Tesla, TSLA & the Investment World: the Perpetual Investors' Roundtable

[Causalien]

Driving an electric car also requires some patience and practice. They’re built with regenerative brakes, allowing the vehicle to function with single pedal driving. When the driver lifts his or her foot off the accelerator, the car will come to a sudden stop, especially when the regen braking is set to high. The abruptness can be jarring and disorientating in the beginning.
“It’s a different driving experience,” Larsen admitted. “There’s a steep learning curve. The first time I drove the I-Pace I had to turn off the regen braking. It felt weird.”
Automakers want consumers to believe that traditional cars are antiquated. In reality, an EV future is decades away.

Goes to show how many ignorant ppl are pretending to be experts when they've never driven a manual before.

Sorry, but whoever uses this argument just outs themselves as a pretender. An ev with regen drives exactly like a manual ICE. Dumb c*** as the Australians would call them.

 

[NicoV]

The FUD continues (not posting the clickbait link):

“We’ll continue to see more EVs come on the market,” Kim said. “In the next three to four years, the market will be saturated with EVs. There will be a lot more supply than demand.”
There are two problems, however, that could put the brakes on the market expansion of EVs, according to Karl Brauer, executive publisher of Cox Automotive. “They still cost a lot more than ICE cars and charging takes a long time,” he told ABC News. “For a rancher in Montana, EVs are not the solution. These cars are for people who live in urban areas and don’t travel more than 100 miles or more a week.”
Brauer, who has driven the I-Pace, said he was “fascinated” with the SUV at first -- until it was time to juice the battery.
“It doesn’t charge as well as it should, even with a Level 2 charger,” he said. “There were times when I thought it was charging but it wasn’t. It has everything going for it and it drives extremely well. In terms of battery, I was disappointed.”
Driving an electric car also requires some patience and practice. They’re built with regenerative brakes, allowing the vehicle to function with single pedal driving. When the driver lifts his or her foot off the accelerator, the car will come to a sudden stop, especially when the regen braking is set to high. The abruptness can be jarring and disorientating in the beginning.
“It’s a different driving experience,” Larsen admitted. “There’s a steep learning curve. The first time I drove the I-Pace I had to turn off the regen braking. It felt weird.”
Automakers want consumers to believe that traditional cars are antiquated. In reality, an EV future is decades away.

ROFL

 

[KarenRei]

Tic-Tac-Toe isn't the only thing a chicken can do. Take that (tesla vision).View attachment 380063

My parrot insists on doing that sometimes. I try to encourage him not to. Sometimes he persists, because it's apparently a comfortable perch with a great view. But he always comes to regret it whenever I have to turn and he ends up doing circles, hanging on for dear life by his feet

 

[EVMeister]

@kbeckley awesome post and very informative. Agree with a lot of the points you raised. One thing:

"Sat in the E-pace (prominent at the front of the booth). Best Non-tesla EV yet...but so far behind IMO. I hope they sell tons of them (they had one available for test drives via the non-profit 'Plug and Drive' group)."

I assume you sat in the car that should have been called the E-PACE but had to be called an I-PACE due to manufacturer shortsightedness with previous naming.

 

[AndyH]

My parrot insists on doing that sometimes. I try to encourage him not to. Sometimes he persists, because it's apparently a comfortable perch with a great view. But he always comes to regret it whenever I have to turn and he ends up doing circles, hanging on for dear life by his feet

I just got the weirdest image of a pirate, wooden leg, eye patch and all fighting with her parrot for control of the steering wheel.
Then wondering what you might say to the cops after the inevitable accident. "Yes it's a Tesla. No it wasn't on autopilot officer, it was my parrot you see. He crazy."

 

[KarenRei]

I just got the weirdest image of a pirate, wooden leg, eye patch and all fighting with her parrot for control of the steering wheel.
Then wondering what you might say to the cops after the inevitable accident. "Yes it's a Tesla. No it wasn't on autopilot officer, it was my parrot you see. He crazy."

The worst is when he manages to slip down into the driver's side footwell. I have zero tolerance for that, that's a get him out immediately or pull over sort of thing.

I've long thought an amusing costume for a party would be for me to go in a parrot suit and dress him up as a pirate and have him on my shoulder

 

[SebastianR]

Fully charged tested the E-tron. Conclusion: Too heavy and too uninspired to drive with too short range. Love how the Audi spokesman try too answer the question of cars produced per year. It's at 21 minutes in the video. "Eeh uhm not 10k uhm only efficient if uhm maybe eeh 100k. Eeh uhm."

