Cadillac Unveils Pricier Alternative To Tesla Model S 196
An anonymous reader writes "Cadillac has officially unveiled its Tesla S alternative, but at $5,000 more than the Tesla, it may not be the cheaper option you've been looking for. 'Cadillac is touting the ELR's 8-inch touchscreen powered by its CUE infotainment system — which two years in is still a buggy mess — along with a range of safety and convenience features, including lane departure warning, forward collision alert, and a 24-hour concierge service to answer questions. There's also a "regen on demand" feature that allows the driver to boost the brake regeneration, slowing the vehicle and recouping energy by pulling on the flappy paddles behind the steering wheel. GM's bean counters are quick to point out that depending on what federal and state tax incentives buyers are eligible for, the net pricing could be as low as $68,495, but that's still a tough sell considering you're basically getting a Volt with more presence and less practicality.'"
Just to get this straight... (Score:5, Informative)
If this is the best GM can do, they better get back to the drawing board quick.
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As for the Tesla comparison, I doubt most Cadillac buyers are ready to make the jump to an all-electric car, let alone by a manufacturer with such a short track record. I would take the Tesla
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It looks like they're trying the Cimarron [wikipedia.org] approach again. First because they think people have forgotten the Cimarron by now, and second it's not a Cimarron because it's electric. (Although it pretty much is an expensive rebadge of the Volt.)
Also I'm wondering, if Buick gets theirs, will they bring back the Electra name?
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You are correct. The Volt is actually a better vehicle dollar for dollar.
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As for this, it's not a pure rebadge, in that there are some major drivetrain changes, but it uses the same battery pack, not unlike a rebadge using the same engine but different transmission (a common rebadge trick for differentiation)
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What I don't get is how its an answer to the Tesla at all. This thing is a plugin hybrid, the Tesla is an all electric. Its not really the same animal at all.
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It's what happens when you completely run out of ideas. You take some old stuff and glue on the new "in" thing.
"Let's make a movie about vampires ... (booo!) ..... IN SPACE!!!! (yay!!!)"
And in this particular case - let's use the existing car design and old components ... PLUS HYBRID!
And yes, I have no idea either how they want to sell this car at that price. It just fails on so many levels (plus, imo, it is ugly). At that price, you could easily buy either the Tesla S for pure electric drive or for thousan
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"Let's make a movie about vampires ... (booo!) ..... IN SPACE!!!! (yay!!!)"
I like your ideas and would like to subscribe to your newsletter.
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Looks great to me but that's subjective. However, 300 mile radius v 208-265 comparison is irrelevant. One can be refueled everywhere in 5 minutes for another 300 miles, the other takes 8 hours unless you find one of the supercharging stations which are still very rare. That is a HUGE difference for anybody who needs to drive that distance occasionally (say LA-Bay Area or LA-Vegas).
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yep you hit it on the head, its another shining example of how GM just does not "get it" and how they should have been alow to fail rather than wasting everyone's time headed right back down the same freaking road
I'm Elon Musk (Score:5, Funny)
I'm Elon Musk and I approve this negative review of my competitor's product.
Altenrative to the Model S? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Altenrative to the Model S? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Altenrative to the Model S? (Score:5, Interesting)
There's always the Porsche 918 Spyder hybrid (although that is a little bit pricier alternative)
$845,000 (Score:2)
A bit? :)
The 918 Spyder starts at $845,000.
It's more than ten times the cost...
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The reason is that Tesla holds the majority of useful patents for the ability to produce a decent electric car.
I doubt it. Electric cars are not such a novel technology, many manufacturers have made them in various forms for decades. If Tesla really was that important, it ought to be reasonably simple for the older manufacturers to buy them outright. All you see instead are some limited deals with e.g. Toyota, without much to show for it.
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Uh, no. Toyota and GM got in there long before Tesla. Other EVs exist, and they would be competitors with the Tesla if they cranked up the price to pay for the larger battery bank. Instead they're making range compromises in order to target a much lower-cost segment of the market.
