A new Tesla for £25k? Sounds good.

Got my order in at 3.30 am when the website opened.

One concern is the lack of hatchback for bike / surfboard transport. Not sure about roof racks on the glass roof.

Never drive more than 200 miles in a day, have a driveway etc like millions of others.

People seem to forget how much more pleasant our towns would be if there weren’t thousands of noisy cars around belching crap into the atmosphere. Oh no but a car’s got to be noisy or people are going to DIE. Damn cancel that order.

And other examples of small mindedness

If you’re developing an apartment block in a narrow, dead-end street that’s next to a railway station, bike path, car share service, bus route and tram line, should you be required to provide private car parking as well?
Yes, according to the state planning tribunal, which has overturned a council’s approval for a “deep green” apartment development in Brunswick after a neighbouring developer objected.
The proposed $5 million project, called Nightingale, was designed with no car parking – and Moreland Council’s approval for it was overturned last week because it lacked parking.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/green-building-with-no-car-parking-thrown-out-by-vcat-for-having-no-car-parking-20151022-gkfia5.html#ixzz44uVNPZ3N
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People are moving from the traditional rules, do some people actually need to own a car? If somebody ordered 50 of these Teslas then set them up as shared ownership? Having gone for a year without a car due to being within walking distance of shops etc. over the year it was cheaper to hire for the times I needed something (Van for racing, small car for a day away etc.) than owning something that was a compromise.

I still wonder why they’re not designed with a backup 3cyl diesel engine or something like the iOne thing BMW have designed. Was the Scope to just produce “the worlds, not quite, fully electric car with leather seats”?

I’d guess that after a month or so on electric charge you would have forgotten to refill the liquid fuel and probably just run out of that

Ok, you have to factor in a lifestyle change to remember to plug it in every night, or every other night. But you’d be in panic mode if you’d decided not to plug it in the night before last, then some emergency happened, and you jumped in it to find you had <25 miles before Armageddon turned the lights off.

Because yes people are that thick

There was a thread a while back on soft drinks that ended up with people utter disbelieving that people could carry around a reusable water bottle and fill from a public source. They came up with all sorts of reasons which were mostly crap.

Like most internet arguments: hybrid cars are rubbish and full of technology that will immediately fail, plastic bag taxes are stupid because people will never bring their own and will just end up buying ten times more rubbish bags, only nerds will read the Internet on their phones, 29″ wheels are just a gimmick, Donald Trump has no chance of getting the nomination…

some more info

http://arstechnica.com/cars/2016/04/the-post-model-3-reveal-reveals-what-we-know-about-the-new-tesla-four-days-out/

but i’ll easily do 300 non stop, quite easy really and i’ve just done it again from UK to Germany and will do the same back from Luxembourg on Friday

Do you drive across the channel?!

But you’d be in panic mode if you’d decided not to plug it in the night before last, then some emergency happened, and you jumped in it to find you had <25 miles before Armageddon turned the lights off.

‘cos there have never been fuel strikes, or petrol stations that run out / inexplicably aren’t open / have closed since you last went / are on fire because someone has crashed into them… 🙂

How does cost per mile compare to a petrol engine?

My understanding is that fuel running costs are a lot lower (charge up overnight using Economy7 at 4p/unit) but that dealership charges and tyre costs can be high.

I ran a hybrid for just under 12months a couple of years ago. We used it around Town when the congestion charge exemption was put in place for hybrids. It was a Prius, it was one of very few cars available in hybrid form back then, and before full Leccy cars came out.
TBH, the car was great. It was quiet in the back streets whilst running at less than 25mph because it was running on battery. Great at stops because the engine was off and pulling away was simplicity in itself. I enjoyed it, not a lot but it saved us paying the congestion charge and we felt humble and we’re not from Islington.
I totally get Hybrids, I think they are the way forward, a combination of battery and petrol/diesel engine is simplicity itself.
I’m enjoying seeing all the new tech come out in Hybrids, glad all the SUV type vehicles are changing over to Hybrids, Toyota are really pushing Hybrids too even with the smallest of their vehicles, one day these Hybrids will become the norm and I applaud that loudly.

I just don’t get why a luxury brand like Tesla haven’t gone down the same route? It would be easy for them to adopt, plenty of viable options for them to pursue with many varieties of design too. Adopt that design segment and I think they couldn’t make enough of them.

