"Car market literally down to 2 cars today"

[Hugh Mannity]

Todd - nice shot !! I'm hoping to do a similar shot with my '51 Studebaker when I get the MX - ancient and modern side by side ... ;-)

 

[aronth5]

TRL: You coulda got the Tesla Green . . .

Very nice Lincoln!
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Yes and look at the very cool smaller mirrors on the Lincoln. If Tesla adopted those for use on the Model S you'd see improved range:smile: Who needs cameras!

 

[cwerdna]

Heya cwerdna - the point of the original post, and the ah-hah that gave rise to this thread, is that at least for two of us, we now have a personal functional definition of "car market" that includes either 2 or 3 vehicles. It is, as you rightly point out, NOT the typical definition of car market.

I think the better choice of words would've been "I've narrowed my choices down to n cars". Heck, when I got my Nissan 350Z long ago, that was the ONLY car was considering. It certainly wasn't the market was only 1 car. When I got my Leaf, the only two contenders for me were a Volt and Rav4 EV.

Worth considering would the Nissan leaf if it had about 25-40% more range. It is a weird design but the car drives well enough. Of course it's sold through crappy dealers and the service costs could be bad over the lifetime of the car.

Ok, re: crappy dealers, but I'm confused as to your statement on service costs. I see no evidence of that at all. The Model S is the one that looks like it'll have comparatively high service costs and repair costs, if Elon doesn't have some of the reliability issues under control (e.g. drive unit noise problems and some failures, battery pack contactor failures, etc.) And, the cost of wear items like tires are certainly higher on a Model S.

 

[AnxietyRanger]

I guess for me the car market is down to a single car from a single manufacturer at this point. The Model S from Tesla is pretty much the only game in town as far as I am concerned.

Just an anecdote:

For me, as the thread starter, the thread is about Model S and Model X being the choices - although, granted, Model X so far is only reservable.

The quote in the title originally comes from another poster, I'm not sure if he was referring to S/X as well or Model S and the Roadster.

 

[mwulff]

Ok, re: crappy dealers, but I'm confused as to your statement on service costs. I see no evidence of that at all. The Model S is the one that looks like it'll have comparatively high service costs and repair costs, if Elon doesn't have some of the reliability issues under control (e.g. drive unit noise problems and some failures, battery pack contactor failures, etc.) And, the cost of wear items like tires are certainly higher on a Model S.

I guess looked at it from another perspective. If you buy a Tesla here in Denmark then the service costs are $862 per service, this includes every spare part needed to keep the car going. Service and maintenance thus becomes a fixed regular cost and not something you need to worry about on a regular basis. The tires will cost and that is an added expense, completely true.

Compared to the Leaf which relies more on a "sell the car and make the money on service" model. You buy the car and there is a highly variable cost to keeping it going. Also most Nissan dealers would love to get you out of your Leaf and into the next ICE-fruitbasket, so I am willing to wager that any major faults on a Leaf will be met with "Better to buy a new car.. ohh look at that Kumquat... Qish-Qosh, Cash-something"...

As an example our local dealer who is listed as the main Leaf dealer for our region could hardly be bothered to show us the car. Didn't know about the battery, knew nothing about service-costs and so on.

Needless to say I don't trust a Nissan dealer further than I can throw them. Especially because you can end up in a game of "deny responsibility" between the dealer, the importer and Nissan.

For sure Tesla has made mistakes and has/had problems with quality, but they have admitted the problems and taken steps to fix them, sometimes at great expense to themselves. I am left with the feeling that the people at the local service centers have the owners backs in case of problems.

 

[llstringfield@at]

Absolutely NOT, I wanted green... Tesla does NOT offer a car in the color green!!!

- - - Updated - - -

TRL: You coulda got the Tesla Green . . .

Very nice Lincoln!
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No way, Tesla Does NOT offer the color green! (I know because that is what I wanted)

 

[Doug_G]

They used to have green...

 

[wycolo]

They used to have green...

Yes, a genuine Tesla Collector's Item. Often folks peer through the dust and grime on mine and exclaim: "It's GREEN!!"
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[eloder]

Ok, re: crappy dealers, but I'm confused as to your statement on service costs. I see no evidence of that at all. The Model S is the one that looks like it'll have comparatively high service costs and repair costs, if Elon doesn't have some of the reliability issues under control (e.g. drive unit noise problems and some failures, battery pack contactor failures, etc.) And, the cost of wear items like tires are certainly higher on a Model S.

After warranty, a $5000 battery replacement on a Leaf every 3-5 years is a very real possibility because the battery lacks active TMS and 3-5 years is enough to degrade the battery capacity down 30% (not to mention the enhanced effect of cold weather on the Leaf's short-term capacity).

Source: Leaf owners on the leaf forums.

 

[GregHudson]

Ever walk into a BMW dealer, get told you have to wait 2 months to two years, and still be willing to plunk down your Thousands of dollars deposit? No.

I've done exactly that on 2 occasions. A 6 month wait for delivery on a custom order is (or was) fairly standard at BMW.

Here's what AU$73k bought me in 1993 (I think the year is correct - it was a long time ago now)...
Oh, I forgot, add another $20k worth of mods (mostly chroming) ;-)

Cheers, Greg.