epsilonGreedy Posted January 1, 2020 Share Posted January 1, 2020 44 minutes ago, Markblox said: You obviously don't know what the product is by that comment I have watched a few hours of Tesla Driver on YouTube to be familiar with his youthful verbiage as he pushed auto pilot to the max on difficult Wiltshire roads. He sounds like an excited teenager when the Tesla AP scares him and forces an urgent manual intervention. How would you alternatively describe my "needed to regain manual control" at 3 minutes 30 seconds in the following video? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UCZ56T16wvc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
epsilonGreedy Posted January 1, 2020 Share Posted January 1, 2020 1 hour ago, Jeremy Harris said: The other main consideration is that reviewers almost always seem to forget that it is essential that the battery be preconditioned (warmed up) in order to accept the full fast charge rate. The car does this automatically IF the driver taps the Supercharger location on the nav screen at least 20 minutes to half an hour before arriving there (something you'd do if route planning anyway). Doing this starts a routine in the car that measures the temperature of all the key stuff and starts diverting motor coolant around the battery pack to warm it up The second link I posted covered this issue, their initial charge rates were much worse until a test scenario was construed to initiate pre warming. I quoted the pre warmed test results. If we accept that the peak charge rates you hope for will tail off beyond 25% charge and that few will want to arrive at a charge point with under 10% charge and that it takes 20 to 30 minutes to pre warm then in practice I would doubt how often pre warming will apply to a super charger visit. Other Tesla commentators has raised this basic conundrum about the applicability of pre warming. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeremy Harris Posted January 1, 2020 Share Posted January 1, 2020 21 minutes ago, epsilonGreedy said: Most people chose to delegate product reviews to others they trust, for example I would not risk wasting 2 hours of my time viewing a film at the cinema without checking what the BBC's Mark Kermode thinks. James May is hardly a randomly selected online quote of convenience, he is the sane, wise and thinking component of a British car review institution. All a question of who you choose to trust, really. I tend to view 99% of everything reported/reviewed on any form of mainstream media as being suspect at best, completely unreliable at worst. The car review business tends to be a bit biased towards performance and petrolheads, with very few motoring journalists being prepared to suggest that anything that doesn't make a lot of noise and need special skills to drive are worth buying. 21 minutes ago, epsilonGreedy said: His critique of the touch screen makes absolute sense, why do you think interacting with a mobile phone while driving is regarded as a dangerous criminal act? Which just proves that he didn't bother to try it for long enough to see just how easy it is to use. The control areas on the screen are larger than typical switches etc on a conventional dash, plus they are very easy to see and well illuminated, so less distracting. Anyway, it's unusual to have to use the touch screen, as there aren't many controls there that are needed when driving. The scroll wheels/buttons on the steering wheel, plus the stalk controls, do pretty much everything needed whilst actually driving. 21 minutes ago, epsilonGreedy said: Taking a Tesla for a test drive would be a waste of my time, if I had £30k to £40k spare for a Tesla it would go on speeding up my self build schedule. I could not contemplate owning a Tesla with its £200 per wheel tyre replacement cost because £200 = a wall hung Gerberit toilet. Even tyres for my old Prius were around £150 each, so not much cheaper than the ~£180 for a tyre for the Model 3. BTW, you can add a bit to the price for a Tesla. The cheapest Model 3, the SR+ is around £41k on the road, the LR AWD is about £10k more and the Performance is maybe another £6k on top of that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SteamyTea Posted January 1, 2020 Share Posted January 1, 2020 3 minutes ago, Jeremy Harris said: The car review business tends to be a bit biased towards performance and petrolheads, with very few motoring journalists being prepared to suggest that anything that doesn't make a lot of noise and need special skills to drive are worth buying. Chris Goffey was a god. Here he tests a Proton. