Musk endeavours

[BobbyD]

British cave explorer demands $190m in damages from Elon Musk over 'pedo guy' comment

- https://www.theguardian.com/technology/ ... uy-damages

A touch optimistic I'd imagine, still seems like a pointless risk to take, and this sort of coverage isn't making driving a Tesla any cooler.

[odysseus2000]

How many folk do you need to talk to get an impression on quality and performance?

...

In the end none of us know the future, it is all about probability.

Regards,

More than one that's for sure! I know precisely 2 people with an electric car. One is ambivalent, happy with the purchase but none more so than previous car purchases. The other underwhelmed, doesn't like the lack of noise, and hates the lack of charging points relative to the numerous petrol stations. Let's be generous and call that a 1-1 draw. Now if I went about making claims that 50% of electric car adopters hate electric cars I would rightly be laughed at for making a ridiculous extrapolation.

I have no axe to grind in this fight, I am not long or short any car companies as an investment, "new" or "old", but frankly the level of argument consistently made on this thread is far below the level of serious and hardly above childish at times.

You in particular will make claims about "probability" yet argue like it's binary! All of which is a shame as this thread should, for me, be about learning new things, which sadly is more difficult than it needs to be.

I welcome all contributions & if you have new things that you want to learn about then ask & see what answers you get.

However, remember this is all about investment which is about emotion which is fickle & changes in a moment & is manipulated by everyone.

Investment/trading is unlike most other human endeavours in that there are no rules, no laws & total uncertainty about the future, the closest analogues are politics & war.

My basic argument is that there is a secular change taking place from ICE to BEV & imho that is now unstoppable & it will hurt legacy & make a lot of money for Tesla equity holders.

In parallel with that there is a secular change taking place from fossil & nuclear generation to renewables & storage & that too I believe is unstoppable & will make even more money for Tesla.

Coming along shortly too are two other secular changes: Robotics & AI, the latter will also imho make a shed load of money for Tesla.

If you study industrial revolutions you find that the folk riding the new wave nearly always destroy legacy.

If you don't believe me then why am I wrong?

If as many folk here believe that Porsche can continue to make huge margins from ICE whilst developing BEV & selling it at -ve margins then fine.

My own experience from practical business that I run is that unless you have some very deep moat, like Apple, then large margins bring competitors. Porsche imho would be better off lowering prices to keep competitors at bay, but they are imho getting greedy & that sin is usually punished in capitalism.

Still, what do you believe, where do you think the largest equity gains can be made?

Regards,

[odysseus2000]

Musk wins defamation case against diver:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-50695593

Regards,

[redsturgeon]

EV drivers can charge for free at Tesco:

https://www.fleetnews.co.uk/news/enviro ... e-at-tesco

Every little helps

RC

Great idea from Tesco. The elephant in the room? What's your chances of turning up and actually finding a charging point that's vacant? Close to zero, I reckon.

RVF

At the start a good chance but as BEV takes off perhaps less so. There are three Tesla charging points at my local Sainsburys, I have only one seen all three occupied.

John

[redsturgeon]

Musk wins defamation case against diver:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-50695593

Regards,

I think the verdict might have gone the other way in a UK court. It seems wrong that you can call someone a "pedo". Then challenge them to "sue if its not true". But then argue that you didn't really mean it.

I guess if you are a billionaire fighting against an impecunious diver trying to help some trapped children then you have an advantage in court.

Not an edifying spectacle.

I guess the lesson is, never insult a billionaire.

John

[kiloran]

At the start a good chance but as BEV takes off perhaps less so. There are three Tesla charging points at my local Sainsburys, I have only one seen all three occupied.

John

A local shopping centre has a couple of Tesla charging points, and I usually see a Tesla there on my weekly shop, but I have NEVER seen it actually plugged in

--kiloran

[BobbyD]

EV drivers can charge for free at Tesco:

https://www.fleetnews.co.uk/news/enviro ... e-at-tesco

Every little helps

RC

Great idea from Tesco. The elephant in the room? What's your chances of turning up and actually finding a charging point that's vacant? Close to zero, I reckon.

RVF

At the start a good chance but as BEV takes off perhaps less so. There are three Tesla charging points at my local Sainsburys, I have only one seen all three occupied.

John

It is not impossible that as BEV's become more popular more charging stations will be installed...

100 of the 600 installations planned by VW/Tesco are already in place so that's another 500 to come and the more there are the less likely you are to go to store A rather than store B on the grounds that store A has a charger.

VW's calculation given the average Brit spends 50 minutes in the supermarket is that you'll be able to pick up 22 miles of range during an average trolley dash, so great if you are a very low mileage user but unlikely to be anything more than another 'little' to help for most users. Perhaps a coffee and a snack while we add another 10 miles? Would be nice to see some higher rate chargers made available on a meter though. Being able to add a couple of hundred miles every week, at a reserved spot, while you did your shopping would probably be enough for a lot of users who don't have home access charging.