Besides, like Toyota, Tesla would be happy to license all their patents for a few bucks... It's free money for them, and if they don't,
Re:Altenrative to the Model S? (Score:5, Insightful)
Nobody gives a shit about the Volt, though. Lots of people will click a headline if it mentions the Tesla Model S, though, so that's what it gets compared to.
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This is so annoying. The Tesla S is a competitor to the BMW 5 series, Audi 6 series, and the Mercedes-Benz E series. And I know why the automotive press is not saying this: they want page views! This new Cadillac is definitely not a competitor direct competitor to the Tesla S because the buyers are completely different.
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Hey now, don't forget Bitcoin and Linux!
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You mock, but ...
Linux Drives Cadillac Into the Infotainment Era [linux.com]
Yes, the "buggy mess" of the Cadillac User Experience is based on Debian Linux, is acknowledged as Open Source by the FSF, and GM provides free APIs & toolkits to allow app development by end-users...
There are no alternatives to Model S (Score:2)
Model S is the only one, period (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not aware of any other production long-range battery car? The Model S is the only all electric car with a 200+ mile range that does not include an ICE, luxury or not.
I'm more impressed each press release by Tesla - not because of anything in particular, but because it seems so impossibly hard for every other manufacturer in the world to even get to half of the Model S range on batteries alone. In fact, if there weren't actual, on the road vehicles I would say - based on their marketing literature and the performance of every other manufacturer - that they were full of shit and may as well be hyping the Moller AirCar.
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Doesn't matter... That's not a market segment! Nobody goes around shopping for cars demanding it have the exact range of the Tesla (but not MORE) and it must NOT have an ICE for a range booster. That would be completely nonsensical.
In the real world (Hello!) the Tesla must very much compete with shorter-range EVs, and hybrids like the Vo
Should have made this first (Score:3)
Cadillac has picked up their game across the board from the ATS, CTS and the XTS with what has to be just about the greatest turn around of any automotive manufacture ever. I have every confidence that they will get this car right and that it will be worth the proverbial money. Hell, even Top Gear magazine (typically very Anti American) gave the ATS and new CTS high praise.
GM should have made this car before they made the Volt. People are far more likely to accept a pricier car at the luxury end of the segment (eco-sheek) than in the family segment where it is much harder to justify the price differential. Now the problem is that people will think of this as an expensive Volt and that may make it difficult to sell.
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Spot on, simply swapping the launch dates would have made the Volt look like a cheap Cadillac, instead of the Cadillac looking like an overpriced Volt.
Let's produce a crappy design... (Score:2)
...then we can pout and claim that Americans don't want electric cars.
Americans don't want your crappy electric cars, they want a Tesla.
When GM does something like this it just advertises that they're a dinosaur stuck in the tar pits of history.
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More proof that the market was right. GM was not too big to fail, it's too stupid to live.
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I remember that my only experience with a Pontiac boiled down to: "What do you mean this car has no electronic stability control or ABS?".
The year must've been 2007 or something.
If one of their top brands didn't have such essential equipment, what did they do to their cheap ones? Were the engine blocks made of paper?
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It goes way back. Ross Perot summed it up in an interview with Fortune magazine back in the 80's.
http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/1988/02/15/70199/ [cnn.com]
An excellent read. One excerpt....
"We've got to nuke the GM system. We've got to throw away Sloan's book ((My Years With General Motors, former chairman Alfred P. Sloan Jr.'s description of GM's management system)). It's like the Old Testament -- frozen thousands of years ago. We still believe that we can find the right page and paragraph
It's like wrist watches. (Score:2)
There are a lot of people who spend $k to by a wrist watch even though there are perfectly good and accurate watches available for $20. Watches are functional jewelry. A lot of people avoid digital watches because they aren't usually very nice looking.