As is, they are alone in a world where the limits of the cars distance limit it’s appeal. It’s a limited audience market to fill, but they could adopt a Luxury Taxi Leccy powered promotion.. because thats all I think they’ll become soon. Luxury Taxis, in the same way Merc EClass and BMW 7Series are.

bikebouy – Member

I just don’t get why a luxury brand like Tesla haven’t gone down the same route? (hybrid)

just guessing…

1) you can already buy hybrid cars – where’s the room for Tesla to develop/sell unique vehicles?

2) it’s only a matter of time before any car (vehicle?) with a combustion engine is banned from cities like LA, Paris, London, etc.

2) it’s only a matter of time before any car (vehicle?) with a combustion engine is banned from cities like LA, Paris, London, etc.

Yep, in my lifetime I expect to see only electric vehicles in cities.

Just throwing my thoughts out there; the range is poor – not terrible , just poor , but more laughable is the time to recharge.

For me to buy one it would need a range of around 300 miles (but higher is better), and a charge time that is measured in single digit minutes. I dont want to be stopping every 160 miles , and waiting 30 mins for a recharge (assuming there is an available charging point, and I dont have to queue for one)

The idea of having to wait 30 minutes while it recharges during a long journey is just unacceptable. The charging infrastructure at motorway services would have to be massive if everyone had one of these cars.

They’ll improve though, and in maybe 10 years, these problems will be overcome.

footflaps – Member
2) it’s only a matter of time before any car (vehicle?) with a combustion engine is banned from cities like LA, Paris, London, etc.
Yep, in my lifetime I expect to see only electric vehicles in cities

I agree, totally support that. I mentioned earlier in my other moan post that cities should be EV only, especially London/Paris/Milan etc. Large cities where space and congestion is a proper issue.

The batteries are getting smaller and more energy dense faster than manufacturers can keep up. I’ve been knocking round the edge of the hybrid stuff for a few years and the batteries are now about half the size. Twice the capacity and capable of being charged with about 10 times the input current.

Give it another few years we’ll be wondering what all the fuss is about.

I still (personally) think the whole hybrid/electric car concept thing has masses of holes in it, regarding emissions/logistics/safety as so on, but the legislation is there, the market is there, and it’s a step in the right direction.

It might turn out to be the wrong direction in 10 years time, but as ever, we’ll have to deal with that when we get there.

maybe 10 years, these problems will be overcome.

I’m not so sure, as it isn’t like batteries are new tech. Also this car isn’t actually going to be delivered for nearly another 2 years.

Much as I’ve always hated the idea of hybrids, if you want to go EV for around town with the occasional long trip away, then they look the best option for the foreseeable future.

For me to buy one it would need a range of around 300 miles (but higher is better), and a charge time that is measured in single digit minutes. I dont want to be stopping every 160 miles

it’s interesting that many people seem to view this as a car that must be able to do everything, when they don’t put that expectation on other cars – you don’t see people complaining that you can’t get bikes in the back of a Polo or that an M3 isn’t cheap to run.

as linked above, the average UK driver only does about 152 miles a WEEK, let alone in one journey. I don’t know many families with 2 cars but for those that do, I’d image an EV is ideal for the town/school/shopping runabout. And there’s a huge market for that stuff, as 5 minutes outside a school at 9am will demonstrate.

More than enough for Tesla to get their teeth into while they ramp up production, I’d say. At the moment it seems that their sales numbers are going to be limited by their production capacity, not their market niche…

that dealership charges and tyre costs can be high.

Idk about dealership costs for electric cars because none of the electric bits of my old Prius ever went wrong (in fact, nothing did). And the tyres were an unusual size but not more expensive or worn than most – certainly got the run flats that everyone complains about.

julians – Member

The idea of having to wait 30 minutes while it recharges during a long journey is just unacceptable.

really?

not even considering the huge fuel savings?

after i’ve had a pee, a coffee and a pasty, i reckon i’d be happy waiting an additional 10minutes to save myself £50….

Given that you can charge it for less than a tenner it sort of puts the “negatives” in perspective.

after i’ve had a pee, a coffee and a pasty, i reckon i’d be happy waiting an additional 10minutes to save myself £50….

to be fair, after the coffee and the pasty, you’re probably down to about £12 😉

after i’ve had a pee, a coffee and a pasty, i reckon i’d be happy waiting an additional 10minutes to save myself £50….

nah – i want to get to where I’m going as quick as possible, plus I dont need a pee, coffee and pasty every 160 miles.