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AliG Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 One of the reasons I wanted to move was to have a good sized triple garage as at some point my daughter will be driving and I hated shuffling around cars in front of the house when I was a teenager and noted it was a big issue with my next door neighbour's kids in our last house. However, I am now increasingly thinking that this is not a great long term idea as when self driving is sorted out the notion that you would have multiple cars seems unlikely. You may have one car that you use a lot, but could probably get by on just dialling up a second or third car as needed. I still do not really expect this to be a reality for a good few years, but it is worth thinking about when you consider the lifespan of a house. If this becomes the case if you have an internal garage you may want it to be set up to be easily converted to living space. We go through these same arguments on EVs etc all the time. Hydrogen has lost the argument and is a wasteful way of moving energy about. I guess if we were in a situation where electricity was close to free then the waste of creating hydrogen then turning it back into electricity in a car wouldn't matter, but I suspect that most cars will be battery powered by then. People also forget that battery technology continues to progress. Cost and density improve and charging speeds increase. I wouldn't be surprised to see something like a 1/3 reduction in battery cost and 1/3 improvement in energy density over the next 5 years, any solid state breakthroughs could beat this, but I think this can be done with continuous improvement. This means that 400mile range cars are quite doable with 90-100kWh battery packs. I do not see there being a good payoff on larger range than this. At this level of cost and utility, BEVs kill ICE vehicles for most applications. They won't replace ICE vehicles in every instance, but for the vast majority of uses they will be equal or better. We have had our Tesla for just over 2 years now, finest car we have ever had.TBF as things advance and I can afford to spend more money pretty much every car we have had is the best we have ever had. That's just progress. However, as mentioned, EVs are just better cars. I nipped into the local Porsche dealer the other day to see if they had a Taycan as I have basically stopped driving my 911 since getting a Tesla. A petrol engine just seems rough and annoying compared to an electric motor, a diesel engine seems positively agricultural. My 70+ parents, hardly at the forefront of technology would love their next car to be electric. Access to Charing in urban areas is difficult, but then 24% of households don't have a car. Most of these are probably in those same urban areas. Where I work in London, a lot of my fellow workers don't have cars. They are not worth the hassle in London. Again these areas will benefit from more availability of car sharing, self driving taxis etc. Only around 1% of trips are over 70 miles, we won't need as many chargers as people seem to think, charging at home will suffice for over 99% of trips. I have not once in two years made a trip where I needed to charge the car. There was one trip where we decided to take the train instead. Charging capacity really is not an issue, everyone will not get an electric car tomorrow. Even if they stopped selling ICE cars tomorrow it would take around 7 or 8 years for 50% of cars to be BEVs. There is ample time to manage the grid. The grid will also benefit immensely from the violability of ever cheaper batteries. The screen argument is exaggerated and anyway, it is nothing to do with electric cars, car manufacturers have just decided that this is what people want. What exactly do people do in their cars, how often do you touch controls other than the indicators? I set the AC to auto 22 and hardly ever touch it. We use voice control for sat nav and to pick songs, or just leave the radio on. The Tesla update I got yesterday allows you to control things such as the seat heaters and rear heated window using voice commands, I haven't tried it yet. But again I turn on the seat heater when I get in the car, or more likely using the phone app before I get in and don't touch it after that. Irrespective of how they work there shouldn't be a lot of messing around with you car, you should focus on driving it. The new Tesla update apparently also allows the car to read texts to you and you to reply using voice control. This is clearly for America where you would be amazed how many people think texting and driving is acceptable. Even without physically typing, concentrating on a text and a reply would be exceptionally distracting while driving and I don't think should be allowed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
epsilonGreedy Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 4 hours ago, Jeremy Harris said: All a question of who you choose to trust, really. I tend to view 99% of everything reported/reviewed on any form of mainstream media as being suspect at best, completely unreliable at worst. I agree with that. Mark Kermode is a rare exception to that rule, he makes no concession for the average mainstream media viewer. He talks exclusively to the upper tier of his audience and is not at all concerned that the other 90% will be left dazed and confused in his intellectual slipstream. His days at the BBC are surely numbered. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gone West Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 14 hours ago, Jeremy Harris said: During the time I owned the little BMW i3 I became a great fan of one-pedal driving, and with the automatic "hand brake" feature that the Model 3 now has that's become absolutely brilliant. I very rarely ever need to touch the brake pedal, as just lifting off stops the car fast enough, and if you get the timing right you can take your foot right off the accelerator just as the car gently rolls to a stop, which automatically applies the brakes to hold the car stationary. When do the brake lights indicate slowing down in that situation? