Tesla Will Discontinue the Roadster

Attila Dimedici writes "Tesla has announced that their business model has failed. Their basic idea was to sell a boutique electric car to fund the development of a regular consumer electric car. With this announcement they are saying that they did not sell enough of the Roadster to make producing it profitable. If that is the case, it is only a matter of time until Tesla closes its doors. I thought their approach was the most likely to create a successful fully electric car. Although it is possible that the technology they have developed will allow the existing car companies to develop successful fully electric cars, it is a shame that Tesla has failed to become a successful car manufacturer." CT: As a huge number of you pointed out, the linked article is not nearly as doom and gloom as the submitter: Tesla isn't locking the doors and throwing away the keys, they plan on selling a $80k sedan in 2012 with a 300 mile range.

Comments

wow totally wrong

[Anonymous Coward]

Not what I heard from the SF Chronicle
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/06/17/BU9U1JUUEO.DTL

How did you come to that conclusion?

[damn_registrars]

The statement

it is a shame that Tesla has failed

Doesn't make any sense if you read the linked article.

From TFA:

Tesla Motors (TSLA) will stop taking orders for the car in the U.S. in about two months as the carmaker focuses on its Model S electric sedan

Further:

the two seat Tesla Roadster sports car was never intended to be a huge seller. Tesla reported sales of 1,650 Roadsters worldwide by the end of April, 2011.

And

Tesla's next big thing: Tesla's roadster production is coming to halt as the maker of battery-powered cars switches its focus to the upcoming Model S electric sedan.

There is absolutely no indication in the provided article that Tesla is going away. They are just stopping the roadster so they can focus on a new car, which was part of their long-term plan some time ago.

In other words, things are going as planned for Tesla. People claiming this is the end of the company are just spouting FUD for whatever reason.

Re:How did you come to that conclusion?

[jimmerz28]

Thanks for the clarification/disambiguation!

I always wanted to own a roadster when I could afford such a thing; they look HOT

Re:How did you come to that conclusion?

[NeutronCowboy]

This is one of the few times where I wish there was a bury option for stories, if not outright delete. The summary is the exact opposite of what is said in the story,is reported by everyone else, and even of what can be inferred through looking at Tesla's financials.

Maybe instead of filtering stories on editors, we need the ability to filter stories on submitters. I have yet to see a story by Attila Dimedici where the summary wasn't the exact opposite of what was actually going on.

Re:How did you come to that conclusion?

[damn_registrars]

The summary is the exact opposite of what is said in the story,is reported by everyone else, and even of what can be inferred through looking at Tesla's financials.

The editors do have the ability to go back and adjust the text of the summary. I've seen corrections before, though this one needs a correction of a rather enormous magnitude since barely anything in the summary is correct in any meaningful way.

Re:How did you come to that conclusion?

[Bertie]

Seriously, who wrote it, Jeremy Clarkson? It just stinks of negative PR by somebody with an axe to grind. Slashdot should really be ashamed of itself for giving such a tirade of obviously biased bullshit such a wide audience.

Re:How did you come to that conclusion?

[Crag]

I'd like a scoring system and a way to get a custom RSS feed which only shows stories above a certain score with a minimum time spent published.

Re:How did you come to that conclusion?

[Aranykai]

If Clarkson had written it, it would have stated "Tezzzlah roadsters have ceased production. Why? Because they are the worst sports cars..................... in the world."

Re:How did you come to that conclusion?

[Nimey]

You'd think filtering by submitter wouldn't be so hard - I've got that individual killfiled in the comments, so the hard part should be done already.

Re:How did you come to that conclusion?

[h4rr4r]

When you have only one factory line and you are making money from Toyota yeah. Telsa will likely make more money by helping toyota build the RAV4 electric than they made on all their Roadsters.

Development for the Model S is done, they have to tool the factory and start cranking them out. At $58k before the subsidies they won't have too much trouble selling them. Their third car should be what most here are waiting for, reasonable priced sedan. If the Model S can do what they claim all we have to do is wait.

Re:How did you come to that conclusion?

[Nimey]

Yeah, I miss Usenet too. :(

Re:How did you come to that conclusion?

[s73v3r]

They're doing it. They just don't have the production capacity to run two lines at once. And given the Sedan is going to have more appeal, they're going to shift focus to that.

Not to mention they're also doing the drivetrain and batteries for the Toyota RAV4 electric.

Re:How did you come to that conclusion?

[buback]

Furthermore, Lotus is discontinuing their current Elise model. It'll be 2015 before they have a new Elise, and has a totally new body and frame.
http://www.autoweek.com/article/20110609/CARNEWS/110609849

How, exactly, is Tesla supposed to keep building it's roadster without a frame?

Re:How did you come to that conclusion?

[MindStalker]

Ignoring the failings of the submitter, I noticed this one line in the article.

Model S will be able to seat up seven people when equipped with an optional third row of rear-facing seats.

Lul wut? So you can put people in the trunk? The car in the video doesn't appear to have room for rear seats.

Re:How did you come to that conclusion?

[BitZtream]

Its extremely common when you don't have infinite funds.

If you notice ... they are switching to a car with more mass market appeal ... which ... was their plan from day one ... so ALL the VC money they got going in ... came from people fully aware of this plan. People who have made enough money to know a thing or two about how to run a business.

Re:How did you come to that conclusion?

[sootman]

> Maybe instead of filtering stories on editors, we
> need the ability to filter stories on submitters.

Or, maybe the editors could, you know, act like editors. Slashdot is overall pretty good but it could really use a good dose of proper, old-fashined journalism: proofread things, do your own verification of facts before publishing what someone submits, check a couple sources, make sure you didn't already publish the same thing yesterday (or last year), etc.

Re:How did you come to that conclusion?

[GameboyRMH]

Yet another reason why Lotus shouldn't have discontinued the current Elise for that fat ugly tank they're planning. WTF were they thinking?

Re:How did you come to that conclusion?

[DriedClexler]

Yep. Anyone with mod points to spare, I recommend you just go through "Attila Dimedici's" posting history and downmod anything that remotely justifies it. I did.

Re:How did you come to that conclusion?

[shutdown -p now]

Judging from his comment history on Slashdot, he is one of the extreme Bush-loving Republicans, so no surprise there - TFS is pure FUD intended to smear a company that actually does something to get rid of oil dependency.

Re:How did you come to that conclusion?

[afabbro]

This is one of the few times where I wish there was a bury option for stories, if not outright delete. The summary is the exact opposite of what is said in the story,is reported by everyone else, and even of what can be inferred through looking at Tesla's financials.

Fortunately, the crack team of Slashdot editors vets every submission before putting it on the front page.

Re:How did you come to that conclusion?

[petermgreen]

It seems clarkson actually quite liked driving the tesla roadster (though he made a load of dubious moans about the batteries later which got top gear in some hot water) and was impressed when he managed to overtake the car it was based on.

Afaict the roadster's biggest problem was it's price, IIRC it was 2-3 times the price of the lotus elise (essentially the petrol version of the same car). It's going to take a LONG time to pay off that kind of price difference in fuel savings even at british prices.

Re:How did you come to that conclusion?

[Thumper_SVX]

The car in the video doesn't appear to have room for rear seats.

Actually, one of the wonderful things about the electric car is the compactness of the whole thing. The Model S is a hatchback, so has a large and open trunk already. For storage, you have space under the hood. The batteries are under the floor of the car and the motors are about the size of a large melon. Compared to an internal combustion engine, electric has the potential to allow much more efficient packaging of the vehicle and the Model S is taking advantage of that since it's designed from the ground up to be electric.

The Roadster didn't really benefit from it as much because it was really a retrofitted ICE car (the Elise) and thus the batteries had to be crammed in where the engine used to live. The S has no such problems.

The engineering's fascinating actually... there's loads of good reading on the net and forums.

RTFA has never been more true

[Toksyuryel]

This summary seems to have nothing at all to do with the article.

Re:RTFA has never been more true

[Rxke]

Is topic starter some kind of troll or one of the paid shills that try to cast everything SpaceX (and so Musk's other ventures) into a bad light?

Musk is getting a lot of far-fetched critiques, lately. Somebody really hates his guts.

Closing the doors?

[Anonymous Coward]

TFA doesn't imply anything of the sort. The Roadster is being stopped to allow focus on the S.

Dimdeici is jumping to conclusions

[Anonymous Coward]

The article says they they are focusing on the Model S, their new luxury sedan. He obviously didn't read the article that he linked.

Re:Dimdeici is jumping to conclusions

[Attila Dimedici]

I read the article. If Tesla is no longer making the Roadster, they will receive a lot less buzz because the Model S is boring.

Re:Dimdeici is jumping to conclusions

[rogerdugans]

The Model S will continue to generate buzz, most likely.

So far there is not a single successful electric car on the market that has succeeded on its strength as a car- unless it was made by Tesla.

The Leaf? What success it has is owed to eco-weenies who WANT a car that screams "I drive a lousy car to help save the world!"
Many of the hybrids out there are in the same boat. There is not a single Prius sold because it is a good CAR. They sell because they are a rolling billboard that says "I'm greener than you!".

Tesla made a damn good sports car that was competitive with its competition in all ways but range- they are the one and only to do so.
Tesla are the ONLY company with a damn good electric sedan planned that will be able to compete with its competitors in all ways but range.

And most people feel that the range is sufficient as it is. (I disagree, of course.)

The big companies are not even pursuing this market- only Tesla is.

If Tesla DOES succeed with introducing the S as planned they will get a HUGE amount of discussion- unless some other manufacturer releases one first.
Since there are exactly none in development....

Re:Dimdeici is jumping to conclusions

[Lunix Nutcase]

Which is not the same as their "business model failing" or such nonsense as " If that is the case, it is only a matter of time until Tesla closes its doors." You summary is nothing but fucking troll bait.

Re:Dimdeici is jumping to conclusions

[Attila Dimedici]

So far there is not a single successful electric car on the market that has succeeded on its strength as a car-

So far, Tesla has not turned a profit. That means that so far there is no need to add any conditions to your statement as I quoted it. Until Tesla turns a profit, or some other company sells an electric car that makes a profit without government subsidies, that will still be true. I thought that the idea of leveraging the sales of a boutique car to develop the technology to make a successful ordinary car had promise. Tesla has decided to give up on that route. The Model S is an ordinary high end car, except for the fact that it is electric.

Re:Dimdeici is jumping to conclusions

[rogerdugans]

Funny thing that, since the car was intended as a testbed and developmental project with sales added in order to further test and prove the technology and generate press about the company.

The car was never intended to become a profit center for the company so the fact that they have not yet turned a profit on it is misleading at the least and completely irrelevant.

My statement that the car succeeded on its strengths as a car: the type of vehicle that it is- small 2 seater with high performance driving as the priority in the $75-150 range.
When compared to similar vehicles in that price range it fares quite well in most ways- acceleration, roadholding, braking, comfort, cargo (not much in the class!) and needs no disclaimer that it "does well even though it is electric."
It just plain does WELL when compared to similar vehicles.

That makes it successful in its class: when compared to similar vehicles it doesn't need to excuse itself because it is electric.
The fact that its very limited sales- which were extended as much as possible due to customer demand for still MORE vehicles- were so successful mean that yes, it was also a success in the market.

Worst summary ever?

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, I think this summary is pretty much the opposite of the article. They have not at all said their business model has failed, and are planning on making a less expensive car in the future.

Summary bears no resemblance to article

[Andy_R]

The linked article implies that their business model for the roadster has succeeded, and they now have the cash reserves to switch production over to making a more affordable car, exactly the opposite of the conclusion drawn in the summary.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Anonymous Coward]

The article says they're working on a sedan that costs less. I don't see any indication that Tesla is going out of business.

cool car but...

[Tsingi]

They are an awesome machine, but the Tesla is a high end green vehicle. Most (not all) people who could afford such a beast don't give a damn about the environment.

Re:cool car but...

[c6gunner]

It takes a special kind of ignorance to go around implying a link between a persons economic situation and their environmental beliefs.

Re:cool car but...

[BitZtream]

Not really.

Most people don't give a flying fuck about the environment, those with more money typically even less so. The statement made was pretty clear, MOST but NOT ALL people capable of buying a Roadster aren't going to give a fuck.

RTFA, PEOPLE.

[jra]

The summary is -- as is so often the case, but I really would expect better here -- not only wrong, but *exactly wrong*.

It is Pessimal.

Re:RTFA, PEOPLE.

[jra]

And I think it's time to take away Samzenpus's keys, for letting that summary out.

Re:RTFA, PEOPLE.

[TheCouchPotatoFamine]

concur - this is an important story to get so wrong. you know, google news results include slashdot. People that never, ever thought of slashdot will be reading about this "failed business model". This needs to be redacted now. /not involved with tesla, just don't like lies.

Re:RTFA, PEOPLE.

[hypergreatthing]

one can only hope the lawyers come knocking on slashdot's door and make the editors answers to libel. You're 100% correct, this is really really bad all around.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[poetmatt]

They bad ass roadster, but it was also expensive as fuck. Had it been 30 grand, even though that's well above what I'd have wanted to spend on a car, I'd probably have bought 2 by now. 109 grand is kinda ridiculous, even if it might be reasonable as far as cost.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[LordStormes]

And, yes, before the trolls come out, I know that TFA says they were trying to fund dev on a regular car. But seriously, how much dev funding does it take to REMOVE features from a badass-mobile until it's affordable?

Summary is just plain wrong

[benjamin_scarlet]

The article says they're stopping production of the roadster to focus on the S. It says nothing about anything failing.

Re:Summary is just plain wrong

[mac84]

No. The summary is reading between the lines. If you can't sell a toy-for-the-rich roadster in tiny quantities with the drawbacks of an electric then you will have even more problem selling a workaday sedan that needs to actually be practical for people to want it. The death spiral has started. Tesla's sedan will never see production of 10,000.

Re:Summary is just plain wrong

[c_jonescc]

The plan is, and has been for a while, to not produce the Roadster for 6 or 7 years after the end of this run. They're going to focus on the Model S, then do an SUV or crossover, filling the gaps, as needed, with their Toyota deal on the Rav 4, and with the Smart car.

The whole summary is troll. Maybe the submitter works for Fisker, or just loves oil?

Summary fail.

[LoganTeamX]

I am disappoint.

Editorialize much?

[CaseyB]

Summary is just some guy's half-assed opinion, and has nothing to do with the article.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[bre_dnd]

From TFA: Tesla's next big thing: Tesla's roadster production is coming to halt as the maker of battery-powered cars switches its focus to the upcoming Model S electric sedan. The first sales of the Model S sedan are expected to begin around the middle of 2012. At a starting price of about $58,000, the base model will have a driving range of 160 miles.

Was the Roadster ever supposed to be profitable?

[Millennium]

Didn't Tesla say at one point that the cars they built were more about testing and demonstrating the technology behind electric vehicles, and that the real money was to be made in licensing the technology to other car makers?

Also, doesn't TFA state that the Model S is still going ahead as planned, even if the Roadster is not?

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[nschubach]

make cars people can afford. .... make a RegularCar, that I can buy for 75k

"People" cannot afford a 75K car. I make a good living and even I cannot afford a 75K car. (Actually, I do not want to afford one because it would literally drain my wallet.)

You must have read a different FA

[Registered Coward v2]

The news bit linked only says they've stopped producing a car, intended to be low volume, to focus on a sedan designed of higher volume. While they may or not be successful, nothing ITFA says "there business model has failed."

It'd be nice if some actually read the submission before... oh wait, this is /.

No need to worry yet

[damn_registrars]

Tesla is not closing or going away. Some idiot here at slashdot didn't bother to read the linked article. If they had, they would realize that this is not the end for Tesla as a company, just the end of a vehicle that was too expensive for many people to buy.

