On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 11:26:21 -0500, "Existential Angst"
wrote:

wrote in message
.. .
On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 10:21:35 -0500, "Existential Angst"
wrote:

wrote in message
...
On Feb 24, 5:52 am, "Existential Angst" wrote:
Awl --

After a recent thread on the Volt, I'm really tryna justify the purchase
of
one, but bleeve, it's hard.
I figger my gas cost per year is $1600 or so, and payments for a Volt
would
proly be $6,000 year.... PLUS electricity costs.

Now, about those electricity costs.....

If you calculate the $ per mile of gas, you get something like this:
At $4/gal, with 30 mi/gal, it costs 13c/mi in fuel.

Now, how much does it cost to charge a battery?
Don't for a minute believe what your ripoff utility tells you about c
per
kWhr.... Do the math on your bill, divide the kWhr on the bill into what
you actually wrote on your check.

That isn't the correct way of doing the calculation. What
you want to find is the INCREMENTAL cost of charging a
car. That could be lower or higher than the rate with your
method. For example if you have a monthly fixed charge
of $25, you're paying that regardless of the car and it
should not be attributed to the car. And if you're
in an area where rates escalate if you exceed a certain
amount, then you're going to pay more for the car
charging than shown by your method.
=============================================== =====

Absolutely. That's why I left the calc as it was.
Some places have, like, a 5c/kWhr rate, which quickly escalates to
50c/kWhr.
Iirc, CA goes up to pert near $1/kWhr.....!!!!

We all know you're a liar. Everyone got your message. You can stop
posting now.

So my calcs are likely, and were intended to be, a BEST CASE scenario for
electrics, given the tier structure of most utility rates. And draconian
tier structure in some, or mebbe most.

But you didn't use the incremental cost, so you didn't even accomplish
that. IOW, more lies.

You don't need incremental cost per se.... too complicated to explain to
you, since you can't even follow a post.

I can follow a post written by a sane person, just fine. You *DO*
need the incremental cost, since you're already paying the fixed
costs, whether you use the energy for transportation or not. You
really are dumb.

I'm so dumb, you're so smart, yet you can't follow my calcs enough to point
out the """lies""".

Your numbers are *lies*. I can't help it if you cry when I point out
that fact.

Why is that?

Because that's what liars do. You lie.

Don't you have some family members you can abuse and berate?

Hell no, I wouldn't live with anyone as stupid as you are and in case
you haven't noticed, I don't like liars.

On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 10:40:11 -0800, Gunner
wrote:

On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 10:33:11 -0500, wrote:


Absolutely. That's why I left the calc as it was.
Some places have, like, a 5c/kWhr rate, which quickly escalates to 50c/kWhr.
Iirc, CA goes up to pert near $1/kWhr.....!!!!

We all know you're a liar. Everyone got your message. You can stop
posting now.

I pay .30kwh here in California

I feel sorry for you. ...for the electric rates, too.

On Feb 24, 5:37*pm, wrote:
On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 09:42:38 -1000, dsi1





wrote:
On 2/24/2013 2:46 AM, The Daring Dufas wrote:

The P.L.L.C.F. are always trying to push junk science and technology.
Electric vehicles have their place but the Moonbats are determined to
push immature technology upon the citizenry especially when there is
no widely established infrastructure to support it. When you see The
President and congressmen traveling around in battery powered limousines
and The Capital and White House powered completely by solar
cells and windmills, the technology will be ready for the masses. Until
that happens I'll be very skeptical that the present national energy and
transportation infrastructure should be scrapped for something from
La La Land. ^_^

TDD

It's a good thing for us that folks who said that the infrastructure was
not in place and that the moonbats were trying to replace horses and
buggys with new-fangled automobiles were unable to convince the
citizenry of their anti-progressive ways. What model carriage do you
drive, sir? :-)

The new model carriages were not forced on anyone. *There *IS* a
difference. *When economics wins, everyone wins. *When it takes a back
seat, everyone loses.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Not to mention that the new-fangled autos had clear
advantages over the horse and buggy. With electric
cars the pitch relies on, yeah they cost a lot more,
even with huge tax subsidies and they don't go very far,
but folks should buy them to reduce their reliance on fossil
fuels. Hence, sales are pretty much confined to rich hippies. Did
they even have hippies back in 1900?

On 2/24/13 4:33 PM, wrote:

Why would any sane person buy a limited range car? That's *nuts*.


Why do people buy short ladders?

On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 12:17:30 -0500, wrote:

On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 09:50:51 -0500, "Existential Angst"
wrote:


But my point was, *just considering the fuel source alone*, electrics *at
best* are = to $4/gal gasoline, *unless* your electric rate is really low.
And I suspect few are.

Which makes those "MPGe" stats of 100 total effing bull****. They must be
using electric rates from 1950.

The other stuff involved with electrics -- initial cost, battery
cost/life/deterioration, etc -- just worsens the comparison.
What a bummer.

Sposedly, the batts for a chevy volt (16 kWhr, 1/5 the rating of Tesla), are
"only" about $3,000 -- not terrible terrible over 8 years/100,000 mile, but
that does add about 3c to the cost per mile calc, not insignificant.

I pay a lot less for power than $0.25 kwh. Mine ends up being $0.139
bottom line.
I still had problems justifying an electric. I was looking at a Honda
kit conversion and the batteries alone killed the deal (based on a 4
year replacement of 14 golf cart batteries) , even if the power was
free.
You are also limited in how far you go unless you have dual power like
a Volt. A pure plug in electric is a notch car. You have to drive far
enough to amortize the fixed costs but you can't drive farther than a
single charge will get you.
Most people will still need a "gas" car.

....or two. I don't think most people are ready for the depreciation
of both (three), either.

On Feb 24, 5:02*pm, Tim Wescott wrote:
On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 06:17:30 -0800, bob haller wrote:
the big advantage of electric vehicles is that they save gasoline making
us less dependent on a finite resource.

And what infinite well of energy does electrical power come from? *Just
because it always comes out of the wall when you plug into it doesn't
mean that there isn't some generating station out there burning
_something_ to deliver the bulk of it to you.

--
Tim Wescott
Control system and signal processing consultingwww.wescottdesign.com

His point was the autos rely on oil for a fuel source
and are responsible for using a whole lot of it.
Very little electricity is generated from oil, at least here
in the USA. It's only a few percent. Coal is the largest
source, followed by nat gas. And there is a lot more of
that available, enough for hundreds of years.

On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 10:02:02 -0600, gonjah wrote:

On 2/24/2013 8:25 AM, Frank wrote:
On 2/24/2013 5:52 AM, Existential Angst wrote:
Awl --

After a recent thread on the Volt, I'm really tryna justify the
purchase of
one, but bleeve, it's hard.
I figger my gas cost per year is $1600 or so, and payments for a Volt
would
proly be $6,000 year.... PLUS electricity costs.

Now, about those electricity costs.....

