Musk endeavours

[odysseus2000]

Anyone of you peeps read this? Musk gets a really bad press.

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2019/08 ... ity?inline

Perhaps you have heard it all before, but it doesn't sound good.

Always money in feeding the folk who loathe Musk and no matter what someone does there will be folk who hate that person: Christ was crucified.

Doubt it has any significant effect.

Regards,

[onthemove]

I really do hope this happens quickly as it would stem the appalling death and injury rates on roads around the world.

Expectations do need to be managed though. Accidents certainly won't be eliminated.

Sure, a self driving car should be less prone to lapses in concentration or falling asleep.

So in some ways, it's true that there is an expectation of safety improvement. But that expectation needs to be managed in that improvement doesn't mean perfection.

Any net improvement over humans would still be beneficial.

The obvious example... of course we all slow down when going along a narrow road with cars parked either side, or passing a bus. But let's be honest, none of us slow right down such we could guarantee that if an unseen child suddenly darted out from between them straight into our path at the worst possible moment, we would be able to completely avoid any contact at all.

And AD cars will have in some situations to strike similar balances.

That's not to say that technology isn't already being developed to see around corners... (without 5g networks or any other connectivity)

e.g.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/ ... nd-corners
https://www.newsweek.com/artificial-int ... -ai-680698

Or the other obvious example... pavements at the sides of the road where pedestrians normally and fully visibly walk in close proximity to traffic.. if a pedestrian, without looking at all, suddenly decided to dart into the road, sideways without first turning and standing facing the road, it's unlikely most drivers would be able to avoid a collision.

A pedestrian determined to get hit by a human driven car wouldn't have any problem bringing the situation about.

That said, I believe that waymo is modelling the normal expected behaviour of different categories of other road users, etc... like pedestrians, cyclists, etc, and would probably be able to quickly recognise when one of these entities isn't behaving as normal per their category, and give them a wider berth. (One of their presentations a few years ago showed a video where the AD had identified a cyclist and held back in expectation that the behaviour of the cyclist would be to move out to go around a parked car)

When driving we're balancing our judgements based on a reasonable expectation of the behaviour of those around us, rather than always accommodating the worst case possibility.

In reality AD cars will have to make similar such balances... but not any more so than already done by human drivers.

[BobbyD]

Anyone of you peeps read this? Musk gets a really bad press.

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2019/08 ... ity?inline

Perhaps you have heard it all before, but it doesn't sound good.

Always money in feeding the folk who loathe Musk and no matter what someone does there will be folk who hate that person: Christ was crucified.

Somebody else who failed to produce electric cars profitably and never implemented a safe and responsible policy on AD development. Musk should pay heed.

[odysseus2000]

Million mile batteries?

https://seekingalpha.com/article/429140 ... le-battery

Regards,

[odysseus2000]

Some interesting performance and price comparisons between the new electric Porsche and Tesla cars:

https://seekingalpha.com/article/429150 ... nstoppable

Regards,

[odysseus2000]

onthemove
When driving we're balancing our judgements based on a reasonable expectation of the behaviour of those around us, rather than always accommodating the worst case possibility.

In reality AD cars will have to make similar such balances... but not any more so than already done by human drivers.

Yes, I concur that there will always be accidents based on risk assessment.

However, if robotic is driving fulfils its potential the number of accidents caused by emotions should decline.

E.g. robotic systems will not be distracted by having something else on their mind, wanting to check and or send a text, seeing a pretty person...

I do not know what % of accidents are caused by these kinds of emotional distraction, but as things now are there about 3000 deaths and serious injuries per year on UK roads.

A 10% reduction means about 1 person per day is no longer a traffic statistic, if this is someone you love or yourself, it is very significant.

Regards,

[dspp]

"Britain-based motoring publication What Car?‘s recent Reliability Survey included a rather surprising addition this year. Amidst the magazine’s Top 10 list of most reliable carmakers in the UK lies Tesla at No.4 ..........Tesla ranked 4th place with an overall score of 96.9%. ........Overall, Tesla was only exceeded by a trifecta of Japanese brands comprised of Lexus (99.3%), Toyota (97.7%), and Suzuki (97.3%)"

https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-4th-mos ... 9-results/

regards, dspp

[Howard]

dspp

It pays to read the detail rather than just accept Tesla fans' opinions. As a non-engineer I'm surprised that you didn't drill down a little.

If you read the Whatcar report you will see that it says

"A four-year/50,000-mile warranty is standard, while the battery is covered for eight years, no matter how many miles you do. Plus, Tesla’s wireless software updates fix glitches and add features while you're asleep, rather than requiring you to book your car into a dealer.

It's good that the warranty is so impressive, because our latest reliability survey makes pretty grim reading for Tesla. The American manufacturer finished third from bottom in our list of 32 manufacturers, while the Model S was the least reliable electric car."