Furthermore, anyone who knows anything about Tesla knows that this has been part of their plan for some time. Build a roadster to get the technology working - and to show to the public that it really is as good as claimed - and then discontinue it to focus on a family sedan. Their first car achieved brand recognition and proof of concept, while bringing in investors. Now they are retooling and setting up a new shop to show that they can make it work on a larger scale.

Unfortunately, they have already sold out in part to a traditional auto maker, so how far they will be able to go unhindered is anyone's guess.

Re:No need to worry yet

[dave562]

Furthermore, anyone who knows anything about Tesla knows that this has been part of their plan for some time.

You are 100% correct about this. A friend of mine went to work for Tesla about a year ago. He was telling about all of the planning that they were doing to shift their production from the roadster to the sedan.

Above and beyond that, Tesla has a lot of patents. They have the best batteries in the industry. Tesla is a long way from going out of business. If anything their biggest concern is probably trying to figure out how to not get gobbled up by another company who just wants their intellectual property.

Re:No need to worry yet

[Nethemas the Great]

There was absolutely nothing wrong with the roadster's sales. It was the supply side that had issues. There has never not been a waiting list to get one of those things. The problem was that they cannot keep up with demand. They might be priced outside the reach of the average middle-class American but that never hindered sales. A 6 month wait list hindered sales.

Re:No need to worry yet

[c6gunner]

Tesla is a long way from going out of business

I dunno about that. They received quite a bit of government bailout money - otherwise they'd have probably been out of business already. I hope they do well, and I think they have a decent chance, but they're certainly not "a long way" from going out of business.

Re:No need to worry yet

[BitZtream]

A 6 month wait list hindered sales.

Agreed, in that you can't sell more if you can't make them.

Some people will certainly be willing to wait 6 months. I waited almost 9 months for a 30k car because I wanted THAT car ... now I'm a little pissed the GM decided to sell that brand off so the only place I can get new parts is from across the frakking pond, but thats another story entirely.

Re:No need to worry yet

[fnj]

There are two ways to deal with a long waiting list. 1) MAKE MORE freakin cars, dammit. 2) CHARGE MORE for the goddam cars. And, OK, 3) a combination of both. If you have a waiting list, you are paying for it in lost income. Not in THIS PLANET is stopping production a sane response to having a long waiting list. Not unless you can't make the damn cars.

The above is just elementary economics in general. Now, Tesla may have specific strategic reasons to switch production 100% to a new model that addresses a different market. This would have to involve some reason why they couldn't just make both models in parallel.

Re:No need to worry yet

[mac84]

Nah. The business model was, that there are enough rich greenie executives in california that will own one of the roadsters just for the statement they make when one cruises Rodeo Drive in one. Problem is, Porsche took six months and developed the 918 plug-in hybrid which it will sell next year. 720 HP and 200 MPH top speed. And you don't have to stop for eight hours to recharge after 3 hours of driving. So the Halo on Tesla's "halo car" is looking quite tarnished.

Re:No need to worry yet

[Nethemas the Great]

If I'm understanding things right, the largest portion of the supply problem involved Lotus not keeping pace supplying the bodies. This unfortunately is out of Tesla's control unless they are prepared to invest in their own facilities to produce the bodies. Tesla's leadership has long stated that the roadster was intended to bootstrap the company so that they could pursue things such as their S Model a.k.a. Whitestar (Babylon 5 fan I guess...). It has certainly accomplished that. Anyone mentioning failure doesn't know what they're talking about.

The Roadster may well just be going on hiatus for a time. From what I understand the Lotus plant that produces the body is being shut down for retooling. With no alternative for Tesla and already a shortfall of parts from Lotus, I don't think Tesla really has a choice but to stop production on it. I do hope that they bring back the Roadster. I personally will likely only be able to afford an S Model but the Roadster is inspiring for what an electric vehicle's potential is. If it wasn't for the Roadster I doubt we'd be seeing the present roll out of electric vehicles from other manufacturers.

Re:No need to worry yet

[Attila Dimedici]

I did not say they were closing. I said their business model had failed. Perhaps I misunderstood their business plan, but I really thought that Tesla had a chance to succeed in the electric car market. I thought that the idea of leveraging sales of a boutique model electric car in order to pay for the development costs of an affordable model electric car made sense. Tesla has yet to make a profit, yet they are discontinuing the boutique car in favor of an ordinary luxury car. They had not yet reached the point where they were able to satisfy the demand for the boutique car and now are switching to a car that is a much harder sell. The model S is nothing special, except that it is electric. it isn't even unique enough looking that people will know you are driving an electrci car. Why would you buy one over a BMW, Mercedes, or Audi?

Re:No need to worry yet

[gr8_phk]

Above and beyond that, Tesla has a lot of patents. They have the best batteries in the industry. Tesla is a long way from going out of business. If anything their biggest concern is probably trying to figure out how to not get gobbled up by another company who just wants their intellectual property.

Tesla doesn't make batteries. OK, they probably make "batteries" but not cells. I haven't heard of any interesting "IP" that tesla has. The Toyota deal struck me as odd. Toyota could certainly do it on their own, so it suggests that Tesla needed the money and Toyota figured they'd fill the plugin hole in their lineup with a minimum of effort. Nothing wrong with that BTW.

Re:No need to worry yet

[damn_registrars]

I said their business model had failed

Which confirms you don't know jack shit about what you're talking about.

Perhaps I misunderstood their business plan

Indeed you did. But you're either an idiot or a hack, so that isn't a surprise that you didn't understand their business plan. Much like the article you linked to, you probably didn't read it.

now are switching to a car that is a much harder sell

The wait list that has been building for the Model S - and just like the Roadster you only get on the list with money down - indicates that you are wrong on this, too.

The model S is nothing special, except that it is electric.

So you don't know anything about the Model S, then. But that's OK since you don't know anything about Tesla's business plan that they've been very forthcoming with for years. That's OK, because you are clearly not the person they are interested in for an investor, or a customer.

Re:No need to worry yet

[damn_registrars]

I did not say they were closing

Actually, you did. In the summary, which you wrote since it sure as fuck wasn't in the article you linked to, you said

With this announcement they are saying that they did not sell enough of the Roadster to make producing it profitable.

Which is inaccurate on multiple levels, however you went on to say

If that is the case, it is only a matter of time until Tesla closes its doors.

Which is exactly what you just said you did not say.

Hence not only are you uninformed, you are lying about it. You could at least have enough conviction to stand by your baseless FUD when you are confronted with reality, but instead you are trying to weasel out of it. You should ride down with your sinking ship of crap and lies, but instead you're trying on a woman's dress in the hopes that you can get on a life boat without anyone recognizing you.

Re:No need to worry yet

[Attila Dimedici]

I have seen the Model S. There is nothing about it that makes it stand out from the crowd, except the fact that it is electric. The Tesla Roadster had the cache of, "See, I've got a Tesla Roadster." When you saw one, it was unique looking, you knew it was somethign unusual. The Model S looks much the same as the general run of cars in its price class. Considering that the Tesla Roadster had performance charateristics that were slightly subpar for that price class, I do not see how the Model S will not, also, have performance characteristics that are slightly subpar for that price class.
Get back to me when Tesla turns a profit, without government subsidies.

Re:No need to worry yet

[Attila Dimedici]

I said it was only a matter of time before they close their doors, not that they were closing. I believe that statement to be true. Without the Roadster as the flagship model, Tesla has nothing to recommend it versus larger car companies with much deeper pockets. If it becomes profitable to make and sell electric cars, someone like Toyota will end up owning that market and Tesla will be unable to compete. The only chance that Tesla had of continuing as an automobile manufacturer was as the maker of aboutique car. They may have been able to leverage that position to, also, successfully sell more ordinary vehicles, but without the boutique model, there is not enough cache in buying a Tesla to support the company vs Toyota (Lexus) and/or other major car companies.

Re:No need to worry yet

[damn_registrars]

I said it was only a matter of time before they close their doors, not that they were closing

There is no important difference between those two statements. Forecasting the closure to be imminent is the same as saying they are closing.

Re:No need to worry yet

[damn_registrars]

I have seen the Model S. There is nothing about it that makes it stand out from the crowd, except the fact that it is electric.

Then I'm sorry about your profound visual impairment. It might explain why you couldn't read the article that you linked to in your story submission. I should probably salute you for making it this far while being somewhere in excess of being legally blind.

"See, I've got a Tesla Roadster." When you saw one, it was unique looking

Except that the Roadster has the same body as the more common Lotus Elise. You cannot easily tell the two apart unless they are being driven.

Considering that the Tesla Roadster had performance charateristics that were slightly subpar for that price class

You are either completely uninformed, or you are intentionally lying to try to save face. Neither looks good for you, though.

Those of us who live on planet earth know that the Tesla Roadster is at least as fast - if not faster - than Porsches that cost more.

I do not see how the Model S will not, also, have performance characteristics that are slightly subpar for that price class.

Sure, you could make that prediction if you insist on ignoring reality. I can't stop you from doing so.

Get back to me when Tesla turns a profit

We would thank you if you were to stay away from slashdot until then. For whatever your concept of "profit" is, anyways.

Re:No need to worry yet

[Teancum]

Tesla is a long way from going out of business

I dunno about that. They received quite a bit of government bailout money - otherwise they'd have probably been out of business already. I hope they do well, and I think they have a decent chance, but they're certainly not "a long way" from going out of business.

They didn't get any of the "government bailout money" at all. There was a loan program cobbled together during the "W" Bush administration and pushed through by the major auto companies that had very low interest rates for electric vehicle production. THAT is the money Tesla Motors got, since they are based in America, using American labor, and selling the vehicles in America they couldn't be disqualified from the program.

It sure wasn't a subsidy and the money does have to be paid back. Furthermore, the money wasn't even targeted at Tesla, but they qualified for it anyway. To me, it is more of a face slap to the other auto makers because they couldn't get vehicles that qualified for the money.

If you have ever received a student loan, you have likely received money from the government under similar terms. Is that a "bailout"?

Re:No need to worry yet

[c6gunner]

They didn't get any of the "government bailout money" at all. There was a loan program cobbled together during the "W" Bush administration and pushed through by the major auto companies that had very low interest rates for electric vehicle production.

Ah, ok. I just remember that they received some $400+ million, and it happened around the same time as the bailouts of GM-et-al. And it was a pretty big deal because the loan was something like twice as big as the value of the company. Not sure that there's much of a difference seeing as the bailouts are all technically "loans", too, but thanks for the correction, anyway.

If you have ever received a student loan, you have likely received money from the government under similar terms. Is that a "bailout"?

Never had a student loan. I don't really like the idea of borrowing money to pay for a piece of paper, and hoping I'll make enough cash afterwards to pay it back. As to whether they're bailouts ... I dunno, now that I think about it, that term doesn't really have a very clear-cut meaning. If a student can't afford to go to university without the loan ... maybe it would be a bailout. It's money given or lent to a person or company who would otherwise fail. So yeah, I guess they could be, if you use a very loose meaning of the definition :)

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[mr1911]

Considering that approximately 66% of electricity in the US is generated by fossil fuels, electric cars are not really much of an alternative. Just because you don't burn fossil fuels directly in the car doesn't mean they are not dependent on fossil fuels.

Here's the source of the 66% number for the "I don't believe your number" types. http://www.eia.gov/cneaf/electricity/epm/epm_sum.html

Call me cynical, but...

[wcrowe]

I have always suspected that Tesla's REAL business model involved being bought out by one of the major automobile manufacturers.

Re:Call me cynical, but...

[Andy Dodd]

That's pretty close to the truth - not necessarily for the entire company to be bought outright, but for other companies to buy their tech.

There's no way in hell that Toyota, one of the pioneers in hybrid electric vehicle technology, would have gone to another company for full-blown EV technology if that company didn't have a rock solid technology demonstrator.

The Tesla Roadster was just that - and now Toyota is buying EV technology from Tesla.

Re:Call me cynical, but...

[BitZtream]

If you read their business plan, which has been public since they announced their existence to the world ... all along the intended to license the tech to the existing manufactures.

No need to suspect it, they told you thats what they were going to do years ago.

Regular cars are not 75K

[Shivetya]

First the article title sucks and the summary is worse.

They are not going out of business, not yet at least. They are going to stop producing the roadster which had a very limited market and work on getting their sedan out.

As to the person I am replying too, it is not the big American three that are at fault, as far as I can tell each continent it quite adept at producing and buying gas guzzlers. In fact while the average person in Europe might be keen on efficient small cars Europe is the land of gas guzzling exotics. I guess the little people should be happy with their itty bitty cars while the rich and powerful blissfully ignore any such concerns.

Don't pile accolades on Tesla, they have yet to prove they can deliver this sedan and have a sustainable business models. All the dreams in the world amount to nothing if they don't come to fruition. Just because someone claims they can solve the problems of the world does not excuse them from actually delivering. Seems to me that vaporware is very common in most industries and far too many investor's lose their shirts over well executed glossy presentations.

Re:Regular cars are not 75K

[JBMcB]

+1.

Building a really good, innovative car that costs $100,000 is easy. Lots of car companies do it.

Building a really good, innovative car that costs $25,000 is incredibly difficult to near impossible.

It's rumored that Toyota and Honda have been selling their hybrids at a loss, mainly to keep their CAFE average in conformance as they were selling more SUVs. A small start-up can't afford to do cost-shifting like that.

Re:Regular cars are not 75K

[JDAustin]

It's rumored that Toyota and Honda have been selling their hybrids at a loss, mainly to keep their CAFE average in conformance as they were selling more SUVs. A small start-up can't afford to do cost-shifting like that.

The major car companies have been selling their sub-compacts at a loss for years due to CAFE averages.

Just goes to show you what regulation really does. It prevents new entries into a established market due to the costs being so high.

Re:Regular cars are not 75K

[csnydermvpsoft]

Just goes to show you what bad regulation really does. It prevents new entries into a established market due to the costs being so high.

FTFY

Re:Regular cars are not 75K

[s73v3r]

Except we're commenting in a story ABOUT a new startup entering the market.

Re:Regular cars are not 75K

[timeOday]

It's rumored that Toyota and Honda have been selling their hybrids at a loss, mainly to keep their CAFE average in conformance as they were selling more SUVs

I will see your a rumor and raise you a cite:

According to the Japanese newspaper Nikkei (via Green Car Congress), each hybrid that Honda and Toyota sell earns the respective company about $3,100 in profit.

In fact Toyota has been meeting this persistent rumor with the same answer - they are turning a profit on the Prius - since 2002.

Re:Regular cars are not 75K

[MrHanky]

Yes, but what about $28,000? Apparently possible, but not possible to sell.

Re:Regular cars are not 75K

[h4rr4r]

Because they wanted $28k, for something that could not compete with a $10k Kia Rio.

Re:Regular cars are not 75K

[MrHanky]

Exactly. Being cheap and innovative isn't enough when innovation doesn't give value for money.

Re:Regular cars are not 75K

[kelemvor4]

It's rumored that Toyota and Honda have been selling their hybrids at a loss, mainly to keep their CAFE average in conformance as they were selling more SUVs. A small start-up can't afford to do cost-shifting like that.

The major car companies have been selling their sub-compacts at a loss for years due to CAFE averages.

Just goes to show you what regulation really does. It prevents new entries into a established market due to the costs being so high.

No, it prevents new entrants from pulling the same scams that the established companies are getting away with currently. It doesn't prevent new entries into the market where the entrant actually complies with the law (and the "spirit" of the law as the saying goes).

Re:Regular cars are not 75K

[LunaticTippy]

Do you have a source for that? Every car company I am aware of makes money on its small cars. Here is an article about Ford making their Focus even more profitable after standardizing globally on a common chassis. There are companies selling profitably in the sub $5k market in China and India.