If you calculate the $ per mile of gas, you get something like this:
At $4/gal, with 30 mi/gal, it costs 13c/mi in fuel.

Now, how much does it cost to charge a battery?
Don't for a minute believe what your ripoff utility tells you
about c per
kWhr.... Do the math on your bill, divide the kWhr on the bill into what
you actually wrote on your check. Around NYC, that seems to be about
25c/kWhr -- which is outrageous.

So let's figger that Tesla's 85 kWhr battery takes, well, 85 kWhr to
charge
it..... that's about $20 in electricity.
If the Tesla gets 200 miles on that charge, that's 10c/mile.
If it only gets 100 miles, that's 20c/mile..... !!!!
Split the diff, that's 15c/mile.... MORE than what I'm paying per
mile in
gas!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WTF??

You get similar numbers for the Leaf, and Volt.

Now, it gets worse:
There's the ever-present thermodynamic kick-in-the-ass.
It will NEVER take only 85 kWhrs to charge an 85 kWhr battery -- it
will
take proly 20% more.

So even if the Tesla DOES get 200 mi per charge (and jb's article
suggests
that it does not
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/10/au...ewanted=1&_r=0

)

factor in the charging inefficiency, and you are just about EQUAL in $
per
mi cost of a 30 mpg vehicle.

Anything less than 200 mi per charge, and the Tesla loses, and poss.
loses
badly.


So at NYC electric rates, an electric car, not counting ANY other
factors,
is actually MORE expensive than gas, at $4/gal.

YET, you see these huge "equivalent" mpg numbers for electrics, typically
around 100 mpg, implying a $ per mile cost of less than 1/3 the cost
of a 30
mpg vehicle..
But my calcs show that an electric will be *at least* as expensive as
gas,
and likely considerably more than gas, as a fuel.... What gives??

Holy ****.... there goes my Volt....

Now factor in the high initial cost of electrics, inevitable battery
deterioration AND replacement cost, and wow, simply not viable. Unless I
made a mistake somewhere.

Now, some may bleat, Oh OH, MY electric rates are 5c/kWhr.... and I
would
repeat, do the net division on your bill to see what it REALLY is. At a
TRUE 5c/kWhr, yeah, it makes sense, you could divide all the above
electric
costs by FIVE.
But I don't think anyone is really paying 5c, and quite a few places,
like
CA, pay MORE than NYS utility rates.

AND, if your small car gets 40 mpg, that's even tougher competition for
electrics.

Idears?? Opinions?


Did the math myself.
Hybrids are good for those that drive over maybe 20,000 miles per year.
For the bulk of us, they cost more. For those that think it is worth
the cost of conservation, hidden costs have not been considered like
mining the battery material, and these are often environmentally
unfriendly.
When Prius first came out, I looked up cost of battery replacement and
figured after warranty ran out and batteries needed replacement you
might as well junk the car for what it was worth.

I don't know about the hidden cost but, the Prius battery is under
warranty for 100k miles, IIRC.

....and after that the car is junk. BTW, how many years? We're not
talking about a high-mileage car, here. If so, there are far better
solutions.

...

On 24/02/13 22:02, Tim Wescott wrote:
On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 06:17:30 -0800, bob haller wrote:

the big advantage of electric vehicles is that they save gasoline making
us less dependent on a finite resource.
And what infinite well of energy does electrical power come from? Just
because it always comes out of the wall when you plug into it doesn't
mean that there isn't some generating station out there burning
_something_ to deliver the bulk of it to you.

Talking about electric cars with a mate that works in the engine
development industry recently. He had a similar chat with another of his
colleagues that is very knowledgable about electric cars and hybrids and
he said the studies have been done and there is not enough electric
capacity out there on the planet to support all electric cars or even
close to it so a mixed fuel economy is likely to be around for some
time. He also touched on other vehicles such as trucks and other large
motive power where there is no practical alternative to diesel at the
moment.

On Feb 24, 2:51*pm, "Existential Angst" wrote:
"harry" wrote in message

...
On Feb 24, 10:52 am, "Existential Angst" wrote:





Awl --

After a recent thread on the Volt, I'm really tryna justify the purchase
of
one, but bleeve, it's hard.
I figger my gas cost per year is $1600 or so, and payments for a Volt
would
proly be $6,000 year.... PLUS electricity costs.

Now, about those electricity costs.....

If you calculate the $ per mile of gas, you get something like this:
At $4/gal, with 30 mi/gal, it costs 13c/mi in fuel.

Now, how much does it cost to charge a battery?
Don't for a minute believe what your ripoff utility tells you about c per
kWhr.... Do the math on your bill, divide the kWhr on the bill into what
you actually wrote on your check. Around NYC, that seems to be about
25c/kWhr -- which is outrageous.

So let's figger that Tesla's 85 kWhr battery takes, well, 85 kWhr to
charge
it..... that's about $20 in electricity.
If the Tesla gets 200 miles on that charge, that's 10c/mile.
If it only gets 100 miles, that's 20c/mile..... !!!!
Split the diff, that's 15c/mile.... MORE than what I'm paying per mile in
gas!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WTF??

You get similar numbers for the Leaf, and Volt.

Now, it gets worse:
There's the ever-present thermodynamic kick-in-the-ass.
It will NEVER take only 85 kWhrs to charge an 85 kWhr battery -- it will
take proly 20% more.

So even if the Tesla DOES get 200 mi per charge (and jb's article suggests
that it does
nothttp://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/10/automobiles/stalled-on-the-ev-highw...
)

factor in the charging inefficiency, and you are just about EQUAL in $ per
mi cost of a 30 mpg vehicle.

Anything less than 200 mi per charge, and the Tesla loses, and poss. loses
badly.

So at NYC electric rates, an electric car, not counting ANY other factors,
is actually MORE expensive than gas, at $4/gal.

YET, you see these huge "equivalent" mpg numbers for electrics, typically
around 100 mpg, implying a $ per mile cost of less than 1/3 the cost of a
30
mpg vehicle..
But my calcs show that an electric will be *at least* as expensive as gas,
and likely considerably more than gas, as a fuel.... What gives??

Holy ****.... there goes my Volt....

Now factor in the high initial cost of electrics, inevitable battery
deterioration AND replacement cost, and wow, simply not viable. Unless I
made a mistake somewhere.

Now, some may bleat, Oh OH, MY electric rates are 5c/kWhr.... and I would
repeat, do the net division on your bill to see what it REALLY is. At a
TRUE 5c/kWhr, yeah, it makes sense, you could divide all the above
electric
costs by FIVE.
But I don't think anyone is really paying 5c, and quite a few places, like
CA, pay MORE than NYS utility rates.

AND, if your small car gets 40 mpg, that's even tougher competition for
electrics.

Idears?? Opinions?
--
EA

It is not an 85 Kwh battery it is around 12Kwh.

