Because nobody has enough money for a new car.
The pandemic killed my car because I left it sitting for weeks. Which wasn’t a big deal since it was almost twenty years old and still had a CD player.
Excited, I was expecting to pay like $20k for a really nice new car. And to my surprise, $20k is baseline average used car now, and new cars are at least twice as much.
- Too expensive
- Not enough range.
- Not recharging fast enough.
- Bad depreciation because batteries.
- Unreliable charger networks.
- Almost non-existent second hand market.
- No access to charger at home.
People mostly use their cars for shorter trips, commuting to work etc but deep down they dream of using it for longer “fun” travels.
EVs in their current state still don’t offer this prospect. If you want to go on a road trip you face too many limitations.
When you fork over upwards of 50k for a vehicle you don’t just want to go to work with it, you’re essentially paying for the dream of doing fun things with it.
idk about the US, but for Canada, there’s nothing under $50k, and anything around that mark is not what I want.
I want economical, basic, non-super-smart, halogen headlight, simple to repair, minimal touchscreen, physical driver controls, and at minimum a hatchback (but ideally wagon)
that car doesn’t exist. so I’ll keep buying used cars and repairing them instead of funneling money to manufacturers for shitty products.
do you guys not get European, Korean or Chinese EVs? or are thw prices of those inflated in Canada?
I guess not?
I went to two websites that claim to help you select an EV in Canada and used those results as the basis of my claims.
Yep. This is what’s up.
When Nokia translates their brick phone design into an electric car, it’ll sell like hot cakes.
Until then, we will see how many shitbox Toyota’s we can keep running well past 300,000 miles.
I think slate is targeting that niche with their truck
The used car market comes a bit later after new car sales gets going. It’s taken off here in the UK now, we can buy lots of EVs second hand. I never buy new cars.
Make them cheaper or pay us more, assholes.
Bc we don’t have the reasonably priced China EVs. Just the American tech billionaire electric SUVs and Teslas
My 2 cents: I could benefit greatly from an EV. Just a small one like a Bolt or something, for commuting… shudders in suggesting GM for my own use
However, I rent. And my lease dictates that EV chargers are explicitly banned on the property. Something about “safety” and “risk of fire” and all that. Yet during my last inspection, they had absolutely zero issues with my welder, nor do they mind me working on my gasoline/diesel vehicles within the garage (as long as it’s not on the driveway…something something property values…nothing more than a brake job in the driveway).
Yes, I know that EVs can be charged elsewhere. But that takes significantly more time than a standard gasoline fill-up, and my workplace (which is 99% of the reason I would own this hypothetical EV anyway) does not have any EV chargers. They might add some in the next year or two, but that’s still a “definitely maybe”, and so my only other alternative choices are a bike or public transit. Except my commute - a 55MPH rural highway - is too dangerous for biking with the complete lack of bike lanes, and public transit doesn’t exist in my area.
I’m left with no other choice but to use a gasoline/diesel vehicle. Or walk, I guess?
because EVs are overpriced still, 30-60k+ isnt exactly an attractive market.
The ev in this picture is estimated to sell for over $700,000…
And it looks like a mcdonalds happy meal toy.
That’s the controversial new electric Ferrari. Apparently it was not popular with Ferrari fans.
What makes it a Ferrari, except for the badge? It’s design was outsourced.
Because they banned the affordable and superior imports from China lol.
Look into the used market. Lots of nice EVs for cheap because people think EV batteries degrade at the same rate as cell phone batteries. They don’t. I got a 3 year old EV for under 25k.
This! I’ve had my EV for 6 years and my battery has degraded ~8% according to diagnostics. It’s still enough to get me ~275 miles at highway speeds before I need to charge, and my average charge session lasts long enough for me to use the restroom and stretch my legs a bit, about 20 minutes.
I take a couple long-distance road trips every year and have never had an issue with range, even when my ‘avoid tolls’ navigation route takes me on some long stretches of county roads.
My local gas station doesn’t have a charger. My place of enjoyment doesn’t have a charger. No gas station near me has a charger. My home is old enough where i would need to upgrade the service to get a charger installed.
I am very happy to never use local gas stations again. Charging at home is a huge convenience.
You might take a closer look at whether you can install a charger: a nice 50a charger is a great convenience, but you could still cover your needs with less.
- most EVs can schedule charging, so it’s only used overnight when nothing else is
- I saw a blog about a “smart” charger that only charged when sufficient capacity was available
- i saw a smart dryer adapter - use the 30a dryer outlet but only when the dryer isn’t running
- you could install a 20a/240v air conditioner circuit to cover most charging needs
- even a standard household outlet can keep up with average driving
After all the comments I put a few calls out. Great feedback from everyone.
Is your daily commute less than 40 miles? Then a level 1 charger could be enough. Especially if you can charge at work. Worried about the occasional longer trip? Look into plug-in hybrids. You can run your daily commute on the electric engine but the ICE engine is there for longer trips.