There is a large segment of the US population that regards cars not just as transportation, but also a statement about themselves. Cadillac has always been a prestige brand. People who buy Cadillacs aren't interested in diving a Chevy volt because Chevy is
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You're forgetting the "buy American" mentality that affects so many. And yes, it is generally older people who buy Cadillacs, many of whom were left with impressions from WWII and would not drive a German or Japanese car. Also, since they are rather expensive, older people are the one's with the means to afford such a car.
GM and others are simply buying time (Score:2)
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Nissan is not a monster car company?
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Nissan is not a monster car company?
It is less than 1/2 of the size of any of the top 3, so no.
BUT, if they can push electric fast with multiple new models next year, they can vastly increase their size quickly.
ultracaps aren't happening (Score:2)
You made sense until your last word. Ultra-capacitors aren't happening. As batteries steadily get cheaper, you can use a bigger battery. A bigger battery can handle more power, so it can cope with more braking regen and recharge faster (and deliver more horsepower); and it's not cycled as much as a smaller battery, so it lasts longer. That reduces the fast-charge and longevity benefits of ultracaps, which are still far more expensive and heavier than a lithium-ion battery of the energy. Ionova claims 10 Wh/
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Ultracaps have a chance in hybrids too, for "caching". They can save wear on the battery from short regenerative braking, and theoretically they should have lower loss for that purpose. Whether they can ever be made with sufficient capacity per weight and cheap enough to make it worthwhile is doubtful...
It would even be possible to quickly charge the ultracapacitor and then let it slowly charge the batteries afterwards... Whether that is useful in practice I am not sure, but maybe it could be combined with
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Tried & True (Score:2)
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I should not reply to AC, but...
the assembly plant is right here in silicon valley.
parts for EVERYONE are always made in china or overseas somewhere. even mighty caddy has parts made overseas. no one can resist the lure of cheap parts. but assembly location does matter and its built here, not in china.
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That's because of the battery. But all the electricity it uses will be domestic :-)
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Thanks for the link. The batteries, which are a pretty major component by cost, are made in Japan by Panasonic. I was really hoping Tesla would find a way to work with an American battery vendor, but that didn't work out so well for Fisker, so I can't say I blame them. The steering column and maybe a handful of other stuff is made by Mercedes, who owns a small percentage of Tesla. This probably accounts for why it has a lower percentage made in the US/Canada.
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Re:Maybe so but it is American Made (Score:4)
most of GM parts are made in mexico, they just do the final assembly here
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american assembly is not a problem.
american influenced design is the problem.
quite a big difference.
otoh, tesla is an outsider and not the usual car company. I would not expect old school gm or ford to be even able to design (much less make) a tesla style car.
if I could afford an S, I'd get one. even with the gawdy and unwanted laptop screen in the thing, I'd still probably get one.
Re:The $5,000 gets you... (Score:4, Insightful)
...to help pay for the heath and retirement benefits of union employees who already retired at 55 [heritage.org].
Yeah, a real shame that people negotiated decent benefits for themselves. Wadda they think they are, CEOs?
Fucking Randroids.
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A word other than negotiation is in order if American taxpayers ended up footing the bill.
My observation of the situation is that managers signed contracts their company couldn't afford. The people who were screaming loudest against bailing out homeowners doing the same for mortgage contracts they can't afford suddenly changed sides at this point and screamed at the unions for having unaffordable contracts, so what did you expect the outcome to be?
Also, since 1974, the PBGC [wikipedia.org] has been bailing out pensions,
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BTW, isn't criticizing someone else's negotiation compensation "the politics of envy" and "class warfare", or does that only apply when it's criticism of executives who get obscene bonuses for running their companies into the ground?
Only when taxpayers foot the bill in some way. What was that famous saying... "No taxation without representation." I don't know about you, but that effectively means that people need to have at least some say in where and how their stolen tax-money is used.
No one is envious here, you're projecting words into someone else's mouth, calm down. People are free to negotiate whatever cushy deal they want with whatever company they choose. Some will be jealous, but that's their problem.
