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TESLA. BEYOND LUDICROUS MODE. PLAID.

staying_tuned

Drag Racing Champion
Wonder if you could run a generator plugged into the car while you're driving.

You can’t while driving but with a towing capacity of 5K lbs. a ho-hum P90 could tow a third wheel plus genny putting out 220 for quick charging at a rest stop. Kind of lame but totally feasible if you woke up and decided to run fossil for the day or for whatever reason, didn’t feel like stopping at a charging station.
 

jimlloyd40

Autocross Champion
They don't have to worry about it.......unless they want to go more than 250 miles from their house while driving like a Prius. ;)

Again, there are a lot of Superchargers but no where near as plentiful as gas stations and there's still no way to address the 75+ minute time to charge. A household still has to have another vehicle for vacations or trips which yes at this price range is assured anyway but again, these are toys and virtue signalling objects.



Right, but how much profit is there in the niche market of 6 figure supercars? Profit would be in perfecting the production of the Model 3s and churning out high production numbers (which would require sales interest to be there for that number as well which brings us back to the whole charging and normal families issue). Audi doesn't churn profits selling the R8. One could argue making these fantastical cars makes press and drives interest but if you think past the marketing hype, I mean Tesla and what they do isn't really an unknown that needs massive press to get the word out.

Profit would also be not wasting money shooting a Tesla Roadster out to Mars. lol

50% charge in 20 minutes. Not bad for 250 plus miles.
 

Thumper

Autocross Champion
50% charge in 20 minutes. Not bad for 250 plus miles.

I know man, I know. But again, I can go almost 400 miles after a 2 minute stop, 600+ in my Touareg TDI. And there is no real world way you are going to get 250 miles on a 50% charge unless you drive it like a Prius. And in that condition you can NOT use the Plaid mode.....so....you have a $150k Prius. Bravo. LMAO Pay attention to the "up to" in their range advertisements. That means they once got that range once or twice with no AC, headlights, seat warmers, etc and at highway speed limit (65mph max). Real life will be in the mid 400s with normal driving and no Plaid use.

Charge times have come a LONG way and that's great but going from ludicrously stupid (8 hours) to terribly inconvenient (1 hour) does not change the bottomline. They are great for around cities and short escape drives to locations with a charger, but you can't drive across the country or just go off where the path leads you without doing acres of math calculations and trying to find a charger, and then waiting.

Again, I am not discounting the cool but I just hate it when people act like these toys are somehow game changers for everyday life. They aren't, they are still toys and status symbols. Super freaking cool toys and status symbols for sure.

Now, when they finally get OTA charging in place THAT'S the game changer and I'll take notice. Especially since that will eventually allow us to scale back the huge batteries needed to reach these ranges and start to deal with the environmental disaster caused by lithium mining and recycling the old batteries as they reach service life.
 

staying_tuned

Drag Racing Champion
Lucid just posted their car ran a 9.2x@156, has a cage and all that tho.

Insane. I recall their Air > Dream (stock proto) running back to back high 9s earlier. Crazy times.
 

staying_tuned

Drag Racing Champion
I just hate it when people act like these toys are somehow game changers for everyday life.

We've got quite a bit of what I'd consider everyday life on my end and here are some highlights, in priority:

When wife has it:
- Wife refuels at home (100% of the time) vs ever hitting a gas station which is a PITA with our 3 and 5 y/o loaded. Unlike me, she remembers to do the small things and somehow has just mentally unsubscribed from gas station visits by simply ensuring her car is charging while at home/parked all of the time with seat-belt-ish muscle memory.
- Frunk & trunk is epic for pull-up grocery delivery from a space and organization standpoint. Full 3 weeks load while delicate items go in the small frunk instead of interior floor.
- She's pretty into being eco friendly so it just makes sense. Yes, lithium mining is thing, so is the fossil it takes to make an EV but it isn't top of mind so happy wife, happy life. For me it's purely about performance, I could give 2 sh*ts what it runs on. If I can send it, I will.
- Near Zero noise. Wife does not have have an appreciation for any sound any car could make other than what comes out of the speakers.

When I have it:
- Zero trips to a gas station means no media nonsense while fueling and no useless monsters/red-bulls.
- Zero fuel on my clear coat in the event I'm rushing and forget to shake ; o )
- Zero concern for winter fuel blends or just plain sh*t gas.
- Zero concern for beyond 20-ish moving drivetrain parts vs over 2k out of warranty on my R.
- Frunk is a plastic cargo container basically. I use it to take my actual oil to auto-zone for recycling without worrying about a leak. I re-use the 5-liter jugs and typically cycle 4 or 5 at a time.
- Zero nonsense from the big displacement crowd. They know enough to save their gas for another car. This is nice, especially when the little ones are with me.
- Near Zero noise. Going very fast, quietly, has its perks.

I may sound like some fanboy but the reason I'm keeping the R is because it's simply eons more enjoyable to drive. My goal with it is to eventually hunt low to mid spec EVs. The R, in my opinion, is a great platform to do so because of the capability and cost. Anything over 30k is nonsense to start from IMO if struggling with ICE vs EV from an everyday performance standpoint. There will always be an incrementally faster EV for the same price and I'm unwilling to put more into an ICE based car to beat an EV. That's kind of where I've personally drawn my own line. I figure I throw 45k total into my 2016 R, which I picked up for 24,xxx OTD to gap a 3P from a roll and I'll be happy. I'll finally be able to throw a big F U in the air to the actual EV fanboys that assume they are the fastest thing on the planet.

