I’m not sure that Lucid is “on brand” as an Apple car. I can see Apple wanting something that was more a premium small family car in the vein of the Model Y with a much nicer and properly thought out interior vs. an ultra luxury sedan. There is a pretty low ceiling to how many luxury sedans will ever be sold in a…

First Gear: Porsche sells about 37,000 Taycans a year, which they consider a success since, like all Porsches, it delivers good profit margins. So if Porsche, an established brand that has an almost unsurpassed level of reputation and prestige, sells fewer than 40,000 luxury electric sedans out of a global dealer…

Yes, this is what was missing from previous mid-sized executive cars aimed at middle management business people: TikTok and garish LED lighting.

The Ioniq 5 is better value in Canada, since they targeted the price to qualify for the $5k federal EV rebate. The Preferred Long Range Ioniq is $55k CAD, but then this gets reduced by the rebate, so it’s significantly less than the base RWD Model 3. If you spec the Model 3 similarly (for example, add enhanced…

The UK has some great public transportation in some of its larger towns and cities. But much of the country is woefully underserved by buses that run very infrequently, and cross country train services that are also pretty dysfunctional. Add to that the near constant strikes and service disruptions, and chronic…

I agree that the Model 3 is a really good car. I will say that the Ioniq is much bigger inside. Rear passenger space and trunk room are significantly better, so it’s more comparable to the Model Y than the 3. In the real world, at least in good weather, I’ve exceeded the claimed range of the Ioniq quite often (but…

Curious if you found it hard to live with the ride in the Model Y? I’ve found it way too crashy and uncomposed on anything less than perfect roads, to the extent that it’s really not a relaxing car to drive. Combined with the creaking and rattling that plagued both interiors of the Model Ys I drove, I could not live…

I’ve done a few real world experiments with this on the same drive in my Ioniq 5. The first time I did an approx. 440 km round trip, I used Eco mode since I was certain I’d need every extra km of range. Most of the driving was on side roads at about 85 km/h, in mild weather, so pretty good conditions for optimal…

They both look they’ve been in some kind of side- and rear-impact collision.

I’m on my second model Y rental right now, and the ride really is abysmal, as are the many squeaks and rattles throughout the cabin as it bangs and crashes over every small road imperfection. It really would be a dealbreaker for long term ownership.

Wow, I wonder if anything happened in March, 2020 that dramatically changed traffic levels.

If it’s any consolation, Electrify Canada (EA’s even shittier Canadian cousin) clearly labels its chargers, but both my 800v EVs have never seen even half the claimed speeds. At one point the 350 kW charger was charging so slowly (like under 80 kW), I cancelled the session and moved to the 150 kW charger, which…

I think they already scrapped the congestion charge discount for PHEVs (in 2021). Central London will be zero emission only by 2025, but perhaps there will be a taxi / car service exemption that allows PHEVs to be on the road.

I know that batteries are very heavy (motors not so much), but a large battery pack would “only” be about 25% of the original weight of the Bentley, so it’s just not believable that the other components would double the weight, particularly not after the removal of a large, heavy V8.

Am I missing something? Where do you see that the weight has almost doubled? I think a 100 kWh battery weighs about 1,000 lbs, so it seems wildly unlikely that the removal of the ICE, addition of battery and motors, and suspension upgrades, would add an additional 3,000 lbs on top of the battery.

It’s not really an off road vehicle, much more than is the iX. The iX gets almost 8x the range from 4x the battery size. Some of that is simple aerodynamics, but the X5 still seems very inefficient.

40 miles seems like very low range from a 26 kWh battery. Particularly when on longer journeys you’ll be driving around with hundreds of pounds of depleted battery.

That really is the billion dollar question, and I think it’s because many of Elon’s ideas are just a knee jerk reaction to needing some insane news to keep the hype going and boost the stock. Anything to avoid the markets concluding that Tesla is becoming a “normal” car company, and shouldn’t be valued at such a crazy…

Porsche charges extra for the callipers to be black instead of red for non-carbon brakes, and more for black instead of yellow on the PCCBs; Audi gives you a discount if you take the ceramic brakes in black instead of red. Makes sense.

A much bigger factor than the tax cuts was the cratering of interest rates and the massive increase in the money supply during covid. Income-producing assets (generally owned by the rich) soared in value, and the poor were given a few dollars to stop them from rioting in protest at the destruction of their livelihoods.