So everything you have written is completely wrong.
==============================================

Mebbe, but not for the reasons you are giving.
The 85 kWhr batt is Tesla'a largest battery, and the one the NYTimes article
was based on, in jb's thread.
The Leaf has a 24 kWhr battery, good for, sposedly, 60-130 mi, depending
depending depending.
The Volt has a 16 kWhr battery for it's 30-40 mi electric-only range --
already some disparity in the above batts.

Accelerations notwithstanding (subject to car mass), and factoring in CdA's,
the range of an electric car should be linearly proportional to the battery
size.
The fact that this appears not to be the case suggests people are plucking
numbers out of the air, or tests are not being properly standardized.

The only one plucking numbers out of the air appears to
be you. You haven't tested an electric car. You have not
measured a thing. If electric cars really aren't getting about
3.5 cents a mile based on 11c/kwh electric, and are
actually 4X worse than that as you claim, then it should
be very easy for you to do some googling and prove it.
Lots of folks have tested these cars. I gave you Consumer
Reports which came up with the above metric, and you
claim they don't know what they are doing.
Then go check out what CarandDriver, Motortrend, RoadnTrack
say. I'm sure they've done testing.

I'm no big fan of electric car, but neither am I a fan of
folks just ****ing in the dark, too lazy to find the actual
test results.

On Feb 24, 2:57*pm, David Billington
wrote:
On 24/02/13 22:02, Tim Wescott wrote: On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 06:17:30 -0800, bob haller wrote:

the big advantage of electric vehicles is that they save gasoline making
us less dependent on a finite resource.
And what infinite well of energy does electrical power come from? *Just
because it always comes out of the wall when you plug into it doesn't
mean that there isn't some generating station out there burning
_something_ to deliver the bulk of it to you.

Talking about electric cars with a mate that works in the engine
development industry recently. He had a similar chat with another of his
colleagues that is very knowledgable about electric cars and hybrids and
he said the studies have been done and there is not enough electric
capacity out there on the planet to support *all electric cars or even
close to it so a mixed fuel economy is likely to be around for some
time. He also touched on other vehicles such as trucks and other large
motive power where there is no practical alternative to diesel at the
moment.

"He also touched on other vehicles such as trucks and other large
motive power where there is no practical alternative to diesel at the
moment."

http://www.forbes.com/sites/kensilve...rs-and-trucks/

http://beta.fool.com/thechieftoo/201...ts-2013/20531/

http://www.dailyfinance.com/2013/01/...nd-buses-will/

"Tim Wescott" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 06:17:30 -0800, bob haller wrote:

the big advantage of electric vehicles is that they save gasoline making
us less dependent on a finite resource.

And what infinite well of energy does electrical power come from? Just
because it always comes out of the wall when you plug into it doesn't
mean that there isn't some generating station out there burning
_something_ to deliver the bulk of it to you.



Oh Oh, now you've done it. You've put logic into the equation.

wrote in message
...

Why would any sane person buy a limited range car? That's *nuts*.

They are -all- limited unless you find an open gas station. I quickly
became aware of that when driving through the mountains on a
motorcycle, and then during the Carter gasoline f**kup.

I was used to having 24-hour gas stations but couldn't find any out in
the country away from 24-hour jobs, like hospitals.

Since retiring I hardly go through 5 gallons a month, mostly for
grocery shopping. I could use a second cheap vehicle with a 10 mile
range as long as it has a good cargo capacity.

On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 16:45:31 -0600, Dean Hoffman
" wrote:

On 2/24/13 4:33 PM, wrote:

Why would any sane person buy a limited range car? That's *nuts*.


Why do people buy short ladders?

Because they're a cheap solution to a problem. Short-range cars are
*not*.

On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 14:47:51 -0800 (PST), "
wrote:

On Feb 24, 5:02*pm, Tim Wescott wrote:
On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 06:17:30 -0800, bob haller wrote:
the big advantage of electric vehicles is that they save gasoline making
us less dependent on a finite resource.

And what infinite well of energy does electrical power come from? *Just
because it always comes out of the wall when you plug into it doesn't
mean that there isn't some generating station out there burning
_something_ to deliver the bulk of it to you.

--
Tim Wescott
Control system and signal processing consultingwww.wescottdesign.com

His point was the autos rely on oil for a fuel source
and are responsible for using a whole lot of it.
Very little electricity is generated from oil, at least here
in the USA. It's only a few percent. Coal is the largest
source, followed by nat gas. And there is a lot more of
that available, enough for hundreds of years.

That's true, as far as it goes, but the infrastructure isn't there to
allow a significant number of cars to switch. ...and there are no
plans to put it there because the same people who are insisting on
electric vehicles are standing in the way of more generation.

On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 14:59:11 -0800 (PST), "
wrote:

On Feb 24, 2:51*pm, "Existential Angst" wrote:
"harry" wrote in message

...
On Feb 24, 10:52 am, "Existential Angst" wrote:





Awl --

After a recent thread on the Volt, I'm really tryna justify the purchase
of
one, but bleeve, it's hard.
I figger my gas cost per year is $1600 or so, and payments for a Volt
would
proly be $6,000 year.... PLUS electricity costs.

Now, about those electricity costs.....

If you calculate the $ per mile of gas, you get something like this:
At $4/gal, with 30 mi/gal, it costs 13c/mi in fuel.

Now, how much does it cost to charge a battery?
Don't for a minute believe what your ripoff utility tells you about c per
kWhr.... Do the math on your bill, divide the kWhr on the bill into what
you actually wrote on your check. Around NYC, that seems to be about
25c/kWhr -- which is outrageous.

So let's figger that Tesla's 85 kWhr battery takes, well, 85 kWhr to
charge
it..... that's about $20 in electricity.
If the Tesla gets 200 miles on that charge, that's 10c/mile.
If it only gets 100 miles, that's 20c/mile..... !!!!
Split the diff, that's 15c/mile.... MORE than what I'm paying per mile in
gas!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WTF??

You get similar numbers for the Leaf, and Volt.

Now, it gets worse:
There's the ever-present thermodynamic kick-in-the-ass.
It will NEVER take only 85 kWhrs to charge an 85 kWhr battery -- it will
take proly 20% more.

So even if the Tesla DOES get 200 mi per charge (and jb's article suggests
that it does
nothttp://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/10/automobiles/stalled-on-the-ev-highw...
)

factor in the charging inefficiency, and you are just about EQUAL in $ per
mi cost of a 30 mpg vehicle.

Anything less than 200 mi per charge, and the Tesla loses, and poss. loses
badly.

So at NYC electric rates, an electric car, not counting ANY other factors,
is actually MORE expensive than gas, at $4/gal.

YET, you see these huge "equivalent" mpg numbers for electrics, typically
around 100 mpg, implying a $ per mile cost of less than 1/3 the cost of a
30
mpg vehicle..
But my calcs show that an electric will be *at least* as expensive as gas,
and likely considerably more than gas, as a fuel.... What gives??