I honestly think if you were to spend a day with any P based model variant they offer, you'll get why the situation is what it is while dispelling a few assumptions.
 

jimlloyd40

Autocross Champion
I know man, I know. But again, I can go almost 400 miles after a 2 minute stop, 600+ in my Touareg TDI. And there is no real world way you are going to get 250 miles on a 50% charge unless you drive it like a Prius. And in that condition you can NOT use the Plaid mode.....so....you have a $150k Prius. Bravo. LMAO Pay attention to the "up to" in their range advertisements. That means they once got that range once or twice with no AC, headlights, seat warmers, etc and at highway speed limit (65mph max). Real life will be in the mid 400s with normal driving and no Plaid use.

Charge times have come a LONG way and that's great but going from ludicrously stupid (8 hours) to terribly inconvenient (1 hour) does not change the bottomline. They are great for around cities and short escape drives to locations with a charger, but you can't drive across the country or just go off where the path leads you without doing acres of math calculations and trying to find a charger, and then waiting.

Again, I am not discounting the cool but I just hate it when people act like these toys are somehow game changers for everyday life. They aren't, they are still toys and status symbols. Super freaking cool toys and status symbols for sure.

Now, when they finally get OTA charging in place THAT'S the game changer and I'll take notice. Especially since that will eventually allow us to scale back the huge batteries needed to reach these ranges and start to deal with the environmental disaster caused by lithium mining and recycling the old batteries as they reach service life.

The majority of people who get a Tesla or any car aren't out there continually driving cross country. A high number of Tesla owners have home chargers so it's irrelevant how long it takes to charge. Not saying it's a game changer those are your words. I'll take the Tesla that this thread is about all day long. If I could afford one.
 

GolNat

Autocross Champion
They are certainly not toys. Yes they have become a social status but that's not the cars fault and doesn't make it bad. Tesla has gotten people interested in EV's who may not have normally looked at them.

I'd still consider them an enthusiasts car but not for all types of enthusiasts. I'd say the majority of the people on this forum enjoy changing the oil and maintaining a car and a Tesla is not like that. I'd say those sorta people would have a second ICE vehicle but for daily driving and family life a Tesla makes a lot of sense.

I'd like to rent one and try it out.
 

brat_burner

Autocross Champion
I'd still consider them an enthusiasts car but not for all types of enthusiasts. I'd say the majority of the people on this forum enjoy changing the oil and maintaining a car and a Tesla is not like that. I'd say those sorta people would have a second ICE vehicle but for daily driving and family life a Tesla makes a lot of sense.

The drive units actually have an oil pump and filter for the gear set. So you can still change your own oil ;):ROFLMAO:
 

staying_tuned

Drag Racing Champion
The drive units actually have an oil pump and filter for the gear set. So you can still change your own oil ;):ROFLMAO:

I'm a software engineer and Tesla's core is open source. I'm pining for the day an actual public API exists (auto warranty void on API registration fine) for the car that we can tap into. Wrap a GUI on it and send it. Then OTA tune iteration & actual remote live-tuning where Ed or whomever is making API calls for values. At that point the notion of us walking around with our straight-out-of-1999 looking Cobb AP manually emailing digital artifacts back and forth will seem absurd. We'll be back to having control over what is pushing us down the road and hopefully, it will fill in the gap that folks like myself are worried could never be filled by EV.

In theory, full automation testing could occur where a remote tuner is testing your tune, on your car, without the car actually moving an inch. Engaging the driveshaft would be just a boolean while all other systems are spun up. I think Ford will actually be the first to support core extension though with the Mach-E. They stuffed those 6 motors in that Ken Block build way too fast for their not to be a lots of hardware modularity (which usually means software flexibility, or at least provisioning, which is great for the tuning/enthusiasts scene).
 

brat_burner

Autocross Champion
I'm curious to see what happens in the next few years with all these companies claiming to be producing EV's. I know the tech/research is usually years ahead of what you can actually put in your driveway.
 

jimlloyd40

Autocross Champion
I'm curious to see what happens in the next few years with all these companies claiming to be producing EV's. I know the tech/research is usually years ahead of what you can actually put in your driveway.

There was a story yesterday where Tesla announced they would have new battery technology online in 2022 that will let them sell a car for 25K.
 

brat_burner

Autocross Champion
There was a story yesterday where Tesla announced they would have new battery technology online in 2022 that will let them sell a car for 25K.

Yea, we'll see if they can get it down that low and what range will be. Seems to be a ton of companies going spac/ipo hoping to chase the Tesla craze. Even Fisker is hoping to get back in the game. I'm sure some will be big losers. Have you seen the Lordstown truck oooffff?

FF to 22:00 and then read the comments
 

StockblockGLI

Go Kart Champion
I recently had a chance to play around with the Model 3. They are super fun in their own way. I would buy one in a heartbeat. The instant acceleration is intoxicating and they handle extremely well. I cannot wait for an electric GTI, it is coming.
 
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