If we just look at these cars purely on their merits, I think they’d still struggle.
You’re talking about a very expensive car with tons of basic quality control issues. The EV market has stalled. I don’t need a car, but I’d probably stick to a classic gas car. Charging stations are still too few in the US.
Teslas feel like luxury secondary cars. With the economy the way it is they won’t sell well
The stations near Federal buildings are slow chargers, they don't matter for road trips. Most fast chargers are commercial, and are not susceptible to Trump's meddling.
You can use Plugshare to look up stations near you. Set the filter to 100kW or faster charging.
The Dakotas are fine. They're better covered than Saskatchewan and we visited there in a Tesla. Superchargers on the highway, the friends and family we visited all had welders so had high amperage 240V, and campgrounds also let us charge overnight.
Frankly, I rather the simplicity of one drive train over a hybrid. The plug in charging is short ranged enough that it's not meaningful and you still need to maintain all the combustion stuff.
Hybrids may be the best of both worlds, but they're also the worst of both worlds.
I recently drove a Suzuki Vitara Hybrid for 4-5 days. The only downside I saw is its fuel consumption is very low.
Also, this one is not a fancy hybrid like Toyota's one. It has a motor between the engine and the gearbox. It also does regen braking, but that's all.
My colleague's Toyota C-HR's fuel consumption is also pretty bad. Half of its nearest competitor, and lower than most car's highway consumption, in the city.
So fuel goes off after a month or so and can damage your engine. If they never run the fuel, do they add stabilizers? Do they just accept the reduced engine life? Or do they run with an empty tank?
AIUI most plugin hybrids have sealed pressurised fuel tanks, which prolong the life; many will also automatically use the engine such that they consume a full tank once every six months or something even if battery power is always available.
Not sure where "here" is, but counter-intuitively (in US and much of Canada - where it has to be labeled) mid-grade is just low-grade + ethanol (which boosts octane), so it's often a down-grade over low-grade (important when you run a carburetor). Grade.
Canada, but I should have checked the current state of affairs before posting - it actually looks like no grade is no regularly available without added ethanol.
My hybrid doesn't even plug in... only has a 1kWH battery... and is warranted for 150k miles / 10 years.
I traded-in a turbo-charged petrol-only vehicle, so I definitely understand your wanting to reduce complexity. My Camry is about as fast as the Subaru, and gets 2.5x the mileage on low-octane (city driving, primarily: high-40's).
On roadtrips the battery really isn't that helpful (other than brief accelerations), dropping to ~38 mpg.
If and when autopilot achieves level 3, the economic equation changes substantially. Whoever does it, I'd be in line demanding that they take my money. After years of false promises I understand the skepticism, but think that the industry is finally getting close. Tesla's large Cybercab bet depends on it so they are demonstrating their confidence in cash. From the beginning it has been Tesla's strategy to leverage the luxury market to fund their market-wide ambitions.
Yeah, but there are actually autonomous cabs rolling out to my metro, and Tesla didn't build them...
So it won't be a monopoly. Which means you're right back to a cutthroat, low margin business.
Personally... I'm generally a "buy the whole market" kind of investor. But I'm actively looking to exclude Tesla. It's shaping up to be a complete and total bust.
> Yeah, but there are actually autonomous cabs rolling out to my metro
The economic difference is that a level 2 cab requires much higher remote labor costs than a level 3 cab to achieve the same productivity, almost by definition of "level 3". As long as a cab company has that advantage they can undercut the competition by price and still make a profit. That advantage is definitely not yet a given. It could even be achieved by open source models and go global for everyone at once. In that scenario Tesla still starts with a large advantage in cost per cab over everyone but BYD.
I looked into it, you need to do something called “direct indexing” if you want to specifically exclude a stock. Here is one example, Wealthfront can also do it.
You're exposing yourself to tracking error every time the index rebalances. If you want to show it to the man, just go to a protest while buying a cheap index fund.
If you want to buy the market and bet against Tesla, it's actually a great way. It may not be the most profitable, but that's never been the point doing something out of protest or spite.
> If and when autopilot achieves level 3, the economic equation changes substantially
The market is limited to America. Nobody is going to let Tesla develop a monopoly (or even commanding lead) in their country for self-driving cars after the way Musk has behaved with Starlink. (I suspect a ban on cameras-only self-driving cars would be popular in e.g. California and New York, too.)
Level 3 is not useful. Humans can't do the rapid task switch that's imagined, so in practice you're still supervising the car at all times even though notionally SAE says that's not what you're doing. Or, likely, you aren't supervising (e.g. you're looking at your phone) and so each such transition is incredibly dangerous.
It kills me that no one else has an "autopilot" on par with Tesla's. All the competitors have very limited scope and tight constraints on conditions. Tesla is the only one you can take into a new neighborhood and it will drive around without saying "sorry not available here".
If you're doing that in my neighborhood, better watch out because I am prepared to defend my family and friends from your monstrosity with considered force and those vehicles are quite easy to "manage" for anyone who knows anything about it.
You’re talking about a very expensive car with tons of basic quality control issues. The EV market has stalled. I don’t need a car, but I’d probably stick to a classic gas car. Charging stations are still too few in the US.
Teslas feel like luxury secondary cars. With the economy the way it is they won’t sell well