Holy ****.... there goes my Volt....

Now factor in the high initial cost of electrics, inevitable battery
deterioration AND replacement cost, and wow, simply not viable. Unless I
made a mistake somewhere.

Now, some may bleat, Oh OH, MY electric rates are 5c/kWhr.... and I would
repeat, do the net division on your bill to see what it REALLY is. At a
TRUE 5c/kWhr, yeah, it makes sense, you could divide all the above
electric
costs by FIVE.
But I don't think anyone is really paying 5c, and quite a few places, like
CA, pay MORE than NYS utility rates.

AND, if your small car gets 40 mpg, that's even tougher competition for
electrics.

Idears?? Opinions?
--
EA

It is not an 85 Kwh battery it is around 12Kwh.

So everything you have written is completely wrong.
==============================================

Mebbe, but not for the reasons you are giving.
The 85 kWhr batt is Tesla'a largest battery, and the one the NYTimes article
was based on, in jb's thread.
The Leaf has a 24 kWhr battery, good for, sposedly, 60-130 mi, depending
depending depending.
The Volt has a 16 kWhr battery for it's 30-40 mi electric-only range --
already some disparity in the above batts.

Accelerations notwithstanding (subject to car mass), and factoring in CdA's,
the range of an electric car should be linearly proportional to the battery
size.
The fact that this appears not to be the case suggests people are plucking
numbers out of the air, or tests are not being properly standardized.

The only one plucking numbers out of the air appears to
be you. You haven't tested an electric car. You have not
measured a thing. If electric cars really aren't getting about
3.5 cents a mile based on 11c/kwh electric, and are
actually 4X worse than that as you claim, then it should
be very easy for you to do some googling and prove it.
Lots of folks have tested these cars. I gave you Consumer
Reports which came up with the above metric, and you
claim they don't know what they are doing.
Then go check out what CarandDriver, Motortrend, RoadnTrack
say. I'm sure they've done testing.

I'm no big fan of electric car, but neither am I a fan of
folks just ****ing in the dark, too lazy to find the actual
test results.

+1 +1 +1

....and whining about someone else's decision.

On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 18:25:50 -0500, "Jim Wilkins"
wrote:

wrote in message
.. .

Why would any sane person buy a limited range car? That's *nuts*.

They are -all- limited unless you find an open gas station. I quickly
became aware of that when driving through the mountains on a
motorcycle, and then during the Carter gasoline f**kup.

It doesn't take much planning to avoid such situations.

I was used to having 24-hour gas stations but couldn't find any out in
the country away from 24-hour jobs, like hospitals.

The plan is to not get in such situations. ;-)

Since retiring I hardly go through 5 gallons a month, mostly for
grocery shopping. I could use a second cheap vehicle with a 10 mile
range as long as it has a good cargo capacity.

....and you are how big of a market? You never go on a vacation or
anywhere?

On 2/24/2013 3:48 PM, gonjah wrote:
On 2/24/2013 12:59 PM, Frank wrote:
On 2/24/2013 11:02 AM, gonjah wrote:
On 2/24/2013 8:25 AM, Frank wrote:
On 2/24/2013 5:52 AM, Existential Angst wrote:
Awl --

After a recent thread on the Volt, I'm really tryna justify the
purchase of
one, but bleeve, it's hard.
I figger my gas cost per year is $1600 or so, and payments for a Volt
would
proly be $6,000 year.... PLUS electricity costs.

Now, about those electricity costs.....

If you calculate the $ per mile of gas, you get something like this:
At $4/gal, with 30 mi/gal, it costs 13c/mi in fuel.

Now, how much does it cost to charge a battery?
Don't for a minute believe what your ripoff utility tells you
about c per
kWhr.... Do the math on your bill, divide the kWhr on the bill into
what
you actually wrote on your check. Around NYC, that seems to be about
25c/kWhr -- which is outrageous.

So let's figger that Tesla's 85 kWhr battery takes, well, 85 kWhr to
charge
it..... that's about $20 in electricity.
If the Tesla gets 200 miles on that charge, that's 10c/mile.
If it only gets 100 miles, that's 20c/mile..... !!!!
Split the diff, that's 15c/mile.... MORE than what I'm paying per
mile in
gas!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WTF??

You get similar numbers for the Leaf, and Volt.

Now, it gets worse:
There's the ever-present thermodynamic kick-in-the-ass.
It will NEVER take only 85 kWhrs to charge an 85 kWhr battery -- it
will
take proly 20% more.

So even if the Tesla DOES get 200 mi per charge (and jb's article
suggests
that it does not
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/10/au...ewanted=1&_r=0




)

factor in the charging inefficiency, and you are just about EQUAL in $
per
mi cost of a 30 mpg vehicle.

Anything less than 200 mi per charge, and the Tesla loses, and poss.
loses
badly.


So at NYC electric rates, an electric car, not counting ANY other
factors,
is actually MORE expensive than gas, at $4/gal.

YET, you see these huge "equivalent" mpg numbers for electrics,
typically
around 100 mpg, implying a $ per mile cost of less than 1/3 the cost
of a 30
mpg vehicle..
But my calcs show that an electric will be *at least* as expensive as
gas,
and likely considerably more than gas, as a fuel.... What gives??

Holy ****.... there goes my Volt....

Now factor in the high initial cost of electrics, inevitable battery
deterioration AND replacement cost, and wow, simply not viable.
Unless I
made a mistake somewhere.

Now, some may bleat, Oh OH, MY electric rates are 5c/kWhr.... and I
would
repeat, do the net division on your bill to see what it REALLY is.
At a
TRUE 5c/kWhr, yeah, it makes sense, you could divide all the above
electric
costs by FIVE.
But I don't think anyone is really paying 5c, and quite a few places,
like
CA, pay MORE than NYS utility rates.

AND, if your small car gets 40 mpg, that's even tougher competition
for
electrics.

Idears?? Opinions?


Did the math myself.
Hybrids are good for those that drive over maybe 20,000 miles per year.
For the bulk of us, they cost more. For those that think it is worth
the cost of conservation, hidden costs have not been considered like
mining the battery material, and these are often environmentally
unfriendly.
When Prius first came out, I looked up cost of battery replacement and
figured after warranty ran out and batteries needed replacement you
might as well junk the car for what it was worth.

I don't know about the hidden cost but, the Prius battery is under
warranty for 100k miles, IIRC.

Here is a interesting article about the life of the battery.

http://www.tirebusiness.com/article/...y-as-you-think




http://tinyurl.com/b6rvkws

We had a Prius for about 50k miles. Great car with great mileage. We
sold it to my niece who loves it too. My wife bought a Sonata Hybrid.
Nice car, but expensive and doesn't get as the gas mileage of the Prius.
Personally, I'd have kept the Prius but it is important to find a good
mechanic to do any repairs. The dealer will soak you. Fortunately I know
a guy that used to work for Toyota and does repairs for a fraction of
what the dealer will. Not that it needed many repairs. The video display
went out and the replacement cost at the dealer was outrageous. I ended
up paying less than $275 for a used display. I think my guy charged me
about $25 to do the replacement. To do the repair at the dealer would
have cost around $5000.