Like I say get the range higher and the recharge time becomes less of an issue, or get the recharge time down and the range is less of an issue, but with the range very low (by internal combustion engine standards) and the recharge time very high , its just not what I would buy – for me any way.

I appreciate for a lot of people who only do local/short journeys that range/recharge time will not be an issue, but I want one car that can do all types of journey I might need to do (so thats short journeys of <40 miles, up to a trip to the alps at 1000 miles). So at present the tesla is no good for me.

Give it time though, and things will mature.

I do wonder whether ‘hot swappable’ batteries is the answer to the recharging problem. ie you dont recharge your battery, you just remove the empty battery and fit a fully charged one. Your old battery is then recharged at the charging stations leisure ready for the next electric car to come along. Should result in similar ‘charging’ time to filling with petrol.

Obviously not a goer now because of the size of the batteries, but in 10 years? maybe a possibility.

for me any way

^ the key point.

But stop bleating on like it wont work just becasue it wont work for you.

I do < 5,000 miles a year, can count on one hand the times I’ve driven > 200 miles in a day in the last 2 years, and I always stop every 1-1.5 hours for a break (10-20 mins) regardless. An awful lot more people are like me than like you (maybe not the <5,000 miles annually, but even for higher annual mileage most daily trips are short)

You are a fringe case, most people do’t need a bigger range, and most people don’t need to recharge/refuel so quickly (or frequently), and everyone needs a world where cars aren’t belching crap out into the air they breathe while burning up a finite fuel reserve.

we get it, right now your requirements aren’t met, but for the other 80-90% they can be, so get out of the way and let it happen already 😀

more importantly, be happy for the rest of us, celebrate and emphasise the positives and get behind the idea in general instead of sulking that it’s not quite right for you yet.

Swappable batteries, expandable batteries, modular range extenders that you can fit for your summer holidays but take out for the rest of the year and have more boot space, or order a car without then later decide to add it.

Or more sensibly, probably- your standard runaround model and if you want to go further you rent or get one from the community car pool.

But stop bleating on like it wont work just becasue it wont work for you.

You’ll note I only just joined this discussion this afternoon, and I havent said anywhere that it wont work , in fact I said I think it will work, but thats its immature tech right now (give it 10 years), and I havent ‘bleated’ on about anything. I even proposed a ‘concept’ that might be used to speed up the recharging time.

I Just put foward a few reasons why ‘I’ wouldnt buy one at present, I thought a discussion forum was for discussions, you know, where people discuss things .

By all means you go ahead a get your deposit down for one, I’m not getting in your way. You have put your deposit down havent you? if not why not?

anyway – I can see my views are not required, so thats me out.

@julians

agreed, probably not fair to single you out, you were just the last poster commenting in that vein to quote from, the ‘bleating’ bit stems from the fact that your comments are so similar to many others from a small but vocal minority who don’t actually represent what ‘normal’ usage is.

By all means you go ahead a get your deposit down for one, I’m not getting in your way. You have put your deposit down havent you? if not why not?

I would, but I’m poor, which is also why I haven’t ever bought a new car. Plenty of other boring normal cars are > £20-30k and also well outside my budget.

anyway – I can see my views are not required.

not at all, it is a discussion after all, it’s just that the discussion often seems to get stuck on the negative aspects for a small number of users, and again, not picking on you specifically, but in general the most vocal against EVs (and other things) are often the people at the fringes, and thus a disproportionate amount of negative comments appear in threads like this and give a false impression to a lot of people researching the topic.

so thats me out.

that’s really not what I (or others I assume) want, I’ll repeat my earlier invite, to help us celebrate what is happening, push the positives and open peoples eyes to how a lot of the misconceptions are actually just that and not relevant to most people.

So many complaints of ‘its no good for me because I do 5000 mile nonstop journeys and I don’t even stop for half an hour to sleep so I couldn’t charge it’. Well, you know what I’m sure a Bugatti Veyron wouldn’t be any good for you either as you would have to stop every 50 miles to fill the tank but no-one is forcing you to buy one of those either.

Electric vehicles are still in their infancy, Tesla are doing great, innovative things pushing forward development of the technology. Just the other year they released all their patents to anyone that wanted to download them.

Maybe in 10 years with enough development there will be a car that suits your needs to drive X hundred miles in one fell swoop but for now the Model 3 will suit a huge number of people who do only commute >200 miles a day and do have a drive way and ability to charge it at home. I’m sure in the UK alone that would cover millions of cars currently in use. As the technology and demand increase, production and development will increase allowing prices to inevitably drop hopefully making them more ubiquitous.

