[ds968]

Clearly we have gotten to a point where a very decent range can be attained with electric vehicles, I've read where they can now be made to sound like a real car ( and not the fake piped-in tune via the speakers but through the real exhaust pipe ) and Tesla is evidence , as was the Fisker Karma, that electric cars looks can be quite appealing... so then what's holding car companies from switching everything they make to affordable ( $ 20 - $ 30 k ) vehicles that have a decent look to them, that do not sound like a sewing machine, and with good range before recharging so many more people can buy them ?? Is the manufacturing process that much more expensive, is it the oil lobby, is it a combination of both, or something entirely different altogether ?

I for one, would like to see gas go away completely ( and I don't mean just after I eat beans and chili ) and would be the first in line to buy and electric car , provided it had all of the aforementioned attributes.

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[flash]

the tesla s would be perfect for you. beautiful car, well appointed, great range, QUICKER than our car, and still has a top end of 134.



i'm not so focused on the sound. while i am used to an exhaust note, i wouldn't miss it if it were gone. now if it sounded like a kazoo, like so many cars...........



as for pricing, many of them are down under $30k. they are smaller cars though, and the range is lower. it takes space to house the batteries.



once they get the battery thing past the EPA, and can figure out how to handle disposal, we're there.



of course the oil companies and service station and distribution networks will have a fit, so this will be a hard fought battle.



it's still far more environmentally friendly burning even coal to generate the electricity to feed the electric cars than it is to use gasoline, even with the battery issues, so in the end i think this will happen

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[ds968]

the tesla s would be perfect for you. beautiful car, well appointed, great range, QUICKER than our car, and still has a top end of 134."



134 is not nearly enough.. it's the principle of the thing and not that I would have the opportunity to do 134 all that often without landing in jail, but still.. futhermore, the 968 looks are way above the tesla's league IMO



i'm not so focused on the sound. while i am used to an exhaust note, i wouldn't miss it if it were gone. now if it sounded like a kazoo, like so many cars.........."



I would miss that.. screw silence !



" as for pricing, many of them are down under $30k. they are smaller cars though, and the range is lower. it takes space to house the batteries."



they are ALL ugly as sin !

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[Cloud9...68]

I have nothing against electric cars, and would love to see more of them on the road. The challenge is cost - lithium ion batteries are very expensive, and it takes a lot of them to give a car a decent range. So it's a trade-off. Also, the projections I've read (primarily in Design News, a publication generally very much in favor of alternate-fueled vehicles) indicate that the price of lithium ion batteries isn't going to come down very fast.



The challenge to electric cars boils down to two words: Hyundai Elantra (or you could substiture "Ford Focus", "Chevy Cruise Eco", "Mazda 2", or a whole host of others). What I mean by that is that a typical electric car, which obviously completely frees you from buying gas, costs in the neightborhood of 30 grand, give or take. The aforementioned conventionally-fueled vehichles can be had for under $20K, can be driven anywhere, and get 30-40+ mpg. But fast forward five years or so - at that point, the same class of cars, which is what most electrics (although obviously not the Model S) would compete with, will be achieving 40 - 50+ mpg. It would appear that the case for switching to an electric cars becomes less and less compelling as conventional vehicles become ever more fuel efficient.



As with all these discussions, making predictions about the future is very dangerous, because you can't predict new innovations, changes to market conditions, or a whole host of other things that could radically alter the outcome. As always, we'll just have to wait and see.

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[flash]

regardless of anything else, unless power prices go WAY up or gas prices go WAY down, it will be cheaper by far to charge the electric car than to fill a gas powered car. right now, it is less than $9 to charge the tesla here in CA and about $3 to charge most other cars. you would need to get over 100mpg to equal that. 40 or 50 won't even get you close.



http://teslarumors.com/USA-Residental-En...State.html



by the way, the nissan leaf is under $19k

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[Cloud9...68]

[quote name='flash' timestamp='1369847504' post='143270']

by the way, the nissan leaf is under $19k

[/quote]



Huh?



http://www.edmunds.com/nissan/leaf/years...s=Electric,



I definitely want to see electric cars succeed, because one universal truth is that when there's competition, the consumer always wins, so I'm all for any alternatives to petro-fueled cars. And I understand that gas mileage will have to get dramatically higher to make gas-powered cars as cheap to run as electrics. I'm just pointing out the dangers of a new technology trying to displace the status quo, when the status quo is on a path to significant improvement. I've seen it many times in my own industry - a promising new idea comes along that offers clear advantages over what's currently being used. But in the five or so years it takes to go from idea to implementation, the baseline approach has improved so much that the new one withers and dies.



Not saying this will happen to electric cars, and I hope it doesn't. It just troubles me that electrics have been out for several years now, and here in very progressive, environmentally aware Austin, they're still almost as rare as 968s. Also, I'm not seeing much on manufacturers' drawing boards - sure, there are a lot of very exotic approaches that we all know will never see the light of day, and then there was the $50,000 electric Rav4, but it looks like the automakers aren't very serious about developing electric cars that will appeal to, and be affordable by, the masses. It's going to be an interesting 5-10 years.

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[flash]

http://business.time.com/2013/01/17/at-u...ly-add-up/



the advantages of the electric car currently (pun intended) are at least 2:1 over the best gasoline car in cost per mile. that's a long way to go for any car to overcome.



now, if we would let the diesels in here, we might have a going battle.

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[ds968]

I don't care if they PAY ME $ 19 k .. OR, if the Nissan Leaf not only reverses global warming, and is the cure for all cancer, I will not be caught dead driving this :



   

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[Cloud9...68]

Interesting article. I'm surprised I hadn't heard about the steep price cut on the Leaf, as I tend to keep up with stuff like this. A quick purusal of Google shows that Leaf sales have jumped since the price cut, which is encouraging. But of course the sub-$19K price has a built-in subsidy of $7500, which can't last forever.



I've noticed an interesting phenomenon as far as hybrids and electrics. While many manufacturers offer hybrid versions of their various models, overall hybrid sales continue to be dominated by one model, the Toyota Prius (although the Ford Focus hybrid seems to be doing reasonably well). Similarly, as far as pure electrics, it's basically just the Leaf. It looks like the other manufacturers are sitting back and letting Toyota and Nissan do their "market research" for them, before making serious efforts of their own.

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[flash]

not at all. i see quite a few of the chevys out there, and a ton of commercials for them. they are coming out with the spark later this summer, which will also be around $19k.

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[Cloud9...68]

By Chevy's, do you mean the Volt? That's actually a hybrid, but it's unique in that it's a plug-in "serial" hybrid, in that that gas engine never drives the wheels. It can run on battery power alone for something like 30 miles, and when the batteries' charge gets too low, the gas engine kicks in to charge the batteries, which continue driving the electric motor. A clever concept, but it's not a pure electric. Its big downside is cost - it's over $40K before rebates for what's basically a Cruze. For whatever reason, the Leaf seems to have the "affordable" all-electric market all to itself for the time being, at least until the Spark comes out.

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[flash]

never noticed it was a hybrid, as they don't talk about it as such, likely because like you say, the gas motor doesn't drive the wheels.



p.s. it's under not over $40k according to the website (39145). then you deduct the 7500 credit, making it 31645.

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[Cloud9...68]

Yeah, I've heard the Volt is actually a pretty nice car, and despite their higher price, I see more of them than I do Leafs. Cadillac is working on a car based on the same platform.

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[ds968]

And here we are just a couple of weeks later and that same gas station now has a price of $ 4.29 for 91 octane, a significant drop and consistent with tne drop I've seen everywhere else. So this is because.....??

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