Might have been over 10 years when I googled battery replacement and I
recalled 7,000 Australian dollars. Still a lot of money today.
Doing cost of car repair, if repair exceeds Blue Book value is is time
to trade in the car.


No argument there. When the dealer told me $5k for the repair of the
display I was wondering what we got into. A quick internet search found
a used display and I found a really good cheap mechanic. If it hadn't
been for that the Prius would be a bad memory.

I'm retired and both wife and I only put about 6,000 miles per year on
our cars. We'd be wasting money on hybrids.

snip

I'm not really sure about that. Most hybrids don't perform that well on
mileage but the Prius is an exception. On one cross country trip we
averaged 75 mpg with the Prius. From that point, I was sold on them.

I'd put your battery worries to rest.

I know Prius owners that love them.
My point is that hybrids are not for everyone.
In my case, the batteries would be a concern if warranty is 10
years/100,000 miles I'd come up 40,000 miles short in 10 years.
Prius, I rode in had one surprise. While the cars are quiet on the
outside, it appeared to have a lot of road noise on the inside.

wrote in message
...
On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 18:25:50 -0500, "Jim Wilkins"
wrote:

wrote in message
. ..

Why would any sane person buy a limited range car? That's *nuts*.

They are -all- limited unless you find an open gas station. I
quickly
became aware of that when driving through the mountains on a
motorcycle, and then during the Carter gasoline f**kup.

It doesn't take much planning to avoid such situations.

It takes foreknowledge of places you've never been before.

Since retiring I hardly go through 5 gallons a month, mostly for
grocery shopping. I could use a second cheap vehicle with a 10 mile
range as long as it has a good cargo capacity.

...and you are how big of a market? You never go on a vacation or
anywhere?

Boomer retirees aren't a market?

On 2/24/13 5:25 PM, Jim Wilkins wrote:
wrote in message
...

Why would any sane person buy a limited range car? That's *nuts*.

They are -all- limited unless you find an open gas station. I quickly
became aware of that when driving through the mountains on a
motorcycle, and then during the Carter gasoline f**kup.

People who don't ride seem to think we can ride forever plus a day
on a tank of fuel. I've had four bikes so far. The largest is the
current one, a Suzuki Volusia, 805cc. All four of those got around 45
mpg. It has a four gallon tank. A lot of bikes seem to have smaller
tanks.
That's usually ok. I need to get off to stretch anyhow.

I was used to having 24-hour gas stations but couldn't find any out in
the country away from 24-hour jobs, like hospitals.

I think there was a sign on Highway 6 east of Denver, CO long ago.
It was on the border. It said something like "Last gas before Denver".

On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 19:00:26 -0500, "Jim Wilkins"
wrote:

wrote in message
.. .
On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 18:25:50 -0500, "Jim Wilkins"
wrote:

wrote in message
...

Why would any sane person buy a limited range car? That's *nuts*.

They are -all- limited unless you find an open gas station. I
quickly
became aware of that when driving through the mountains on a
motorcycle, and then during the Carter gasoline f**kup.

It doesn't take much planning to avoid such situations.

It takes foreknowledge of places you've never been before.

Enough smarts to not get overextended.

Since retiring I hardly go through 5 gallons a month, mostly for
grocery shopping. I could use a second cheap vehicle with a 10 mile
range as long as it has a good cargo capacity.

...and you are how big of a market? You never go on a vacation or
anywhere?

Boomer retirees aren't a market?

No, not rocking char bound boomers. I have no great wants to be a
homebody when I retire (did it once, didn't like it).

How many cars do you think you'd sell when you advertise the fact
that for a long trip you need to go rent a trailer with a generator?

more than admitting the vehicle can never go far unless you have
chargers along the way.

my best friend converted his 66 jeep and 68 impala in 1972 to dual
fuel, gasoline OR CNG it works great and the exhaust is super
clean.....

since the USA has lots of natural gas the feds should encourage dual
fuel vehicles in a big way with big tax breaks.

to decrease crude oil imports.

On Feb 24, 10:21*am, wrote:
On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 06:17:30 -0800 (PST), bob haller
wrote:

...

the big advantage of electric vehicles is that they save gasoline
making us less dependent on a finite resource.

Nonsense.

although i think any only electric vehiicle should be designed to
hitch on a trailer generator in case someone needs to take a really
long trip. generator trailers could be sold or rented for occasional
use

That's the *dumbest* idea you've ever come up with. *...and that takes
some doing!

how so? it makes the all electric vehicle typically used for around
town easy to plug into a tiny trailer for long term trips. owner could
buy trailer or rent it for occasional use..

and since very little electric is generated by burning crude oil,
around here its nuclear, coal and natural gas.

anything that uses less crude oil / gasoline is less $$ given to the
arabs who hate us.......

wrote:

Why would any sane person buy a limited range car? That's *nuts*.

I've never seen an unlimited range car yet. After about 300 miles, I have
to fill my gastank.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

Well there are things more important than cost!!

Importing so much oil from the mid east and other places where were
hated puts our entire economy at risk if say Iran decides to sink some
tankers in the straight of hormuz..... Imagine gasoline at 8 bucks a
gallon

If you look back at our last few recessions they went right along with
gasoline at over 4 bucks a gallon.

Were right at that pont again and worse congress is more interested in
politicking than being responsible abut sequestration....

USA has at least a couple hundred year supply of coal to generate
electric.

All thats needed are large coal burning stations large enough so that
scrubbers are cost effective...

His point was the autos rely on oil for a fuel source
and are responsible for using a whole lot of it.
Very little electricity is generated from oil, at least here
in the USA. *It's only a few percent. *Coal is the largest
source, followed by nat gas. *And there is a lot more of
that available, enough for hundreds of years.

That's true, as far as it goes, but the infrastructure isn't there to
allow a significant number of cars to switch. *...and there are no
plans to put it there because the same people who are insisting on
electric vehicles are standing in the way of more generation.

During the day the power grid is used a lot, but after work, evenings
nights and weekends the power grid as lots of extra capacity

People could charge their vehicles at nght, at off peak rates.

On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 10:40:11 -0800, Gunner
wrote:

On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 10:33:11 -0500, wrote:


Absolutely. That's why I left the calc as it was.
Some places have, like, a 5c/kWhr rate, which quickly escalates to 50c/kWhr.
Iirc, CA goes up to pert near $1/kWhr.....!!!!

We all know you're a liar. Everyone got your message. You can stop
posting now.

