What do you think of EV’s?

Question

I do not like this transition to EV’s

No engine sound, no manual transmissions, boring.

I love the sound of a powerful V8 roaring on the highway. Now? Reeeeeeeee that’s what EV’s sound like

Stupid global warming narrative

MrOracle · Accepted Answer

Here's the deal:

EVs *will* take over the auto market. And they'll do it organically, meaning people will CHOOSE EVs.

For anyone old enough, do you remember the time before smartphones? People loved their flip phones and their Blackberrys. But virtually all of those same people have been carrying a smartphone for years, and so has everyone else. No mandates were required, and so incentives were really needed. The product was simply better for nearly everyone. Of course, there were a few edge cases with very niche needs and desires who would have preferred to keep their flip phones or their Blackberrys, but frankly they were too small of a market to worry about - it isn't financially feasible to serve that small of a market given the complexity of the product at anything beyond the Kickstarter level.

So too is the case for EVs. Is it still very early in the EV process? YES. Are their problems? YES. Are their many companies who will try and fail, and bankrupt their companies in the process? YES. All of this happened in the phone industry, and the people who were the biggest legacy players all failed to transition well. How many people carry a Nokia, Palm, Blackberry, LG, or Sony Ericsson or Motorola today? Virtually no one.

If you remember, there were a lot of problems with early smartphones. Many didn't get updates. Many had their manufacturer go out of business or just leave the market, stranding buyers without support. Some models just sucked. All of that will repeat with EV vehicles. But what will also repeat is that great strides will be taken and the brutality of the market will kill the companies who don't make great products and will reward the ones who do - and the products overall will be better for everyone. In the western world, it's actually pretty hard to buy a truly terrible smartphone today - even entry-level phones are pretty good these days. But it took over a decade to get to that point.

EVs are going through the same process. The public charging infrastructure (which is largely only needed for driving long trips or for people who can't charge at home as most owners will do) is being built out, and, for example, in North America, is being standardized on a single standard (NACS, or the North American Charging Standard [aka the "Tesla plug"] has become the standard, and CCS is going away) so that other than a relatively small number of people with legacy CCS cars, everyone will be able to plug in anywhere and know it will work.

Batteries improve every year, and breakthroughs are happening all the time, though not all will prove to be feasible for economical production at scale. Still, batteries will become more reliable, charging capacity will increase, and cars will be built better. Plus, AI will be driving most cars on the road within a decade (I suspect largely via licensed Tesla software), which will significantly reduce accidents in the first place.

No, there is not currently an EV that's a suitable replacement for EVERY use case - yet - but they will get here. But the vast majority of Americans could have 100% of their automobile needs perfectly served by a Tesla Model Y just as they are today - which is why the Model Y is the best selling vehicle (not EV, but vehicle) on the planet in 2023.

Some are going to grumble, just like there were Blackberry and Palm and flip-phone holdouts, many who complained loudly. But most people will choose to buy EVs once they realize what a breakthrough and improvement they are. Tesla and Rivian are going to do very well. Ford *might* survive. GM and Stallantis (Chrysler/RAM/Jeep), the Japanese companies including Toyota and Honda, and the VW group, are doomed. Some will hold out longer than others, but they are all headed to zero.

ShadezMcgee · Accepted Answer

I understand the idea of wanting a cleaner vehicle with environmental emissions not being a big concern, but I don't like the idea about how they are trying to push it and how they go about it.

Some states forcing people to have an electric vehicle by 2029/2030. They are expensive to maintain and the batteries still need to be disposed of after they get switched out and those things are just as harmful to this fragile environment that they want to protect. We don't have the infrastructure in place yet to charge these things properly, especially if we are trying to get the nation to all be using them in 2030 time frame.

Some of them look nice and they cam get up to speed quick, but otherwise, this is just a cash hemorrhage at this point. People should have a choice on whether they want to drive one or not. Plus, if we are talking emissions, our country isn't the leader of them, yet we got holier than thow hypocrites preaching cleaner emissions all the while keeping their private planes, yachts and gas cars.

