Is that a Jaguar?

[Zythryn]

I had a guy in a truck ask me, while driving down a county road at 50, about the car.
Motioned him to pull over on a side street, we did so and chatted about the Tesla.
While I was showing him the car, another guy stops in his BMW convertible and asks about the car.
It was one of the most fun impromptu Tesla Time chats I have had

 

[Electric700]

A couple of days ago, I was giving a first ride to members of my family and we saw a neighbor walking on the road. We stopped to say hello, and he asked "what car is that? It looks like a Rolls Royce!"
I explained it was a Tesla, Model S, made in Fremont, CA. And he replied with "Oh so that's a Tesla! Well, I payed for 7500 dollars for your expensive electric car."
Say what? "Yeah. I am a taxpayer, and I have to pay a subsidy for your car just because its green!"
How does one even begin .... must be watching too much Fox News.

We're all paying subsidies right now to the oil companies, so that's one response. You can always decline the $7500 when you file your taxes too :smile:

 

[jeff_adams]

We're all paying subsidies right now to the oil companies, so that's one response. You can always decline the $7500 when you file your taxes too :smile:

Yeah, might be interesting to frame the answer like this "you know I agree with you on that. It's going to cost you a penny for every one of these Model S that they sell. I think they should discontinue that subsidiary along with the oil companies subsidiaries. We should all be paying the TRUE price of gasoline like they do in Europe. I think it's about 9 dollars a gallon now. That would be a more fair solution, don't you think?"

Pause and see how that gets answered.

 

[VCanucks]

Had a guy say "I like the Fisker better" told him I like a car that works, better.

 

[AustinPowers]

I usually get Aston Martin or Maserati, one guy asked if it was 'a new Mazda 6', I almost fell over....

Why? At least a basic resemblance is there:

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A couple of days ago, I was giving a first ride to members of my family and we saw a neighbor walking on the road. We stopped to say hello, and he asked "what car is that? It looks like a Rolls Royce!"

Aside from the other rubbish that guy said to you, he also seems to have never actually seen a Rolls Royce before.
I can hardly think of a better example for a car that looks COMPLETELY DIFFERENT to a Model S

 

[Mayhemm]

...he replied with "Oh so that's a Tesla! Well, I payed for 7500 dollars for your expensive electric car."
Say what? "Yeah. I am a taxpayer, and I have to pay a subsidy for your car just because its green!"
How does one even begin .... must be watching too much Fox News.

So, if your house was on fire, I assume he would also hassle you about having to pay for the firemen to put it out?

He's such a generous guy; he also pays for the pavement you drive your fancy car on....

 

[dailydriver]

I get many of the same comments (except for the subsidy one, fortunately :wink. I do believe the overall profile and rear looks most like the Jaguar XF. Here is a picture of a friend's XF parked next to mine. Clear differentiators are that mine has the cord hanging out of it and his has the tailpipes. :smile:

 

[Doug_G]

"Oh so that's a Tesla! Well, I payed for 7500 dollars for your expensive electric car."

"Well I paid a lot more in subsidies to oil companies."

 

[K5ING]

I explained it was a Tesla, Model S, made in Fremont, CA. And he replied with "Oh so that's a Tesla! Well, I payed for 7500 dollars for your expensive electric car."

When responding to "that guy", I would just say "Well, thank you!", then walk/drive away.

 

[HHHH]

When responding to "that guy", I would just say "Well, thank you!", then walk/drive away.

That's exactly what I would do too, it's just not worth the time and energy it takes to explain.

 

[caddieo]

Not exactly sure where I heard this or if the math is correct but it goes: "Well, if we divide $7,500.00 by the number of taxpayers, that means I owe each taxpayer about half of a cent. So why don't I give you a penny and you can keep the change".

 

[evme]

Not exactly sure where I heard this or if the math is correct but it goes: "Well, if we divide $7,500.00 by the number of taxpayers, that means I owe each taxpayer about half of a cent. So why don't I give you a penny and you can keep the change".

The math would not work out because not everyone pays the same taxes. You would have to compare how much they paid in federal taxes vs the total amount paid in federal taxes. (Assuming your not in a state that gives extra). That said, if you told them that, they will probably be too insulted to actually do the math so it works out regardless.

