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The EV fact thread

I my experience this only partly true. If I compare my previous car (mild hybrid/diesel A8) with my current diesel Macan, the Audi saved 20% of fuel.
These cars run the same base engine, are both 4WD and similar weights. Where they differ is that the A8 is much more slippery (0.26 vs 0.35 cd) and benefits from having a 'starternator' replacing the both the starter and alternator of the Macan. Virtually no more complication and a 20% fuel saving.
On the other side, I didn't get a hybrid BMW i3 as they were older and carried 125Kgs weight penalty over the lightweight pure EV version.
It's difficult to make sweeping generalisations.

All believable and sensible.
But a 'mild hybrid' is not a hybrid, it's just an ice car with some sensible changes that easily recover wasted energy, e.g., the starternator charging on coasting, not charging on acceleration, stop/start, etc., etc.. Better to call it a NANWICE - not as needlessly wasteful ice.
An actual hybrid has a battery and electric motor, i.e. ice and EV together - and on first glance I'd say this suits most (especially me) but 1) they combine the complexity of ice with the new and unknown long-term reliability of EV, in a perfect storm of potential trouble, so I'd say ice or EV better. And 2) i owned a GTE for a while and though it was very nice it was new and on a contract so I didn't care about reliability and the range was exactly half advertised, and that was round town... It's mpg was low to mid 30s on a run, i.e. no better than a GTi, in fact probably worse...
 
Very expensive and not perfect. Sounds like they deserve all the criticism they get. Tesla's atrocious panel gaps for instance should not be a common feature on a 'premium' product.
The Tesla Y is incredibly popular round my way, awful blobby design, boring interior, iffy build, and massive expense or not... I guess very generous tax breaks are fuelling this over everything... makes one wonder about depreciation in 3 years
 
Hertz.

As I understand it is that they ordered 100000 Teslas as part of a big green EV push and were given a certificate (for a$$ kissing , I think) by the Whitehouse for helping the green thing.

Tesla shares rocketed.

Fast forward a year or two and someone at Hertz got a new battery in their calculator and decided it was a bad idea...a really bad idea to continue with the Tesla dream and binned it.

Of course car rental companies sell off stock while it still has value , I hire a lot of cars in the USA (usually AVIS) and quite often I will collect a car and hanging on the mirror and the keyring is an advert asking me if I would like to buy this particular car even though it has low mileage , and a website address to visit to see what's available.

The Hertz Tesla dump is something quite different.

Apropos of nothing . When collecting an Avis car in the USA/Canada I qualify for an upgrade and I often ask what is available 'above' my upgrade and sometimes I get it gratis and sometimes I add a few dollars more to get me into something interesting.

Using this I have driven Camaros SS, Mustangs, Challengers, Chargers, Nissan V8 Titan trucks ... But what was never offered to me was a Tesla , despite (especially in San Francisco) loads of them just sitting there.

I have no idea why (next time I will ask) , maybe it's because my rental periods are quite long 20, 30 or even more than 40 days . No idea 🤷‍♂️ You would think that when I leave the airport I head straight into silicone valley where Tesla supercharges are everywhere and Tesla facilities are all over the area I work in and some of the people I work with are ex (or even future) Tesla employees.

You would think I would be in just the right place to be given a Tesla to whizz around in.

Anyway , enough waffle from me , this is supposed to be a fact based thread. I should know , I am the OP :doh:
By The Way. Don’t forget that the headline order - and presumably the big discount for the first big Rental EV contract - was for 100,000 units.

Yet, curiously, one year on, it seems that Tesla only drew down 60,000 units, not the full 100,000.

Curious that. Have never heard an explanation as to why that shortfall, although “you might think” that Hertz were annoyed by the dramatic price reductions after they bought.

But maybe it’s the repair cost issue, maybe it’s bids from the other EV manufacturers.
 
True, though the 'oversized tablet' - spearheaded by Tesla and followed by other EVs - is slowly creeping in to all cars, including ICE.

Some tablets are easier to ingest than others, of course. Like Tablets in front of the driver’s eyeliner, showing relevant data, and not dependent upon dropping down through multiple menus.

A tablet is easier to ingest if it uses the usual route. Slip it in another way, and using it becomes far more challenging.