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeremy Harris Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 The brake lights are controlled by car deceleration, so seem to come on at a set deceleration rate. In the i3 I never knew when this was, as there was no indication inside the car that the brake lights were coming on, the only clue was to look in the mirror at night and see if you could spot their reflection. The Tesla has an image of your car (right down to the correct colour, wheel type etc for your actual car) to the right of the screen, and this shows both the front and rear lights, and shows pools of light cast by the headlights on the virtual road around the image. When the brake lights activate, they show in this image of the car. In typical Tesla fashion, they also use the weather data for your location to make sure that the reflections shown in the virtual car glass roof and screens are right, so there will be clouds moving over it on cloudy days, an apparent reflection of the sun on sunny days, and stars showing on a clear night... 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ProDave Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 It would be interesting to hear an MOT testers view of EV's and hybrids. e.g our Toyota hybrid. Drive it onto the ramps and stop it and the engine will stop, if it hadn't already stopped before you even got to the ramp, with no obvious manual way to force the engine to run. how do you test the emissions? With the brake light behaviour on the Tesla that @Jeremy Harris describes, how do you test the brake lights? There must be lots of other subtle things that don't fit the conventional testing wisdom of an MOT? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeremy Harris Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 4 minutes ago, ProDave said: It would be interesting to hear an MOT testers view of EV's and hybrids. e.g our Toyota hybrid. Drive it onto the ramps and stop it and the engine will stop, if it hadn't already stopped before you even got to the ramp, with no obvious manual way to force the engine to run. how do you test the emissions? With the brake light behaviour on the Tesla that @Jeremy Harris describes, how do you test the brake lights? There must be lots of other subtle things that don't fit the conventional testing wisdom of an MOT? Hybrids are exempt from emissions testing. There is a way to force hybrids into emissions test mode, via CAN bus commands sent via the OBDII port, but MOT testers aren't permitted to do this. Brake light testing is OK, as the brake lights also work when the brake pedal is pressed, as well as when regenerative braking is slowing the car. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joe90 Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 10 hours ago, AliG said: The new Tesla update apparently also allows the car to read texts to you and you to reply using voice control. This is clearly for America ha, my old windows phone did this but it broke recently and the new Motorola replacement phone won’t and according to the web not many phones do nowadays (this is with my old 2008 ICE merc). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SteamyTea Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 10 minutes ago, joe90 said: windows phone did this but it broke Windows phone started off as broken Nokias. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joe90 Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 4 minutes ago, SteamyTea said: Windows phone started off as broken Nokias. But it did everything I wanted it too.........and I can’t find a new one that will.....(I can’t afford a Tesla to resolve my phone issue ?) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gone West Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 5 hours ago, Jeremy Harris said: Brake light testing is OK, as the brake lights also work when the brake pedal is pressed, as well as when regenerative braking is slowing the car. I think the new Honda EV coming out this year has only one pedal, so that will be interesting. I also wondered how easy it would be to get used to braking without a brake pedal to hit in an emergency. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SteamyTea Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 (edited) Will we need a new name for the peddle. The "Brakellerator". (I have written about this elsewhere, my first thought was 'Big Muff' as I was in a musical mood that day) Edited January 2, 2020 by SteamyTea Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joe90 Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 I am not sure I would like single pedal operation, on my (many) journeys up the M5 I don’t touch any pedals most of the time (cruise control). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ProDave Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 19 minutes ago, joe90 said: I am not sure I would like single pedal operation, on my (many) journeys up the M5 I don’t touch any pedals most of the time (cruise control). I am sure the brake pedal still works just the same with cruise control on an EV. