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If you live in an apartment building, it’s unlikely that your landlord is going to spring for charging stations for every tenant. What if you park on the street? By the same token, will your employer install chargers so that you don’t have to rely on charging at home?
That's precisely what we did here at WGN. A few years ago, we converted one row of the parking lot to EV-only.
Cost wasn't that huge. We chose a row already adjacent to a spot on the building where we had surplus panel capacity, and all we did was hang a bunch of NEMA 14-30 (clothes dryer) outlets on the wall, under weatherproof covers. And precisely because a lot of folks don't have a garage to park in.
Most of the parking garages also have EV charging capacity. As do all of the Jewel-Osco supermarkets. the Whole Foods markets, etc.
Originally Posted by xturner
Currently, a Level 2 charger can supply about 40 miles per hour - at least on a Model 3.
We're city folk who don't drive suburban mileage. I shop for groceries twice a week on average, and could do my entire weekly charging just during those two stops.
Originally Posted by codrus
Never is a long time, and many people are not willing to give up the flexibility of being able to go on a road trip at the drop of a hat. You can argue that this is irrational (rental, etc), but nevertheless it seems to be the case.
Hah! I'll never accuse American consumer of being rational.
But, c'mon, we're Miata owners here. We're all familiar with renting a sedan or a minivan once or two a year as needed.
By that reasoning, I should own a 20' box truck, as I do occasionally move, and hate having to go to U-haul every single time.
What you're suggesting seems more like buying an additional car rather than outright replacing a car.
Personally, a 50 mile EV with AWD and decent ground clearance would work fine as an only car for me.
The fact that I presently own two vehicles is purely an indulgence. I require the Juke (or something like it), however I also desire to have the Miata for when it's above freezing.
I'm really quite puzzled by this, as I had thought that Teslae had built-in battery heaters, thus enabling charging at sub-freezing temps.
It's also interesting that we are only hearing about Teslas freezing up. I wonder if that's simply reporting bias, or if they really are uniquely susceptible to extreme cold.
It'll be interesting to hear Tesla's explanation for this, if they ever provide one.
At any rate, my Nissan has fired right up on the first try every morning for the past week. We're having the kind of cold where, if I were driving the Miata, the shifter would be noticeably stiff, and if you pushed it to the left or right (while in neutral), it'd just stay there.
Personally, a 50 mile EV with AWD and decent ground clearance would work fine as an only car for me.
The fact that I presently own two vehicles is purely an indulgence. I require the Juke (or something like it), however I also desire to have the Miata for when it's above freezing.
Yeah, that's been making the rounds.
I'm really quite puzzled by this, as I had thought that Teslae had built-in battery heaters, thus enabling charging at sub-freezing temps.
It's also interesting that we are only hearing about Teslas freezing up. I wonder if that's simply reporting bias, or if they really are uniquely susceptible to extreme cold.
It'll be interesting to hear Tesla's explanation for this, if they ever provide one.
At any rate, my Nissan has fired right up on the first try every morning for the past week. We're having the kind of cold where, if I were driving the Miata, the shifter would be noticeably stiff, and if you pushed it to the left or right (while in neutral), it'd just stay there.
I believe the problem comes from trying to use the supercharging feature, where it rapidly dumps massive ah of charge in a very short period of time. The battery can only accept it if its been thermally conditioned. I suspect the Tesla cars could accept a significantly lower charge rate without strict conditioning requirements, but no one has the time to wait for that slower charge in such cold conditions, and accordingly, other EV makes without such a high supercharge capability would likely not be suffering and triggering these news stories.
IMO a 200hp EV with 50-60 mile range and a tiny 50hp motorcycle engine for longer trip would be perfect for most people. Small battery and you still get the gas engine for longer trips
IMHO, a very decent and capable car has already been built, marketed, and retired !! You can still get a used one fairly easily though. I've mentioned the car here before; it's the Chevy Volt, 2nd gen preferably. It is a pure battery electric car with an on board ICE to run the generator. It has a plug-in battery range of 53m before it switches on the ICE and powers the battery. Gas mileage with the ICE is right around 42mpg, so with a 9 gallon gas tank it adds another 375 miles of range on top of the 53 from the plug in charge. I drove one home to the SF east bay area from a Socal dealer (Rydell in Northridge) at 75-80 mph without stopping for gas and still had plenty of range to spare. My wife used it for a few years and then my son took it over. A little over 7 years old now, it's got 130K miles on it and it still runs flawlessly. Current battery range is down less than 10% from new. Still on original brakes due to regen braking too. I have no clue why they cancelled the car, or why they never properly promoted it. Most people have no idea it is a pure electric with a tidy little 1.5L I-4 onboard generator. It has plenty of power to get up and go (0-60 in 7.5 sec) with just shy of 300 lb.ft. of torque. Why reinvent the wheel? These are out there. 90+ % of your daily driving is covered completely by the plug-in charge, and for longer trips, no rental is required.
Agreed, the Volt and (more expensively) BMW i3 are like that.
The problem with the "small battery and small gas motor" is that when you run out of battery juice you're now driving a massively underpowered car around with the battery being nothing but dead weight. So yes, technically you CAN take it on road trips, but the experience sucks.
Agreed, the Volt and (more expensively) BMW i3 are like that.
