

Free Transportation for Life - benackles
http://blog.launch.co/blog/mind-blowing-idea-free-transportation-for-life.html

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quanticle
* They can dump 150 miles of drive time into your car in an hour

I appreciate that it's a massive improvement over existing charging technology
but compared to a gasoline pump, it's pitiful. A gas pump can dump _300 miles_
of drive time into my car in five minutes.

Secondly, sure, the Model S has a range of 300 miles. But that's at 55 mph.
Now, tell me, does anyone actually drive at 55 mph on the freeway? Moreover,
does anyone ever drive at 55 mph without AC, radio, or heat? All those things
will cut into the range of the Model S. I think that one of the things holding
back EV adoption is the fact that Americans have been lied to so often about
battery capacity. We have "6-hour" laptops whose batteries barely last 3. We
have "24-hour" MP3 players whose batteries are empty after 8. We have cell
phones whose batteries barely last through a day of light usage, despite
manufacturer claims that the battery will last "up to" 36 hours. Given the
typical consumer's experience with battery powered devices, is it any surprise
that they're extremely leery of battery powered cars? A dead MP3 player or
laptop is a minor annoyance. A dead car (especially a dead car which can't be
refueled or jump-started easily) is a major inconvenience.

In order to engender consumer trust, Tesla has to do more than just publish a
simple optimistic "300 miles at 55 miles an hour!" blurb. They need to give
the consumer detailed information about what affects the battery life of the
car. How much does driving at 70, rather than 55 cut down my range? How much
do I lose for using the AC? The heat? Even if these Supercharger stations
become ubiquitous, I still want these questions answered because, unlike the
people caught in Elon Musk's reality distortion field, I _do_ think that an
hour spent twiddling my thumbs at a gas station is an hour wasted.

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lmm
Right now the battery is basically a consumable, and the replacement cost is
comparable to your gas expenditure (though in one lump, rather than spread out
over several year)

