Another quality VERGE article i see…
Pure poetry from AndyJHawk:
Like the Honda e before it, it’s a vehicle too tiny for America’s truck-shaped digestive system.
This isn’t software that is exclusive to EVs.
Look into used Bolt EVs, many are in the 12-14k range after tax credit, 230 miles on a charge, no bells and whistles, drives great. Many have new batteries after the recall that happened a few years ago.
How many clues have been spilled here to show s/he is american?
The article specifies a JD Power study, which is an American institution. Seems obvious enough…
Why is the preview pic two politicians kissing aggresively
I own a Mach e. Seeing Ford that high is terrifying to think how bad it can get because as high as Ford is on that list, it sucks pretty bad.
I think a big part of the issue is that the Chinese market is fucking huge, and the Chinese market also seems to love gimmicky software crap in their cars, and often emphasizes that over hardware features and other general aspects of, you know, being a car. It’s an unfortunate and obnoxious case of carmakers following the money.
Thanks to badly written software, you can literally design “planned obsolescence” into your products.
“The computer says you need to replace your 15,000 dollar battery pack.”
“But my car is only six months old!”
“Yeah, but the Computer SAYS-”
Maybe if they’d focus more on making them functional vehicles instead of smartphones on wheels, it would simplify that problem.
Exactly! Like, take a basic car, and make it an EV. It doesn’t need to be a spaceship. I just need speed, charge level, maybe a tach or electrical load indicator, and a range estimator, all of which already exist on a basic car’s dash. The head unit can remain a separate device that connects to my phone for navigation and phone. That’s it.
Like the Ami, but just enough bigger and faster to accommodate out of town commutes?
Yep!
I’ve seen enough EV conversions to know it’s not rocket science. The instrument cluster just displays the values relayed to it over CAN bus, most of the sensors are the same as they are on a conventional ICE vehicle, and the only real difference is the powertrain. There’s some consideration for the battery placement and management, but that’s pretty much it. Leave the touchscreens in the backseat for the kids, and give me physical buttons to operate the vehicle.
…but then how will they rent you services like heated seats?
They need to be able to turn cars into a glorified gacha machine so that they can make money from Whales, too! /s
Unless there’s major pushback from car buyers in the next 10 years, I’m going to be holding on to my 2017 hybrid for as long as possible. May even look into doing an EV conversion on it or possibly some aftermarket way to make it a plug-in hybrid (there is a plug-in hybrid version of my car, and I’ve been looking to trade-in for that, but I cannot find any within 250 miles of me).
The bed is starting to rot off my 1999 truck, I’m not sure how or if I should repair it
Replacing the bed isn’t too bad if you have someone to help you lift it on/off and you can find a donor in good shape. I had to pull the bed off my old beater truck to replace the fuel pump, and did the work myself (plus an extra set of hands to lift the bed on/off, naturally) On that one, it was only like 6 bolts holding it down. Hardest part was that two were seized up and had to drill them out (and replace the bolts afterward).
Finding the replacement is what worries me.
Well that and if the bed is going how is the frame
Yeah, my 2004 not-quite beater truck came to its end that way. The frame rusted out where the leaf spring shackle attached, and there’s no real way to fix that. Surprised I was able to drive it as long as I did with it like that (it was my daily driver at the time lol).
For my OG beater truck, I got a lot of its body parts from a local salvage yard. Some of the parts I got were rusted in the same spots as mine, just less so (e.g. the quarter panels on S10s were notorious for rusting out).
The frame rusted out where the leaf spring shackle attached, and there’s no real way to fix that.
There is always a solution that involves welding, but unless someone is able to do it themselves odds are it would be far more expensive than finding another used vehicle in better shape.
I’ve been calling them McMansions on wheels, but considering how much tracking they do, I may start using your analogy.
Wish I could take credit for the term, lol, but I heard it elsewhere.
A friend bought a new BMW, with all the bells and whistles. The app for the car is like a game, where you have to subscribe to get the juicy content.
You can subscribe to different feature-packs. They sure made the effort, that the $$$ system works flawlessly.
Like, the app surely is buggy and things may not work as expected, but you only get to try it out, when your money is on their account anyway.
The good news is programming everywhere is garbage.
Nissan leafs and toyota Prius have been around in big numbers for more than a decade.
It’s the enshitiffication that all modern cars are doing: cramming way too much tech into something that is for moving people around, not entertaining them
Yup, I drive a Toyota Prius and am looking at Nissan Leafs. My wife and I hate all the smart crap in cars, and it’s pretty much everywhere now…
don’t make them into smartphones. problem solved, you are welcome auto industry.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Like in past versions of the survey, battery-electric and plug-in hybrid vehicles performed worse than their gas equivalents in just about every repair category measured by JD Power.
“Owners of cutting edge, tech-filled BEVs and PHEVs are experiencing problems that are of a severity level high enough for them to take their new vehicle into the dealership at a rate three times higher than that of gas-powered vehicle owners,” Frank Hanley, senior director of auto benchmarking at JD Power, said in a statement.
JD Power attributes this to major design changes in Teslas, such as the removal of traditional feature controls like turn signal and wiper stalks.
And when car owners try to find relief from terrible native software experiences by mirroring their smartphones, they run into even more obstacles.
Someone who buys a Ram truck every few years is going to report way fewer problems with their experience than someone who is taking a risk on a new brand — or even a new powertrain.
We’re in the midst of a huge shift from traditional gas-powered vehicles to high-powered computers that run on enormous batteries.
The original article contains 600 words, the summary contains 181 words. Saved 70%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
I just want an EV company to make the equivalent of a shitty Toyota Prius.
Chevy Bolt EV/EUV
FYI you can get these relatively cheap from Hertz if you don’t mind the base model. Sure it was a rental, but many of them have <15k miles
Which has been discontinued. They have said they’ll bring back a EUV for the 2026 model year, but we’ll see if that comes to fruition.
General Motors accidentally made a good car so that’s why they had to kill it.
I was pleasantly surprised how good the Bolt was and still liked it after 3 years of leasing it. I was ready to get another one after the lease was over, but the pandemic changed my decision (working from home meant I didn’t really need a nice car and definitely wasn’t driving enough for the price plus-up for EV to make sense, so I got a used beater).
How did you feel about the L3 charging rate? 50kW isn’t super fast.
Barely noticed it. The only time most people would use that are on long road trips, which I only take about twice a year (most of my road trips are between 100-200 miles one way, which can be done with filling up at the destination). So if I used L3, it was for 30 minutes while grabbing lunch on the road and getting half the charge “filled.” 99% of my charging was L2 at home or at destinations.
I bought one just before the end. No ragrets. There are definitely some software quirks (the rear cross traffic alert always points the wrong direction) but overall I like it.
deleted by creator
A Nissan Leaf?
They’re discontinuing it in 2026.
There’s tons on the used market.
They all use Chademo connectors and air cooled batteries. Might be ok for puttering around town or as a commuter car, but that’s about it.
They did say a shitty prius.
That covers like 99% of all private car use.
Sorry, theyre banned here because china made em