I know the transition was painful for many domestic carmakers because they ended up with a lot of SUV stock and plants that weren't needed, and the profit on an expensive SUV is larger than on an inexpensive compact.

Re:Regular cars are not 75K

[afidel]

$41,695 for an electric Ford Festiva, yeah I can see why that didn't sell well.

Re:Regular cars are not 75K

[Teancum]

A new start-up that is selling its CAFE credits to Toyota as a part of the partnership to get things built. It doesn't exist in a vacuum and this start-up is headed by somebody who is getting pretty familiar with Washington DC and its political process.

Tesla may be fine and thriving in that environment, but it still is incredibly hostile to a new start-up company that doesn't have all of those political and business connections.

Re:Regular cars are not 75K

[JBMcB]

That's a common misconception about the profitability of the Prius and Insight. They do make make gross profits on those cars - that is cost above the cost of building them. Gross profits don't factor in development costs, though, which are a significant portion of the total cost of making a car. Since these were basically brand-new platforms, most analysts think that they have only recently started making a net profit on those vehicles, if at all.

The largest immediate benefit from these vehicles are skewing their CAFE averages so they can sell very profitable SUVs.

Re:Regular cars are not 75K

[timeOday]

The Prius was a big development effort and risk for Toyota at one time, but it entered the market 14 years ago (1997) and has sold over 2 million copies since. I don't know when their break-even point was, probably nobody outside the respective companies does, but it seems to have been paid off and positioned them well for the future. I only hope Chevy ever reaches that point with the Volt. They about a decade late to the party.

Battery packs are thier future

[jzarling]

They were probably never going to succeed beyond being a boutique auto manufacturer. Their real innovation is their battery pack technology. Sure its a bunch of small cells, but its semi affordable, and more development may bring down to fully affordable.

your chance is coming

[damn_registrars]

Now make a RegularCar, that I can buy for 75k, and I'll have one in the driveway tomorrow

The actual article - which sadly the slashdot editor apparently made no attempt whatsoever to read in any way, shape, or form - says that is exactly what they are working on next.

Actually, they'll do you one better. The Tesla model S (for sedan) will start at $58k. Some details are in the article; you can get a 300 mile range version for around $80k. If you look up information on it, you can find prototype pictures, it looks like a Jaguar XJ or XF sedan of the current generation.

However, there is a wait list. You won't have it tomorrow, but if you go put some money down, you can have one when one is ready for you.

Re:your chance is coming

[Attila Dimedici]

Yes, that's right, Tesla will be building a car that competes with $20,000 sedans and selling it for $58K. The Roadster was a good idea because it was a boutique car. People do not buy boutique cars because of the value, but because of the statement they make. The Tesla Roadster was a car that handled well enough that when combined with the cool factor of driving an electric car allowed it to compete with other $100,000 cars. Except that apparently it didn't.
The Model S is going to be competing with several models from BMW, Mercedes, Lexus, and others. I just don't see it. People who buy cars in that price range buy a car for performance, ride quality, or snob appeal. I don't see how the Model S makes it in that market. People buy $100,000 cars to have something unique.
I thought that Tesla's idea of developing a boutique car and using the publicity and earnings from it to pay for developing an affordable car made sense. Now that they are discontinuing the Roadster, I cannot see any logic whereby the company will compete as a car manufacturer. They may succeed as a supplier of parts to other manufacturers, but I do not believe they will stick around as an automobile manufacturer.

Re:your chance is coming

[damn_registrars]

Ah hah, are you the same idiot who misread (or just simply did not read) the article and got this total piece of garbage summary posted that directly contradicts the cited article?

Because what you're saying seems to indicate that indeed you don't have a clue what you are talking about.

Tesla will be building a car that competes with $20,000 sedans and selling it for $58K

Simply no. The Model S is not designed to compete with $20k sedans. It is a $58k sedan designed to compete with $60k sedans. Can you find a $20k sedan that has the features and performance of the Model S? I'll save you the time; none exists. Not here, not anywhere else.

The Model S is going to be competing with several models from BMW, Mercedes, Lexus, and others

That might be the only accurate statement you've made.

I just don't see it.

Clearly, you don't. That's fine, you don't need to buy one. You are free to buy whatever car you like from any manufacturer you want. Hell you can skip cars altogether if you want, and use a bicycle or public transportation instead. You can hire a taxi if you want.

People who buy cars in that price range buy a car for performance, ride quality, or snob appeal.

All of which the Model S has in spades.

I don't see how the Model S makes it in that market.

Apparently then you've never seen or read the specs for the Model S. Sure, this is slashdot, but if you want to come across as being somehow knowledgeable, you might want to do some reading.

Now that they are discontinuing the Roadster, I cannot see any logic whereby the company will compete as a car manufacturer.

Look at the numbers that BMW, Jaguar, and Porsche turn out to stay solvent. You don't need to sell billions of cars to stay in business. You just need a product that people want to buy. As much as you want to hate it - in spite of the fact that you clearly don't know shit about it - there are plenty of people who are interested in it.

but I do not believe they will stick around as an automobile manufacturer.

In spite of the fact that you have provided no reason whatsoever to support that belief of yours. You even linked to an article that contradicts damned near everything you said - of course if you actually read the article you would have known that and perhaps cited a different one or just not sent this in.

Re:your chance is coming

[Attila Dimedici]

As far as I know, Tesla has yet to turn a profit. The Roadster was a car that stood out and that sold to people who could afford to buy a car just for that. The Model S is nothing special, at its price point, and not particularly distinct looking.
I find it hard to believe that the Model S is competitive in performance at its price range, considering that the Roadster was barely competitive with cars of that price range.

Re:your chance is coming

[damn_registrars]

The Model S is nothing special, at its price point

Thank you for confirming yet again that you don't know anything about the Model S

I find it hard to believe that the Model S is competitive in performance at its price range

We already know you don't know anything about the Model S, you are only driving home the point now.

considering that the Roadster was barely competitive with cars of that price range

So you didn't know anything about the Roadster either, then. I'm glad to see you know samzenpus well enough that he will post meaningless and misinterpreted shit from you to the front page. You must be proud,

Re:your chance is coming

[Attila Dimedici]

Get back to me when Tesla turns a profit without government subsidies. I really thought that Tesla was going to be a successful car company, but without the boutique model, there is nothing that sets them apart enough to compete with established car companies with much deeper pockets. If the time comes when it is profitable to sell full electric cars, one or more of the major car compaines will eat Tesla's lunch (unless of course one of them buys Tesla instead).

Re:your chance is coming

[damn_registrars]

If you insist on not reading about what you are writing about, I cannot change that for you. You posted an article for the front page where your summary flat-out contradicted almost every word of the article that you were linking to. You have made numerous statements in discussion here that clearly demonstrate you don't have a clue what you are talking about.

If you want to stay away from slashdot until Tesla meets whatever concept you have of "profit", I think we would all be better for it.

Re:your chance is coming

[damn_registrars]

The illiterate goon who was credited with this "story" couldn't bother to read the article he was linking to. Hence there is no reason to expect that providing a link to anything else would be useful, either. He apparently believes that the cars he clearly has no knowledge of are some sort of worthless milk trucks that get passed by intoxicated snails on the sidewalk. There is no point in correcting him with actual information because he clearly cannot process it anyways.

The real question is how on earth he found the article that he provided (but did not read). He is clearly incapable of using google; I can't even think of a news source that would so badly massacre information intentionally.

Re:your chance is coming

[rogerdugans]

But yours is long gone and you are digging yourself a deeper hole with further inaccuracies.

Never was the Roadster intended to be a long-term "boutique" production model. But as I recall it ended up selling better than expected, and more than originally planned.

How many BMW, Mercedes and Lexus sedans are available for $20,000? You earn another dope slap for that argument as well.

As for competing with cars in the projected price range- very much so as far as accoutrements, handling and performance other than the range/cost per mile variances. I do expect the S to come in 10 or 15K over projected cost, at least initially, but those who are tempted by such a vehicle are likely to pay the extra happily.

Look, Attila Dimedici:
I do not LIKE electric vehicles. The Leaf, for example is useless and if given one I would burn it just to make a statement.
I think Hybrids are a good thing but even there many of them are crap- the Prius leading that segment. It is a horrible little car that should have all existing examples gathered up and destroyed in an effort to protect the planet from mediocrity.

Most important to ME is a car that provides reliable transportation for up to 250 miles AT SPEED per day and allows me to enjoy my time driving it.
Good fuel mileage is ever more important, but NOT at the cost of a good vehicle that is fun to drive.

And yet even I know far more about Tesla and how successful they have been so far and how bright the future looks for them and their products.

You need a remedial course, man.

Re:your chance is coming

[Attila Dimedici]

I am completely disappointed by this move by Tesla. I do not believe that the technology is there yet for an all electric drive car to be an everyday car for average Americans. I believe that this move by Tesla indicates that Tesla will not have the money to develop such a car and that the company is based on government subsidies.

Re:your chance is coming

[Teancum]

As far as I know, Tesla has yet to turn a profit. The Roadster was a car that stood out and that sold to people who could afford to buy a car just for that. The Model S is nothing special, at its price point, and not particularly distinct looking.

Before Tesla started to dive big into the Model S, they did turn a profit and that in fact was one of the major selling point for the company when they did the IPO. Fortunately, they didn't want to stay a boutique automotive company and had bigger ambitions.

Sadly, the process of bringing a new production vehicle out is a rather expensive and painful process, particular to demonstrate to the various government agencies that your vehicle is "safe for the general public" and to engineer not just the raw design of the vehicle but to also engineer the production facilities to make the vehicle as well. The reason Tesla is posting losses right now is not due to the lack of profit coming from the Roadster, but the fact that they are on a serious expansion phase of their company and tooling up for something much larger.

If once the Model S goes into production and they still can't turn a profit, your remark would be much more justified. As it stands, it is just like a division of one of the major automobile manufacturers who is operating at a theoretical loss while they tool up for their next model. That doesn't come cheap.

Re:your chance is coming

[Teancum]

Get back to me when Tesla turns a profit without government subsidies.

{{Citation needed}}

Seriously, what government subsidies? Are you talking about the loan program Tesla qualified for and is using for developing the Model S? Perhaps you are referring to tax breaks they got for developing the NUMMI plant? (which is a state and local issue, not even related to the federal government). Perhaps you are talking about "low-emission vehicle credits" that apply to all electric vehicles and are not unique to Tesla?

If you are going to quote something like this, at least know what the hell you are talking about in the first place rather than regurgitating something you've heard somewhere else that likely isn't true. Tesla is not, I repeat not getting subsidies, at least in the manner you are talking about. It is also something not unique to Tesla and something even you, yes you could have qualified for assuming you owned an automotive manufacturing plant (and were American.... I guess that is a bit of an assumption here that isn't always valid).

This often repeated lie needs to be exposed for what it is, even if some "mainstream" reporters continue to screw up on the issue as well.

Re:your chance is coming

[Teancum]

At least thank you for trying to raise the bar here and know there are others who agree with you.

The original posting is flat-out full of disinformation to the point that if he were any better known would be grounds for libel because of how mis-leading it is. Hopefully some people reading this will go down into the comments to see some of the real facts and learn a little bit more about the company.

Tesla isn't a perfect place and there are problems with the Roadster including a very colorful development history. I'm not really all that happy with how they've essentially shut down their "fan community" on their website (I used to be a regular reader), but then again the company culture changed a bit when Elon Musk kicked Martin Eberhard out. Likely it was for the better as Tesla has been able to grow where previously it was a shipwreck headed to the bottom of the ocean.

Still, when I see people slander Elon Musk and his companies with blatant lies and deliberate misinformation, it does get my dander up and I push back. If you want to attack the guy, attack him for things that are true as you don't need to destroy a guy with lies as he is so arrogant that he made Ironman (as portrayed by Robert Downy Jr.) seem human, on film no less. He is a modern incarnation of D. Delos Harriman, warts and all. I admire the guy after a fashion, but I'm not really sure I'd like my kids to grow up to be like him.

Re:your chance is coming

[damn_registrars]

Tesla would likely be disappointed to know that there are people who are as thoroughly and utterly incorrect in their understanding of Tesla Motors. They might be even yet more disappointed to know that lack of knowledge on your caliber is making front-page news at a technology site such as what slashdot used to be.

Re:your chance is coming

[rogerdugans]

I am sorry that my bias against vehicles I consider unworthy offended you. That was not my intention.
I posted MY bias to show that while I am not a fan of such vehicles I still follow development somewhat and know full well that the summary Attila Dimedici wrote was based on absolutely no evidence or knowledge of the subject.

If I had been writing an article or summary that I was presenting as FACT I would not include my inflammatory opinions in such a way.

I do not like to see FUD such as the summary above written about a company that has done so much to advance the art of the modern automobile and been successful at every step up to this point.

Re:your chance is coming

[Thumper_SVX]

Sorry, I'll have to agree with the general consensus here that you're either misinformed or an idiot. The fact that people have provided plenty of citations and examples of why your summary is blatantly wrong (not least of which within the article itself you linked) but you still insist that you're right just leads me to the latter conclusion.

Let me spell this out for you so you can research at your leisure (Google is your friend):

The Tesla Roadster was ALWAYS intended to be a limited production run car. Tesla sold MORE than they intended to build originally by about 40%
The Roadster was never intended to sell alongside the Model S
Tesla has a rather limited production facility and would rather use that space to build a more mass-market car.
The Model S does not compete with ANYTHING around $20K-$30K. It's a direct competitor to the BMW 7 series and Mercedes S Class. Both of these cars sell at the same price as the Model S or higher once you option them out. The Model S will be extremely competitive with these and their current competitors. In fact, if you look at the standard options in the Model S then you're actually looking at a 5-series or E-Class price range, so it's actually cheaper.
Tesla doesn't use government subsidies to function. You're thinking of GM and Chrysler.
The roadster was a proof-of-concept that was for sale to the public. The concept was proved, the technologies improved and the S was engineered from those things that were learned.

There's far more I could write that's wrong with your arguments, but I really don't see the point unless you're actually going to research. However I don't see any evidence that you will. Yes, we get it; electric cars are not for you for whatever reason, and you have some axe to grind against Elon Musk. Get over it. I have looked at my driving over the last 18 months and I could easily buy a Model S for daily commuting duties. I rarely drive more than 60-80 miles in a day, and plugging it in at night would take me all of about 30 seconds when I pull into my garage. It's a different way of thinking about things, but if you're averse to that what the hell are you doing on a geek site? People who are so afraid of change as you seem to be are generally referred to as a curmudgeon. Yes, you can look that up on Google, too.

For me, I will continue to drive my 15 year old Subaru until the Model S is released. If it still matches with my lifestyle (quite likely) then I for one will gladly pay for the pleasure of owning one. While the car's bigger than I'd like, there's no doubt in my mind that owning such a wonderful piece of engineering (and quite frankly I believe a piece of history) will be awesome in ways few other vehicles can compete with. And yes, $60K or thereabouts is well within my price range. Last year I came within a whisker of buying a new BMW M3 loaded to the hilt for around $75K... I just didn't for personal reasons.

Re:your chance is coming

[rogerdugans]

Go ahead and criticize me for having an opinion.
I still think the Prius sucks. There are a LOT of better vehicles- hybrid and non-hybrid that get better mileage, have more room and drive better.
Toyota has done a lot to advance the art of hybrids- they make some of the best, in fact. I just don't believe that the Prius is one of them.

If you own a Prius and are offended because I think your car choice sucks- get over it.
You most likely would think my choice sucks- as if I care.

AS to the original point of my post, and those of many others:
We have succeeded at least partially-
There is a blurb under the summary which helps take the sting out of the idiotic headline.