Thanks for sharing. I found this video almost a bit tragic: Stefan Niemand is clearly a guy who gets it - remember he is on record saying that Tesla did everything right and that those who ever have driven electric will never go back to ICE vehicles.Audi Executive: ‘I hate to admit it but Tesla did everything right’

I really feel sorry for him: he knows what they are doing is half-a$$ed and while he points towards making "smart use of the Audi parts portfolio" the sentence that they "only" build everything from scratch that "had to be built from scratch" for this car. So this is clearly not a "EV-first" car but an adaption of an ICE platform. Also that he had to give the silly talking point that customers for any car should be able to chose between fuel types like Petrol, Diesel and EV is clearly painful for him. We all know a ground-up EV is a different class of vehicle not a matter of fuel choice...
The fact this, this is a heavy steel car, with Q7 suspensions, Q5 interior, A8 infotainment system, A6 seats build in a plant that can only achieve costs at a run-rate of 100k units a year (all as per the video linked) while needing motors from a plant that is geared up to about ~40k cars (i.e. ~80k(?) motors year since the factory can make 400 motors a day - source: Audi starts electric motor production for e-tron quattro ahead of imminent launch). So nothing of the eTron story seems to make sense - it's all a big mixed-up and convoluted.

It's pretty sad actually. The fact that they flew Fully Charged to Abu Dhabi and only got a luke-warm recommendation out of it. Oh, that's not good. Fully Charged is normally hyping every EV they can find and is over-the-top enthusiastic.

This is not good. After the damning Manager Magazin article the other day now this. This doesn't bode well for Audi.

Edit: PewDiePie Meme Review is at 12.7M views, 1.2M likes, >110k comments in about a day or so. The most successful Ads for the 2019 Superbowl compare as follows: Overall viewership of the SuperBowl is down to 95M, then weekend before/during/after the event the top 3 are the following: Amazon (46M), Pepsi (37M) and Lexus (25M). 2019 Super Bowl Ads Were Viewed Massively Online Before And After The Game

On viewership, I assume that we will be in Superbowl numbers in a few weeks as we haven't even gotten onto the list of most watched PewDiePie videos yet...

 

[jerry33]

I've been wondering. What's stopping ppl from converting a semi into a home? Ppl already turn shipping containers into apartments, so why not just drop one of those onto a tsla semi, or even a normal ICE semi?

The correct driver's license, road tax, and having to stop at every scale.

 

[jerry33]

Anyone remember the battle to get the automakers to make seat belts standard?

When Ford first put seat belts in cars (long before any talk of mandates), sales went down because the customers thought it indicated that Fords were somehow less safe than other cars. Something similar happened to Chrysler when they sold the first unibody car and released a film showing how it was safer than the ladder construction in a rollover. For some reason it takes a lot of education and often enforcement to get people to change their thinking--even on things that would seem obvious if only a little thinking was involved. There are people who still don't wear their seat belts.

I wouldn't know anything about the sausage delivery situation.

 

[KarenRei]

When Ford first put seat belts in cars (long before any talk of mandates), sales went down because the customers thought it indicated that Fords were somehow less safe than other cars. Something similar happened to Chrysler when they sold the first unibody car and released a film showing how it was safer than the ladder construction in a rollover. For some reason it takes a lot of education and often enforcement to get people to change their thinking--even on things that would seem obvious if only a little thinking was involved. There are people who still don't wear their seat belts.

I wouldn't know anything about the sausage delivery situation.

It's sad that the innovators are usually the ones that suffer. Look at, for example, the DeSoto/Chrysler Airflow, which revolutionized streamlining (as well as being early examples of unibody construction). A curved (albeit split), raked windshield? A tapered rear, with no external obtrusions? Blasphemy, I say, blasphemy!

1933 DeSoto Airflow (the Chrysler Airflow was similar but larger):

Ford's competition at the time, the 1933 Model B:

Due to a lack of demand due to the "unusual" looks (despite its far superior performance and handling), DeSoto / Chrysler were forced to take a step backwards in 1935, with the DeSoto Airstream:

Being an innovator is tough :Þ

 

[Fact Checking]

The correct driver's license, road tax, and having to stop at every scale.

It's apparently possible to re-rate class 8 heavy trucks into a lower category that doesn't require a commercial driver's license:

https://www.worktruckonline.com/145897/re-rating-gvwr-why-and-how-its-done​

I'd expect a company that mods a Tesla Semi into an RV to handle the certification too. It probably won't be cheap in any case.

 

[KarenRei]

It's apparently possible to re-rate class 8 heavy trucks into a lower category that doesn't require a commercial driver's license:

Re-rating GVWR: Why and How it's Done​

I'd expect a company that mods a Tesla Semi into an RV to handle the certification too. It probably won't be cheap in any case.

Or you could take a step in the opposite direction and go big...

The above company - Anderson Mobile Estates - makes luxury homes on wheels designed to be hauled around by a big rig. A perfect fit for Semi, for a customer who can afford it...

(If I recall correctly, the one in that picture is owned by Aston Kutcher)

I kind of thought that such a concept might be a neat business opportunity - for example, mobile hotels that travel to wherever there's festivals going on, mobile restaurants that move from town to town, etc.

 

[Causalien]

I guess a problem with a semi home is, where do you park them. Places with such a huge parking spot is rare.

Also, are there actually advantages with an ev semi in this setup? No need for gas hookup. AC with no fumes. Not really enough advantages.