Just a bullshit scam at this point.

Anonymous · Accepted Answer

EVs have the potential to be great; but they’re still in their infancy and until their batteries aren’t exploding. And they become more reliable they're trash in my opinion. I do think we need to do something about our emissions; but it falls more to factories polluting the air and atmosphere than the emissions of a vehicle. The warming and cooling of our planet is a normal part of the earths cycle humans have just accelerated the process with industrializing and emissions.

purplepoppy · Accepted Answer

They've been released to the public too soon. New technology always has teething problems and those can destroy confidence in the product. They should have limited them to city delivery drivers and company vehicles for 5 years

lightbulb27 · Answer

you're quickly becoming my top fav poster.

Agree... I don't like it.

There's some advantages in some areas, it's change. For example, I have electric assist bicycle that has opened up new endeavors for me to ride. It's also made me weaker, but a least I can ride more. Saving the planet... nope...

Electric dirt bikes- Once solid state is here... maybe. But damn it's scary being on a track with no sound and 80HP flying over top of you. Currently the bikes are too heavy to complete, but fun to play on. Savings on tech complexity, so some advantage to bring others to the activity.

Cars... blech... not an improvement and lot of complexity (note govt loves that..$). Cybertruck acceleration is amazing... until you realize almost no sound going 0-60 in an instant is very dangerous, people gonna suffer and die because idiots drive these vehicles too fast. They need speed limiters and noise makers...

I'm all for saving the planet... by changing our way of living. You want coffee... you get a ceramic cup to use, it's yours, you maintain it. no more disposables, etc.. Everything recycled. Fill in space with trees and plants and gardens. E-car is a BS way to avoid doing the things we should be doing and will cause more problems and pollution. Obama championed all this mess and made it worse... keeping the production engine of China whirling... for economic peace. should do a remake of dumb and dumber EV version.

Just let the water powered car out to the masses so we can move on...

smne35 · Answer

Until you have actually owned one, I promise you, you will never go back to a, ice vehicle again, you read about the woes people complaining about EV, s it's all BS, what if I run out of charge, there's not enough charging stations, is biggest misconception, first of active who runs their battery completely should not be drinking any car at all, do you run out of gas no when it's low you go refill your tank, there are charging stations ask across this country and ôl plenty ïl in the cities and state, so there's no excuse for being paranoid, hell I drove my car across this country this past summer and last year, had a great time never worried about finding a charger,, I spent about 75 Dollars on charges round trip, there's free chargers all over, compared to 5 dollars a gallon, plus oil changes with an EV fight worry about any of that, there fast, very smooth ride and comfortable as hell to drive just bought my second EV and you should not be fearful of anything about them, you like playing a hundred bucks to fill your tank have at it I sure don't want to buy do you own comparison see if it's a good fit for you

exitseven · Answer

I really wanted to see this technology succeed. There is a lot of things I like about EVs. In an internal combustion engine only about 10-15% of the energy derived from burning gasoline goes to driving the rear wheels. The rest is given off as heat which is dissipated from the radiator. An EV uses about 90% of the electricity stored in the batteries to drive the rear wheels. An EV has lots of low end torque so most EVs do a 0-60 in 4 something seconds. And they should be more dependable with fewer moving parts.

However they are expensive. A lot of the expense is all the fancy electronics they bundle together that you don't need. I rode in one recently and it had 360 degree cameras and had a way to display a top view of the vehicle.

Even with the $7500 tax credit it is still 10-20 K more than a gas powered vehicle. The range still is not good enough. Most will really go only 200 miles before needing a charge. The cost of electricity has risen dramatically over the last few years and it is not really any cheaper to operate than a gas engine.

The EVs can catch fire and they burn really hot and sometimes the fire department has to come back and douse it again. There is a Tesla dealership in the next town and a car caught fire. The fire department had to go 3 times because it kept re-igniting. Finally they put the car on a flat bed and got it out of there. I do not know where they put it. Maybe the drove it off a pier into the ocean?