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No problem with that but GM should have been allowed to fail because of it. 100% contribution of pension funds needs to be the law, no hope we will be able to cover our promises 60 years down the road. It quickly becomes to big to fail which translates into make the taxpayers pay for large private mistakes to insure people that made a bad bet do not get hurt buy it.
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Re:The $5,000 gets you... (Score:4, Insightful)
Here's the real takeaway from that article for me: base wages are $30/hr, the effective wage due to the overtime ends up being $40/hr, and the general rule of thumb for the fully loaded cost of a worker is usually 150%-200% of salary, so they are right on target. Remember that, for instance, 4 weeks total of vacation and sick leave costs 7.7%, unemployment insurance costs another few percent, payroll tax is another 6.8%, throw in a few more percent for worker's comp. You're north of 20% before you even start paying for health insurance and retirement.
If you think that's too much compensation for somebody working in a factory, you don't believe that the United States should have a middle class.
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Why are you hating on the makers living the American dream?
Re:$5000 gets you... (Score:5, Insightful)
1) Subjective. I fail to see much difference, except I'd bet the dashboard seams in the Model S don't squeak after 5k miles like every GM product's dashboard, ever.
2) Subjective. The Model S is a beauty, and the Volt is not. This car is a boxier Volt, which makes it even uglier, IMO. Then again, I've never known GM to build anything that looks better than the average pile of animal feces.
3) Its battery life is pathetic, so it makes up for it with a mediocre ICE to charge with. Wake me when it has a range near 1000 miles, which is what a setup like this should be sporting.
4) A GM? Not likely. I have yet to see one last much beyond the warranty, and I've seen several that didn't last even that long. GM should be replacing Country Time [countrytime.com] any day now.
5) Where is GM from 10 years ago? Gone? Buyouts and bailouts are two different things, and GM was bought out. Meanwhile, Tesla paid back their loan nearly a decade early. And that loan wasn't part of a bailout or a buyout, it was an R&D loan for their electric vehicle technology.
6) Window dressing. Any idiot can bolt on more irrelevant crap, and GM hires the best idiots they can find to do exactly that.
Re:$5000 gets you... (Score:4, Insightful)
I agree with everything with the exception of number 2, "Then again, I've never known GM to build anything that looks better than the average pile of animal feces." The 69 Camaro was pretty nice.
Re:$5000 gets you... (Score:5, Funny)
That was 44 years ago. The guy who designed it is probably dead.
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3) Its battery life is pathetic, so it makes up for it with a mediocre ICE to charge with. Wake me when it has a range near 1000 miles, which is what a setup like this should be sporting.
Wow, not sure how you get +4 with utter crap like that. You thing that setup should be sporting near 1000 miles? OK, lets see about that. Presumably, you don't think that the model S has a pathetic range, so we'll use that as a baseline for what you think a car should get. The modelS gets 230 miles off a 60kwh battery. So that means the Volts 16kwh battery should get 60 miles. So yes, the Tesla makes more efficient use of the battery. But lets get back to that 1000 mile figure. So we've got 60 miles from th
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The idea here is that a properly-tuned fixed-RPM engine should be able to charge those batteries several times over on a tank of gas.
If you're using your gas to charge your battery, then you'd be going more efficiently by directly using the gas.
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2) Subjective. The Model S is a beauty, and the Volt is not.
You just said that as though it was an objective statement. Other than that, I agree with you, I do prefer the look of the Model S. I ALSO think it's objectively nicer, but that would be incredibly hard to prove with the current state of research into aesthetics. Maybe give it a millennium ;)
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Fashionistas might like it. It goes well with the new Hasselblad-decorated Sony NEX7 http://www.dpreview.com/news/2013/06/10/hasselblad-lunar-now-shipping [dpreview.com] or the new Leica M decorated by Jony Ives and Mark Newsom.
Of course, some of a certain age might remember the last time Cadillac tried this, in the '80s, with the Cimmaron, a rebadged Chevy Cavalier with the addition of clear-coat paint and a hideous chrome-plated luggage rack on the top of the trunk lid. It nearly led to the death of the brand.