Uh what?

[bmo]

>Subby writes bad summary totally at odds with the meat of an article - probably didn't read the article and submits it anyway.
>gets "voted up" in the firehose by idiots that didn't read the article.
>gets posted on the front page by an "editor" that didn't read the article.

There are 3 layers of fail here, all of them inexcusable.

>Slashdot readers actually read the article and call Subby and the editor stupid

The Apocalypse is here.

--
BMO

Re:Uh what?

[assertation]

This kind of thing build resentment against Slashdot.

I submit articles which get rejected without any reason given. This guy submits a BS post and gets it published. Why should I volunteer to spend my time moderating Slashdot when asked if this is how they treat people who bother to submit articles?

Re:Uh what?

[Aceticon]

I, for one, welcome our new article reading Slashdot overlords.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Kell Bengal]

I agree - the summary is completely incongruous with the article. My understanding was that Tesla was always going to make a sedan after the roadster. According to the article, they are doing exactly that. Doing exactly what you planned to be doing sounds like success to me.

The fact that they are discontinuing the roadster seems peripheral, although one may ask why they would discontinue them if they were profitable. Perhaps they don't have enough capital to tool more than one production line at a time? Perhaps the sedan is expected to be more lucrative and they don't want to pay the opportunity cost of continuing to make roadsters.

Stock market disagrees with summary

[rcs1000]

Well: there's a surprise. Summary says: Tesla announces business model has failed and bankrupcy imminent.

Meanwhile, in the real world, Tesla's stock is up in an down market. The company is trading comfortably above its six month average price. The company, IIRC, always said that there would only be 2,500 Roadsters made...

Next year, the Model S will launch. The company has thousands of preorders, with people having put real money down.

The Model S may, of course, fail miserably. But the absurd FUD in the summary is ridiculous.

Re:Stock market disagrees with summary

[AndyMoney]

I agree. I wouldn't be surprised if the poster is currently shorting the stock. The ridiculous editorial is exactly the same as the garbage I see on the yahoo finance forums. On top of the positives mentioned by some of the posters in here: Toyota made a large investment in Tesla, and Tesla is going to be building the electric version of Toyota's RAV4. Tesla also has a deal with Daimler to build the battery packs in the electric version of the Smart car. I hardly call this a failure...

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[bmo]

If you're spending 75K on a car, you can probably afford the Roadster anyway, even though it's 25K more.

--
BMO

Alternative narrative

[foetusinc]

As I understand it, the current Lotus Elise, on which the Tesla is based, is also being discontinued. In Lotus case, they're replacing it with a brand new Elise built on a slightly larger chassis - and they can afford to do this because (compared to Tesla at least) they're high volume.

Tesla on the other hand doesn't have the time & money to reengineer the Roadster to work with the new Elise chassis at the same time they're trying to launch their sedan model. And they certainly don't have the clout to force Lotus to keep churning out an obsolete chassis for them.

End result: they disco'd an old model to focus on a new model. For every other car company on the planet this is called "Business As Usual", but apparently when you're Tesla it's a sign of impending collapse.

Re:Alternative narrative

[Beyond_GoodandEvil]

End result: they disco'd an old model to focus on a new model. For every other car company on the planet this is called "Business As Usual", but apparently when you're Tesla it's a sign of impending collapse.
Every other car company makes more than one model of car. Now, it is entirely possible that without the halo effect of the roadster people will still be interested in Tesla, and that the interest on the money people have already put down to buy the Sedan will allow Tesla to continue to operate, but when a company that is suppose to make money selling cars stops selling cars, and they(Tesla) aren't sitting on a ton of cash, people begin to think it is the beginning of the end.

Re:Alternative narrative

[Andy Dodd]

The halo effect of the roadster has already done its job for Tesla.

SMART EV, RAV4 EV, Mercedes A-Class E-Cell - all using technology bought from Tesla.

Re:Alternative narrative

[RightSaidFred99]

It's a sign of impending collapse because Tesla is doomed to fail. I don't really get the soft spot Slashdot has for Tesla. Any fool could see their entire business plan was silly. They planned on being a boutique electric car provider at a time when there weren't many other options. There are tons of options now and they'll be facing competition even in the high end from other, larger auto makers before long.

Sorry, Slashdot. Tesla is and always was doomed to failure.

Re:Was the Roadster ever supposed to be profitable

[trout007]

Correct. The Tesla was sold to help offset R&D costs. What better way to get real world data than have people pay you $100k to be test drivers. If they really sold 1650 cars at 100k that is $165 million towards R&D.

All of the lessons learned are going into the sedan which will be priced to be profitable. We shall see what happens.

No.. No.. No..

[LoveMuscle]

This was Tesla's plan for a while now, and the article says nothing about their business model failing. The cannot use the government funds they were given to develop a sports car, it must be used for the Model S. Also they based the Roadster on the Elise Chassis, and Lotus has quit making them. This isn't reddit or I'd down vote for the horrific summary. There is lots of info in their IPO filing, and elsewhere..

Also the basis of the business model for the Roadster was to smash the image of the electric car being a hippie-green eco-shitbox, which most electric car's to date have been. That was a resounding success.

http://www.teslamotors.com/about/press/releases/tesla-gets-loan-approval-us-department-energy
http://www.allcarselectric.com/news/1042150_tesla-roadster-production-to-end-in-2011-new-version-expected-in-2013

#740..

Re:No.. No.. No..

[Dixie_Flatline]

Someone mod this up. The end-of-life of the Lotus Elise was known when the Roadster was first being built, and this end-of-life for the Roadster has been planned all along. What a crock of a summary.

Editor

[Palshife]

Fix this shit. Submitter didn't read the article and is making things up.

Re:Editor

[Narcogen]

Actually, I think he did read it.

He read it and then wrote what he wanted anyway, because the story he wanted told wasn't the one he linked to.

There is no way this should ever have been posted.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Pope]

The Lotus Elise, which closely resembles and was the initial test mule for the Roadster, costs around 40k US, and that's a standard gasoline engine. How the hell would Tesla get their tech anywhere near 30k?

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[JWSmythe]

    It's all about pricing. If you sell, as they called it, a "boutique" item, it will have limited acceptance. Only those with money to throw around will be able to afford them, and they will never become a high volume item.

    I know a lot of Slashdot readers and car enthusiasts wanted them. We also don't have over $100k to drop on a 2 seat car that is still essentially a prototype.

    If they had an entry level model priced for the average consumer, and possibly a mid-range and high-line car, that would satisfy the markets. More people would have bought one priced closer to $10k. At $109k, you can buy two of any of the common hybrid cars available, *AND* you could get parts and have it serviced almost anywhere. Those with the money will get the high line model. Many who look at the entry level model would consider or buy the mid-range model.

    I was interested in buying a Tesla. I can't justify buying a novelty car for more than the current market value of an average home, regardless if it's better or worse for the environment.

I'll miss them

[Animats]

I see Tesla roadsters on the road almost every day. I live in Silicon Valley on a hilly, winding road which leads to a lightly used road along a lake. It's about the only place in Silicon Valley where driving a sports car is a fun experience. The Silicon Valley Tesla dealership is nearby . So I see the little roadsters go quietly swooshing by as the dealership demos them.

There are enough Teslas in Silicon Valley that I see them around, being driven, parked in parking lots, and just routinely being used. Only once have I seen one on a flatbed truck, being hauled into the shop.

Not having anything to sell for a year seems a business mistake. Even if they're not making much money on the roadsters, keeping some product on the market seems necessary to retain attention. There are competing electric sedans, after all. The Tesla Roadster was unique, and finally killed the image of the electric car as wussy.

Re:I'll miss them

[Lunix Nutcase]

Tesla is not going away. The summary is total trollbait.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[jellomizer]

You could probably afford a $75k car. However you will need to adjust your lifes tradeoffs to get the car. I wouldn't do it, but some people do it all the time. Why do you see some hot shot kid in a Porsche, while they live in a low rent apartment.
But the 75k is probably towards the 1's millionaires out there (the Poor Rich). Baby Boomers who wants to relive their childhood.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Hadlock]

That's the problem with bleeding edge technology. It's priced to recoup the R&D that went in to it. Also 400lbs of lithium ion batteries isn't cheap. The average laptop battery is about half a pound and costs $50 at e-retail, and there isn't much margin in that.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[yarnosh]

r. Now make a RegularCar, that I can buy for 75k,

WTF? 75k? That's a luxury car. GIve me something under $20k. I assume you mean USD.

Another failure brough to us by samzenpus

[damn_registrars]

I thought I had seen a craptacular job by this hack before, and indeed, back in 2009 we saw a completely inaccurate front-page story posted by him where he didn't bother to read the article that he linked to.

But apparently on the front page, FUD sells, eh?

Doesn't sound like a failure to me

[hawguy]

They sold over $1.5B worth of Roadsters (1650 @ $109,000) and have used Roadster technology to help produce a more affordable car that will let them sell more cars. The $100K car market is only so big, I don't think they planned on selling millions of the Roadsters. The new "affordable" Model S won't hit the market until next mid next year.

Tell me again where the failure is?

Re:Doesn't sound like a failure to me

[hawguy]

Tell me again where the failure is?

The failure is in your multiplication. It is $180 million, not $1.8 billion.

Ahh yeah, you're right - that'll teach me for miscounting my 0's!

Re:Doesn't sound like a failure to me

[BitZtream]

Might want to check your math and remove a zero off the end so you can get back down to the actual amount of 180 million.

109,000 * 1650 = 179,850,000

If you'd had said 1.8B it would have made a little more sense, but 1.5B isn't even off by just an extra 0 on the end.

Gov't Loan to Tesla

[seven of five]

Tesla received $465M in Federal money according to engadget. They couldn't possibly have burned thru it already.

Re:Gov't Loan to Tesla

[Dunbal]

No, the whole program existed to get that government money in the first place.

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[jellomizer]

So in theory that is a 34% drop in emissions then. Then you add Hybrid like energy savings to the car (Charging battery for deceleration or going down hill) Still it is better. Also for the electric grid, A lot of the cars charging time is on off peak hours. Where the plants still need to run and burn fuel but less are reaping the power. So the question is with the extra power on the grid durring non-peak hours how much more fossil fuels will be in delta from the extra load.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[rilister]

You can tell the Roadster served it's purpose because "Besides building its own cars, Tesla has a business partnership with Toyota Motor Co (TM) to produce a plug-in electric version of the RAV4 SUV and a deal with Daimler (DDAIF) to provide batteries for an electric version of the Smart ForTwo minicar."

That's Toyota, developer of the Prius, admitting that Tesla have technology and know-how that they need. That's what the Roadster bought Tesla.

They have not succeeded yet either

[sheepofblue]

While I agree the intro did not reflect the article many responses act as if they have succeeded which is also not true. As of now they are burning investor and government money in search of profit. They might get there or they might not. But acting like they have failed is wrong but so is acting like they have succeeded based on an announced product and no history of profit is also wrong. There is a lot of 'green' technology that is cost effective and despite the desires of some the technologies that are not cost effective will fail no matter the 'green' factor. The only temporary exception is something that is mandated and even that will expire after causing damage to the economy.

Summary fail

[toxonix]

"business model failed" ??? that's not even close to summarizing or paraphrasing the article. They delivered 1650 Tesla roadsters. Lamoborghini, which is somewhat a competitor, sold around 1200 units over roughly the same time period. The Model S should be comparable to the Porsche Panamera, Aston Martin Rapide or Maserati Quattroporte in terms of luxury and performance. They will probably be competitive with these high performance gas drinkers. So to say a low volume boutique company's business model failed is stupid and irresponsible. The relative rarity of the Roadster makes it even more desirable, which is what buyers of low volume boutique cars want. I think Elon Musk and his team have done a extremely difficult thing, albeit with a lot of money to help them along. RTFA before you write shit like this.

Going from 100% fossil fueled to 66%

[sean.peters]

Is still a pretty big deal. If everyone cut the transportation portion of their fossil fuel use by a third, we could put a big dent oil imports and cut pollution by quite a bit (probably even more than a third cut in this, as it's easier to capture pollution from one big smokestack than from millions of tiny ones). Additionally, you'd probably actually cut energy usage by more than a third, because electric vehicles are a lot more energy efficient than internal combustion ones (most of your energy is lost as heat). Further, as wind/solar/nuclear use replace coal/oil/natural gas, you automatically improve all this stuff without having to do anything else, just because your cars instantly become even less dependent on fossil fuels.

Let's not let the perfect be the enemy of the good here. Switching to electric cars would be a big step forward.

Re:Going from 100% fossil fueled to 66%

[Jon_S]

Additionally, you'd probably actually cut energy usage by more than a third, because electric vehicles are a lot more energy efficient than internal combustion ones (most of your energy is lost as heat).

True, but generating electicity from fossil fuels also loses more than half the energy as heat. You can lose it at the power plant, or lose it in and internal combustion engine, same difference. Of course if the source is renewable, there is a difference, but it will be struggle to even get close to 50% renewable anytime in the foreseeable future.

Re:Going from 100% fossil fueled to 66%

[h4rr4r]

Not the same difference, the power plant is far more efficient than your car.

Re:Going from 100% fossil fueled to 66%

[RockClimbingFool]

You can lose it at the power plant, or lose it in and internal combustion engine, same difference.

There is a big difference. Granted, that while this paper was written by Tesla Motors in 2006, it does give some pretty believable back of the envelope calculations demonstrating their Tesla Roadster to be twice as efficient as a Honda Prius.

Either way, that paper is a good read and shows why burning hydrocarbons at the power station and sending electricity back to vehicles is the way to go. You can then start to supplement the power station hydrocarbon burning with alternative fuels, or more nuclear power.

Re:Going from 100% fossil fueled to 66%

[Kavafy]

Honda Prius? Now *that's* what I call a hybrid!

Even so, Tesla is too late

[Kupfernigk]

Tesla will fail, no matter how much people want them to succeed. Why? Economies of scale.

Toyota have already delivered something like 3 million of their hybrid drivechains. The latest Prius is the biggest, heaviest, fastest and most economical to date, and now they will produce a small hybrid (Yaris). They have nearly 20 years of hybrid development. GM has what is in reality a plug in hybrid. Mercedes planned the original A-class to be electric; they have lots of development, as yet unused, probably over 20 years. Nissan has the Leaf entering volume production. Mitsubishi is ramping up its city car. The simple fact is that the moment batteries are good enough to go it alone - and they are not, yet, except for niches - these manufacturers can do it all over Tesla because they can crank out reliable, proven designs in volume. The sheer amount of development it takes nowadays to build a car reliably and economically is staggering, and Tesla cannot amortise that over large production runs. Their products are always likely to be way overpriced - and although some people will pay for a badge, the total number as a percentage of the market is very small indeed.

Toyota is in the strongest position because they can vary the relative amount of electric and gasoline power according to the state of energy costs. As gasoline gets more expensive, the gas engine can shrink and the battery can grow. As a result they can sell vehicles people actually want to buy. (OK, I admit it, I ended my support for Diesels and bought a Prius this year.)

Re:Even so, Tesla is too late

[Andy Dodd]

Except that Toyota already decided that if you shrink the gas engine to 0 and go all-electric, Tesla's tech was better than their own. Much of that was likely thanks to the Roadster.

Oh, he read it

[sean.peters]

He just wanted to spin the results in a certain way. Even on Slashdot, though, there's only so much spin you can get away with without people noticing.

Re:Oh, he read it

[damn_registrars]

Even on Slashdot, though, there's only so much spin you can get away with without people noticing.

Correct. If he would have blamed the "failure" on President Obama, it would have gotten through with even less scrutiny.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[McNihil]

I think he meant monopoly money. :-D

Slashdot editors...