The batteries have to be replaced after 3 or 4 years. They cost 20-30 K to replace and they are expensive to have them properly recycled. People will leave them by the side of the road and the heavy metals will leach into the water table and into the drinking water

Anonymous · Answer

I'm generally indifferent; my main scepticism about EVs is their total reliance on electrical infrastructure and lack of self-contained generator. Sound is simply the result of the mechanism that we associate with results; you'll find people who love the sound of steam engines for this reason, even though it's totally different to electric or diesel.

Another issue is state force and restriction; this is never good if the solution they force is flawed in many ways (see Congo pit mines). I've seen people use their knowledge of thermodynamics to make their own combustion engines, if there is a total crackdown there will be rebels. I'm sceptical of both petrochemicals and EVs, my engineer friend says his research says their research team can get the energy exchange rate for purifying Hydrogen above 90% which may make it a game changer, and then there is the proposal of using ammonia as a safer storage medium for hydrogen too.

BCA6010 · Answer

The infrastructure to produce and support them is utterly insane and completely counter-productive from an environmentalist standpoint. Even in perfect conditions, there is no way that they can fully replace combustion engine cars without at the very least, a major breakthrough in energy production, AND alternative sources for minerals required, most notably cobalt and lithium. I don't see them as any more than a novelty toy for the foreseeable future, and attempting to force impractical, premature, overpriced tech on people and businesses within the next few years (2030) is going to be a big problem.

From a driving standpoint, I hate them. They are cars that are built for people who don't care about or even don't like driving, and even the higher end "sporty" or "performance" ones aren't much better. In fact, you're usually paying even more for something even less practical.

abc3643 · Answer

They are effectively necessary for now because the problem of greenhouse gases is very serious.

I wouldn't worry about batteries because battery technology evolves and will become cheaper and cleaner.

Look for this eventually... I had this idea and, I later discovered, Musk had it too.
Refueling stations will change in that you will not need to be concerned about the battery of your car. What will happen is that your cover will drive over a recess in the ground and then your depleted existing battery will be swapped with a fresh battery. So, you only have a wait a few minutes for the swap and then just drive off. The depleted battery is recharged at the station and will be used in another car. This won't happen in my lifetime, but it will in yours. So, you won't have to worry about battery expenses or lifetimes.

Also, car repairs are easier with electric vehicles because the complexities of combustion are irrelevant and there are less moving parts.

Likes2drive · Answer

It’s more of a novelty to me because I wouldn’t want to rely totally on them, I would always want a gas powered vehicle available just in case, you can’t charge them everywhere you want and not everyone lives in a place they can have a charger installed

FunkyMonkee · Answer

They're not worth it!! Besides, if they REALLY want to avoid fumes from gas-burning cars, they should let us start using water burning cars! The run-off from that is steam! Steam, eventually, becomes water! That water can be put back into the tank and burned again and again and again!! Problem solved!! Fill up the tank with your garden hose or rain water (or melted snow) that you catch in a rain barrel, or what have you.
The only thing is, the fumes from cars are actually making the planet greener!! There's a few deserts that have become rain forests because of that over the years!

BoopBoopBeep · Answer

Nobody wants to talk about all the heavy mining that happens to get the rare earth elements out, particularly when it's China mining, or what happens to the nonrecyclable batteries. Dig deeper (ha...) and you see they aren't as green as you thought.

Siri137 · Answer

Electric vehicles will  never  catch on and be popular in the same way that petrol cars are. They might continue to be made for the rich elites who like to think they're "doing something for the environment", but the majority of us will never be able to afford a $100,000 plus car that has a tendency to catch fire (Tesla) and is only good for inner-city driving (where you don't need it anyway, because there's public transport).

MysticDevice · Answer

I personally don't care for them. However I don't have an issue with their existence. I do have an issue with the government trying to force me to buy one.

Electric cars don't solve the issue. The electricity is still generated by coal, oil, and gas.