That said, technically it is not his tax money anyways because your not getting a federal refund. Your in reality just paying less taxes then you would normally owe.

 

[SwedishAdvocate]

A couple of days ago, I was giving a first ride to members of my family and we saw a neighbor walking on the road. We stopped to say hello, and he asked "what car is that? It looks like a Rolls Royce!"
I explained it was a Tesla, Model S, made in Fremont, CA. And he replied with "Oh so that's a Tesla! Well, I paid for 7500 dollars for your expensive electric car."
Say what? "Yeah. I am a taxpayer, and I have to pay a subsidy for your car just because its green!"
How does one even begin .... must be watching too much Fox News.

Crossposting this from the General Forum/Cars and Transportation/ICE cars are dangerous – thread, since it’s seems like another valid counterargument if one has the time/energy and also remembers it in time.

This happened not far from my house a couple weeks ago:
[video=vimeo;59564508]https://vimeo.com/59564508[/video]

A 1991 M5 - the last of the hand-built M5s. Couple hundred grand on the odometer.

The owner had driven just about a mile from his house when he saw smoke. He thinks it was leaves/pine needles that fell through the exterior air vents in front of the windshield that ended up resting next to resistor-based potentiometers that get hot when used to slow down fans. That doesn't seem right for only a mile of driving. The fire was surprisingly slow to get going (water & fire extinguisher didn't work by the time we got them to him), but I think there had to be some kind of fuel/oil leak to have it spread like it did.

Oh, and no boom. Apparently, in most cases something rubber burns away and the fuel drains out of the tank onto the ground. The big danger is an almost empty tank that has a lot of fumes, which are more easily ignitable.

Glad that no one was hurt in this case. But it also has me thinking about all of the oil and gas that must have seeped out and either run off into the ground water or burned dirty and deposited particulate matter downwind. What a mess.

The governor of our state was recently asked if he though it was fair we let buyers of electric cars here not pay sales tax. He pointed out that the state pays millions upon millions of dollars every year cleaning up oil and gas spills from leaky cars and collisions. Millions that come from tax payers. Since electric cars will never contribute to that, it makes sense to him to give them a tax break. One of the best defenses to tax credits for electric cars I've ever heard. [My bold.]

 

[callmesam]

Here's what I've said:

It's an electric vehicle made in California. No tailpipe emission. Solar powered even on road trips. It's a TEZZLA.

1B filling stations worldwide.

 

[brianman]

Solar powered even on road trips.

This one's begging for an extended conversation when you run across people that know more details. It's also begging for a Fisker discussion, which I've found is generally counterproductive.

 

[AC1K]

I've gotten asked if it was a Lexus more than a Jag, my response is, nope, i don't burn gasoline anymore

 

[astonclassics]

The very nicely styled Model S is undeniably flattery of the sincerest form to Callum’s Jaguar XF, as carbon a copy as one can find among auto companies today outside of mainland China. The original 2007 C-XF concept is widely regarded as one of, if not the most, beautiful 4-door designs in the modern era, so one can hardly fault von Holzhausen for imitating the best in the business.

The much more wavy, bulbous, vaguely Mazda 6-ish 2009 Tesla prototype might have been more distinctive, but the final production version, with its Jaguar lines and proportions, is far more beautiful. Not quite so gorgeous as the original, but it’s tough to top one of the all time greatest pens (DB7, DB9, all modern Jaguars.) Still, it is wonderful to see an American company proving it can achieve world-class engineering and design, and that off-the line performance is beyond impressive.

 

[GlennAlanBerry]

I think the Tesla Model S looks pretty similar to an Aston Martin Rapide S (which I understand that some Aston Martin purists don't think is a an attractive Aston Martin). http://www.astonmartin.com/en/cars/rapide-s

 

[fluxemag]

Someone asked me if it was a Leaf on Friday. They were serious.

 

[Mayhemm]

Someone asked me if it was a Leaf on Friday. They were serious.

Wow. I'm a bit surprised they didn't ask you if it was a horse.