[Beelzebud]

Are the Slashdot editors pissed off because Tesla doesn't accept bitcoins for their cars?

Re:Slashdot editors...

[damn_registrars]

Are the Slashdot editors pissed off because Tesla doesn't accept bitcoins for their cars?

Why would that matter? It's not like townhall.com pays slashdot in bitcoins anyways...

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[JDAustin]

No, If Tesla can not make it on their own, without governmental support they do no deserve to exist. A great goal does not justify governmental intervention. Before you get to warped, I disagreed with and will always disagree with the government intervening in any business, there is no such thing as too big to fail.

GM and Chrysler could not make it on their own with out government support and yet they still exist. Had they been allowed to fail (nothing is to big to fail), maybe they would have left a void waiting to be filled by Tesla. But alas we get the government subsidized Leaf instead.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[whisper_jeff]

Now make a RegularCar, that I can buy for 75k...

Can I live in your world where "regular car" equals 75k? Jebus...

Wrong summary, good news

[Anonymous Coward]

Tesla has in fact succeeded with most of their goals for the Roadster:
Created a good looking, high performance, pure electric vehicle that both proved the advances in electric car tech and that electric cars can be a viable alternative for some people NOW.
Admittedly the Roadster is not viable for everyone- lack of cargo space and lack of real range being the biggest problems.
But they PROVED that a pure electric can also be a GOOD, enjoyable car.
Something that no other manufacturer has done.

Since their business model was to use the Roadster to test and prove tech in small numbers and create buzz about the product and company and then stop production in favor of more mass-market friendly models.... well, so far they are doing exactly what they intended, and doing so successfully so far.

Strange situation here- I am not a fan of pure electrics as they don't meet my needs and I don't care for the increased pollution they cause in most of the US (electric generation plants are not exactly the "greenest" things around, not to mention battery disposal!) but Tesla has improved automotive tech for both pure electric and Hybrid (which I DO see as truly viable in the real world) and has so far been a very successful company.

Cowboy Neal needs to slap Attila Dimedici down for being an idiot, methinks.

Re:Wrong summary, good news

[rogerdugans]

It's a personal opinion and there is plenty of evidence to back up both sides of the discussion.

Funny thing though- I am amongst the people who are correcting the clown who wrote the summary and pointing out all of the errors, and reinforcing how incredibly bad those are errors are by including the fact that I DON"T LIKE ELECTRIC CARS AND EVEN I KNOW MORE ABOUT TESLA THAN THE BOZO WHO ORIGINALLY POSTED THE STORY HERE.

Yet instead of those who are fans of Tesla appreciating the fact that someone who prefers ic engines is helping to defend against FUD and false statements, a few of you are trying to convince me of the benefits or taking me to task for my opinions.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[yarnosh]

Pretty sure that making a safe consumer friendly car means adding features, not removing. Sure, they can take away performance, but consumers expect a lot out of a car these days. For one hting, if I recall, the Roadster has rather limited range. There's a reason why even the Volt has an engine.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[dagamer34]

Even if it's profitable, it's probably better to pour their limited resources into a car that would have larger mass-market appeal. They only have so many engineers.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Andy Dodd]

Yes - I don't see how this article indicates that the business model has failed at all. I think, if anything, it has succeeded wildly - my guess is that the Roadster was likely less of a "fundraiser" than as a "halo car" for marketing. If you want to sell your tech to potential partners (Their partners list includes Daimler and Toyota) it helps a LOT to have a widely recognized vehicle.

A lot of times "halo cars" fail - but for Tesla it seems to have succeeded. They now have partnerships with major automotive manufacturers to license their tech. (Toyota RAV4 EV, SMART EV, Mercedes A-Class E-Cell).

More energy needed to make gas than for electric?

[Paul Fernhout]

http://www.evnut.com/gasoline_oil.htm
"So I can get 24 miles in my ICE on a gallon of gasoline, or I can get 41 miles (at 300wh/mile) in my RAV4EV just using the energy to refine that gallon. Alternatively - energy use (electricity and natural gas) state wide goes DOWN if a mile in a RAV4EV is substituted for a mile in an ICE!"

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[cayenne8]

Yeah..but this blows.

This is about the ONLY electric (or even for hybrid class) type cars I'd ever be remotely interested in...

Everything else out so far, is fugly...and boringly utilitarian.

Oh well, guess I'll stick with gas powered cars, with performance that I can shift...till they outlaw gasoline, which I don't envision in my lifetime.

If something isn't fun to drive...might as well take a fucking bus with the winos.

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[Andy Dodd]

Keep in mind, in addition to the "that's still 34% better" comments - Fossil fuel power plants don't have to worry about power-to-weight ratios and hence can be MUCH more efficient and cleaner than vehicle engines.

Admittedly not all of them are - we have a LOT of shitty legacy coal plants, but in general, it's a lot easier to make a highly efficient coal or gas power plant economically than to make a highly efficient vehicle engine economically.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[cayenne8]

The Lotus Elise, which closely resembles and was the initial test mule for the Roadster, costs around 40k US, and that's a standard gasoline engine. How the hell would Tesla get their tech anywhere near 30k?

If they could have gotten it into the range of a corvette, I'd likely own one.

Too bad I wasn't in CO a few years back, when they had a tax rebate snafu that I'd heard of on electric vehicles. I think they had a huge percentage tax credit...with no cap for awhile. I heard you could have gotten a tesla for in the $50K range with all the credits....

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Noughmad]

I think he meant monopoly money. :-D

But Canadian dollars are worth even more that US ones!

This company has a plan!

[pherth]

It is interesting to watch both companies run by Elon Musk: SpaceX and Tesla. Both companies step into fields which were so far not run by big businesses. What sets his ventures apart from others, is that they are executed along plans which not only span many years but most importantly on a clear path of technical evolution. When SpaceX went from Falcon1 to Falcon9 and soon to Falcon9 Heavy they followed a clear technical concept, where on each iteration main parts of the previous step were reused, keeping the technological and financial risks in control. What is so faszinating is, that that this progression was clearly planned from the start for a long time and range of products. Tesla is built on the same principle. They started with the roadster. No one expected it to generate multi-billion dollar revenue. But if you multiply its price with the sold number of cars, some nice revenue comes together. By price and concept it was targeted to a small group of wealthy enthusiasts. The roadster created a lot of awareness in the media. Now the technology and the price for batteries has improved vs. the time the roadster has been designed. Also now Tesla has many years of more experience with the technology and production of electrical cars. So the second step in the chain of products is a car which is targeted to a broader audience, by concept and price. The S will be the first model intended to reach higher production numbers. Consequently, in a few years we might expect another Tesla car, once again cheaper and more geared to the mass market, based on the revenue and experiences obtained with the model S.

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[Patch86]

Their business model was always to produce their "boutique" Roadster, follow it up with a sedan (at about half the price- still expensive, but more reasonable), and finally follow that up with an affordable car. They're now gearing up for step 2, so step 3 must be approaching one day (if they survive long enough).

I hope they reincarnate the Roadster one day, once they've got the facilities to justify tooling up for such a low volume item. The basics behind the design should still be "cutting edge" for years yet.

Re:just opened store in local mall

[whoever57]

I wonder how fancy their corporate HQ offices are.

Tesla recently moved into their new manufacturing facility -- it cost $50M -- the former NUMMI factory in Fremont, CA (New United Motor Manufacturing Inc --which was a joint GM/Toyota venture). Coincidentally, Toyota invested $50M in Tesla. Since the NUMMI factory operated for over 30 years, I wonder what environmental issues there might be if the factory was ever completely decommissioned. But I guess that Toyota no longer has to worry about that (GM doesn't have to worry about it either, but that is because GM went through bankruptcy)

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[cayenne8]

75k is definitely not a "RegularCar". 30-40k is closer to a reasonable high end sedan. Most sedans are still in the 20-30k range, but at least 30-40 would be a consideration for a lot more people.

I think it was on the CBS evening news in the last week or so...they said the avg US car price had hit an all time high...I'm trying to say it was like $24K-$28K.

And that prices were increasing...largely due to lack of cars being produced due to shortages of parts caused by the Japanese problems.

OP should be embarrased

[atlasdropperofworlds]

OP, did you even read the article past the title before going on your little monologue?

Can you read?

[jitterman]

Submitter apparently did not read the article s/he submitted! Content samples: "...was never intended to be a huge seller" and "...production is coming to halt as the maker of battery-powered cars switches its focus to the upcoming Model S electric sedan...for the middle of 2012". Sure as hell doesn't sound like Tesla believe that they've failed in their goal, nor that they're shutting down. Damn, this is the first time I've ever posting a bitch-fit (I've edited to take out the multiple f-bombs I had here), but shit, read the article before you submit, and before it is accepted!

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[s73v3r]

It's a fucking Ferrari-class car. Of course it's going to be expensive as fuck. But it got people talking about it, and it got investors excited.

In other news, the new 2012 Edsel has arrived!

[Suzuran]

N/T

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[h4rr4r]

They are still going to make the Model S. Which honestly if I could afford I would buy.

Summary != Article

[palpatine]

Was this summary written by an oil company executive? Or was this a contest to see how different the summary can be from the actual article? I RTFA'd this news story yesterday was glad that the Roadster has achieved its purpose -- now Tesla Motors can focus on its Model S, not to mention the Mercedes A-Class E-Cell, Smart EV, and Toyota Rav4 EV 2nd gen. I think the 10s could be the decade of the electric car.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Jonathan_S]

The fact that they are discontinuing the roadster seems peripheral, although one may ask why they would discontinue them if they were profitable

I heard that the Roadster was always going to be a limited production run. Tesla got the frame and body from Lotus; paying them to run an production line that otherwise would have been temporarily surplus. But Lotus now has their own uses for that line so Tesla can't buy the chassis / body from them anymore.

Continuing roadster production now would drain their cash because they'd have to license the right to built the frame / body from Lotus then fund a new production line for it. Instead they want to focus on their next step, making a production line for the Tesla S sedan.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[PIBM]

The Roadster is much closer to the Elise SC (performance wise, at least), which retails for around 70K$

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[s73v3r]

No, fuck that. Profit should NOT be the only measure of something's worth.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Sensible Clod]

Tesla's Roadsters are built on a Lotus chassis. Since Lotus is discontinuing that model, Tesla won't be able to make more Roadsters. It really is that simple.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[trum4n]

Yea, because idiots think that a car has to be able to lap the world in a day to sell. How many miles do you drive a day? 200 miles is enough for 90% of Americans, the rest, don't buy one. On a side note, the Volt is a joke.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[s73v3r]

Had they failed, unemployment would have skyrocketed, and we'd be in the depths of depression instead of just recession. I know it's trendy and hip to be on the "Free Markets or Bust" bandwagon these days, but maybe you should actually look at what the domino effect of your desires would actually do.

Re:just opened store in local mall

[h4rr4r]

That NUMMI factory built the best "GM" small cars there were at the time. The best GM could provide the American small car buyer was a rebadged Toyota, I think that explains how they ended up too big to fail.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[hesaigo999ca]

Bill Gates to the rescue....
This is one of those situations where Bill Gates could get involved and invest some money that he cant take with him when he dies, to actually make the world a better place....ecologically speaking of course....and when the new roadster comes out fresh and mint, and really top of its class in electric cars on the market, he will make another few billion dollars...

good riddance

[greymond]

While an electric sports car is indeed innovative, if companies actually want to make a successful business from hybrid or electric cars they need to sell to the masses first, then target disposable incomes second. The Nissan Leaf, Ford Fiesta and even the Wheego are all more realistic options. Granted they're above the average consumer level too being in the $30-40k range which places them in the luxury price tag category of the lower end and great gas mileage cars from Mercedes and BMW, but still no where near the small pool of people who would actually pay $110k for an electric roadster. I think most who can afford that price for a car would still rather have an Aston Martin or Bentley due to their status symbolism.

As someone who lives in the bay area, I think I saw maybe 1 Tesla around Palo Alto near Stanford's campus once. I see a dozen Prius's ($23k) every time I get in my car.

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[s73v3r]

Considering that approximately 66% of electricity in the US is generated by fossil fuels, electric cars are not really much of an alternative. Just because you don't burn fossil fuels directly in the car doesn't mean they are not dependent on fossil fuels.

Maybe, but two things:

1). Power plants are much more efficient at converting fossil fuels to power than a bunch of individual engines.
2). The thing with electricity is that the sources can be changed out for cleaner ones without most of the consumers noticing. So while now that number is 66%, in the years to come it is expected to drop.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[morari]

$75K? You and I have very different ideas of affordable.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[jank1887]

A lot of dev funding when you realize it requires removing the 'has a battery' feature.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[SnarfQuest]

till they outlaw gasoline, which I don't envision in my lifetime.

You gas powered vehicle is safe, just like your light bulbs are safe. The government would never force you, by law, to use some Chinese made replacement.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[morari]

Tesla will just have to start buying up all the old Europa bodies to use instead. :)

wrong business model?

[scharkalvin]

Well it seems that the Roadster was not priced high enough to be in the black. Tesla's decision to discontinue it may be a bit rash, they should shelve it until they have a car in production that DOES earn them a profit, the model S could be that car. Just as Chrysler was selling a few crazy V12 powered motercycles (I'm sure they did NOT lose money on them as long as nuts like Leno would buy them at any price), Tesla could then offer the Roadster at it's REAL cost to the deep heeled crowd that doesn't look at price tags. The roadster has done it's job, it has made a name for Tesla. Now they need to get a more down to earth electric out there. The model S still is in the high end "beamer" class so it won't be the average man's car. But maybe there will be a follow up to the model S that will be in the volt/prius/leaf class.

Re:wrong business model?

[ErikZ]

Huh. I thought their problem wasn't the price. But that they weren't building them.

I kept on reading about Tesla. And I wondered how they could go so far without actually delivering cars to buyers.

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[s73v3r]

At the same time, a sedan isn't all that exciting. Sure, it's much more practical, and more people would buy them, but it's not sexy. And that's what Tesla needed to get off the ground and get investors on board, not to mention the public excited about their tech. Not to mention that the battery tech when they started was super expensive, and there's no way a sedan would have made it at that price point. So they aimed higher, and tried to show off what they could do, performance wise.

They're already working on the Sedan. It's coming. They just wanted to get people, and investors, excited first.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[timeOday]

Had it been 30 grand, even though that's well above what I'd have wanted to spend on a car, I'd probably have bought 2 by now.

30 grand is how much it costs to by just the gasoline for a car that goes 150,000 miles at 20 mpg on $4 gas.

I keep seeing this over, and over, and over again - people complain about the purchase price of a hybrid or battery car without making any allowance at all for the reduced operating cost. Now, am I assuming electricity or replacement batteries are free? No. Maybe a battery car doesn't meet your needs, or isn't affordable even after including gas vs battery costs. But don't just look at the purchase price, it's pointless.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[h4rr4r]

Please don't mention electric cars and Jaguar in the same sentence. Jaguar electrical problems are legendary. Lucas electrical work was a nightmare.

Re:just opened store in local mall

[BitZtream]

I wonder what environmental issues there might be if the factory was ever completely decommissioned.

Pretty much the exact same issues there would be if it doesn't get decommissioned or if they had decommissioned it sooner.

It doesn't magically make bad things when you tear it down. They are already there, already leaching into the soil, water and air around the plant. Eventually it will all come out, its just a question of when. Cleaning it up at once, before it has leaked into the environment and been dispersed across a large region is FAR easier and better for everyone involved.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[interval1066]

"Now make a RegularCar, that I can buy for 75k, and I'll have one in the driveway tomorrow.

