ewoodrick
Well-Known Member
I'm not trying to be bleak but I am being realistic. And yes I know it's very rare for Tesla to replace a degraded battery pack under warranty, even though I know of a few. I'm not worried about that issue. But range is the first question non EV owners ask me. It doesn't matter to them if they don't need a huge amount of range for daily driving, and that they probably don't even know the range of their ICE vehicles. I have a friend that recently bought a plug in Hybrid and said the EV side cost him almost as much as gas. When I said that I have not experienced that he kept insisting EV's don't have money on charging. Didn't matter to him that Tesla EV's are way more efficient than the electric side of his hybrid. Also have a relative that said he would never get an EV because you can't go many places, like the desert to charge. Even though he never drives out into the desert. The perception to them is that EV's don't have a big enough range and the only thing that would convince them is a base number of at least 400 miles on all EV's. Then they actually might find other benefits, like filling up at home while you are sleeping and less vehicle maintenance.
Realistic is that with 300 miles range, I've travelled from the Great Lakes to the Florida Keys.
Bleak is that it needs more miles to do it.
A Hybrid can absolutely be expensive. But in that hybrid, what was the Fuel Economy? >60mpg? That's because of the electric side.
But a Hybrid isn't necessarily a PHEV, (plug in hybrid). A PHEV's advantage is going to be a comparison between battery size and average daily driving. And it requires it to be plugged in every day. If the battery is big enough to represent a majority of the commute and it is plugged in, then the daily cost should be significantly lower than a Hybrid or ICE only.
You know, wherever there is a gas station, there's electricity?
When people think that there aren't that many chargers, whip out PlugShare. People just don't know what a charger looks like and they don't realize how many they pass everyday. No need to get into the L2 vs DCFC at that point, just blow their minds at how many chargers there actually is.
Trust me, 300 or 400 miles won't convince them at that point.
How do they get convinced, they have to see it at work. That's why I say from the Great Lakes to the Florida Keys. That's a real life example and it puts a chink in their brick wall. Take those trips, don't brag about it to your friends "My EV did" just a simple "I went to" The more and more they hear it, the more chinks in the wall come off.
Once there's a lot of chinks removed, take them for a drive. If they are into speed, let them feel it. Speed by itself is often a chunk of the wall.
It takes time. When they mention they had to go to an oil change, your response is "Oh yea, I forgot about having to do them"
The #1 selling car in the US is also a good fact to drop, Did I say US? I meant WORLD. That takes another chink, because that's showing how many other people are buying EVs.
Sit them in the car and ask them a place to go to and tell the car to route there.
Like you said, most folks don't have the slightest idea what their ICE range is. If you tell them that a Tesla can go 500 miles, they'll want 600. Tell them 400 miles, they'll want 500.
But first, it takes YOU believing that 300 miles is enough.
I will admit that there have been routes that I have gone that have been iffy. But most of them were years ago and I never ran out of energy. These days, it is starting to be hard for me to find challenging routes.