'member when the California Air Resource Board required BMW to de-rate the capacity of the i3's fuel tank in software (which it then did for the entire US market), so that it could only utilize 1.9 gallons' worth of capacity in the tank, rather than the full 2.4 gallon capacity which was available to owners in literally every other country?
Yeah, those were good times.
Originally Posted by codrus
The problem with the "small battery and small gas motor" is that when you run out of battery juice you're now driving a massively underpowered car around with the battery being nothing but dead weight. So yes, technically you CAN take it on road trips, but the experience sucks.
A reasonably aerodynamic sedan requires about 25hp to maintain a steady 65 MPH.
25hp is what a typical 250cc single-cylinder motorcycle engine produces.
I may have the opportunity to transition to a job which does not tie me to one specific area. The role would be largely travel-oriented, so I could live pretty much anywhere I wanted, provided that I'm not too far from a major airport.
I have never faced this kind of choice before. Being able to actually decide where I'd like to live.
I'd like suggestions on places to live within the continental US which are relatively cheap, preferably with decent weather, and not far from a major airport. Let's say within a one hour drive or train ride.
Places like Detroit or New Orleans are disqualified for what should be obvious reasons. But that doesn't mean I'm closed to suggestions such as Vegas or Little Rock.
Location: Detroit (the part with no rules or laws)
Posts: 5,677
Total Cats: 800
Personally i'd live in or around Knoxville. Charlotte would be a close second.
Outside of that somewhat central eastern US area, probably the panhandle of FL.
A good friend’s son has lived in Charlotte for about 8 years, and is really happy there. Winter is pretty mild and not too long, summer is hot but not Florida/AZ hot. I understand the airport is decent, too - especially compared to the big 3 in greater NY.
I lived just outside Columbia SC for a year in the 1990’s. That was pretty nice, too- especially after living through New England winters my whole life. I understand that Columbia can take the occasional beating from hurricane season, if that’s a concern. I’ve been playing with the idea of moving to the Charleston area. It’s a great place if we can find something hurricane-safe and affordable.
OK, so that's one ban issued for recommending Buffalo, NY here.
Those of you recommending the NC / TN area all seem to be from New England or the middle east, insofar as your profile data is concerned.
I grew up in FL, and lived briefly in coastal NC. Also very familiar with Nashville.
I wouldn't have intuitively gone to any of those places. But I'm open to the notion that my prior experiences were either incomplete or biased in some way.
A bunch of folks I know from work have gone to the greater Vegas area, like Henderson, and seem to like it. My next door neighbors in Maine moved to Tucson, and have an excellent home in the foothills. I like the desert, but not enough to live there.
I live on the coast of Maine. The weather can kind of suck sometimes, mostly right about now, but being able to look at the ocean while drinking my coffee every morning makes it better.
Given the flexibility you noted in the job offer, Joe, is there a particular reason you would want/need to live in a single location? You could choose certain seasons of the year to live in one location (that might be less preferable for all seasons) and then spend the rest of the year in another locale entirely. Seems like it might make the list of options a bit bigger if you didn't have to write off certain places because of seasonality issues.
I moved to NC from PA 8 years ago and live about an hour North of Charlotte and 30 minutes South of Winston-Salem. I wanted to get away from the harsh winters and road salt of PA and be close to the mountains and beach. I do a lot of mountain driving for recreation and some of the best roads in the country are located within a couple hours or less. I've never lived in a small town prior to moving here, previously living in Pittsburgh, Los Angeles, and Minneapolis. I've come to enjoy not having any traffic and not having to deal with crowds of people everywhere like I have in the past. I enjoy a low cost of living here with property taxes less than half of the cost they were in PA for my modest 1200sq 1 car garage house compared to my 2100sq house here in NC with a 2 car attached and 28x36 detached garage/shop. Interstates 77/40/85 are all within a 10-30 minute drive away so it makes traveling very easy. CLT is an hour and 5 minutes, and GSO is 45 minutes away so flying isn't bad either. The ski areas are 1:30 hours away and the beach is 3:30 hours away. VIR is 1:50 away, CMP is 2:15 away, and they are building a road course at the Charlotte Motor Speedway in Concord 50 minutes away.
Given the flexibility you noted in the job offer, Joe, is there a particular reason you would want/need to live in a single location?
Now that is an interesting question.
In all my years in this business, I have only ever known one person who was genuinely 100% homeless. This fella works as a commissioner and trainer for Ross (manufacturer of video equipment), and spends probably 90% of his time on business travel. He accumulates airline miles and hotel points at a sufficiently rapid rate than when he does have a few days where nothing is going on, he can arbitrarily choose to spend that time wherever he wants. Scotland, Vietnam, Egypt, Japan, Yellowstone... He has that kind of freedom.
In my case, if I do go forward with this (still a big IF), I'd probably be traveling less than 50% of the time. So I probably would not be able to fund that sort of lifestyle, and would need a semi-permanent place to live when I'm not on the road. Basically the same arrangement I was in during the 2000-2010 decade.
There are plenty of tiny little towns in OH and KY where a single-wide on a half acre costs $30k, and you're within an hour of CVG.
Ditto places like Arkansas and Tenn, though all else being equal, I have somewhat of a preference not to be in the south-eastern US.
I'm wondering about states like OK, NM, etc., which are generally known for extreme poverty, sunny weather, and little else...
01-09-2024, 10:06 AM
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