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joe90 Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 16 minutes ago, ProDave said: I am sure the brake pedal still works just the same with cruise control on an EV. yes but with single pedal operation you only have a throttle that operates the brakes when released, in an emergency if you hit that pedal you accelerate surely.?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gone West Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 (edited) 19 minutes ago, ProDave said: I am sure the brake pedal still works just the same with cruise control on an EV. So in a single pedal EV with cruise control working, in an emergency you would have to blip the pedal to cancel cruise control and then do nothing and hope it stops in time. I hope they'll come up with something better than that!!! Edited January 2, 2020 by PeterStarck Cross posted with joe90 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SteamyTea Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 Do 'single peddle' cars actually only have one physical pedal. Or is it marketing crap that you can slow down without using the brake pedal, like my Father had on is mobility scooter. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ProDave Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 I thought they had two pedals, and the brake pedal always works as a brake pedal. It's just that they can be set into single pedal mode where lifting the throttle causes regenerative braking. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stones Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 Interesting to see how this particular debate has unfolded. Are electric vehicles that green? From the perspective of zero emissions at point of use, yes. Assume that the power for those cars is derived from 100% renewable or emission free sources, yes. Assume that all of the vehicle and its constituent parts can be recycled and reused, yes. But there's a problem with the key component in an EV, i.e. the batteries and what they are made of: Lithium production. From everything I've read, it's a hugely damaging (to the environment) process, but because it's out of sight, no-one really cares. In 20 years, I suspect we'll be told, just as we have with Diesel, that we are killing the planet and things have to change. And then there's Cobalt. Kids in the DRC digging up with their bare hands, and little to no environmental protection? Takes the shine of EV's IMHO. Reference was made earlier to patents of key battery technology being sat on. If we truly are at a tipping point in terms of the future of the planet, maybe governments need to seriously look at this, and remove patent protection if the holders fail to licence out or develop the tech themselves. We are prepared to compulsory purchase land to build a road or railway against the wishes of the owner, so why not patents on tech that could improve (or save) our world? 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeremy Harris Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 39 minutes ago, ProDave said: I am sure the brake pedal still works just the same with cruise control on an EV. Yes it does. Even on the Tesla pressing the brake pedal disengages both autopilot and cruise control (if either are activated). Single pedal driving usually refers to the way the car can be driven most of the time without needing to touch the brake pedal. Both the BMW i3 and the Tesla can do this (although Tesla were a bit late in getting it to work well). I'm not aware of any EV that doesn't have a working brake pedal. The newly released Honda E has a brake pedal, as can be seen in this photo: I suspect that, like almost all EVs it can still be driven in "single pedal" mode most of the time, with the brake pedal really just being there for emergency use. I found one-pedal driving a bit strange at first, but after a year or so of driving like this I wouldn't be without it. I can turn it off if I wanted to, and even make the car behave like an automatic, and creep with my foot off the brake, but I much prefer driving in one-pedal mode, with automatic brake application when the car stops. The latter is incredibly useful, for everything from hill starts to coming down our drive to the lane. Just lift off the accelerator and the car just comes to a stop, no jerkiness, just rolls gently to a halt and applies the brakes to hold the car stationary. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ProDave Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 2 minutes ago, Jeremy Harris said: I am not sure I like the pretend wood. It reminds me of an old Ford Granada. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeremy Harris Posted January 2, 2020 Share Posted January 2, 2020 4 minutes ago, ProDave said: I am not sure I like the pretend wood. It reminds me of an old Ford Granada. The dash in my Tesla has a strip of oak running across from one side to the other (not my car, but a photo of exactly the same spec as mine, from Tesla): Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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