I pay .30kwh here in California

Correction...I pay .34 cents a KWH since they put the remote scanner
on my meter. Ive not run a welder or machine tool for 2 months..yet
they claim I used 1034 KWHr. All my lights are CFLs or florescents and
I have a gas stove, and gas drier.



Gunner

The methodology of the left has always been:

1. Lie
2. Repeat the lie as many times as possible
3. Have as many people repeat the lie as often as possible
4. Eventually, the uninformed believe the lie
5. The lie will then be made into some form oflaw
6. Then everyone must conform to the lie

The methodology of the left has always been:

1. Lie
2. Repeat the lie as many times as possible
3. Have as many people repeat the lie as often as possible
4. Eventually, the uninformed believe the lie
5. The lie will then be made into some form oflaw
6. Then everyone must conform to the lie

On 2/24/2013 5:43 PM, Frank wrote:
On 2/24/2013 3:48 PM, gonjah wrote:
On 2/24/2013 12:59 PM, Frank wrote:
On 2/24/2013 11:02 AM, gonjah wrote:
On 2/24/2013 8:25 AM, Frank wrote:
On 2/24/2013 5:52 AM, Existential Angst wrote:
Awl --

After a recent thread on the Volt, I'm really tryna justify the
purchase of
one, but bleeve, it's hard.
I figger my gas cost per year is $1600 or so, and payments for a Volt
would
proly be $6,000 year.... PLUS electricity costs.

Now, about those electricity costs.....

If you calculate the $ per mile of gas, you get something like this:
At $4/gal, with 30 mi/gal, it costs 13c/mi in fuel.

Now, how much does it cost to charge a battery?
Don't for a minute believe what your ripoff utility tells you
about c per
kWhr.... Do the math on your bill, divide the kWhr on the bill into
what
you actually wrote on your check. Around NYC, that seems to be about
25c/kWhr -- which is outrageous.

So let's figger that Tesla's 85 kWhr battery takes, well, 85 kWhr to
charge
it..... that's about $20 in electricity.
If the Tesla gets 200 miles on that charge, that's 10c/mile.
If it only gets 100 miles, that's 20c/mile..... !!!!
Split the diff, that's 15c/mile.... MORE than what I'm paying per
mile in
gas!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WTF??

You get similar numbers for the Leaf, and Volt.

Now, it gets worse:
There's the ever-present thermodynamic kick-in-the-ass.
It will NEVER take only 85 kWhrs to charge an 85 kWhr battery
-- it
will
take proly 20% more.

So even if the Tesla DOES get 200 mi per charge (and jb's article
suggests
that it does not
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/10/au...ewanted=1&_r=0





)

factor in the charging inefficiency, and you are just about EQUAL
in $
per
mi cost of a 30 mpg vehicle.

Anything less than 200 mi per charge, and the Tesla loses, and poss.
loses
badly.


So at NYC electric rates, an electric car, not counting ANY other
factors,
is actually MORE expensive than gas, at $4/gal.

YET, you see these huge "equivalent" mpg numbers for electrics,
typically
around 100 mpg, implying a $ per mile cost of less than 1/3 the cost
of a 30
mpg vehicle..
But my calcs show that an electric will be *at least* as expensive as
gas,
and likely considerably more than gas, as a fuel.... What gives??

Holy ****.... there goes my Volt....

Now factor in the high initial cost of electrics, inevitable battery
deterioration AND replacement cost, and wow, simply not viable.
Unless I
made a mistake somewhere.

Now, some may bleat, Oh OH, MY electric rates are 5c/kWhr.... and I
would
repeat, do the net division on your bill to see what it REALLY is.
At a
TRUE 5c/kWhr, yeah, it makes sense, you could divide all the above
electric
costs by FIVE.
But I don't think anyone is really paying 5c, and quite a few places,
like
CA, pay MORE than NYS utility rates.

AND, if your small car gets 40 mpg, that's even tougher competition
for
electrics.

Idears?? Opinions?


Did the math myself.
Hybrids are good for those that drive over maybe 20,000 miles per
year.
For the bulk of us, they cost more. For those that think it is worth
the cost of conservation, hidden costs have not been considered like
mining the battery material, and these are often environmentally
unfriendly.
When Prius first came out, I looked up cost of battery replacement and
figured after warranty ran out and batteries needed replacement you
might as well junk the car for what it was worth.

I don't know about the hidden cost but, the Prius battery is under
warranty for 100k miles, IIRC.

Here is a interesting article about the life of the battery.

http://www.tirebusiness.com/article/...y-as-you-think





http://tinyurl.com/b6rvkws

We had a Prius for about 50k miles. Great car with great mileage. We
sold it to my niece who loves it too. My wife bought a Sonata Hybrid.
Nice car, but expensive and doesn't get as the gas mileage of the
Prius.
Personally, I'd have kept the Prius but it is important to find a good
mechanic to do any repairs. The dealer will soak you. Fortunately I
know
a guy that used to work for Toyota and does repairs for a fraction of
what the dealer will. Not that it needed many repairs. The video
display
went out and the replacement cost at the dealer was outrageous. I ended
up paying less than $275 for a used display. I think my guy charged me
about $25 to do the replacement. To do the repair at the dealer would
have cost around $5000.


Might have been over 10 years when I googled battery replacement and I
recalled 7,000 Australian dollars. Still a lot of money today.
Doing cost of car repair, if repair exceeds Blue Book value is is time
to trade in the car.


No argument there. When the dealer told me $5k for the repair of the
display I was wondering what we got into. A quick internet search found
a used display and I found a really good cheap mechanic. If it hadn't
been for that the Prius would be a bad memory.

I'm retired and both wife and I only put about 6,000 miles per year on
our cars. We'd be wasting money on hybrids.

snip

I'm not really sure about that. Most hybrids don't perform that well on
mileage but the Prius is an exception. On one cross country trip we
averaged 75 mpg with the Prius. From that point, I was sold on them.

I'd put your battery worries to rest.

I know Prius owners that love them.
My point is that hybrids are not for everyone.
In my case, the batteries would be a concern if warranty is 10
years/100,000 miles I'd come up 40,000 miles short in 10 years.
Prius, I rode in had one surprise. While the cars are quiet on the
outside, it appeared to have a lot of road noise on the inside.

That was my wife's complaint. She also said the car didn't have enough
weight to feel safe in.

If you read the article, the batteries are lasting much longer than
expected and, according to the article, refurbished battery packs can be
had for $1400. Just don't buy a battery from the dealer.

I'd love to have a Prius but I have a 98 Tacoma that will probably last
longer than me. Also, I don't have $25k to spend.

On 2/24/2013 4:48 PM, wrote:
On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 10:02:02 -0600, gonjah wrote:

On 2/24/2013 8:25 AM, Frank wrote:
On 2/24/2013 5:52 AM, Existential Angst wrote:
Awl --

After a recent thread on the Volt, I'm really tryna justify the
purchase of
one, but bleeve, it's hard.
I figger my gas cost per year is $1600 or so, and payments for a Volt
would
proly be $6,000 year.... PLUS electricity costs.

