Cars

There are a lot of things to love about the Audi A3e-tron which got a price tag this week. Chief among them is the car’s beautiful looks and almost reasonable $37,500 starting price tag. Unfortunately for the EV enthusiasts amongst us, it has a relatively small battery, unless you are comparing the Prius PHEV. Audi says the 8.8kW hour battery will take the etron around 15-20 miles on a charge (subject to tuning and final EPA testing). That’s not even a tenth of the range of the Tesla Model S and that makes sense since the battery is a tenth of the size.

Audi is also a little ambiguous about when the electric will kick in saying that the ICE will be required to help for high powered situations.

As the owner of a Prius plug-in, this sounds very familiar and it s a big turn off. The ICE ticks on all the time and it is hard to make it a few miles without gas. Hopefully Audi’s controls are a little better.

So for now, think of this as a A3-priced A3 with 17 miles of electric tacked on with a whole lot of powertrain complexity that comes with it. 
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A prototype Model X

It’s no secret the Tesla Model X, which is expected to start delivering this Fall, will come with eye-catching falcon-wing doors. They’re hard to miss, and have gathered most of the new SUV’s press, including taking the blame for some of the vehicle’s delays. But, flying under the radar has been another engineering challenge: a special set of second row seats.

During the February earnings call, Tesla CEO, Elon Musk, had this to say about the seats:

“And then the second row on the Model X… is a sculptural beauty. They’re amazing. They are the nicest second row seats you’ve ever seen in any car ever. That actually might have been harder than the door.”

Musk mentioned the seats again in each of the following two earnings calls. In May, he mentioned them alongside the falcon wing doors as challenges. This week, he mentioned that the seats will be a possible hang-up with some of Tesla’s suppliers.

“I don’t want to sort of name specific suppliers, but our biggest challenges are with the second row seat, which is, it’s an amazing seat, like a sculptural work of art, but a very tricky thing to get right. The falcon-wing door actually seems to probably not be a critical path item.” – Elon Musk, August 5, 2015.

Given these comments from Musk, it should be no surprise that there will be something special about the second row in the Model X. What’s perplexing, though, is why would Tesla be going through so much trouble to design a seat the driver will never sit in? After all, in most parts of the world, it’s the driver who purchases the car, not the passenger. Also, why would a seat be so difficult to design and manufacture to begin with?
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Tesla is hosting their Second Quarter 2015 Financial Results Q&A Conference Call today at 5:30 pm EDT / 2:30 pm PT. Stay tuned here for live updates from the call, or listen live on Tesla’s website.

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Tesla just delivered its shareholder letter where it announced quarterly sales of over 11,000 vehicles. Some highlights:
• Record quarterly deliveries of 11,532 vehicles
• Produced a record 12,807 vehicles, exceeding plan while improving efficiency
• Introduced new Model S variants that improve range, performance and value
• Model X remains on track for start of deliveries in late Q3
• Tesla Energy deliveries set to ramp in Q4
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Those who updated their Tesla Model S app today are seeing a new red button in the upper right hand side called “From Elon”.

Clicking that button brings up the text of the announcement of the affiliate program which we covered last month (full text). From there you can “choose friends” from your contacts list to send invites to set up a Model S and soon a Model X with including your unique affiliate code.

What’s even cooler is that the leaders globally (currently leader is Bjorn from Norway) and local leaders (I’m tied for 1st with 1 in my area!) are also listed, see below.

Oh and don’t forget to get your $1000 off Model S here using my link.

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Tomorrow, Tesla will release their financial results for the second quarter of 2015. Due to their recent policy change of disclosing Model S deliveries right after the end of quarter, the company already confirmed record deliveries of 11,502 cars. The Model S being by far the main source of revenue for Tesla, there shouldn’t be too much of a surprise on the revenue side, but let’s take a look at what to expect:
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Google is currently operating a fleet of Lexus SUVs retrofitted with their self-driving technology – these cars were recently being tested in Austin – but Google is also testing a fleet of prototypes developed in-house from the ground up (picture above). The company’s different approaches to the car business can get confusing and adding to the confusion, according to documents recently obtained by the Guardian, the company created a wholly owned subsidiary to operate their car business – Google Auto.

There are a lot of different reasons for a large corporation to create a subsidiary, but with this being a first for a project coming out of the Google X division, for example the company didn’t create a subsidiary for Google Glass, it raises a few questions.
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Rumor has it that Tesla closed its factory to public tours ahead of Model X production and is set to bring the Model X design studio online any day now to allow reservation holders to place their orders.

Last month, we wrote about Tesla having over 24,000 reservations with deposits for the Model X, or about twice as much as they had for the Model S before its launch in 2012, but now that we are closer to launch, let’s recap what we know about Tesla’s all-electric SUV.
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Apple and BMW have engaged in negotiations over Apple’s interest in using BMW’s i3 electric cars as a basis for its own electric car project, according to a new report from German publication…

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From 9to5Toys.com:

Using your own muscles to propel a bike or skateboard is so played out in 2015. We’ve seen the lightest e-bike on the road and now a group of inventors is showing off “the world lightest” electric vehicle of any kind on Kickstarter.

The Stary Board is enjoying massive success after a few weeks, raising more than double its goal in that time. Weighing in less than most newborn babies at nine pounds, this new skateboard promises fast speeds at a low cost. 
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Ludicrous Speed Badge Mockup by electrek.co. Pre-composite image credit: “Car and Driver”

If you want others to know that your shiny new P90D came with the $10,000 Ludicrous Speed option, have no fear, Tesla is making a special badge for you.

According Tesla spokeswoman, Alexis Georgeson, “badges will be differentiated. P90D will simply be ‘P90D’ and the Ludicrous option will be the same badge with an underline: ‘P90D.'”