As an A
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Re:$5000 gets you... (Score:4, Insightful)
Why can't cell phone companies make good cell phones? Why did Apple and then Google have to show them how? Why didn't Sony build iPods? How did they let Apple do it first, years after Sony should have dominated the market? Why can't big car companies make a good electric car? Why did Tesla have to show them how? Why is GM even offering this stupid model, and why did BMW offer an even dumber one? Is it to prove to themselves that electric cars are a bad idea? Why are all of these examples Silicon Valley innovations?
Honestly, I just can't figure out whats wrong with GM, BMW, Motorola (before being bought - the Moto-X rocks), Sony, and so many other large iconic corporations. It's one thing to lack a marketing genius like Steve Jobs. It's another to be so incredibly stupid that even the average slashdot geek can see your product will be a dismal failure. There is simply no way that this car, or BMW's freak-show of an electric car will succeed. Why are they wasting their time and money? Why are they so stupid?
Honestly, I don't know. I know a bit about business, but I can't make sense of corporations acting so illogically.
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One more example - not from Silicon Valley! Why are the big cell service providers so dumb? Coverage sucks everywhere, yet it takes tiny Republic Wireless in North Carolina to figure out that cell phones should switch to VoIP when WiFi is available? Why is it so hard for big companies to do the obvious right thing?
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T-Mobile has had WiFi calling since at least 2006, probably longer. Republic Wireless is nothing new or innovative.
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T-Mobile also has VoIP built-in to many / most of their phones, and Republic Wireless isn't exactly the model of a good idea done well... many RW customers complain that calls get dropped when they go past the range of WiFi, exactly what RW claims doesn't happen, and exactly the problem with the idea in
NOT a rebadge, not like the Cimarron (Score:2)
As Anonymous Coward points out elsewhere, sharing a powertrain is NOT a rebadge. The ELR looks nothing like the Volt, therefore it is not a rebadge.
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Then it follows you believe the Lexus ES3xx is a different car than a Camry.
To each his own (opinion.)
Re:$5000 gets you... (Score:4, Insightful)
1) A nicer interior
2) A nicer exterior (tesla is bland, this is one of the nicest looking cars ever)
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder... and you need to get your eyes checked. This so far from one of the "nicest looking cars ever" that it makes me wonder if you've ever seen any other car in your life.
3) A car you can drive anywhere without charging
Of course, not charging it will eliminate most of the benefits of lugging that 400 lb battery around everywhere and will make your fuel economy go down significantly, but hey... you can still point at it and claim you're environmentally conscious, right?
5) Support from a company that wont be out of business in 10 years
Let's just ignore the fact that GM filed chapter 11 bankruptcy just four years ago and had to be rescued by the government. That's completely irrelevant to whether the company will be around in 10 years.
6) A lot more technology features (the tesla has a rear view camera but not much else)
"Cadillac is touting the ELRâ(TM)s 8-inch touchscreen powered by its CUE infotainment system â" which two years in is still a buggy mess"
Technology that is badly designed and doesn't work properly isn't a selling point.
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.
You're saying this [theautochannel.com] is "so far from one of the nicest looking cars ever"?
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Yes.
Trying to do the angular sharp look of an aventador, but falling SO wide of the mark that it doesnt even register
Tesla S is much nicer to look at.
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Technology that is fundamentally defective by design and can't work properly isn't a selling point. Who in their right minds wants a touchscreen-controlled anything in a car? That's exactly the opposite of making cars safer. You can't control a touchscreen without taking your ey
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Why flamebait mods?
The guy makes some interesting points
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GM had to make a choice, keep Saturn, or keep Buick. The Chinese liked Buick; GM's words, not mine. And the once ubiquitous Saturn, while affordable, is no more. Good job on that one GM?
And another thing, it was Tesla that punched a hole in the Dealership wall, not GM. In this case, GM is the Camp Follower.