Is that in dollars or pesos, 'cause $75K is much more than I'm willing to pay for a car, and I'm sure I'm not alone. That price is going to have to come down for a product to be a commercial success.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Dracos]

Tesla's next, the Model S, will be a sedan targeting the $50k price point. There have been rumors that it will also spawn wagon and CUV variants. Not that CUV's aren't completely silly as a form factor.

If Tesla did go out of business, all their technology and patents would likely go to Toyota, since GM pulled out of the NUMMI plant and Tesla came in.

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[interkin3tic]

Considering that approximately 66% of electricity in the US is generated by fossil fuels, electric cars are not really much of an alternative. Just because you don't burn fossil fuels directly in the car doesn't mean they are not dependent on fossil fuels.

Except it -can- be run on renewables. You could install a solar panel on your garage to charge it up in theory. If your local power plant is renewable, your car can run on non-fossil fuel energy.

A gasoline engine, on the other hand, absolutely cannot.

Also, not all fossil fuels are created equal. I vaguely remember hearing that natural gas is cleaner than gasoline, though I could be mistaken. At the very least, it reduces demand on foreign oil. We have coal and natural gas. Save Canadian and Mexican oil for things that must be run on oil, and stop importing from Saudi Arabia, that would be a good thing.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[h4rr4r]

You're right. No light bulbs have been out lawed, only reasonable minimum set. There are even incandescents that meet these limits.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[SnarfQuest]

I think he means, he just wants a regular car, like a Pinto or a Yugo, but he wants to pay $75K for it. He's obviously a Democrat, who doesn't think things are expensive enough yet. Get rid of those cheap reliable American made incandescent lights, and replace them with crappy Chinese flouresents.

Did you read what you wrote?

[SuperKendall]

At $58k before the subsidies they won't have too much trouble selling them.

Really? That's way more than the Leaf or Volt. Look at the volumes those are selling at (few hundred/month across the U.S.). How exactly can Telsa sustain at those levels (or lower) of sales? They can't even count on many California people buying as subsidies there are done for the year...

The summary might be bombastic but I'm not sure the conclusion is not correct.

Re:Did you read what you wrote?

[damn_registrars]

The summary might be bombastic but I'm not sure the conclusion is not correct.

No, the summary is crap. The summary claims that the entire company is going to disintegrate this afternoon because they sold less than 500 quadrillion Roadsters.

Tesla is working on a different business model than the large manufacturers, largely because they are not a large manufacturer. They can't afford to do the R&D, retooling, and sales for a $30k car right now, they need to work their way to that price point.

Re:Did you read what you wrote?

[h4rr4r]

Because the Model S does not compete with either of those cars. It competes with the BMW 7 series low end or high end 5 series, it competes with Midrange Mercs and their ilk, not econoboxes.

Re:Did you read what you wrote?

[jdcope]

The only reason the Volt looks like it is selling is because the dealerships are selling them to each other to get the rebate from the feds. I have seen several Volts here, in Portland, Oregon...listed at over $50k. And that is for a "used" one, with less than 100 miles on it.

Re:Did you read what you wrote?

[0123456]

Because the Model S does not compete with either of those cars. It competes with the BMW 7 series low end or high end 5 series, it competes with Midrange Mercs and their ilk, not econoboxes.

Because people who buy such cars are so totally worried about gas mileage. And never drive more than a hundred miles or so without stopping for several hours to refuel.

Re:Did you read what you wrote?

[h4rr4r]

No they buy them for image, which is what this is. It is an image car. Most people don't drive more than a couple hundred miles a day. Mercedes buyers included.

Re:Did you read what you wrote?

[GameboyRMH]

The Leaf or Volt aren't comparable to the Model S. The Leaf is like an electric Mazda3 (but fugly), and the Volt is like an electric GenericCheapSedan (also HOLY SHIT WHY IS IT SO HUGE!?). The Model S is like an electric BMW M3 (but better looking). It's very competitively priced and entirely practical for people who don't take road trips every day (real or imagined).

Re:Did you read what you wrote?

[Magius_AR]

The Model S is like an electric BMW M3

Ummm, no. The M3 does 0-60 in about 4 seconds, maybe 4.3 being conservative. The Model S is looking at a mid 5 (~5.5) 0-60. The cars aren't in the same class. A closer comparison would be something like an Infiniti G37, which can be had for like 15-20k less. This is the discrepancy people are pointing out time and time again in this thread, yet somehow keeps getting glossed over.

Re:Did you read what you wrote?

[GameboyRMH]

Well I think the Tesla's luxury crap should count for something. And $15-$20k extra for an electric version of a car is pretty reasonable anyways, considering that's about what the battery costs.

Re:Did you read what you wrote?

[SuperQ]

ding ding ding, you nailed this exactly. The Model S is going to sell like hotcakes to the BMW/Audi/Merc/Lexus/etc luxury sedan crowd. Tesla's market planning has so far been flawless.

Re:Did you read what you wrote?

[Thumper_SVX]

Because people who buy such cars are so totally worried about gas mileage. And never drive more than a hundred miles or so without stopping for several hours to refuel.

I just sold my BMW 545i and am driving my 15 year old Subaru (owned both at the same time). At around $60K you might have to chain me down to STOP me buying a Tesla model S because I think they're freaking cool. I love the engineering, I love the look (like a Maserati Quattroporte), I love the technology and I love the fact that they're really looking like they're going to deliver precisely what they promised at around the price point they promised. Something many auto manufacturers fail on.

The model S is a perfect fit for my lifestyle and driving during my daily commute. It would also be awesome for taking clients to lunch, where many of the people I take out are IT directors or CTO's who would appreciate the tech in the car.

Re:Did you read what you wrote?

[Thumper_SVX]

Heh... my experience is that Mercedes drivers typically drive LESS than someone who owns a Honda Civic. Mostly because they can afford to live closer to the office. I know our CEO at work drives an S550 that he drives the 3 miles from his house every day and back again.

Re:Did you read what you wrote?

[Magius_AR]

Well I think the Tesla's luxury crap should count for something

Only if it is adding something the other luxury cars don't also offer on their base/standard package. The G37 is a luxury car as well. And since the Model S base package hasn't yet been established according to Tesla's site, it's a bit hard to compare.

And $15-$20k extra for an electric version of a car is pretty reasonable anyways, considering that's about what the battery costs.

That's a different argument. What you said that it was "competitively priced". A 15k/20k bump just for "electric" is not "competitive" to other cars in the same class. It's a premium, and in my opinion a hefty one. That's the point that people in this thread are trying to make: The Model S is _not_ competitively priced with similar class cars, it is priced at an "electric premium". Whether you believe that premium is worth having an electric car is a separate debate.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[rjstanford]

Yeah. Makes you wonder why Ferrari doesn't just sell a stripped-down version for $20k too.

The platform that the Tesla Roadster was built on is going away. That's why Tesla isn't building on it any more. They'll do another sports car at some point - probably all in-house - that won't have this problem.

!story.

Lotus is involved.

[tarzxf]

The underlying issue is that Lotus is ceasing production of the Elise, which the Roadster shares the underpinnings for, because of upcoming regulations in North America that it cannot or will not comply with. Something about airbags if memory serves correct.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[h4rr4r]

You mean the one that slandered them?
Clarkson staged the out of power incident and made repeated lies about the car. I love Top Gear, but staging such a thing is nuts. It is also why I really prefer the episodes were they make some crazy car, since I know that stuff is faked.

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[BitZtream]

(Charging battery for deceleration or going down hill)

I've been working with regenerative braking since the 90s, its not nearly as efficient as you seem to think it is.

Yes, it puts some energy back into the system. No, its not worth mentioning because the amount is so little that its irrelevant.

This technology isn't even a little bit new and is FAR more efficient in the areas I deal with it than it is in a car, the only reason its done is because with all the other technology involved in making electric braking work on an electric motor requires shunting electricity somewhere. The power controllers HAVE to be able to electrical flow in both directions in order to work. They'd actually have to add components to use the motor as a brake without recharging the battery as they'd have to add components to shunt the motors poles together.

The point, regenerative braking isn't worth mentioning, and they aren't doing it to be impressive, they're doing it because its the cheapest way to build the power controller for the car. They just spin that into a marketing bullet point to fool those who don't know anything about the tech.

Any gain you get from it, you'll loose 100 times over powering your air conditioner to offset the increase heat generated in the motors, electronics and batteries that makes its way into the cabin.

misleading summary

[dnaumov]

"Tesla has announced that their business model has failed."

I don't think I've seen a more misleading /. article summary in quite a while. Tesla has announced nothing of the sort.

Their stock price also very much begs to differ.

wrong

[PJ6]

Tesla has announced that their business model has failed.

The technology failed, not the business model.

The battery tech remains unready and over-promised.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[mac84]

Elion Musk and company are just like Preston Tucker, Jean Carmichaels, and John DeLorean before them. Inflated egos and fraudulent business models which fooled enough investors for a long enough time to generate some capital. In the end, it turns out what Detroit has been saying is true. The electric car is not ready for prime time, The only way to sell it is at a loss, subsidized by sales of conventional cars and government tax credits.

Answer

[SuperKendall]

Why do you see some hot shot kid in a Porsche, while they live in a low rent apartment.

Drug dealer. He has to live there because any place better neighbors would notice and report the traffic coming and going.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[h4rr4r]

Because the choice is not 20mpg or a hybrid it is 40mpg or a hybrid. The 2012 Hyundai Elantra does 40mpg and retails for $16k. That is $10k less than a 2012 Prius. The Prius gets the same mpg combined and really only comes out a win if you do tons of stop and go driving. Sure the Elantra is probably a little smaller inside, but I don't need anything bigger.

Re:More energy needed to make gas than for electri

[BitZtream]

just using the energy to refine that gallon.

Sure ... IF and ONLY IF you ignore all the other things that were produced during the refinement process that we'd need anyway or actually produce energy as well.

If we totally stopped using fossil fuel based engines RIGHT THIS INSTANT, the only thing that would change is we'd have a massive surpluss of fossil fuels useful for a combustion engine. You do like plastics and lubricants and medicines and food by products, and all the other shit that stims from oil productions ... DON'T YOU? You turn off the energy to produce that gallon of refined gasoline and your world would turn upside down even if you ignored the direct results of not having gasoline.

There is practically 0 waste in an oil refinery, yes, they have big flames all over burning waste gases, and those are trivial in comparison to the amount of crude that goes through them.

But hey, don't let taking the big picture into account prevent you from sayings something stupid.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[afidel]

CUV's are wagons with a raised suspension, good if you want to go through a couple feet of snow without the awful fuel economy of a full truck.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[StikyPad]

No, it retails for that much. What it costs to build a consumer vehicle is only tangentially related to its sale price.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[stabiesoft]

Um, normally I only have one car that I use for commuting and trips. I typically do around 600 miles/day when I travel. I could rent a car for trips, but I'd rather drive the car I am used to. So I disagree, I think the Volt/Prius models got it right and the Leaf is totally useless. The Tesla at 300 miles is still not useful to me, even at 100K. It still does not have the needed range for that infrequent road trip.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Osgeld]

these guys took a fairly standard electric car, hot rodded it, sold it at an ultra premium out of their place in silicon valley (one of the worst places to produce anything) and your surprised?

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[buback]

I pay my local power company for delivery, not for generation. My power comes from wind, solar, and nuclear.

If I had an electric car, it wouldn't be powered by fossil fuels. It's not like you don't have a choice, which is what you are implying.

Just because the majority of US households are powered by fossil fuels doesn't mean yours has to be as well.

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[Chris Burke]

Keep in mind that calling it a "sedan" may give the wrong impression that it's going to be like a Toyota Corolla.

It's going to be more like a BMW "luxury sports-sedan", which only makes sense to try to go for that market given that it's priced as though in that market. Quite a few people find those pretty sexy, and will probably find the high acceleration rate of the Tesla offering to be a nice sexy icing on the sexy cake too.

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[BitZtream]

If they had an entry level model priced for the average consumer, and possibly a mid-range and high-line car, that would satisfy the markets. More people would have bought one priced closer to $10k. At $109k, you can buy two of any of the common hybrid cars available, *AND* you could get parts and have it serviced almost anywhere. Those with the money will get the high line model. Many who look at the entry level model would consider or buy the mid-range model.

You wouldn't catch me, or many other people dead in what passes for a hybrid or EV car today. Its as if they makers are going out of their way to produce cars so fucking ugly and so pathetic in every way that no one wants to buy them, and those who do are so far off the deep end that you can't take their opinion about the car seriously, they are clearly anti-gasoline fanboys well beyond what anyone would define as rational.

A Tesla roadster on the other hand, I wouldn't mind driving around town.

My current car costs about the same as a nice EV, but it doesn't look like ass, it doesn't have a range thats not worth mentioning ... oh yea, and its rather fuel efficient so if you take into account the entire life cycle of an EV and my car ... well, the EV has produced more pollution before its rolled off the assembly line than my car EVER WILL guzzingly gasoline ... and ITS A FREAKING SPORTS CAR.

All current Hybrids and EVs are novelty cars, if you buy one for any other reason, you're an idiot who hasn't bothered to due complete research.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[RCGodward]

That's why the Brits drink warm beer. Damned Lucas refrigerators....

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[itsdapead]

So in theory that is a 34% drop in emissions then.

...approximately 66% of electricity currently generated in the US is generated by fossil fuels (assuming GP is correct). If there is any significant uptake of electric cars, more generating capacity is going to be needed. The question is, will that be C02-and-other-crap-belching fossil-fuel based or perfectly-safe-if-nothing-goes wrong nuclear? May the best lobbyist win.

Re:The Tesla Roadster

[h4rr4r]

The Telsa was faster than a stock Elise, it was comparable to the SC model.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[triffid_98]

It's a fucking Ferrari-class car. Of course it's going to be expensive as fuck

Since when is that? It's roughly equivalent to a regular Elise but with an extra 700lb worth of batteries.

Also, am I the only one who finds it ironic that a company named Tesla has a failed business model?
As much as Nikola Tesla virtually invented the 20th century, he was a terrible businessman and died a pauper.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[yarnosh]

You also have to factor in periodic battery replacement. That's a pretty major cost that people forget about with electrics.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[SuperKendall]

Had they failed, unemployment would have skyrocketed, and we'd be in the depths of depression instead of just recession

No, we'd be in full recovery by now. Constantly saving big companies like banks or GM makes all the other companies nervous because they know the Tax Hammer will have to come down eventually to pay for all this.

GM would have re-organized in the traditional way, there would have been some layoffs but also GM would have been able to actually pay workers a reasonable wage instead of (as they are now) having to pay wages overly inflated by the unions. GM is just a zombie company now, going from handout to handout.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[dbialac]

And you'll only have to charge the thing for 16 hours between 200 mile drives. Fine for day to day, but forget about the road trip. IMO, the Chevy Volt solves this problem in a much better fashion. Hell, even Top Gear was smart enough to put an electric generator in their electric car to solve this problem.
As for their business model, it was destined to fail. The companies that make super cars that also make road cars for the rest of us all sell their super cars at a loss. The Ford GT, the Bugatti Vayron (VW), the Lexus LFA, etc. are all sold at a loss. These cars are built for prestige and R&D, not for profit. Companies like Aston Martin and Ferrari sell their cars for profit, but there isn't that huge of a profit margin. They're not exactly known as fortune 500 companies. Aston Martin has started offering a compact, but only because of a change in EU regulations regarding fleet-wide fuel economy.

IMO, Tesla would have been far better off taking the Ferrari model and focusing on building electric HYBRID super cars. By doing this, they could have greatly reduced the battery weight and had an even faster car.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[bickle]

It sounds like 'Attila Dimedici' either has an axe to grind or has poor reading/summarization skills.

Probably both.