I for one welcome our electronic overlords Tesla’s announcement and would seriously consider one in a few years time when I need to replace one of our cars that is used for local commuting and domestic duties.

Give it another few years we’ll be wondering what all the fuss is about.

The fuss will be having sufficient grid capacity. Road transport fuel accounts for about 39 million tonnes of oil equivalent. The entire UK annual generation of electricity is equivalent to about 29 million TOE.

(2014 stats from DUKES)

There are times when I want to drive a long way and get there pretty quickly without stopping and if I had an electric car it wouldn’t be able to do it. In which case, I’ll probably hire a IC engine one.

I like the idea of these cars, but am confused why the sudden surge in interest in this particular car. What is it that makes it so much more appealing than current offerings? Is it the range?

Many comments on here about the average car owner doing few enough miles to only have to charge it once a week etc. so why aren’t those people rushing out to buy cars like the Nissan Leaf, Renault Zoe, BMW i3? Yes, the range is less in those as I understand it, but if they genuinely are doing so few miles, then that shouldn’t be a problem as they can charge them every day or two at home….

And if they need to go on a longer journey, as has been suggested; they can just hire a car for that.
Is the charging time of the Tesla that much quicker than the opposition, or is the range that bit further that people feel it is a genuine equivalent…?
I’m just confused as to why the people who are happy to sign up and put money down for this car that doesn’t exist yet, aren’t in car dealers buying current offerings…..

Have you seen an i3 it gops. Its also only a 4 seater and has a tiny boot and will cost you as the base model with no extras £30k for 81-100 ‘real world’ miles of range.

you don’t see people complaining that you can’t get bikes in the back of a Polo

Probably because you can perfectly well with the seats down, or put them on the roof (recently saw a whole family of 4 with their bikes on top of a Polo).

I’ve seen the odd Renault Zoe and they seem perfect for what most people claim Tesla’s are for, yet a Zoe can be bought now, for much cheaper than a Tesla and come from a reputable car manufacturer with dealer base. Surely if EV was so great we’d see bigger take up?

The point above by ransos is really valid a move to EV in any significant numbers will require a big investment in generating capacity. Hinkley Point C anyone 😉

But stop bleating on like it wont work just becasue it wont work for you.

Easy tiger – that’s a lot of italics and pointed comments to someone that was making a very reasonable point, calmly

Everyone I know with a leaf / zoe or i3 (and there’s a few of them) are really happy with them. The 2 guys I know with tesla model s’s are really really happy with them.

Easy tiger – that’s a lot of italics and pointed comments to someone that was making a very reasonable point, calmly

😳

Sorry, got a bit carried away didn’t I…

come from a reputable car manufacturer with dealer base.

I’d say that they’re a reputable manufacturer already = in 2015 they produced 7 x more cars than Ferrari.
I think you’ll see the number of car dealers slowly diminish over the years as EVs become more commonplace as there will not be enough spannering/servicing work required to keep them going.

Hardly a reputable manufacturer when they just missed manufacturing their correct amount of SUVs due to supply issues and the Tesla forum has people saying that they couldn’t supply parts for repairs.

Why would dealers get less they primarily exist to sell cars, EVs still need to be sold, warrantied, MOTed and require some servicing.

and require some servicing.

A lot less than petrol cars though. With regen / motor braking they wear through brakes less. Brushless motors pretty much last for ever, no fluids to change.

The industry is already concerned that their parts and service business will collapse, which is a big chunk of their profits and most of the dealer’s profit.

Interesting that some people are utterly determined to rubbish the manufacturer and the whole concept. All I can say is give it a go. EV driving is addictive. I’m ashamed to say I’ve only biked to work once in the first month of ownership.

The point above by ransos is really valid a move to EV in any significant numbers will require a big investment in generating capacity.

And, the law of supply and demand would dictate a massive hike in electricity costs while the genertating capacity catches up. I’m going to be really grumpy with EVs if a massive take up of them makes my leccy bill go sky high…

dragon – Member
Hardly a reputable manufacturer when they just missed manufacturing their correct amount of SUVs due to supply issues and the Tesla forum has people saying that they couldn’t supply parts for repairs

So kind of like most car makers where people go to bitch about their problems….

and tyre costs can be high.

Anyone care to explain this one?