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"You're forgetting that these are toys for rich people."
The Tesla perhaps, the article talks about a toy for rich, old people.
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Nope. Per TFA:
essentially a two-door Chevrolet Volt with a handsome exterior and a leather-lined cabin.
Exactly.
Comparing it to the Tesla S is patently ridiculous.
16.5 kWh lithium-ion battery pack in the Volt finds its way underneath the creased sheet metal of the ELR, as well as its 1.4-liter gasoline-powered range-extending engine. That allows the Caddy to motor along on electric power alone for up to 35 miles before the gasoline engine kicks in to juice up the pack and keep the ELR going for a claimed range of 300 miles.
Claimed range of 300 miles is when you run out of gas.
You get 35 miles on battery.
Its Volt technology in a much heavier car.
Comparing that to real world Tesla range [fool.com] makes for pretty depressing reading.
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I think that electric vs. hybrid depends on your use pattern. If your typical use is a commute that is within the vehicle range, and you either rarely take long trips, or you have a second car, then pure electric may make sense. If you frequently need to drive beyond the recharge range of a pure electric, then a hybrid makes sense.
In my case the 30 mile range would work out OK. That would let me do my daily commute all on electric, but I would have the gas engine for long trips.
I don't personally want
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1) RTFA. The Cadillac in the article is a hybrid with a gasoline engine, not all electric, so your rant is irrelevant.
2) There's nothing ass-backwards about an electric car if it fits the needs of the person buying it. Just because it doesn't fit your needs doesn't mean it shouldn't be sold.
Re:my goodness a whole 8 inches of display (Score:4, Insightful)
as for having touch as an interface is beyond stupidity in a car, why do 99% of cars have knobs and buttons ? clue: it isnt a technological problem its more of a "how can i adjust ac/settings/radio/nav without taking my eye of the road"
good luck in court
I agree, real knobs and buttons in a car are a necessity. Try adjusting temperature or fan setting via a touch screen, especially a GLOSSY touch screen. Now compare to a simple illuminated button which you can ALWAYS see (and feel, and feel the feedback). It's like typing blind on a simulated keyboard on your tablet vs. on a "real" keyboard.
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Errm, you're a bit off there. Rather than 4 hours and 43 minutes, a Tesla supercharger is rated at 20 minutes for 50%, 40 minutes for 80%, and 75 minutes for 100%. The other thing (for any plug-in hybrid or full electric) is to charge it overnight so that you start every day with a full charge. The automated battery swap would reduce that to a minute and a half, although those are similar in cost to a tank of gas. The 240v outlet is about right, although if you get an 80A one installed it's cut in half.
So,
Target market fail (Score:2)
If you only have the resources to own a single vehicle, you're not the target market for ANY all electric.
As a side note, I find it impossible to imagine hauling a load of plywood in my Subaru sedan, 6 people and luggage to the beach in my truck, or take my minivan on snowy roads to go skiing. Amazingly, with three vehicles between me and my wife I can do all of those things *AND* average about 26-28 MPG combined on all the vehicles. It can't be done with a single vehicle, but that doesn't mean that any of
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If you only have the resources to own a single vehicle, you're not the target market for ANY all electric.
Not entirely accurate, but close. The truth is, that there are plenty of ppl that do not carry plywood, etc. Likewise, a number of these ppl live in a city or a close suburb. For them, a SMALL electric like the leaf, or the Model E when it comes, is perfect.
In addition, if only haul things around say every 6 months, you can rent a cheap truck from Home Depot to do the job. Likewise, if you go on Long distance trips once a year and can rent a car for that week, for the next 2 years, then something like the
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Top Gear is to blame here (Score:5, Informative)
It is unbelievable that this article is taken seriously. The writer refers to the shift paddles as "flappy paddles behind the steering wheel". This tells me that the person writing the article knows nothing about cars and did very little research to reach their conclusions.
Actually, you just showed you know less about the automotive world than they do.