Why did that summary get approved? It's obviously false.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[DamnStupidElf]

I think you mean the "Free Markets AND Bust" bandwagon.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[h4rr4r]

Who has a couple feet of snow?
I live in the shadow of a great lake, we get lake effect and it hits that level once or twice a year. I lived in Alaska and that was about the same. If you want a vehicle for snow, get a Subaru.

Ummm

[svtmunk]

Whoever posted this summary has failed... to read the article and comprehend what it says...

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[jdcope]

But if they cannot make the technology profitable at $120k, how can they expect to do it at $50k?

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Shotgun]

Had they failed, the market they were building cars to satisfy would have been filled by another company. Those companies would have had to hire extra workers to fill the demand. There might have been enough demand that an investor would have bought the vacated factories to build cars. Maybe someone like Tesla. Instead we have the corporate rulers that ran the company into the ground still at the helm.

I know it's trendy and hip to be on the "The World Will End" bandwagon these days, but maybe you should actually look at what the domino effect of your desires will actually do.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Shotgun]

Fine. You use your money to manufacture the car that no-one can or is willing to buy.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[karnal]

I would buy a car for 75k if it would run reliably for 500k miles. Now - this doesn't mean 0 service needed; however it would have to be minimal (1-2k a year at most.)

My current car is at 124k. It's not in bad shape - in fact, I could probably stand to pour another 1-2k in it this year to get it driving perfectly. But the seat (driver's side) is wearing (foam all compressed, leather is getting kinda fugly). Door seals don't quite seal out the wind like they used to; headliner in the back is peeling a little (nothing a little glue won't help...) etc. But I've not had a payment on it for 3 years now, and I don't want that to change unless it gets totaled.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[kelemvor4]

... unlike Chrysler and GM. Between automaker loans and clean-energy, get-off-oil money, there's got to be something to help Tesla out.

Failing that, guys, make cars people can afford. You make a bad ass Roadster. Now make a RegularCar, that I can buy for 75k, and I'll have one in the driveway tomorrow.

You must live an privileged life if what you consider to be "regular cars" sell for 75k. Unless maybe you're talking pesos or yen or something? I think most of us would like to see electric cars in the 20k range (just slightly cheaper than the chevy volt for example).

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[yarnosh]

In reality you have to take some edge cases into consideration when making an investment as big as a car. I may not drive more than 200 miles often, but sometimes I do and I don't want to have to wait for my car to charge over night before I can begin the next leg of my trip. I know more than 10% of Americans are in the same boat. I'm certainly not going to invest $40k in a car and then have to keep a spare economy car on the side just for long trips.

Either way, electric cars are well off my radar for the forseeable future simply because I don't buy new. When I look for a new (to me) car, I'm looking for something used under $7k. I simply cannot justify paying tens of thousands of dollars for transportation.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Shotgun]

If you have to ask, you can't afford it.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[0123456]

Sure the Elantra is probably a little smaller inside, but I don't need anything bigger.

Plus the Elantra isn't spewing out a cloud of smug wherever you drive it.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[0123456]

You could probably afford a $75k car. However you will need to adjust your lifes tradeoffs to get the car.

And I'm sure that lots of people will be happy to 'adjust their life tradeoffs' to buy a 'luxury sedan' that they can drive for a hundred miles (or whatever the real-world performance turns out to be) and then have to wait to be towed to the nearest power point.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[icebrain]

The trick is to buy older exotic cars (late 80s, etc). They aren't daily driver cars, but you can get a Porsche or Ferrari for $18-30k. A friend of mine has a wall full of pictures of all the cars he's owned in the past 15 years (Porsche, Ferrari, Lambo, Maserati, etc.) from doing this. He's an aviation mechanic, not some super-rich guy.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[GameboyRMH]

$75k? Haha that's at least 3 regular cars!

Re:More energy needed to make gas than for electri

[Paul Fernhout]

First off, you are not clear about what percentage of petroleum becomes plastics and lubricants, and what is burned. I'd suggest the part used for products is relatively small. One example:
    http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview/id/770859.html
"The manufacture of all plastics consumed approximately three percent of the total petroleum used in the US in 1997, and PS production comprised approximately .002 percent of that amount. Comparatively, 71 percent of total petroleum used in the US is used for gasoline, jet, and diesel fuel, and 26 percent for the production of asphalt, oils and lubricants."

Most drugs are essentially a scam anyway, compared to eating better:
    http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/foodpyramid.aspx

Also, plastics and many other products including lubricants can be derived from other sources, such as plants, and things can be redesigned with magnetic bearings to reduce lubrication needs. Example:
    http://www.maglevwindturbine.com/

Asphalt can be replaced at possibly less cost by solar roadways:
    http://www.solarroadways.com/

I've worked a bit over the years towards systems that would help people figure out how to do that:
    http://www.kurtz-fernhout.com/oscomak/

So, we have lots of options. We don't have to pollute or otherwise destroy our world for the reasons you suggest. We have plenty of alternatives.

That said, I'm not going to disagree that you make a good point about integrated systems. But your tone suggests you have not really looked into alternatives. Why is that?

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[mr1911]

You miss the point. The power for electric vehicles is still predominantly fossil fuel. You move the problem, but you don't eliminate it.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[trum4n]

My family owns 7 cars. At any given time, there are at least two parked at my house. One of my cars is a DIY converted 96 Saturn electric, another is a 74 Dodge Charger. The electric has a pathetic 20 miles of range. Not bad for 1000$. My mother's commute is 4 miles round trip. Store? 2 miles round. Trips like that are where electrics thrive. My mother's Subaru gets nearly 30mpg.....once it has warmed up. She averages 8mpg commuting. The electric has payed for itself. The Subaru costs nearly 50 cents per mile like this. The Saturn costs under 1.5 cents per mile.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[_Sprocket_]

Because the tech they were selling at $120k is not the tech that they're selling at $50k.

spouting FUD for /this/ reason

[timchampion]

The person who wrote the summary probably wants to create a dip in Tesla stock prices so he can buy-in cheaper. The other note I want to make is that one of the reasons that the roadster must be discontinued is that Lotus is discontinuing its Elise that the roadster is based on, so unless they start making their own chassis, Tesla has no choice but to discontinue their roadster. Now, with the Model S, they aren't reliant on anybody else for the chassis, so they should be in better shape.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[afidel]

Crap fuel economy and engines that fairly regularly need two headers worked on, no thanks. I was seriously looking at a used Subaru but between the fairly high used prices and the potential for an ~$2800 engine job needed I've decided to get my first new vehicle. I'm leaning toward a Chevy Equinox, 27mpg mixed with AWD.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Intrepid imaginaut]

Its almost like the submitter had an agenda or something. Beats me what it could be though.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[edmicman]

So what *is* the TCO over say 10 years for a gas vs electric? And might as well bump that up to 30 mpg for the gas as you can easily get a smaller sedan at that range for 20-30k.

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[mr1911]

I pay my local power company for delivery, not for generation.

Apparently you don't understand how this works.

Just because the majority of US households are powered by fossil fuels doesn't mean yours has to be as well.

Not really. Since the generation capacity of alternative sources is far below the demand, I could choose to buy "green" electricity, but it would simply be the case of moving my fossil consumption into someone else's bucket.

I'm not interested in a shell game. If you want to get away from fossil fuels, build nuclear plants and wind farms, turn off your lights, and walk to work.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[h4rr4r]

You are complaining about engine problems and then you want to buy a Chevy?

Was that supposed to be a joke? Besides the Equinox is a damn SUV.

Author motives?

[bareman]

Wonder if someone is an Oil industry shill?

http://www.pctechs.org/tag/attila-dimedici/

Someone seems a bit too much pro-fossil fuel.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[m.ducharme]

By selling more of them.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[DarkVader]

They weren't slandered.

Everything Clarkson said was accurate. The car has serious issues. Those issues are shared by any other all-electric car, and will be until there's a major breakthrough in battery technology.

The Tesla would be a lot of fun - for a very short distance. That would be followed by a long recharge, whereas with any other car you just refuel and keep going. And it would be ridiculous for Top Gear not to show that very real issue. Did they dramatize the showing? Yes. Would the outcome have been any different if they had just driven the car until the battery died? No.

Ultimately, any battery operated car is either a short-distance commuter (and who wants a Tesla for sitting in rush hour traffic) or a toy. And other toys at the Tesla's price point will give you a lot more fun for the money. The Tesla is a very cool technology demonstrator. It's not a very good car.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[GameboyRMH]

Lotus is phasing out the current-gen Elise entirely for a butt-ugly, heavy thing :-(

Their whole lineup from 2013 onward will be heavy, and many of their new cars will be ugly.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[timeOday]

Even if true, conspicuous conservation is still a lot better than conspicuous consumption.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[calagan800xl]

I watched that scammy show and the fact that it was immediately followed by an overly positive preview of Honda's fuel-cell car made me real suspicious. I'm not watching this show anymore, although I used to enjoy it a lot.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[GameboyRMH]

There's not much you could take out, it's pretty minimalistic, basically an Elise with an electric powertrain.

You could strip the sound system, heated seats, and climate control, but that's about it. That might knock $5k off the price if you're lucky. Next I guess you could cut the battery size in half, also cutting the range in half, that would probably knock $15k-$20k off the price, but now you've really got an oversized electric go-kart.

Batteries aren't cheap, and the Lotus-built chassis and body aren't either.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[astar]

In passing, I could use an electric, even very small, with even only a 10 kilometer range. Mostly, I do not go far or need to go fast. And I did a back of the envelope and the problems at that trivial level seem to be all government and anti-competitive stuff, if there is a difference. The actual price should in fact be rather nominal for an entire car at that range.

One of the problems is that a minimal and even legal auto body is straightforward and should be cheap, you pretty much cannot buy one new and off the shelf from any one who has the mass production capability. But .. I am no expert.

max

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[GameboyRMH]

A hundred miles it more than a day's driving for many, perhaps even more than a week. And if you don't plug it in at night, well you deserve to pay for a tow truck.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[mlts]

On average, 200 miles is enough for most people. However, emergencies happen. I might have to go pick up someone, then hit the bank. Or I might be so frazzled from a day of picking up stray inodes that I forget to plug the vehicle in for a charge. Then, I'm screwed because there are no real ways to charge an electric vehicle outside of the specially designed housing installed at home.

The Volt is a good start. However, what GM needs to do is put the big R&D dollars into the Silverado Hybrid and the Tahoe Hybrid. The Silverado is their top selling vehicle, and if they can do well selling those, they will make a larger profit than yet another compact car. The real gas savings overall are the pickups and SUVs that get MPG in the low teens. Not compact cars, which some of them (the VW diesels) are as good as one is going to get without some revolution in engine design.

A hybrid GMC 3500 costs a pretty penny, but companies and fleets would buy it just for the PR. If done right, it would have some awesome side features too, such as being able to run some serious hardware via an inverter off the batteries, or use the vehicle as an effective/efficient emergency generator.

A hybrid pickup truck with high wattage inverter capabilities would be a boon to RV-ers. Plug your 30 amp or 50 amp line into the pickup truck when boondocking, when the batteries get low, fire up the engine, then if the vehicle's gas tank gets below a certain amount (say 10 gallons but needs to be user-settable), shut the generator off.

knew when tesla sued Top Gear they were in trouble

[Dan667]

when you cannot compete in the marketplace the first thing a business tries to do is blame someone else and sue.

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[slimjim8094]

Actually did the math on this one for a paper a few months back. Here's how it breaks down:

-The average efficiency of internal-combustion engines is about 18-20%, with a mathematical limit of 37%. ICEs in cars almost never operate at their peak efficiency.
-The oldest, dirtiest, crappiest coal plant is 33% efficient, and 6.5% of that is lost in transmission - still more efficient than an efficient ICE running in real-world conditions
-The large motors in electric cars are up to 99.99% (!) efficient. So even a particularly terrible coal plant, with an average grid and electric car, will use less energy

-Now, a new combined-cycle natural gas power plant operates at 50+% efficient, pulling the overall real-world efficiency well over even the theoretical maximum for an ICE.

We haven't even considered that as we come up with better ways to make power, they can be swapped out in the grid without modifying the car in the slightest. Throw solar or a nuke plant in your local grid? Everyone's car is now powered more efficiently. You can't do that for millions of small ICEs, without an expensive "cash for clunkers" program.

You discount, well, just about everything by claiming that fossil fuels are all the same, regardless of what they are or where they're burned. We may depend on fossil fuels, but almost no power plants burn oil. It's mostly natural gas (produced in Canada or the Northeast US) and coal (produced in the US or Australia).

The other reason the roadster is going away

[jonwil]

The other reason the roadster is going away is because the car its based on (a Lotus) is also going away.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[mlts]

If done right, the government support can be considered the same thing as a research grant to a university... with three stipulations:

1: The research belongs to the US government. Anything that results can be used for the public good.

2: If their product sold like gangbusters, the USG would take a percentage of the profits to fund more startups.

3: The work done in the US for jobs.

If this is done, I don't object to the US government funding company research.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[couchslug]

The people who SELL lots of 75K cars would beg to differ.

Tech trickles DOWN like nothing else. Cars themselves were one pure luxury, and when you wanted to do work you used a steam tractor, locomotive, or horses/mules/oxen.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[SerpentMage]

Really? I call BS...

Do me a favor and lookup Rust belt and why it was called the rust belt.

The reality is that when the steel industry in the rust belt collapse so did the economies in those areas. It took DECADES not years for many to recover. And some have not recovered to this day.

The problem we have these days is that our industries are too tightly integrated. It is the result of globalization. Thus when one falls, all fall. No and's, if's or but's...

Where is Attila Dimedici to back this up?

[Filter]

Where are Attila Dimedici's comments where he can justify such an outrageous summary? I think if I submitted a story, I would at least follow the discussion. The impression he is leaving about Tesla closing it's doors is irresponsible at best.

Tesla Roadster stops along with Lotus Elise

[shway]

The Roadster is built on the same assembly lines as the Lotus Elise (and shares some components like airbags windshield, and some of the interior).

Lotus is no longer going to make the Elise, so that manufacturing partner is going away for the Roadster. It will cost to much money to try and move the glider manufacturing elsewhere in the short term. Tesla is focused on getting their own manufacturing up and running for the Model S, so they are stopping production of the Roadster. I am sure if Lotus were going to continue to manufacture the glider, Tesla would continue to sell them - but it is unfortunate timing while they try to get the Sedan out the door.

Tesla has talked about possibly creating a convertible version of the Model S in the future (sometime after the Model S and the Model X crossover) but they have not set a timetable on it. I assume no real Roadster-style replacement for many years, unless they partner with a different manufacturer to help produce it.

Re:Tesla Roadster stops along with Lotus Elise

[Foo2rama]

Exactly, the Elise/Exige losses the DOT waiver for the old standard airbags later this year, hence the stoppage of sales of the Elise/Exige and Tesla Roadster.

Re:Tesla Roadster stops along with Lotus Elise

[Teancum]

Exactly, the Elise/Exige losses the DOT waiver for the old standard airbags later this year, hence the stoppage of sales of the Elise/Exige and Tesla Roadster.

Please tell me how the loss of the "DOT waiver" for the Elise has anything to do with the Roadster? They aren't the same car, not even the same chassis. The only similarity is that both has the chassis manufactured in the same physical facility. Is that where you get the mistaken notion that somehow they are one and the same car, where the Roadster is merely an electric version of the Elise?

Re:Tesla Roadster stops along with Lotus Elise

[Foo2rama]

The Roadster is on the same platform as the Exige/Elise. While it may not be on the same DOT waiver, Lotus is shutting down the tooling for that platform. The only reason I am saying it may not be on the same DOT waiver is I cannot find that part of the DOT website.