Two trends which are at loggerheads are the increasing use of car park management companies and provision of electric charging. It was, from memory, BP who introduced a 30 minute maximum stay on one of their forecourts enforced by a 3rd party to stop people using their parking for nearby attractions and introduced a chargemaster on the same site. Apparently people don't like being charged £100 for using the facilities you provided as intended. Less of a problem in supermarkets because we are talking about a free charger in this case, and average stay is longer, our local Waitrose has a 2 hour limit although they charge for charging.

[redsturgeon]

It is not impossible that as BEV's become more popular more charging stations will be installed...

You don't say!

My belief however is that charging stations will be playing catch up for a few years yet.

Personally I don't have too much of an issue with that. I have a 7kw charger on my drive so I will keep my cars charged up. I foresee only a few times a year needing to wait at a motorway charging point for a really long journey.

I would probably always drive by any supermarket station and pull in if it is free for a quick top up while shopping.

John

[BobbyD]

It is not impossible that as BEV's become more popular more charging stations will be installed...

You don't say!

My belief however is that charging stations will be playing catch up for a few years yet.

I'd say there was an outside chance!

Is charging infrastructure actually lagging? It would appear from very scant evidence that there is capacity waiting for use rather than cars desperately seeking charge. Maybe it's more of an ill fit than an imbalance?

[Howard]

It is not impossible that as BEV's become more popular more charging stations will be installed...

You don't say!

My belief however is that charging stations will be playing catch up for a few years yet.

I'd say there was an outside chance!

Is charging infrastructure actually lagging? It would appear from very scant evidence that there is capacity waiting for use rather than cars desperately seeking charge. Maybe it's more of an ill fit than an imbalance?

Yes, because of Ody's enthusiasm we tend to think that BEVs are fairly common. They have only just reached a market share of 1.5% of new cars sold in the UK year to date. Their share of the whole UK car fleet is infinitesimally small at the moment.

And, by the way, who spends 50 minutes in a supermarket? I don't think I have ever spent that long for a visit in my life. If I go with Mrs H, she takes no more than half an hour for a weekly shop. I'm a bit scared to go in one on my own, but have been known to drop in for 5 minutes or so.

regards

Howard

[tjh290633]

As it happens, I do our regular weekly shop on Saturday morning, usually, at about 8am. It usually takes about an hour. Were I to take my wife along it would take twice as long. This is down to her speed of walking, a random approach to going round the store, and the inevitable gazing at things not on the shopping list.

There is a 3 hour parking limit at our local Tesco. I see that Lidl allow 1.5 hours. I visited under protest a few days ago.

TJH

[odysseus2000]

New revenue stream for Tesla, copying the Apple model of charging for services:

https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-premium ... tion-cost/

With say currently 700k Tesla cars on the roads and a 10% take up, this would equate to 70k x10 x 12 = $8.4 million a year & increasing as the number of Tesla cars rises. 10% take up probably a bit pessimistic given how folk now have trouble living without the internet. There will be some collection overhead that will probably require people although synthetics are now very close to being capable of dealing with most of the overhead issues.

Regards,

[odysseus2000]

My shopping tends to be late in the evening, often after 9 pm as I am too busy the rest of the day.

At that time in my local stores there are often more shelf packers than customers and often perishable stuff has been marked down such that I often get bread at 5p a loaf. There is some competition for this but as a lot of the late night shoppers are Muslims I can sometimes find coming to end of sell date pork, sausages etc at very good prices as they don't eat it. If my dog is lucky she gets a nice bonanza. There is often low cost cooked chicken put out at around 7-8 pm, but that is too early for me. Although the supermarkets are getting better at inventory management and there is less high end stuff than there used to be. Christmas eve used to be my favourite day for shopping but the happy days of very heavy Christmas eve mark downs seem gone for ever and one has to shop a few days before to do really well which last year brought me some super exterior led lights at about 20% of the initial price.

Given the number of folk about I imagine that if there was free charging it would not be heavily used, but as there are few customers the time needed to shop is relatively small, often the longest part being the self check out as having the luxury of someone else to scan seems to have been mostly removed and often I do something wrong and have to wait for one of the few employees to reset the scanner etc. I have however, found that if I don't use any kind of shopping bag till after I have paid, the check out weighing scale is less awkward and vexing.

Regards,

[BobbyD]

Tesla is worth $10, $250 or $500

- https://ftalphaville.ft.com/2019/12/06/ ... 0-or--500/

Herndon, VA — Volkswagen AG has successfully demonstrated the world’s first live use of quantum computing to help optimize traffic routing. During the Web Summit conference in Lisbon, Portugal, earlier this month, nine public transit buses used a traffic management system developed by Volkswagen scientists in the United States and Germany, powered by a D-Wave quantum computer to calculate the fastest travel routes individually and in near-real time.

- https://media.vw.com/releases/1236

[BobbyD]

A Tesla on Autopilot slammed into two vehicles on Saturday, one of which was a Connecticut State Police cruiser, officials said.

The driver of the Tesla told police that he put the car on Autopilot because he was checking on his dog in the backseat, according to a statement from Connecticut State Police.