Now, about those electricity costs.....

If you calculate the $ per mile of gas, you get something like this:
At $4/gal, with 30 mi/gal, it costs 13c/mi in fuel.

Now, how much does it cost to charge a battery?
Don't for a minute believe what your ripoff utility tells you
about c per
kWhr.... Do the math on your bill, divide the kWhr on the bill into what
you actually wrote on your check. Around NYC, that seems to be about
25c/kWhr -- which is outrageous.

So let's figger that Tesla's 85 kWhr battery takes, well, 85 kWhr to
charge
it..... that's about $20 in electricity.
If the Tesla gets 200 miles on that charge, that's 10c/mile.
If it only gets 100 miles, that's 20c/mile..... !!!!
Split the diff, that's 15c/mile.... MORE than what I'm paying per
mile in
gas!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WTF??

You get similar numbers for the Leaf, and Volt.

Now, it gets worse:
There's the ever-present thermodynamic kick-in-the-ass.
It will NEVER take only 85 kWhrs to charge an 85 kWhr battery -- it
will
take proly 20% more.

So even if the Tesla DOES get 200 mi per charge (and jb's article
suggests
that it does not
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/10/au...ewanted=1&_r=0

)

factor in the charging inefficiency, and you are just about EQUAL in $
per
mi cost of a 30 mpg vehicle.

Anything less than 200 mi per charge, and the Tesla loses, and poss.
loses
badly.


So at NYC electric rates, an electric car, not counting ANY other
factors,
is actually MORE expensive than gas, at $4/gal.

YET, you see these huge "equivalent" mpg numbers for electrics, typically
around 100 mpg, implying a $ per mile cost of less than 1/3 the cost
of a 30
mpg vehicle..
But my calcs show that an electric will be *at least* as expensive as
gas,
and likely considerably more than gas, as a fuel.... What gives??

Holy ****.... there goes my Volt....

Now factor in the high initial cost of electrics, inevitable battery
deterioration AND replacement cost, and wow, simply not viable. Unless I
made a mistake somewhere.

Now, some may bleat, Oh OH, MY electric rates are 5c/kWhr.... and I
would
repeat, do the net division on your bill to see what it REALLY is. At a
TRUE 5c/kWhr, yeah, it makes sense, you could divide all the above
electric
costs by FIVE.
But I don't think anyone is really paying 5c, and quite a few places,
like
CA, pay MORE than NYS utility rates.

AND, if your small car gets 40 mpg, that's even tougher competition for
electrics.

Idears?? Opinions?


Did the math myself.
Hybrids are good for those that drive over maybe 20,000 miles per year.
For the bulk of us, they cost more. For those that think it is worth
the cost of conservation, hidden costs have not been considered like
mining the battery material, and these are often environmentally
unfriendly.
When Prius first came out, I looked up cost of battery replacement and
figured after warranty ran out and batteries needed replacement you
might as well junk the car for what it was worth.

I don't know about the hidden cost but, the Prius battery is under
warranty for 100k miles, IIRC.

...and after that the car is junk. BTW, how many years? We're not
talking about a high-mileage car, here. If so, there are far better
solutions.

...


Not necessarily. Read the article I posted. They are well built cars.

http://tinyurl.com/b6rvkws

Just don't go to the dealer for parts.

On 02-24-2013 05:52, Existential Angst wrote:
Now, some may bleat, Oh OH, MY electric rates are 5c/kWhr.... and I would
repeat, do the net division on your bill to see what it REALLY is. At a

I did that long ago. It is truly (or it was then!) less than ten cents
per hour.

On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 06:17:30 -0800 (PST), bob haller
wrote:






the big advantage of electric vehicles is that they save gasoline
making us less dependent on a finite resource.


Shhh, don't tell anyone, but at the other end of the wire there is a
huge coal burning generator spewing all sorts of stuff into the air.

What we really need is a tiny nuke plant to power a car. Hey, it
works for aircraft carriers so just scale it down.

On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 22:57:54 +0000, David Billington
wrote:




Talking about electric cars with a mate that works in the engine
development industry recently. He had a similar chat with another of his
colleagues that is very knowledgable about electric cars and hybrids and
he said the studies have been done and there is not enough electric
capacity out there on the planet to support all electric cars or even
close to it so a mixed fuel economy is likely to be around for some
time. He also touched on other vehicles such as trucks and other large
motive power where there is no practical alternative to diesel at the
moment.

Power companies are trying to get us to reduce consumption so they do
not have to build new plants. How many lightbulbs must be destroyed
to power a Volt for a shopping trip?

On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 17:37:52 -0800 (PST), bob haller
wrote:

Well there are things more important than cost!!

Like?

Importing so much oil from the mid east and other places where were
hated puts our entire economy at risk if say Iran decides to sink some
tankers in the straight of hormuz..... Imagine gasoline at 8 bucks a
gallon

Don't be such an idiot. We could stop imports in five years if we
wanted.

If you look back at our last few recessions they went right along with
gasoline at over 4 bucks a gallon.

I thought you just said that "there are things more important than
cost". IOW, you're a liar.

Were right at that pont again and worse congress is more interested in
politicking than being responsible abut sequestration....

God, you're an idiot!

USA has at least a couple hundred year supply of coal to generate
electric.

And oil. And NG. And a few (ten) thousand years of nuclear. So?

All thats needed are large coal burning stations large enough so that
scrubbers are cost effective...

You really are an idiot. But everyone knows that.

On 24 Feb 2013 20:28:07 -0500, (Scott Dorsey) wrote:

wrote:

Why would any sane person buy a limited range car? That's *nuts*.

I've never seen an unlimited range car yet. After about 300 miles, I have
to fill my gastank.

Another bloomin' idiot heard from.

On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 17:19:29 -0800 (PST), bob haller
wrote:


How many cars do you think you'd sell when you advertise the fact
that for a long trip you need to go rent a trailer with a generator?

more than admitting the vehicle can never go far unless you have
chargers along the way.

my best friend converted his 66 jeep and 68 impala in 1972 to dual
fuel, gasoline OR CNG it works great and the exhaust is super
clean.....

since the USA has lots of natural gas the feds should encourage dual
fuel vehicles in a big way with big tax breaks.

Why? If it makes sense, people will do it on their own. Why should
their neighbors pay for it?

to decrease crude oil imports.

Drill, baby, drill.

On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 17:25:10 -0800 (PST), bob haller
wrote:

On Feb 24, 10:21*am, wrote:
On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 06:17:30 -0800 (PST), bob haller
wrote:

...

the big advantage of electric vehicles is that they save gasoline
making us less dependent on a finite resource.