You likely don’t need to upgrade service, for a L2 charger either. I have 100 amp service and my biggest hurdle was making room in my circuit breaker. I just had to combine some circuits. I had a few circuits that were just lights. Every bulb I have is LED, so there was no problem combining them. Then I added a $100 device that monitors my whole house usage and turns off the charger if there’s a chance of tripping the main breaker. But that never happens because I have the charger set to 30 amp, which is plenty for me. I’d have to be running the dryer, oven, and charger at the same time for that device to kick in, but I have the car set to charge after 9pm when we never cook or do laundry. I could run it at 50amp with this strategy, but it’s way more than I need for my 20 mile commute.
If you’re genuinely interested but think you can’t because of your home charging options, then check outthis video from Technology Connections. This video about electricians unnecessarily hooking up 50 amp lines for EV chargers might be useful too.
If they’re rural enough that no gas station near them has a charger, their commute is more than 40 miles.
I live rural and there are no chargers around me for almost 20 miles, the same as my one way commute. I easily charged that up in a night with L1 charging. I was also able to charge at work sometimes.
Also, you don’t save money when you public charge. It’s about charging at home. Going EV requires a mental change in how you “fuel up.” You don’t stop to charge, you charge when you stop.
I was on a L1 charger for a couple months and after the mental adjustment, I only public charged when I went on longer trips.
I live in a moderately sizes city >100k people within 30 miles of two bigger cities and no gas stations have chargers in town. There are chargers, but they’re in weird places like by the movie theater or tucked behind a brewery.
Assuming you’re in the US, you have at least two gas-station adjacent super charger locations within city limits of any 100k city, except in alaska.
I don’t know where you’re getting that info, but I just checked google maps for my city and it isn’t true. There is one single Tesla supercharger location, outside a coffee shop in the parking lot of a Walmart. The nearest gas station is 1.8 miles by car, .4 miles walking (lots of one way streets).
I guess maybe my city is too small on a technicality? The 2020 census put us at 98k people, with 175k in the urban area.
The nearest big city has a population of 299k (metro 800k) and apparently has two total superchargers near gas stations, though one is literally on the city line, so whoever is making that claim is operating entirely in lawyer speak and not how most people would understand that claim.
You can’t only look at Tesla. They may be the biggest, cheapest, most reliable network, but there are lots of other brand chargers as well. You may need an adapter but it could mean a lot more convenience
I’ve never used a Tesla charger, my car can’t without an adapter. But the commenter made a claim about super chargers, Tesla’s proprietary charging network, specifically and it sounded like the info came from a PR promise Tesla made that isn’t true in a practical sense.
I’ve had no problems charging my car on road trips, but it has mostly been in e.g. Ford dealerships outside of towns with nothing to do but sit in my car.
to be pedantic, no gas station near me has a charger, they’re all at grocery and dpmt stores lol
This
Most of the time you are right. Last three contact jobs were well over 60 miles round trip. This job is about 30 mil it’s round but trip. Problem is Im a long term contractor so once year I’m close, next few I’m not 🥺
I got a quote to put a 50 amp outlet for a level 2 charger in my garage for $600. This isn’t free, but at your commute it will pay for itself quickly since then you can charge overnight. I run real numbers, but I tell people my electric car is like paying $0.30/gallon of gas, which is close enough for my area. I can’t tell how much my electric bill has gone up since getting the EVs (last year without any I spent more in February than this year with two - that is my heat pump was working harder last year, and in turn costs more than whatever I’m spending to charge the cars)
Do make sure you get something with plenty of range - in some cars winter range really is half summer so consider getting the extended range battery. Or just remember to find a charger when you are at those distant charges - odds are they are there just hidden.
If you live in a colder area, it’s well worth selecting an EV with heat pump, so less reduction in winter range. Many do, but sometimes it’s an optional feature
Why would a gas station have a charger?
We should make the engineers die a death of madness by forcing them to design a single receptacle that can both charge an EV AND pump gasoline!
I already spark riots by parking my EV at the pumps when I just need something from the shop…
Because some cars run on electricity now, and because there’s no more dinosaurs dying today to replenish the gas reserves.
I meant more: Why do you expect your local gas station to have a charger? What use is it? You need chargers 200 miles from home at rest areas with decent coffee, not near your home.
Maybe, maybe not. If there is space in the panel, you could still install a Tesla charger and go into the settings and rate limit it down to what your panel can safely provide. I installed one on my garage and moved it down from 48 amps to 40, but I am pretty sure it can go down much further if desired. Even 24 amps charges the car overnight, so it isn’t a big deal at all unless you drive a ton.
People are poor and have no money, EVs are new and cost a lot of money. Is this the same situation when they keep asking why people are not having kids? I think they know the answer but don’t like it.
Let them eat cake type of shit
Because they’re too expensive. Easy. Next question!
I bought a used 2013 Chevy volt with 190,000 miles, and I ran a 10 gauge extension cord from my house to my parking pad since I don’t have a garage. So far I have used 2 gallons of gas for the 2,000 miles I’ve driven since January. Those 2 gallons where used when it was like -20F here in Minnesota. I hope gas hits $10+ per gallon.
What kind of range u get in that bad boi
Have you ever tried to roll coal in an EV? /s