The P90D, despite some confusion, will not come with the Ludicrous Speed option (0-60 in 2.8 seconds), by default. Instead it will ship with Insane mode (0-60 in 3.1s), which debuted with the P85D. The base P90D, though likely to be rare, will come with the non-underlined badge.

A report today from Green Car Reports states that the new 2016-ish Prius Plug In Hybrid will go 30-35 miles on a charge. That’s about 3x the current Prius Plug in for which I am a dissatisfied owner. It is also about 50% more than previous estimates on the range extension.

The current version of the Prius Plug-in contains a 4.4kWh battery and is said to go 11 miles on a charge. The charge is provided by a typical wall outlet in about 3 hours or a Level 2 charger in about an hour and a half.  Using our friend math and assuming no radical changes in efficiency (design prototypes above), we can estimate that the new battery will be somewhere between 12 and 15kWh and should be able to charge is around 3-5 hours from a level 2 charger.

The reality, however, is that you can’t go very far on electricity alone in  aPrius Plug-in. We bought ours for around the town driving which would theoretically let our family drive almost exclusively on electricity if we kept to the 11 miles per charge.

The reality is quite different. If you need to go up a steep hill, the ICE will turn on and will stay on for an indeterminate amount of time. If you go over 65 MPH on the highway, the same thing happens. Air conditioning or heat? ICE.

That actually would be fine (as long as the ICE turned off after – which it almost never does) but the ICE turns on at times for no particular reason. I can be driving down a hill regen-ing with no climate control or even windshield wipers going and bam! On comes the ICE.

Overall this has brought the mileage down to near our old, non-plug-in Prius.

And, the 11 miles range is more like 8 miles if you drive really softly. So figure the new Prius will reliably hit 25 miles if it says it can hit 30-35.

I’ve considered doing things like letting the gas run out so the motor could start. Or I’ve hear that the European Firmware for the Prius allows better control of the ICE.

As it stands now, this car shouldn’t be allowed to be called anything more than a normal hybrid. If Toyota doesn’t fix this problem in the 2016-7 model, it doesn’t matter how bit the battery is.

What comes after “Insane Mode?” Well, apparently “Ludicrous Mode.”

In a conference call today, Tesla announced the release of the Model S P90D, an update to already one of the fastest accelerating production cars ever made, the Model S P85D. The vehicle, which is being sold as an upgrade to the still existing P85D, will come with nearly 6% more battery (90kWh from 85kWh) and will accelerate to 60 mph 10% faster (2.8 seconds from 3.1 seconds). According to Tesla, the faster acceleration option will be labeled “Ludicrous Mode” on the vehicle’s center display.
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11:38 There is of course one speed faster than ludicrous, but that is reserved for the next generation Roadster in 4 years: Maximum Plaid! See you later!

(Full Audio below)

11:36 Weight improvements? .20 engineering changes happen per week. Always happening.

11:34 “No one asked for ludicrous mode…it’s too ludicrous” It was Tesla Engineers who wanted it because it is fun and exciting.

11:33: Body redesign for Model S? No comment. Focus is on X. 30% of the car is the same between the cars.
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Update: It would appear that this would be for the Model S and not the X according to Musk who just tweeted this out.

Model S product call at 11 today. Rocket discussion at noon on Monday.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 17, 2015

Tesla sent press invites out last night to select media for a small quick event today at 11am local Pacific time. We won’t be on hand but have heard from a variety of sources on the matter. Only one knows what it is and could only say that it is a “new option”. I’ve been discussing the likelihood that Tesla will announce a 100+kWh pack with Frederic who noted that CEO Elon Musk said in January:

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That’s what a Faraday Future representative told MotorTrend when asked about the reality of launching a car, which is undoubtedly one of the most difficult kind of product to bring to market. The young electric car company, whose name is still only a placeholder, took a small step out of “stealth mode” yesterday to disclose that they are looking for a location, in the US, for a new manufacturing facility.

We first heard of Faraday Future earlier this year after receiving some unconfirmed tips about Apple being involved with the startup company through their secretive vehicle program. Although Apple’s involvement remains unconfirmed, Faraday Future is a very real company.
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If you are a family who lives in snowy weather, you don’t have many EV options. You want an SUV with 4-wheel drive. You want the ability to carry more than 5 people at a time. Maybe you just want to carry more than 5 people or some cargo?

Sure, I know that almost all 7-seat, $70,000+  Tesla Model S’s are now AWD and the Model X “Crossover” is about to debut but what about a family that wants to spend a lot less on a vehicle that can be used day to day and doesn’t require over 100 miles of range.
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[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cri9WuhBIps]

As announced last month during the shareholder meeting, Tesla is upgrading its Superchrger Cables from a thick copper cable (and it is very thick – more than even a gas station fuel hose) to a thinner mystery cable that is liquid cooled.

I can’t speculate what is going on inside the cable – whether it is a superconductor or just a low resistance conductor that is prevented from overheating – but it is said to allow more capacity. Today’s Tesla Superchargers top out charge at 135kW. However, we know Tesla is trying to speed up Superchargers even further. In an interview with MIT Technology Review, Straubel said that Tesla aimed to get Supercharging times down to 5-10 minutes:
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Electric cars continue to sell well in spite of lower gas prices. Why? Because it is still an order of magnitude less expensive to fill up an electric vehicle. And that’s if you pay for your electricity rather than get it from solar panels or free EV chargers. I expect Tesla’s Model X launch, the rise of solar panels and continuing education of car buyers to accelerate this trend for the second half of 2015. Five more graphs below:
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The CHAdeMO fast-charging standard increases in popularity with Nissan championing the program by recently installing over 1,600 CHAdeMO charging stations at their dealerships in Japan, bringing the worldwide total to over 8,550.
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