IMG_2356.jpeg
 
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For me the Mercedes mantra of the best or nothing is far more persuasive aspirational concept than the apparent as long as it is battery powered it will do maxim of many EV manufacturers. See Tesla and Polestar.

Or those MG EV's that do not even have tinted glass as standard. Reminds me of a modern day Yugo :p. God knows what BYD's are like but seeing as Arnold Clark are selling them i dare say the bar is not set too high.
 
I my experience this only partly true. If I compare my previous car (mild hybrid/diesel A8) with my current diesel Macan, the Audi saved 20% of fuel.
These cars run the same base engine, are both 4WD and similar weights. Where they differ is that the A8 is much more slippery (0.26 vs 0.35 cd) and benefits from having a 'starternator' replacing the both the starter and alternator of the Macan. Virtually no more complication and a 20% fuel saving.
I watched Harry's Garage video on new Defender with the D300 powertrain and his comparison to the Range Rover Sport with the same powertrain and his explanation of why the Defender used 1/3 more fuel. Higher weight was (a small) part, the drag coefficient the main one. This was in relation to motorway cruising speeds. The difference between your A8 and Macan mpg could be similarly accounted for in the same scenario? That said, off the motorway I'd expect the regen braking of the A8 to contribute to the 20% fuel saving. You,, knowing the driving patterns, would know better as to which of the two (superior aero, regen braking) is making the difference. Possibly/probably both - benefits whatever the driving conditions. If so, that IMO justifies any additional complication.
On the other side, I didn't get a hybrid BMW i3 as they were older and carried 125Kgs weight penalty over the lightweight pure EV version.
It's difficult to make sweeping generalisations.
Semantics: was the BMW i3 with its ICE a hybrid or a BEV with RE (range extender)? I can stretch the definition of serial hybrid to include the i3. But, despite the much vaunted efficiency of electric motors, why is it that serial hybrids are less efficient at motorway speeds that parallel hybrids? A diesel electric train is a serial hybrid and seems to have been efficient (efficient enough that no one thought or sought to replace the electric components with a manual gearbox) so why weren't gearboxes (manual or auto) in cars not binned and replaced with generator and motor combo hooked up behind ICE? The answer I suspect is because it isn't as efficient as a direct mechanical connection twixt crankshaft and road wheels - serial hybrids vs parallel hybrid mpg on motorways suggest so. None of this however tallies with quoted 90% efficiencies quoted for electric drivetrains.
 
I've not got a problem with screens per se......but ones like that, that look so "after thought" with next to no integration into the dash annoy me a bit!
Looks like the design was finished and then someone said "that's great.....but where are the info screens?"
.....oh sh**!
 
For me the Mercedes mantra of the best or nothing is far more persuasive aspirational concept than the apparent as long as it is battery powered it will do maxim of many EV manufacturers. See Tesla and Polestar.
Or those MG EV's that do not even have tinted glass as standard. Reminds me of a modern day Yugo :p. God knows what BYD's are like but seeing as Arnold Clark are selling them i dare say the bar is not set too high.
Reminds me of a base spec Focus, but without the driving pleasure and ride quality.

And we know what happens to the 2nd and 3rd owner price of those wonderful Fords.
 
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All believable and sensible.
But a 'mild hybrid' is not a hybrid, it's just an ice car with some sensible changes that easily recover wasted energy, e.g., the starternator charging on coasting, not charging on acceleration, stop/start, etc., etc.. Better to call it a NANWICE - not as needlessly wasteful ice.
An actual hybrid has a battery and electric motor, i.e. ice and EV together - and on first glance I'd say this suits most (especially me) but 1) they combine the complexity of ice with the new and unknown long-term reliability of EV, in a perfect storm of potential trouble, so I'd say ice or EV better. And 2) i owned a GTE for a while and though it was very nice it was new and on a contract so I didn't care about reliability and the range was exactly half advertised, and that was round town... It's mpg was low to mid 30s on a run, i.e. no better than a GTi, in fact probably worse...
But the A8 had both and electric motor (starternator) and an additional traction battery (under the boot floor). The car would retain about 70mph for almost a minute with the IC shut down. That's hybrid..but I agree in a very mild, but effective, form.
If you think of medium density traffic on a dual carriageway or motorway, you can see why.
 
