluminum melts at a much lower temperature than steel
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# ? Jan 4, 2016 03:12 |
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Also, from the comments over there, apparently the fire service people didn't have the equipment to put out a high voltage electrical fire, so it got to keep burning until it was out of things to burn.
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# ? Jan 4, 2016 05:07 |
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roomforthetuna posted:Also, from the comments over there, apparently the fire service people didn't have the equipment to put out a high voltage electrical fire, so it got to keep burning until it was out of things to burn. So.. powder or CO2?
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# ? Jan 4, 2016 05:58 |
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Lithium ions can't melt aluminum beams
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# ? Jan 4, 2016 07:00 |
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roomforthetuna posted:Also, from the comments over there, apparently the fire service people didn't have the equipment to put out a high voltage electrical fire, so it got to keep burning until it was out of things to burn. There is a lot of different reporting on this. Many houses have 400V input wires, the firemen are still going to try putting it out. Tesla's instruction is "lots of water", that's obviously available to them. It could be that they were unsure on how to put it out, but apparently when they arrived the fire was developed enough that they concentrated on letting it burn out safely while protecting the buildings around it. It's still not clear what actually caught fire, even if it's very apparent where the most energy was flowing before the fire. While I don't think this incident is a very big deal in itself, it has, along with reading some owner experiences in the winter season, brought forward my pet hate about Teslas: the "clever" doors. The windows freeze up, which happens on all cars, but on this car it means you can do damage to the window then you open the door since it has to slide down a little bit. The gee-whiz pop-out door handles don't pop out, or stay out when they should pop in. All this clumsiness to make flush door handles, when fully mechanical flush handles have been done decades ago. Then there's the issue with a fire. The door openings are electrical, driven by the 12 volt circuit. That circuit can (or does so automatically) cut out in a fire. This means people can be trapped inside. There are emergency levers inside, but it doesn't take much imagination to come up with a realistic fatal scenario which would end well if they just had regular drat door handles. Hope they drop this crap on the Model 3.
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# ? Jan 4, 2016 09:47 |
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Ola posted:While I don't think this incident is a very big deal in itself, it has, along with reading some owner experiences in the winter season, brought forward my pet hate about Teslas: the "clever" doors. The windows freeze up, which happens on all cars, but on this car it means you can do damage to the window then you open the door since it has to slide down a little bit. quote:Then there's the issue with a fire. The door openings are electrical, driven by the 12 volt circuit. That circuit can (or does so automatically) cut out in a fire. This means people can be trapped inside. There are emergency levers inside, but it doesn't take much imagination to come up with a realistic fatal scenario which would end well if they just had regular drat door handles. Hope they drop this crap on the Model 3.
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# ? Jan 4, 2016 17:31 |
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Good points. I feel better about it now, in a bad way.
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# ? Jan 4, 2016 18:03 |
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As long as it's not more risky, yeah, I don't have to deal with any funny dissonant feelings. (I've had an issue related to the auto-lowering on mine, in fact, but it was the opposite: it wasn't going back up when the door was closed. Resolved itself, which I guess is good.)
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# ? Jan 4, 2016 18:19 |
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Update for the Tesla autodriving thing: works pretty good, except in heavy rain. Also certain exits on the highway confuse the system so it starts veering to the right before swinging back, which is pretty unnerving. It hasn't actually taken a wrong exit yet, but I've corrected manually most of the time.
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# ? Jan 4, 2016 19:11 |
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It also has trouble when driving into a low sun, I've found. I wish I could give it a nudge on the wheel to give it guidance on which of the diverging lane markers to track. Or lane positioning, man, Elon must really like hugging the left of the lane. It makes congested highway driving 95% less annoying, though, and mostly does a good job dealing with people squeezing into my lane. I bet there's a Contra code that shows the sensor fusion stuff on the display. I'd love to see that.
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# ? Jan 4, 2016 19:23 |
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wolrah posted:To be fair, this stupidity is surprisingly common on other vehicles. Subaru in particular seems to love them. Aside from the BRZ, Subaru hasn't sold a vehicle with frameless windows in almost 10 years. When they did sell them, they were not power activated (the current BRZ ones are.) Frameless windows do make it easier to enter and exit the car when the window is down since you don't need to open the door as far. bull3964 fucked around with this message at 20:26 on Jan 4, 2016 |
# ? Jan 4, 2016 20:23 |
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bull3964 posted:Aside from the BRZ, Subaru hasn't sold a vehicle with frameless windows in almost 10 years. I'm sure it does make getting in and out in a narrow space with the windows down easier, but how often are you really doing that? Do you leave your windows down when parked in a tight lot or where some random person is likely to pull in close to you?
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# ? Jan 5, 2016 04:28 |
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Well, my garage actually. Subaru also apparently did it for A and B pillar strength. It's hard to argue that when the GD Impreza caused EMTs to publish a writeup on how to do a proper roof removal since it was impossible for the jaws of life to cut the B pillar.
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# ? Jan 5, 2016 04:37 |
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wolrah posted:
On many cars you can hold down the unlock button on the remote and it will roll down the windows. I forget if Subarus did this. A lot of (all?) 2 door BMWs and the 4 GC also have frameless windows that roll up and down when you open the door. People in the BMW thread seem to complain about it somewhat but those people complain about a lot of things.
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# ? Jan 5, 2016 05:31 |
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The BMW ones are indeed lovely. I had a 1 series, cold mornings were sketchy.
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# ? Jan 5, 2016 13:16 |
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It's one of the reasons i won't buy my 2 series until i have a heated garage (i e never) also because i'm financially responsible *goes out to look for the new oil leak in his 16 year old BMW". Actually global warming might make winter obsolete before i have the money for a garage, so i could end up buying a 2 series after all.
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# ? Jan 5, 2016 18:30 |
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# ? May 16, 2024 15:45 |
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Heated garages are bad for cars you drive in the winter. Let's park that salt covered slab of metal in an enclosed space and then heat it so the relative humidity goes up as all the snow and slush on the vehicle melts.
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# ? Jan 5, 2016 18:50 |