Nonsense.

although i think any only electric vehiicle should be designed to
hitch on a trailer generator in case someone needs to take a really
long trip. generator trailers could be sold or rented for occasional
use

That's the *dumbest* idea you've ever come up with. *...and that takes
some doing!

how so? it makes the all electric vehicle typically used for around
town easy to plug into a tiny trailer for long term trips. owner could
buy trailer or rent it for occasional use..

A trailer? Really? You really are going some to prove just how
stupid you are tonight.

and since very little electric is generated by burning crude oil,
around here its nuclear, coal and natural gas.

With coal being forced into oblivion by your fearless leader. But so
what? Electricity is a particularly dumb mobile power source. Convert
everything else possible away from oil, though. It's cheaper.

anything that uses less crude oil / gasoline is less $$ given to the
arabs who hate us.......

Do *DRILL*. Good Lord. THINK!

On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 18:48:17 -0800 (PST), bob haller
wrote:


His point was the autos rely on oil for a fuel source
and are responsible for using a whole lot of it.
Very little electricity is generated from oil, at least here
in the USA. *It's only a few percent. *Coal is the largest
source, followed by nat gas. *And there is a lot more of
that available, enough for hundreds of years.

That's true, as far as it goes, but the infrastructure isn't there to
allow a significant number of cars to switch. *...and there are no
plans to put it there because the same people who are insisting on
electric vehicles are standing in the way of more generation.

During the day the power grid is used a lot, but after work, evenings
nights and weekends the power grid as lots of extra capacity

People could charge their vehicles at nght, at off peak rates.

....and come home from work in the morning. Nice idea, dolt.

On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 21:35:31 -0600, gonjah wrote:

On 2/24/2013 4:48 PM, wrote:
On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 10:02:02 -0600, gonjah wrote:

On 2/24/2013 8:25 AM, Frank wrote:
On 2/24/2013 5:52 AM, Existential Angst wrote:
Awl --

After a recent thread on the Volt, I'm really tryna justify the
purchase of
one, but bleeve, it's hard.
I figger my gas cost per year is $1600 or so, and payments for a Volt
would
proly be $6,000 year.... PLUS electricity costs.

Now, about those electricity costs.....

If you calculate the $ per mile of gas, you get something like this:
At $4/gal, with 30 mi/gal, it costs 13c/mi in fuel.

Now, how much does it cost to charge a battery?
Don't for a minute believe what your ripoff utility tells you
about c per
kWhr.... Do the math on your bill, divide the kWhr on the bill into what
you actually wrote on your check. Around NYC, that seems to be about
25c/kWhr -- which is outrageous.

So let's figger that Tesla's 85 kWhr battery takes, well, 85 kWhr to
charge
it..... that's about $20 in electricity.
If the Tesla gets 200 miles on that charge, that's 10c/mile.
If it only gets 100 miles, that's 20c/mile..... !!!!
Split the diff, that's 15c/mile.... MORE than what I'm paying per
mile in
gas!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WTF??

You get similar numbers for the Leaf, and Volt.

Now, it gets worse:
There's the ever-present thermodynamic kick-in-the-ass.
It will NEVER take only 85 kWhrs to charge an 85 kWhr battery -- it
will
take proly 20% more.

So even if the Tesla DOES get 200 mi per charge (and jb's article
suggests
that it does not
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/10/au...ewanted=1&_r=0

)

factor in the charging inefficiency, and you are just about EQUAL in $
per
mi cost of a 30 mpg vehicle.

Anything less than 200 mi per charge, and the Tesla loses, and poss.
loses
badly.


So at NYC electric rates, an electric car, not counting ANY other
factors,
is actually MORE expensive than gas, at $4/gal.

YET, you see these huge "equivalent" mpg numbers for electrics, typically
around 100 mpg, implying a $ per mile cost of less than 1/3 the cost
of a 30
mpg vehicle..
But my calcs show that an electric will be *at least* as expensive as
gas,
and likely considerably more than gas, as a fuel.... What gives??

Holy ****.... there goes my Volt....

Now factor in the high initial cost of electrics, inevitable battery
deterioration AND replacement cost, and wow, simply not viable. Unless I
made a mistake somewhere.

Now, some may bleat, Oh OH, MY electric rates are 5c/kWhr.... and I
would
repeat, do the net division on your bill to see what it REALLY is. At a
TRUE 5c/kWhr, yeah, it makes sense, you could divide all the above
electric
costs by FIVE.
But I don't think anyone is really paying 5c, and quite a few places,
like
CA, pay MORE than NYS utility rates.

AND, if your small car gets 40 mpg, that's even tougher competition for
electrics.

Idears?? Opinions?


Did the math myself.
Hybrids are good for those that drive over maybe 20,000 miles per year.
For the bulk of us, they cost more. For those that think it is worth
the cost of conservation, hidden costs have not been considered like
mining the battery material, and these are often environmentally
unfriendly.
When Prius first came out, I looked up cost of battery replacement and
figured after warranty ran out and batteries needed replacement you
might as well junk the car for what it was worth.

I don't know about the hidden cost but, the Prius battery is under
warranty for 100k miles, IIRC.

...and after that the car is junk. BTW, how many years? We're not
talking about a high-mileage car, here. If so, there are far better
solutions.

...


Not necessarily. Read the article I posted. They are well built cars.

http://tinyurl.com/b6rvkws

Just don't go to the dealer for parts.

I did read the article. It's written by someone who already had the
solution. IOW, it's propaganda.

Pay for a house that drives 40 miles a day and then rent a car
to drive out of town. That car would have been almost ok in my
job in the bay area - 47 miles one way after the 4th company.
I might have been able to put in a watt meter at work and run up
a monthly bill. But good grief.

Martin

snip
There is also common sense. Lets say you typically drive 40 miles/day
round trip and you take a longer trip on occasion. Why couldn't you
simply rent a gas engine car for those long trips? This is very similar
to driving a mammoth truck with 150,000 towing capacity and a 500 HP
engine everyday so you can tow a trailer once/year.

gonjah writes:

On 2/24/2013 4:48 PM, wrote:
On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 10:02:02 -0600, gonjah wrote:

On 2/24/2013 8:25 AM, Frank wrote:
On 2/24/2013 5:52 AM, Existential Angst wrote:
Awl --

After a recent thread on the Volt, I'm really tryna justify the
purchase of
one, but bleeve, it's hard.
....
kWhr.... Do the math on your bill, divide the kWhr on the bill into what
you actually wrote on your check. Around NYC, that seems to be about
25c/kWhr -- which is outrageous.

16c here in Central NJ.

Not sure what you expect. It's Con Ed.

--
Dan Espen

On 02-24-2013 10:21, wrote:
On Sun, 24 Feb 2013 06:17:30 -0800 (PST), bob haller
wrote:

although i think any only electric vehiicle should be designed to
hitch on a trailer generator in case someone needs to take a really
long trip. generator trailers could be sold or rented for occasional
use

That's the *dumbest* idea you've ever come up with. ...and that takes
some doing!

He didn't come up with it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ac...o_DSC00467.jpg