I watched Harry's Garage video on new Defender with the D300 powertrain and his comparison to the Range Rover Sport with the same powertrain and his explanation of why the Defender used 1/3 more fuel. Higher weight was (a small) part, the drag coefficient the main one. This was in relation to motorway cruising speeds. The difference between your A8 and Macan mpg could be similarly accounted for in the same scenario? That said, off the motorway I'd expect the regen braking of the A8 to contribute to the 20% fuel saving. You,, knowing the driving patterns, would know better as to which of the two (superior aero, regen braking) is making the difference. Possibly/probably both - benefits whatever the driving conditions. If so, that IMO justifies any additional complication.

Did you chuckle, like me, at him commenting on his 27 mpg in his review of the £97,000 Defender 130 D300 ? (Compared to 40 mpg on his RR Sport)

For a man who seldom puts any miles on his huge collection of cars, mpg seemed the least important of his worries

Interesting that that 27mpg across France is about 10% worse than the mpg I see on my S211 2008 E500 for the same kind of journey, in a car that runs on cheaper fuel as well !
 
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For me the Mercedes mantra of the best or nothing is far more persuasive aspirational concept than......
Concept?....yes.....but it must be 30 years since Merc lived up to that Mantra. I was reading a roadtest of a Genesis the other day....the tester said that "it has build quality, both perceived and real, that Mercedes could only dream of".....very sad.
 
Concept?....yes.....but it must be 30 years since Merc lived up to that Mantra. I was reading a roadtest of a Genesis the other day....the tester said that "it has build quality, both perceived and real, that Mercedes could only dream of".....very sad.
Who was that tester and which Genesis?

They're nice up-market Hyundai, but they're no challenge to Mercedes / BMW ... yet....
 
Concept?....yes.....but it must be 30 years since Merc lived up to that Mantra. I was reading a roadtest of a Genesis the other day....the tester said that "it has build quality, both perceived and real, that Mercedes could only dream of".....very sad.
Have no idea what a Genesis is? Lets see how many are actually quality products that are still on the road in 30 years time, like many Mercedes ICE's are.
 
It was this car....they do ICE cars.

 
For me the Mercedes mantra of the best or nothing is far more persuasive aspirational concept than the apparent as long as it is battery powered it will do maxim of many EV manufacturers. See Tesla and Polestar.

Or those MG EV's that do not even have tinted glass as standard. Reminds me of a modern day Yugo :p. God knows what BYD's are like but seeing as Arnold Clark are selling them i dare say the bar is not set too high.
:wallbash::wallbash:🙄🙂
 
I watched Harry's Garage video on new Defender with the D300 powertrain and his comparison to the Range Rover Sport with the same powertrain and his explanation of why the Defender used 1/3 more fuel. Higher weight was (a small) part, the drag coefficient the main one. This was in relation to motorway cruising speeds. The difference between your A8 and Macan mpg could be similarly accounted for in the same scenario? That said, off the motorway I'd expect the regen braking of the A8 to contribute to the 20% fuel saving. You,, knowing the driving patterns, would know better as to which of the two (superior aero, regen braking) is making the difference. Possibly/probably both - benefits whatever the driving conditions. If so, that IMO justifies any additional complication.

On another diversion, interesting that he's using cross climate tyres all year round, in addition to the usual four wheel drive.

The Alps in winter hold no appeal for me, but I still wonder whether Winter tyres and two wheel drive are actually enough for anyone not living there all through the winter.

So much engineering and weight thrown at 4WD vehicles running around on Summer tyres which will never see snow and ice on the School run, let alone the motorway.
 
It was this car....they do ICE cars.

Suspected as much.

Tiger Woods speaks very highly of them. When he hit a curb and rolled his GV80, at unadventurous speeds on a boring road, he reckons its safety features saved his life.

Would it be unkind to say that a good car wouldn't have left the road, let alone rolled, as a result of hitting a curb?

(Acknowledge that it was made worse by rolling into a gully)

Rated three star at What Car. Less than 150 sold in the UK - barely a sniffle by Mercedes standards.

Screenshot 2024-01-16 at 11.53.30.png
 
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Have no idea what a Genesis is? Lets see how many are actually quality products that are still on the road in 30 years time, like many Mercedes ICE's are.

Genesis is the brand name that Hyundai use for their upmarket luxury cars. In the same way that Toyota use the Lexus brand, Nissan use the Infinity brand, and (in the US) Honda use the Acura brand.
 

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