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The best defense, it seems, is a cheap EV of our own.
No shit. Proving yet again that auto industry executives are complete morons waiting for another bailout.
Chevy has had a perfectly serviceable and low cost EV on the market for years. It's possible to buy them new for $30,000 or less (before rebates) and used ones can be had for under $14,000.
It isn't just about price or being an EV or the Leaf would be the best selling car in the world. People also want a car that isn't a piece of junk with low resale value, is cramped, or has bad styling. These are big purchases and a lot more thought goes into buying them than two simple checkboxes.
Automakers don't care about the used market in the same way video game makers or authors don't. They only get money from the initial sale. Everyone is trying to move to a subscription model to capture some of that revenue. No such thing as a 'used' League of Legends copy.
There are tons of affordable used EVs under 30k. Most of them just don't happen to be made anymore or have any parts availability without a fabrication shop.
The Bolt is nice, but it's crazy that it doesn't have much competition in the US.
Automakers do care about the used car market. Otherwise reliability would go out the window. There's a reason Toyota is the #1 manufacturer in the world.
The Bolt is nice, but it’s crazy that it doesn’t have much competition in the US.
It's early days for EVs and one thing that really pinched was that COVID happened literally right as manufacturers had just or were about to roll out their EVs. You can't build cars when your workforce is sheltering in place and when they did show up to the factories they couldn't get the parts thanks to supply chain problems. Those woes were then followed by super inflation and labor disputes with the UAW which delayed rollouts even further.
Right now sales are flat / declining because the early release EVs are too expensive for the current economic environment and the 2nd Gen Mainstream EVs are right around the corner. I wanted to buy an EV two years ago but in 2022 they were in very short supply and the dealer markups were insane so I didn't. Prices have returned to something like normal but now we're just months away from the release of the next generation so I'm holding off until they get here.
Chevy has had a perfectly serviceable and low cost EV on the market for years
With the caveat that for those years it's been basically unobtainium. I looked into buying one at the start of last year and five dealers all had none in stock + a 6 month wait. (Their websites listed several in stock but we'll ignore that other thorn)
They killed production of it to focus on building luxury SUVs (Cadillac Lyriq) and the Blazer EV (starts $42k), so the stock that exists today is all there is. Used ones exist but the problem is they never actually made them in sufficient quantities to meet demand, and instead of ramping up production decided it'd be better to sell $40k-60k vehicles instead.
Bearing in mind they had them in the early 90s. Then killed them. Twice. Now they’re all “ooohhhh somebody’s doing it better” well of course they are, you quit doing it at all until five minutes ago!
The late 90s EVs, like the EV1, were absolute dogshit. They had the styling of a Beluga Whale, a maximum speed of 80MPH, maximum range of as little as 50 miles and a recharge time of 8 hours!
The EV1 was an Alpha release prototype, there was barely 1,000 of them ever made. It was never a serious car, nor could it have been. The technology wasn't available.
Any "early 90s" EVs were one off custom built toys and would have been even worse than the EV1.
I just read a whole article about the price of a car and don't know the price of the car. "Journalism"
it's discounted
And even a replying comment doesn't say the price.
Yeah...sure it is. My brother ordered one 3 years ago and it was delivered last year - during which Ford hiked the price twice, removed features from the trim package, etc.
Each time he was given an opportunity to back out with a full refund of his deposit.
I'm pretty sure they were just trying to cut down the number of required deliveries while they figured out production problems - this discount is probably just returning to pre-hike pricing.
Quick google says $40k. Not expensive, but definitely not a "cheap" EV.
From what I can tell, it’s still in the ~$50,000 range.
I don’t really see how that can be considered ’cheap’.
But why is it so ugly?
Yeah, I don't know why everything is moving toward that ugly crossover form. They're ugly as sin IMO.
It's the carcinization of automobiles. Tall station wagons are simply the most practical shape for cars to be.
Frankly, the thing that bothers me about the Mustang Mach E isn't the shape, but rather the fact that they desecrated the name of what's supposed to be a low-slung coupe.
Frankly, the thing that bothers me about the Mustang Mach E isn’t the shape, but rather the fact that they desecrated the name of what’s supposed to be a low-slung coupe.
The shape bothers me a lot, but this bothers me more. They could have just called it the Bronco. Or the Fairlane.
But if cars are all going to look like that in the future I guess I'm never buying a car again.
I would hate this car much less than I do if they had called it anything BUT a Mustang.
It's much more like a mustang than a bronco. Regardless, If Ford wants to call it a mustang, it's a mustang.
As much as I hate it, having a 50 year old blue collar welder with 2 Chevy trucks parked out front come over and get excited about "The new Mustang" made me realize how perfect that decision was. People can complain about it all they want, but I don't think it would have been anywhere close to being as successful otherwise.
Nobody lost money underestimating the American consumer
Frankly, the thing that bothers me about the Mustang Mach E isn’t the shape, but rather the fact that they desecrated the name of what’s supposed to be a low-slung coupe.
That...that right there.
I think it's worse than them being ugly. I think the dimensions and visibility for crossovers makes people worse drivers. Massive blind spots, zero rear visibility, huge amounts of body roll in curves, and the danger of rollover are all worse in this body scheme.
It's so bad that they have to add technology like rear cameras, BLIS, and traction control to attempt to fix it because they can't just make a car with reasonable dimensions and good sight lines.
The MachE doesn’t really suffer from any of those issues. I had no major blind spots, in fact smaller than what I’ve been used to. Rear view mirrors were very effective, it’s a “Mustang like suspension” so it was super stable, to the point of uncomfortably stiff. With the battery pack underneath, the center of gravity makes a roll over extremely unlikely.
Your points are accurate for many other CUVs, especially ICE ones. But not the MachE. It has its own issues mind you. Specifically the suspension being so bumpy it induces car sickness. A, frankly, obscene amount of power which tempts bad driving habits. And the worst central control system I’ve ever experienced.
I'm glad the MachE doesn't have those issues, but you raise a good point about it having an obscene amount of power. A lot of EVs have way too much power for the average person.
The yellow is indeed bad. But it's still one of the better looking EVs...
I much rather take my old car and pay to have the ICE engine taken out and replaced with a crate EV motor.
The problem is not the motor (as much) as it is where to put the batteries. Replacing just the gas tank on my tiny Subaru with a battery is not going to give the range I need.
Ya, unfortunately that's the problem. But the majority of people don't need to drive over 100 miles a day and most kits these days are over 100 now.