SethInMI

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SethInMI last won the day on November 19 2019

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    135
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  • Home DZ
    SkydiveAllegan in Allegan, MI
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  • License Number
    47765
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    USPA
  • Number of Jumps
    470
  • Years in Sport
    15
  • First Choice Discipline
    Formation Skydiving
  • Second Choice Discipline
    Wing Suit Flying

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  1. I'm curious what your SIL is going to do. Did he buy the Model S new? Is he going to stay with Tesla for his next car? Go to a different EV brand? Or go back to ICE?
  2. Interesting. Geely is going to sell in the US, through its Volvo subsidiary. I suspect BYD will watch and see how that goes. I read that the Biden administrations view of the tax credit rules for leases of EVs is pretty generous, and I suspect if Trump wins he could re-interpret them and close that door.
  3. I've been seeing this alarmist subject popping up for me lately, the latest from the NYT: The gist is that BYD and Geely the big chinese automakers are going to be selling EVs & PHEVs in the US soon and will be cheaper than Tesla, and cheaper than any domestic / european ICE cars / SUVs. This will flip the script of subsidy debates, instead of the conservatives griping over EV tax credits they will be clamoring for EV tariffs to push the price back up. The liberals will be pinched, as they want to support EVs and also domestic labor, so strange bedfellows will likely be shacking up. The big three won't be in as much trouble as one may think, as they sell pick-ups and large SUVs and those have a loyal (to ICE and brand) fan base. We live in interesting times.
  4. Prob not. My buddy bought a used Ford Flex last year, the water pump quit and that trashed the timing chain and the valves hit the pistons = new motor. Dealer quote was ~13k to replace. He found a junkyard motor and I think got out for 4-5k. But I would hesitate to extrapolate a early Model S to cars being sold now-a-days. As volumes ramp up and competition improves the gouging that comes with repair should come down. I actually wonder what the equivalent replacement motor would be for a low volume luxury car (high end BMW or Mercedes) of 10 years ago. Might be 20k.
  5. I know it has been a few days since your post, but at your wingloading and experience you are fine on the Sabre3 (I say that as someone on the internet who is taking you at your word. Getting advice from an experienced coach / instructor who has watched you land will be worth a lot more) Also, a lot of people say they won't downsize, but as you get more jumps and get more comfortable, they do and likely you will too. Downsizing isn't terrible to do, downsizing before they are ready is where people get hurt.
  6. Since the "EVs in the cold / the Chicago event" has come up a lot in this thread recently I can add my 0.02 on what I have read. Obviously as others have noted, Teslas have been used successfully in the winter for many years (Norway is a great example, but in the Midwest and Canada many many Teslas are used throughout the year, I'm in Michigan after all) What happened in Chicago seems to be some Superchargers near O'Hare were off line which is unusual. This may have caused a number of people coming from the airport with depleted cars to get stuck trying to get to the next nearest charger. Also their batteries would have been cold, and that causes a slower charge rate which exacerbates the wait time for others. Having better destination chargers at airports (or in other places like apartments or on-street parking) will go a long way to mitigating this issue.
  7. so how far out do you feel comfortable predicting Brent? Where are EV sales in 5 years in the USA? Is Tesla bankrupt finally? EVs a distant memory? Or are they still the same 7% of overall sales they are now?
  8. An almost a-political post garnering no responses . TIL that the Tesla connector uses the same pins for DC and AC power. Not sure why I didn't see that before...pretty slick. I saw Bill said that he "expects" Tesla to change their connector, but I would be surprised at that. They have long championed it, and it can do all anyone needs right now. 1000v and >650A is a crazy amount of power. I say "expects" because I think he was being a little sarcastic, but anyway we got a standard.
  9. I came to the same conclusion many years ago. Several times a year I rent the pickup that our local big-box store has available so I can haul things, or borrow a family van to do that as well. Way cheaper. Not going to throw rocks at anyone who wants to own a pickup though, sometimes it is just nice to have a capability at your finger tips, even if you rarely need it...but people need to understand how much that actually costs them.
  10. The advantage I see is that PHEVs don't run the engine as much, so less wear and tear on it should make it last longer, and the electrical parts of the drivetrain should be very reliable. (edit some Hybrids don't have a transmission with many gears so they eliminate a lot of complexity there) Really either way (pure EV or PHEV) you have to pay a lot of money for something you don't need very often, just for long trips. (pure EV extra battery capacity; PHEV an entire engine). I like the pure EV b/c the driving experience is better with smoother acceleration and ease of maintenance (no oil changes, etc) but I ain't throwing rocks at anyone with a PHEV
  11. agreed. I add that plug-in hybrids are also a fine solution for lowering carbon emissions, as many trips can be done solely or almost solely electrically. Any way to get clean energy from the grid into peoples' cars or trucks is a win.
  12. This is inevitable. A lot of people just don't want Teslas. Maybe due to Elon's antics, or just they don't want to be yet another Tesla on the road. My wife is one of those people, as long as there is another brand that is matching Tesla on price and features, she will go with that. As more models enter the market, this loss of market share is only going to increase.
  13. Agreed. Tesla Semis are making runs from Fremont to Nevada and back but that is only like 300 miles, and the Semi can do 500. The nice thing about that application is you run over the Sierras, and EV trucks can regen during the descents which is safer and of course far more energy efficient.
  14. Here is an estimate for a straight through drive from Winnipeg to Eloy (stopping overnight would save about 40 min of charge time if you could slow charge at the hotel). You are charging about 15% of the time. It ain't pretty, but it can be done.
  15. It's great to see all this chat about EVs. Some more details on charging since people were bringing it up. As Ryoder mentioned, Teslas have a very asymmetric charge rate. At low levels of charge, they can accept 250kW of power but this tapers off to around 50kW near 80% (iirc). As a result, I don't charge much past 50% as a rule. Here is my ideal all day charge drive pattern: Leave home with 100% battery. Drive 3.5 hrs until at 6% Charge 7 minutes, add 100 miles Drive 1.5 hours Eat Lunch. Charge 30 minutes, get up to ~70% Drive 2.5 hrs until back to 6% Repeat short charge, then long charge for dinner. 2.5 hrs to hotel. Hopefully one with L2 charger so next day can leave with full battery. Otherwise have to add charge in morning.