So actually, like the "Which" survey Tesla scores very badly on reliability when compared with other car manufacturers.

regards

Howard

See:

https://www.whatcar.com/tesla/model-s/h ... ing-owning

[Howard]

Obviously JLR aren't a big player in electric cars yet and their CEO will have an angle to promote, but what he says in this article is an interesting view of the future.

He makes the point that in the UK there is a need to improve the charging infrastructure to encourage motorists to switch to electric cars.

https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/indu ... eaper-soon

Personally I'd be very happy with a range of 200 miles for a second car. Particularly if topping up charging is quick and easy.

regards

Howard

[redsturgeon]

Personally I'd be very happy with a range of 200 miles for a second car. Particularly if topping up charging is quick and easy.

regards

Howard

Me too, I think the range factor is obviously a bigger issue in the USA than somewhere compact and densely populated like England.

John

[odysseus2000]

Obviously JLR aren't a big player in electric cars yet and their CEO will have an angle to promote, but what he says in this article is an interesting view of the future.

He makes the point that in the UK there is a need to improve the charging infrastructure to encourage motorists to switch to electric cars.

https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/indu ... eaper-soon

Personally I'd be very happy with a range of 200 miles for a second car. Particularly if topping up charging is quick and easy.

regards

Howard

Let me translate:

We can't make cars with longer range and the ones we do make are very inefficient compared to Tesla. So rather than spending some money on engineering and/or license Tesla batteries and power trains and fix our issues we have to emphasise that it is not our engineers and capital allocation that are at fault but the government for not providing enough electric points.

Tata management should sack him now and appoint someone who hasn't got lazyitus. He is talking like every UK motor boss I ever knew and as they fiddled the UK car industry collapsed. Watch out Tata, learn from history!

Regards,

[Howard]

Ody

Here's another article to get your teeth into.

We've discussed some of these VW issues, but this is a good summary of their BEV plans.

https://seekingalpha.com/article/429178 ... attle?dr=1

regards

Howard

[odysseus2000]

Ody

Here's another article to get your teeth into.

We've discussed some of these VW issues, but this is a good summary of their BEV plans.

https://seekingalpha.com/article/429178 ... attle?dr=1

regards

Howard

Ok here is my translation:

We are making shed loads from our ice cars, all the machinery is depreciating nicely & we can run it down & not bother with anymore capex. But we need to give the impression that we are going into heavy BEV production, so let's trumpet one factory with modest capacity, which we won't use fully & as we can't make batteries we will sub contract to other folk making batteries that were good for a few years ago, no sense trying to match Tesla battery tech which is way better. We will sell these low range vehicles on price to folk who believe our marketing & in the mean time we will go to our favourite gods & pray that Tesla make some very bad errors. If they do then great, if not we will buy BMW & use that rescue as an excuse not to get too serious about BEV for many more years & we will lobby our politicians to avoid any painful carbon taxes & pray they listen. Those swines are Tesla have put us in a real fix here, but with luck & lobbying we won't get hurt too much so long as the Chinese don't start under cutting us, in which case we will go to our politicians & ask for big tarrifs.

Regards,

[BobbyD]

Ody

Here's another article to get your teeth into.

We've discussed some of these VW issues, but this is a good summary of their BEV plans.

https://seekingalpha.com/article/429178 ... attle?dr=1

regards

Howard

Ok here is my translation:

We are making shed loads from our ice cars, all the machinery is depreciating nicely & we can run it down & not bother with anymore capex. But we need to give the impression that we are going into heavy BEV production, so let's trumpet one factory with modest capacity, which we won't use fully & as we can't make batteries we will sub contract to other folk making batteries that were good for a few years ago, no sense trying to match Tesla battery tech which is way better. We will sell these low range vehicles on price to folk who believe our marketing & in the mean time we will go to our favourite gods & pray that Tesla make some very bad errors. If they do then great, if not we will buy BMW & use that rescue as an excuse not to get too serious about BEV for many more years & we will lobby our politicians to avoid any painful carbon taxes & pray they listen. Those swines are Tesla have put us in a real fix here, but with luck & lobbying we won't get hurt too much so long as the Chinese don't start under cutting us, in which case we will go to our politicians & ask for big tarrifs.

Regards,

I have to admire your dedication Ody. Poking out both of your eyes takes some dedication.

You've got VW exactly the wrong way round. They don't see BEV's as a threat. VW have scale and a massive R&D budget. They make 10 million cars a year. Their R&D isn't just sector leading, it is world leading. Expensive new technology with complicated supply lines isn't a threat to VW it is an opportunity.

The people it's a threat to are the competition. They have less scale. They have less money. The risk for them is far greater. Unless they buy in the technology... Like say Ford, who rather than develop their own technology have asked VW for 600,000 units of MEB.

If the ID3 is low range so is the model 3...

Zwickau's modest capacity is higher than Tesla's total capacity, and that's the first European factory. There will be more, as well as plants in China and America.

...and unlike Tesla VW actually own a piece of a battery company.

If BEV's fail it will be more expensive for VW than dieselgate.