"Flappy paddle" has been the derogatory term Jeremy Clarkson and the other Top Gear presenters have used for years upon years, and it's now in widespread popular use. It referred to three things, early on: 1)Automatics with paddles that simply said to the transmission "shift up or down now", which usually happened eons after you pushed the paddle and the transmission still has all the inefficiencies of an automatic 2)Automated-manual transmissions which had horrendous "creeping" functionality, poor usability/interface (ie 3 point turns were mind-numbingly hard/slow/complex), and broke down a lot because of the complexity of actuators/sensors/etc. 3)Sequential transmissions that were brutal in terms of comfort (having been adopted from racing applications) and poor creeping functionality.
Nowadays the term is mostly used by automotive fans who hate anything that doesn't have a manual gearbox, even if it's a perfectly reliable 7 gear, double-clutch transmission that shifts so smoothly you can do so mid-corner and not upset the car's balance, and can shift so fast it has to wait for the engine to match revs...
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It is unbelievable that this article is taken seriously. The writer refers to the shift paddles as "flappy paddles behind the steering wheel". This tells me that the person writing the article knows nothing about cars and did very little research to reach their conclusions.
Actually, you just showed you know less about the automotive world than they do.
"Flappy paddle" has been the derogatory term Jeremy Clarkson and the other Top Gear presenters have used for years upon years, and it's now in widespread popular use. It referred to three things, early on: 1)Automatics with paddles that simply said to the transmission "shift up or down now", which usually happened eons after you pushed the paddle and the transmission still has all the inefficiencies of an automatic 2)Automated-manual transmissions which had horrendous "creeping" functionality, poor usability/interface (ie 3 point turns were mind-numbingly hard/slow/complex), and broke down a lot because of the complexity of actuators/sensors/etc. 3)Sequential transmissions that were brutal in terms of comfort (having been adopted from racing applications) and poor creeping functionality.
Nowadays the term is mostly used by automotive fans who hate anything that doesn't have a manual gearbox, even if it's a perfectly reliable 7 gear, double-clutch transmission that shifts so smoothly you can do so mid-corner and not upset the car's balance, and can shift so fast it has to wait for the engine to match revs...
Fine, so it's a made-up term from a TV show, and not a technical term... It doesn't mean squat about how much I do or don't know about cars. It just means that I haven't been hanging out in circles that use the term. The article, however, doesn't even pretend to perform a comparison against the Volt and the new Caddy but come to a conclusion that it is well over priced. It may well be, but where is the proof??
"Regen paddles?" (Score:3)
"Regen paddles?" Why should the driver have to control the power train at that level? Regenerative braking should happen during any braking, as it does on most other electric cars. For light braking, regenerative braking is enough; push the brake pedal down further and the brake pads engage.
This isn't a new concept; it appeared first in the PCC streetcar, from 1936. (San Francisco still runs a fleet of them.) The PCC cars had a whole hierarchy of braking. As the brake pedal was depressed, first the dri
Re: (Score:2)
It is unbelievable that you don't know that the shift paddles are actually called "flappy paddles". Go watch some Top Gear before you complain about motor journalism.
Like top gear is serious motor journalism... I've watched a large number of Top Gear shows both the British and American versions and they have been nothing but entertainment TV. They are fun to watch, but there is very little actual content other than this car, that I can't afford, goes faster than that car, which I also can't afford...
They are not called flappy-paddles (i.e. not the technical term), this is just a cute term coined by Top Gear and is used by people who don't know better.
The point of a "demand" paddle (Score:2)
Well, what should happen when you lift off the accelerator? In a conventional car, the engine brakes the car, and engine braking increases in lower gears. So GM has reused the concept to adjust the amount of brake regen when you lift off. Other electrified cars coast, or apply a set amount of regen. I don't know what VW's new plug-in hybrids, with a conventional dual-clutch transmission, do.
Tesla hooks brake regen up to the accelerator pedal, so as you lift off more more brake regen increases, turning it in