Hydrogen combustion is a far better option.

Or at the very least using nuclear energy to create the power.

Believe it or not nuclear energy, if done properly, is completely safe and is completely green. The only byproduct is steam.

Condeming nuclear power cause of Chernobyl is like condeming air travel cause of the Hindenburg.

Jersey2 · Answer

I love sports cars but the fact is EVs can blow a traditional sports car away. But they can’t get the roaring sound of a big V8, the shifting or the kick in of overdrive. As sad as that is I would select the EV just for acceleration.

I also like the simplicity of the EV even though I have fixed up cars and worked in them with friends and family. I won’t miss all the tedious things that can go wrong with a traditional car.

My next car may very well be a Tesla. The issue of chargers is how far you can go on a charge. The next issue is battery life. Biden should have covered the country with 20,000 charging stations to get people using cars for long trips.

EmmaMary · Answer

Personally I hate them with a vengeance... And certainly won't be getting one until the bitter end.

Anonymous · Answer

I feel like I did a good amount of research into EV's for my business. Becausewhile seemingly like you I like a good muscle car. But enjoymentt is enjoyment and business is business. And for my company I'm always going to choose what makes the best financial sense. And researching I read equally as many problems with EV's long term as gas powered vehicles. EV's had no decided advantage over gas powered cars and to their nature of fueling can actually be a hindrance.

I think EV's are OK as long as reliability is not a big factor for you.

rigmarole · Answer

I think if people want to waste their money on electric vehicles to make gasoline cheaper for me for longer they can throw themselves on that sword all day. I won't appreciate them for make dumb moves, but I will reap the benefits of their mistakes.

Static_In_The_Attic · Answer

EV’s look good, sound good & if they come with gas generators that would be better.

Levin · Answer

The technology is extremely underwhelming. Most of the promises and green credentials are extremely questionable. The range is poor. They're too expensive. The battery is extremely expensive to replace and has a fairly short life. The mining for the precious metals is clearly not green. EV's and 'ultra low emotion zones' are essentially a form of regressive taxation. They hit the poorest the hardest. I am extremely resistant to them, especially since they've been pushed on us.

gorydetails · Answer

They're utter garbage. Horrible for the environment and a complete sham.

LiamJHayden · Answer

The technology does yet not match the hype. The mining for materials for current batteries is insanely destructive. Much of the power to create the electricity is from fossil fuels. Their costs are ridiculous. Charging stations can have long, long waits. So many issues.

DeeDeeDeVour · Answer

Except for a chosen few, I moved my fleets away from EVs and into hybrids and economical gasoline-powered & diesel-powered vehicles.

NathanDavis · Answer

I'll wait for pulsar sounds... I do like those...

Anonymous · Answer

Just a step in the eventual ban on private vehicle ownership

AviatorTom · Answer

I wonder where all the electricity is going to come from to charge all the EVs, and what is going to happen to all the batteries after their lifespan (10 years?) runs out.

tfan1 · Answer

No thank you especially now they are practically forcing you to buy them.

andreasderjuengere · Answer

I'm beyond silly motormania. Give me something affordable that works - and I'm happy with it.

Astarlessnightsky · Answer

Okayish. Still lots of problems, but its a good start to get off fossil fuels.

slatyb · Answer

Inevitable. They are superior to petrol-fueled cars in every way except range and time to refuel.

Redstang88 · Answer

I’d never have one as my ONLY vehicle, but I do see the appeal of having one for certain purposes

zagor · Answer

Good as a second car, but still impractical a lot of places as a sole means of transport.

jahaims · Answer

Causes more pollution and human suffering than traditional

OddBeMe · Answer

Ev will become the norm. Just physics of having depleting gasoline resources.

KrakenAttackin · Answer

Agreed. EV's don't have soul.

AnusDestroyer3169 · Answer

Scam

noohair · Answer

Oversized golf carts.

Hispanic-Cool-Guy · Answer

Trash.

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