Meh, stretching does not require getting out of the car.
One of the things I really like about my new(ish) car is the level 2 automation. It’ll stay in the lane by itself (as long as there’s not fog or rain or snow) which is awesome when you want to stretch. You’re right there in the driver’s seat and can get your hand back on the wheel in a second, but to be able to stretch for just a few seconds is super nice. I’ve noticed that I am considerably less fatigued driving the new car than the old one that didn’t have this feature on the long road trips. Because it definitely does make a difference to stop & stretch regularly.
Oh, I find that the default settings on most seats are not comfortable, and I’m being kind. Reclining them just like 5 degrees from the default position makes a hyuuuuuuuuuuuggggeee difference to back comfort.
I have back issues, so that is not something I take lightly.
Yeah, get a media player with all your CDs on it. And, the CD player you don’t have won’t break after 10 years of playing it non-stop (as mine did). My iPod syncs with my new audio system (I bought purposely without a CD player), and I can use the remote (steering wheel is not that fancy) to change artists and albums. But that’s just me. You do you.
What car did you eventually buy?
Asking for a friend.
Years ago I installed an Alpine head unit in my wife’s Honda, it had an interface like this (no steering wheel controls, but whatever). I ran a cable into the console and put an older iPod in there that we weren’t using, and she had a couple thousand songs with her at all times. This was like 2010 so it was pretty novel.
Now I have Apple Music and the native Tesla app so I have unlimited music, for all intents and purposes. Or I can Bluetooth with my phone for podcasts and what not.
I don’t know that I’d use a CD player at this point in the game when I can just call up any album I want and stream it.
I think I’m just going to buy a used Tesla similar to the one that I had totaled. Feels like the price is decent. Roughly net economic improvement for me. Will buy slightly cheaper car and own it outright; car payment will go away.
So ~$25k-$35k on a 4-7 year old Tesla Mode S. Anything I’m not thinking about? Any alternative car I should be considering that is selling for cheaper and would be interesting to try? Or something I’m not thinking about with a 4-7 year old Model S with 25k-60k miles on it? My 2018 had 51k miles on it.
I find long drives to be terribly fatiguing. 12 hours of driving would be preferable to 12 hours of running or exam studying, but no matter what I’m going to be wiped.
4 hours is a normal drive to our “distant” family who aren’t massively far away, and I hate doing it every time.
My partner and I try to take turns where often 1 of us will nap an entire direction while the other drives, and we switch. Or optionally wake the other person if you need them to help you stay awake, or take over. (Bringing a pillow and blanket is a game-changer.)
I think buying a used Tesla makes sense, as the price and capabilities of new EVs are changing quite rapidly at the moment and they may be much better value in 3-4 years time. Alternatively, there are some excellent 3-year lease deals at the moment (I posted this article in another thread). It might be interesting to compare their prices to your expected costs (including depreciation) for the Tesla.
The Osborne Effect is mentioned a lot in EV forums. That is, people are holding off buying a product because they think it will soon become obsolete and much better value can be had in the near future.
I currently get about 200 miles of range in 25 to 30 minutes of charging. These new chargers will get 200 miles of range in as little as 8 minutes (they claim 5 minutes but the math doesn’t quite work out). Of course, the car will need the ability to charge at 500 kW to take full advantage (mine tops out around 180 kW) -
Gasoline pumps at 10 gallons per minute (US reg for passenger cars), so less than two minutes to get at least 400 miles of range for most cars. Slightly longer for the least fuel efficient cars out there.
200 miles of range in 5-8 minutes is still slower, but it’s a significant step closer to the convenience of gasoline on road trips.
If they can double that (400 miles of range in 5-8 minutes) I’d call that close enough. So… not there yet, but getting closer.
It may never get quite as fast as gasoline (unless they use battery swapping). When changing to different technologies there’s often something that’s not quite as good. For example, the transition from analog to digital meant the quality of sound (or photo) was not as good but close enough and the technology made up for it in other ways.
Even transitioning from taking photos using a digital camera versus a phone was a plunge in quality at first but not having to carry around the extra device was so much more convenient. I was looking back through my photos and realized this year I’m coming up on ten years when I last used my digital camera. For about 3 years I was interchanging between the two and I guess I forgot to bring my camera on one trip and didn’t miss it.
Remember cellular phones in 1990? They were so big you could only have them in cars and they’d run off the car battery.
Battery technology is rapidly improving. Barring disruptions in supply (like we go to war with China and can no longer import their rare earth metals) I think they’re going to rival gasoline in the foreseeable future… probably by the time I’m in the market for a new car (which will be a while… I drive cars forever). And there will certainly be a period where they’re “close enough” to not cause a material delay in road trips. 400 miles of range in 5 minutes would be “close enough” IMO, if I was able to go inside and use the restroom and/or pick up a burger & fries during the 5 minutes.
You will not get 400 mi (100kWh at a minimum) in 5 min (1.2MW average) within 25 years, and not likely in 50. Would a car company design a battery system using multiiple chargers to charge separate parts of the pack to cut time.in half/third? Possibly, but that would sacrifice efficiency and cost for a quicker charge time. Commercial use maybe, where time charging is more consequential to regular use.
I don’t think this is the comparison. Assume you’re on a road trip - if you’re not on a long trip then you charged the night before and you’re likely not driving 200+ miles locally. You’re on the interstate, and you have to exit, drive to the station, get out, remove gas cap, swipe credit card, maybe enter your ZIP code, pump gas, button things back down, get back to the interstate. If the ‘fueling’ portion was zero seconds you still lose at least five minutes. I haven’t timed myself at this but I’ll throw out a guess that it’s ten minutes or so to stop and re-fuel.
The five minutes lost just navigating is the same for EVs. Plus 25 minutes to charge, so it’s 10 minutes for ICE vs 30 for EVs. If we could get EV charging to 15 minutes then it becomes 10 minutes vs 20 minutes. We might never get to parity, or not for a long time, but the delta will get pretty small.
Plus the 50 weeks or whatever of the year you aren’t road-tripping, you spend less time charging an EV than you spend fueling.