Anyway, here's how I am planning to live in my retirement.

Semi, self-driving on a highway by itself. Half of it is a garage for my roadster and the other half is a cozy living area.

Picture me, driving up behind in my red roadster after meeting up for coffee with my friend in vegas and the semi open up the back to slide down a ramp so the roadster can self park into the garage. I unwind and check the map for more places to explore.

 

[KarenRei]

Also, are there actually advantages with an ev semi in this setup? No need for gas hookup. AC with no fumes. Not really enough advantages.

Yeah, the big advantage is that you don't need a power hookup (so long as there's a megacharger network to charge at, as Tesla intends). No fuel needed to run a generator, and no noise from it either. If you have a sufficient water tank (and/or rainwater collection), greywater recycling, and a sufficient sewage tank, you can park for weeks without any utility hookups at all - potentially even recharging a meaningful amount during that time if you have a good solar array on the roof and any awnings. When you move around, it's done cheaply and cleanly.

It offers the potential for a whole new type of lifestyle, particularly for retirees. There already are many who live by RV, but this would be taking it to the next level.

I agree, of course, that a smaller electric cab would make it more mass-market.

 

[KarenRei]

Chao Zhou trying to get some new GF3 pics as we speak:

Chao Zhou on Twitter

So far:

That's like a whole new (office complex?) that's risen up since the last video. No roof on it yet.

ED: What if that's more than an office complex? Of course, I don't know how high it's going to go before it gets roofed off. But can you imagine if they started tooling in there... next month? It's certainly possible, at the rate that thing appeared out of thin air....

I still think, based on the windows, that it'll most likely be offices, or housing for workers. But you never know. Either way, if they can raise whole buildings this quickly...

 

[NicoV]

Yeah, the big advantage is that you don't need a power hookup (so long as there's a megacharger network to charge at, as Tesla intends). No fuel needed to run a generator, and no noise from it either. If you have a sufficient water tank (and/or rainwater collection), greywater recycling, and a sufficient sewage tank, you can park for weeks without any utility hookups at all - potentially even recharging a meaningful amount during that time if you have a good solar array on the roof and any awnings. When you move around, it's done cheaply and cleanly.

It offers the potential for a whole new type of lifestyle, particularly for retirees. There already are many who live by RV, but this would be taking it to the next level.

I agree, of course, that a smaller electric cab would make it more mass-market.

Let me now when I can sign up for this in Iceland! (Just got home from a photography trip to Iceland, what a beautifull country! Can’t wait to go back!)

 

[Tslynk67]

You mean like using the bug report voice command that already exists? From the manual:

This is different and I had a similar reflection to the OP when I had a couple of bogus emergency braking situations on the highway - both times while passing under bridges, which could have resulted in a nasty accident, fortunately not.

I suggested to support that when you get such an event, that a pop-up could be given afterwards to confirm whether the car interpreted the situation correctly, or not.

In this case I had, Tesla asked me to identify the time and the location where I got the issues so they could find it in the logs.

 

[KarenRei]

This is different and I had a similar reflection to the OP when I had a couple of bogus emergency braking situations on the highway - both times while passing under bridges, which could have resulted in a nasty accident, fortunately not.

I suggested to support that when you get such an event, that a pop-up could be given afterwards to confirm whether the car interpreted the situation correctly, or not.

In this case I had, Tesla asked me to identify the time and the location where I got the issues so they could find it in the logs.

IMHO: False positives are way better than false negatives. In the IIHS testing, Tesla's AEB system was the only one to never experience a false negative (aka, not trying to brake when it should have braked). But they god a good number of false positives.

There does not exist a system in the world that lacks both false negatives and false positives. A great example would be with Uber, when they ran down and killed that homeless woman. They had two separate AEB systems - a factory system with the car, and their own system using their cameras, lidar and radar. They found that the factory system was bothering drivers too much with false positives, so they just shut it off. It did detect the woman, but because they shut it off, it did not apply the brakes. Their own system, tuned to avoid false positives, failed to detect the woman (a false negative).

Anyway, big kudos to anyone who reports false positives to Tesla. They need a lot of data to make the car better at discerning these corner cases.

 

[Words of HABIT]

View attachment 379897 Elon just posted this photo on his new website on memes. What does it mean? Is there a millennial in da house who can interpret?

The hunted becomes the Hunter.

 

[Off Shore]

I guess a problem with a semi home is, where do you park them. Places with such a huge parking spot is rare.

Also, are there actually advantages with an ev semi in this setup? No need for gas hookup. AC with no fumes. Not really enough advantages.

Anyway, here's how I am planning to live in my retirement.

Semi, self-driving on a highway by itself. Half of it is a garage for my roadster and the other half is a cozy living area.

Picture me, driving up behind in my red roadster after meeting up for coffee with my friend in vegas and the semi open up the back to slide down a ramp so the roadster can self park into the garage. I unwind and check the map for more places to explore.

Sign me up!