The incident happened in the early morning hours Saturday on Interstate 95 in Norwalk.

Police had been called to the highway because of a disabled vehicle that was occupying a lane, authorities said.

As troopers were waiting for a tow truck for that car, the Tesla, described as a 2018 Model 3, was traveling northbound and struck the rear of the cruiser before continuing in the same direction and hitting the disabled vehicle, according to authorities.

The car was finally stopped several hundred feet ahead by another trooper.

- https://abcnews.go.com/US/tesla-autopil ... d=67570199

[Howard]

I see that, at last, the mainstream media have cottoned on to what we sceptics have been saying. Perhaps they have been reading this thread?

In the Times today on page four is an article headed. Chelsea tractors rule the road as SUVs outsell electric cars 37 to 1.

The article quotes a study by the UK Energy Research Centre which points out that BEVs still only account for about 1 percent of new car sales. And gas-guzzling SUVs made up 21% of new car sales, up from 13.5% in 2017. This is an international trend according to the study.

The rapid uptake of unnecessarily large vehicles makes a mockery of UK policy on the environment.

The evidence in the article is repeated in the Times leader column.

The main conclusions match many of our comments. Electric cars must get cheaper and more convenient to be more popular.

See https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news ... -zt0kpsvqv
(Registration necessary)

regards

Howard

[odysseus2000]

I see that, at last, the mainstream media have cottoned on to what we sceptics have been saying. Perhaps they have been reading this thread?

In the Times today on page four is an article headed. Chelsea tractors rule the road as SUVs outsell electric cars 37 to 1.

The article quotes a study by the UK Energy Research Centre which points out that BEVs still only account for about 1 percent of new car sales. And gas-guzzling SUVs made up 21% of new car sales, up from 13.5% in 2017. This is an international trend according to the study.

The rapid uptake of unnecessarily large vehicles makes a mockery of UK policy on the environment.

The evidence in the article is repeated in the Times leader column.

The main conclusions match many of our comments. Electric cars must get cheaper and more convenient to be more popular.

See https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news ... -zt0kpsvqv
(Registration necessary)

regards

Howard

Or ice cars must get more expensive & less convenient.

The beautiful fact is that there is a huge BEV market for the taking!

Regards,

[BobbyD]

I see that, at last, the mainstream media have cottoned on to what we sceptics have been saying. Perhaps they have been reading this thread?

In the Times today on page four is an article headed. Chelsea tractors rule the road as SUVs outsell electric cars 37 to 1.

The article quotes a study by the UK Energy Research Centre which points out that BEVs still only account for about 1 percent of new car sales. And gas-guzzling SUVs made up 21% of new car sales, up from 13.5% in 2017. This is an international trend according to the study.

The rapid uptake of unnecessarily large vehicles makes a mockery of UK policy on the environment.

The evidence in the article is repeated in the Times leader column.

The main conclusions match many of our comments. Electric cars must get cheaper and more convenient to be more popular.

See https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news ... -zt0kpsvqv
(Registration necessary)

regards

Howard

SMMT have BEV's at 1.5% for the year but 3.0% in November, with PHEV at 2.8% and HEV at 4.5%. All told that's 10.3%.

That 1.5% was 0.6% last year.

Makes you wonder what has changed in 12 months. That's 18,941 extra BEV's and other imports only runs to 11,762.

There's a theory that BEV sales in the US might spike this month as their tax year runs Jan 1st to Dec 31st, so tax rebates are closer at hand for those who buy in December.

Or ice cars must get more expensive & less convenient.

Both are pretty much nailed on as far as I can see. ICE emissions standards are scheduled to keep tightening, r&d on ICE is scheduled to grind to a halt and there will eventually be a loss of scale, and the e-Citigo IV is coming.

VW agree:



- https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EK9JGufWwAAP6NF.jpg:large

Original presentation here: https://www.volkswagenag.com/presence/i ... adshow.pdf

[Meatyfool]

What is lost to a great many "ordinary" people is that they could have an electric car now, but are scared away by reports about charging infrastructure.

If it is a second car that is only used for a short commute, runs to the shops etc, has a charger at home with off-road parking, then it is a no-brainer to go electric.

There must be more than a million cars on the road that fit that description.

Meatyfool..

[BobbyD]

What is lost to a great many "ordinary" people is that they could have an electric car now, but are scared away by reports about charging infrastructure.

If it is a second car that is only used for a short commute, runs to the shops etc, has a charger at home with off-road parking, then it is a no-brainer to go electric.

There must be more than a million cars on the road that fit that description.

Meatyfool..

I would imagine one of the major hurdles is that most people don't know anybody with a BEV. Being the first in to the sea always carries a certain risk. Once John has been very happy with his BEV for 6 months and Jane's eldest won't shut up about how much she loves not paying for petrol anymore, people will feel more confident atleast considering a BEV.

For those more resistant possibly an ICE with a training battery will help, and of course there are some who would rather walk than buy an ICE, but I suspect that will diminish with time.