[BobbyD]

Elon Musk claims he didn't intend to accuse British diver of pedophilia

Elon Musk is continuing to try to wriggle his way out of a defamation lawsuit, claiming in a court filing on Monday that a tweet labeling a British diver “pedo guy” was not meant to actually accuse him of pedophilia.

...Musk responded with a series of erratic tweets calling Unsworth a “pedo guy”. He later called him a “child rapist” in emails to a BuzzFeed reporter.

Musk’s lawyers have argued these statements were simply insults, not accusations.

...“There is no evidence that Mr Musk intended or believed that his July 15 tweets, that Mr Unsworth was ‘sus’ or ‘pedo guy’, would be interpreted as fact,” the filing said. “To the contrary, the evidence is that Mr Musk believed and intended his statements to be read as what they were: bare insults.”

...This defense comes despite follow-up tweets from Musk, which said “bet you a signed dollar it’s true”, implying he indeed believed Unsworth was a pedophile. Lawyers for Musk said said in Monday’s court filing that while his initial tweets were intended as a joke, he continued to call Unsworth a “pedo guy” in subsequent tweets because of “disturbing information” allegedly uncovered in a private investigation funded by Musk himself.

“The investigator reported that Mr Unsworth was a fixture in Pattaya Beach, Thailand – a locale notorious for prostitution and child trafficking, that he had a taste for young Thai girls, that he whoremongered his way through the go-go bars of Thailand, that his only friends were his ‘sexpat’ peers, and that he married his Thai wife when she was a teenager, after starting a relationship when she was a young girl,” the response from Musk’s lawyers reads.

- https://www.theguardian.com/technology/ ... weet-diver

[odysseus2000]

VW have a factory which they believe will have a capacity of 330,000 BEV cars per year, but don't expect to use all of it for their cars.

So at best this represents 330,000/10,000,000 = 3.3% BEV out of total capacity.

It is a token effort designed to look good to regulators & politicians with claimed ranges that won't be met in practice to make sure their ice cars keep selling.

Regards,

[BobbyD]

VW have a factory which they believe will have a capacity of 330,000 BEV cars per year, but don't expect to use all of it for their cars.

So at best this represents 330,000/10,000,000 = 3.3% BEV out of total capacity.

It is a token effort designed to look good to regulators & politicians with claimed ranges that won't be met in practice to make sure their ice cars keep selling.

Regards,

If they are producing 330k BEV's what does it matter what proportion of their total output that makes up?

Could you explain how they are going to keep their crown in China without selling BEV's out there?

UFC Fighter Plays Smash While His Tesla Drives Itself

- Lee posted a video of himself yesterday driving to Montréal, his Tesla in control as he stuck a Nintendo Switch to his windscreen and played some Smash.

- https://kotaku.com/ufc-fighter-plays-sm ... 1838164053

[odysseus2000]

BobbyD

If they are producing 330k BEV's what does it matter what proportion of their total output that makes up?

Could you explain how they are going to keep their crown in China without selling BEV's out there?

Because it illustrates that VW are not aiming to go BEV, just to make enough to keep the politicians happy so that they can keep flogging ICE.

VW are now up against several Chinese makers who will want as much of the Chinese and European market that they can get and Chinese will compete on price and quality.

Regards,

[tjh290633]

BobbyD

If they are producing 330k BEV's what does it matter proportion of their total output that makes up?

Could you explain how they are going to keep their crown in China without selling BEV's out there?

Because it illustrates that VW are not aiming to go BEV, just to make enough to keep the politicians happy so that they can keep flogging ICE.

VW are now up against several Chinese makers who will want as much of the Chinese and European market that they can get and Chinese will compete on price and quality.

Regards,

Rubbish. It just means that they see a gradual and perhaps only partial transition to battery powered vehicles. Don't forget that hydrogen is a possible and more attractive alternative.

TJH

[BobbyD]

BobbyD

If they are producing 330k BEV's what does it matter proportion of their total output that makes up?

Could you explain how they are going to keep their crown in China without selling BEV's out there?

Because it illustrates that VW are not aiming to go BEV, just to make enough to keep the politicians happy so that they can keep flogging ICE.

VW are now up against several Chinese makers who will want as much of the Chinese and European market that they can get and Chinese will compete on price and quality.

Regards,

Rubbish. It just means that they see a gradual and perhaps only partial transition to battery powered vehicles. Don't forget that hydrogen is a possible and more attractive alternative.

TJH

It's almost like they are planning to scale their BEV production to BEV demand, increasing their production as BEV becomes more widespread at the same time advancing the development of the market through the scale and expertise they bring, and using a phased transition to avoid significant disruption to their overall output...

Still, as the thought processes of a profitable company I can see why the Teslarati have difficulty understanding the idea. I guess we should acknowledge progress though. we've moved from a counter argument of VW's BEV's are all vapourware which will they will never produce to they are only going to produce more BEV's than anybody else has managed so far...