Either way the article is wrong, for one reason or the other that platform will no longer be made, this is really old news in the auto community. It is not being stopped because it was a failure.

Re:Tesla Roadster stops along with Lotus Elise

[Foo2rama]

Found it...


http://edocket.access.gpo.gov/2008/pdf/E8-1359.pdf

Re:Tesla Roadster stops along with Lotus Elise

[Teancum]

It is a completely different chassis. I did read between the lines and see that the Roadster and the Elise are using the same airbag components, so that would require a redesign on the part of Tesla to get into conformance.... something that Lotus isn't even bothering to deal with because they are jettisoning that particular line and are doing something different with their production facility.

As I mentioned earlier, there are other considerations, but please don't perpetuate the myth that the Roadster is using the same platform as the Elise. That is a patently false lie altogether. Lotus helped Tesla in terms of its production and it happened to be using the same production facility and at least part of the same supply chain, but it isn't identical and the vehicles are quite different on a basic level with some fairly important differences between the two vehicles. Simply put, the Roadster isn't just an Elise with an electric motor installed.

It looks like the largest problem facing Tesla, and the reason why they are shutting down the Roadster, has to do with the fact that Lotus has essentially shut down the entire production facility for retooling and a new product line of their own. Simply put, the contract with Tesla isn't sufficient to justify keeping the production line going where common parts and molds used to produce the Roadster (it was put into the Elise production facility) require re-engineering anyway for the new line. It is a manufacturing engineering issue and something where there is considerable cost and time required before more Roadsters can be built again because of the changeover. That they may be using the excuse of the airbag issue to cover their behinds, that is hardly the only thing that is causing this model to be discontinued.

Besides, I'm betting that Elon Musk wants to bring this vehicle "in-house" after they get their Model "S" into production, so a convenient excuse like this is all that more of a reason to essentially terminate their contract with Lotus. They have to essentially engineer a whole new vehicle anyway, so why not do it right and really target hard the high end market with a vehicle that has real muscle and make the Roadster look like a toy. I really have a hard time believing that Tesla is going to give up that particular market segment.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[bmxeroh]

Do you have a build log or anything? That sounds like a neat project.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[GameboyRMH]

Ferrari does have a huge profit margin. 30% of a Ferrari's cost is basically a donation to the F1 team. Then there's profit on top of that.

Fossil fuels != Oil

[gr8_phk]

Considering that approximately 66% of electricity in the US is generated by fossil fuels, electric cars are not really much of an alternative. Just because you don't burn fossil fuels directly in the car doesn't mean they are not dependent on fossil fuels.

Fossil fuels are not restricted to oil. In fact very little of our electricity comes from oil. That means a shift from oil to electricity reduces our oil dependence which is a good thing. It's not the ultimate solution, just mid-term solution. I also didn't see you offer anything that would classify as an actual alternative...

Easy way for Tesla to make money

[maddmike]

All they have to do is start selling the electric motor they put in the Roadster.

Anyone who has looked into doing an electric car conversion can tell you the motor in the roadster is much better than anything else on the market in terms of size to power output. They have the market locked down though so you can't buy them.

Canada

[Roger W Moore]

Who has a couple feet of snow?

Ever heard of Canada? ...although we'd call it 60cm. We even managed a respectable 1.4 cm snow this June.

Re:Canada

[h4rr4r]

Yeah, I am actually farther north than some of Canada right now.
This is about cars though, ice skates and dog sleds have you guys covered.

Re:just opened store in local mall

[afidel]

Partnerships are nothing new in the auto industry, Daimler-Benz, Ford and Mazda, Ford and Volvo (the new Taurus is build on the same platform as the S60), etc, etc. Doing all the design and validation work for a new auto platform costs a LOT of money, spreading those costs over the most units possible just makes sense. This is especially true in areas where your company has not historically been strong because a fully modern design from scratch takes so long that it's often outdated by the time it actually gets into production.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[spire3661]

He also had nefarious forces working VERY hard against him, Edison for one. Its hard to avoid rhetoric from 'the man that lit the world'

R & D ???

[gr8_phk]

If they needed to learn the lessons, they could have set up shop in Detroit and hired people who already knew the answers. I work with guys who have been doing this stuff since the early 90's. I even worked on battery systems for one of the big 3 last millenium before doing some other things. Now I'm back with some of the same guys working on volume production stuff now that the cost is down and the market is better. Oh, but teslas whole marketing message was that Detroit fucked up the electric car so their cool California company was going to show them how to do it right.

Re:R & D ???

[uninformedLuddite]

Maybe they are wanting to employ people that are looking at the problems from a fresh angle?

Too bad...

[HikingStick]

I'm no made-of-money type guy, but every once in a while I get a crazy idea to save for something seemingly rediculous. The Tesla Roadster was just the type of product that catches my interest. Sure, in reality it is highly unlikely that I ever would have saved enough to buy one in the next 10 years, but such goals do prompt some of us to save. Oh, well. Now I'll just need to find some other crazy toy to convince me to put away all my pennies (and dollars).

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[guruevi]

The actual cost of the metal and carbon compounds used for any car is way less than the retail price of a car. The main cost (like with drugs) is the research and development costs. However Tesla does have very expensive components (Lithium, rare earth magnets) which are also becoming increasingly scarce.

Electric vehicles are not really what we need imho for the far future. In the near future they will do loads of good until we are running out of resources to make them. What we need is a more individualized but central system such as high-tech rail where we only have to drive ~15 minutes to get to a boarding station, then you can use standard batteries or even capacitors in the car and then hop the vehicle onto a rail system or use the zip-car method in cities.

Re:just opened store in local mall

[rjstanford]

I wonder what environmental issues there might be if the factory was ever completely decommissioned.

Pretty much the exact same issues there would be if it doesn't get decommissioned or if they had decommissioned it sooner.

It doesn't magically make bad things when you tear it down. They are already there, already leaching into the soil, water and air around the plant. Eventually it will all come out, its just a question of when. Cleaning it up at once, before it has leaked into the environment and been dispersed across a large region is FAR easier and better for everyone involved.

A better statement might be, "I wonder what legal issues there might have been based on unknown environmental issues that would have been discovered during decommissioning." Which is a bit FUDlike in that the GPP has no actual knowledge that there are any, but its basically impossible to prove otherwise and will generate a lot of "Well, he might have a point," beard-stroking. There may be issues. There may not.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[TooMuchToDo]

I own a Roadster *and* have a deposit on a Model S. This was the plan all along, as it would not be efficient for them to keep building Roadsters while trying to ramp up Model S production.

Opinions are like assholes, even on the internet. Yet another uninformed moron spouting off.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Teancum]

Some of this goes into the manufacturing philosophies of Martin Eberhard vs. Elon Musk. Eberhard was a major fan of outsourcing, where he wanted to speed up the whole process of building the original Roadster by only concentrating on the key technologies and then using existing supply chains in the automotive industry to build everything else. Given that Tesla was a brand-new start-up when Eberhard was first trying his ideas out, much of that makes a whole lot of sense too. The problem with outsourcing your components is that you are at the mercy of your suppliers in terms of both price, volume, and quality. Tesla found that out the hard way when they struggled trying to get a decent transmission working, where a simple two-speed transmission (all they were hoping for at the time) simply got thrashed by the electric motor and the engineering team working on the transmission (an outsourced supplier) never could get the job done. Admittedly it was a very tough engineering challenge, but that supplier also didn't have the motivation to get the job done.

Ultimately, it was this transmission problem coupled with spiraling costs going out of control due to the plethora of suppliers on even key components (like the frame and body from Lotus, to give another example) that got Eberhard fired. He is a mighty fine engineer and even engineering manager, but he also bet wrong on how to deal with the suppliers a few too many times.

Elon Musk, particularly with his experience at SpaceX, has become much more sold upon the concept of building everything in-house and reducing the number of external parts suppliers to the absolute bare minimum. He doesn't even mind simply buying a supplier completely and putting the employees of that company on his payroll. Where it makes sense, he also tries to even relocate those supplier subsidiaries so they are even physically located in the same building. That has worked very well for SpaceX and I've seen Musk do that with Tesla as well. Lotus was originally going to be shipping completed cars to America, but later on a "final assembly plant" was set up for the Roadster in California where "gliders" came from the UK (the Lotus plant) and had their batteries along with other parts (wheel, engine, and some other stuff) put into the vehicle for final assembly. The Tesla engine itself has been manfuactured by a wholly owned subsidiary and Elon Musk has been making moves to consolidate even that part of his business.

More to the point, I think this move on the part of Tesla towards the Roadster really shouldn't be a surprise, as the particular parts chain has been an expensive and frankly failed experiment. In that regard perhaps the original parent is correct that the business model has failed, but of course the OP didn't mention what aspect of that business model failed. Roadsters have been only marginally profitable for Tesla and the need to revamp the production line, setting up much more part manufacturing in-house, and backing out of the agreement with Lotus to make the chassis is sufficient that even another high-end model might as well be something completely different as it will essentially have to be completely re-engineered anyway. Why not just have a clean break with the past, call the existing Roadsters to be the "end of the line", and create perhaps a whole new vehicle line for high-end customers in the future?

I don't see that Tesla is going to completely give up on that market segment, and in this sense it may even be something for high performance electric vehicle fans to look forward on. If anything, I'd expect Tesla to come out with another high performance vehicle in the next couple of years trying to target the same market segment, but blowing away the Roadster in nearly every aspect and targeting the $150k-$300k price point for those who can afford the really high end vehicles. If anything, the Roadster could have sold for much more to at least some of the customers who ended up buying the Roadster. Discontinuing the Roadster is therefore going to free up resources for when that happens. I'd also expect that high performance vehicle to happen before their supposed "mass market car" that was originally targeted for around $25k or less.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[TooMuchToDo]

The Roadster purchasers (myself included) paid for the electric drivetrain and energy management system R&D through our purchases. The rest is easy for Tesla now.

Failed? Hardly. Awesome cars were built, knowledge was gained, and the masses will now benefit. Fuck you submitter.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[chimpo13]

Don't blame Lucas for that. They destroyed their reputation by selling the bean counters who were destroying the British car/bike industry. They demanded the lowest price and Lucas said for a few cents extra, we could build you reliable stuff. Then after the bean counters were finishing off reliability of their products, they cut back on R&D. Then the unions getting involved and the British government. Wait, in fact, just say "Lucas sucks". It's easier. And the Civil War was over slavery.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Lifyre]

I know for you it is a matter of semantics but there are ways to make those same types of lights more efficient. So restricting one of the most inefficient and wasteful uses of electricity isn't a bad thing, it saves money and resources and decreases pollution. Of course if you actually knew anything about what you were talking about beyond one tiny nugget of (mis)information you would already know that.

Falling materials prices

[opentunings]

Electronics prices are constantly dropping. The Roadster came out a few years ago. They're probably saving a lot simply by getting the same (or better) electronics for a lot less money.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Lifyre]

Hey maybe he'll get lucky and the engine will be rock solid... The transmission on the other hand...

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Teancum]

Tesla's Roadsters are built on a Lotus chassis. Since Lotus is discontinuing that model, Tesla won't be able to make more Roadsters. It really is that simple.

The Lotus chassis you are referring to was a completely redesigned and rebuilt chassis anyway. Lotus built it, but the design was completely by Tesla and from what I understand owned by Tesla as well in terms of its design. There might have been some agreements that Lotus could only build it, but discontinuing the model by Lotus was not even remotely a factor in this equation. Lotus signed on to help Tesla because they had some surplus manufacturing capacity and wanted to keep their plant busy at off-times in the Elise production facility. There was some retooling that had to happen when switching between the Roadster and the Elise, but that was something Lotus worked on and could cope with.

The Roadster does not use the Elise chassis at all, and if somebody tells you otherwise they are smoking something and greatly confused. The only common elements are that it was made in the same manufacturing plant and that the two chassis were about the same size (roughly).

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[yarnosh]

So what is your point? I'm a single guy living by myself. How many cars should I own?

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[trum4n]

My car can charge off anything from 60-300vac or 90-300 vdc. Wall outlet is fine. The Volt is a step backwards. It's anemic performance and tiny battery make a perfect example for people who want to talk down about EV's. My $1,000 Saturn could easily beat it in acceleration, and with about another thousand in upgrades, crush it on EV range and top speed. So congrats Chevy, you did what a college kid can do for $2,000. The Volt features no innovation. Also, a "proper" battery pack is about 3 days worth of driving. That way, if you forget to plug in, it's no disaster. Also covers the long days. I like your SUV/Generator idea, but it will never happen, it's too smart.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[trum4n]

I started a thread on DIYelectriccar.com. Search for user AlexCrouse.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Zebedeu]

Except the "period" seems to be quite long: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toyota_Prius#Battery_life_cycle or http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nissan_Leaf#Battery

After 10 years, even if you want to keep your car that long, battery technology will have evolved, so it's difficult to predict if it'd still be a major cost to replace them.
Let alone the fact that you'll probably only be replacing them once in the car's lifetime.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[JDAustin]

Had they failed, unemployment would have skyrocketed, and we'd be in the depths of depression instead of just recession. I know it's trendy and hip to be on the "Free Markets or Bust" bandwagon these days, but maybe you should actually look at what the domino effect of your desires would actually do.

This is the same mindset that gave us a trillion dollar stimulus to keep unemployment under 8%. Unemployment is still higher, were trillions more in debt, and people are now out of work on average longer then during the great depression.

Its a recession when your neighbor is out of work
Its a depression when your out of work.
Its a recovery when Obama is out of work.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[h4rr4r]

Ford Ranger is all I have to say to that one. I hear the stick shift ones were fine though.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[rrossman2]

Not only that.. Didn't Toyota invest money in Tesla recently?

"Toyota is designing a new motor through its partnership with Palo Alto, California-based Tesla Motors (NASDAQ:TSLA), an electric sports car manufacturer."

http://resourceinvestingnews.com/18085-toyota-developing-alternatives-to-rare-earth-motors.html

I know there's a better article and more info somewhere out there

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Teancum]

For some reason the Roadster that Top Gear was driving wasn't charged up before it was being used. You can blame either the Tesla PR guys or Top Gear for that excuse and it unfortunately tainted the whole piece too. Driving a vehicle with an empty tank that uses exotic fuels and then complaining that you don't have the fuel to recharge the thing would have produced similar results.

In terms of "short distances", I'm curious what you consider to be a short distance? It is true that you can't drive the Roadster from New York to Los Angeles on a single charge, but then again you can't drive a car that distance on a single tank of gasoline either. A typical electric automobile only goes about 25-50 miles, and the Roadster got more like about 300.... with ordinary driving. They were targeting about 500 miles and somewhat missed the mark, but that still is by itself a remarkable achievement.

I will agree that the battery recharging issue is a legitimate one, and something that isn't easily solved either. In theory you could recharge a battery for something like the Roadster in about 15 minutes, but you would also need some high voltage connectors that I wouldn't personally want to be close to at the time if you did and you would need a nearly direct connection to a nuclear power plant in order to be able to receive that much power. That is physics, and those who blow smoke claiming some new technology is in the works to make a fast recharge possible don't know what they are talking about. Spreading the recharging times out to several hours makes using a 220 v or 110 v power connector possible, and something a mere mortal can cope with.

In terms of electric vehicles, I'd call the Roadster the first all-electric vehicle that proves the concept is at least practical if you want to build a real production vehicle using that sort of technology. Previous incarnations before Tesla basically were golf carts with incredibly short driving ranges that would have the car die before you were done buying groceries.

Modding of Headlines?

[Dripdry]

Ok, this is it:

ATTENTION SLASHDOT: With the increasing use of inaccurate headlines, how about you give us, the users, the ability to mod headlines up or down? That way, we can see a little red or green bar that indicates if a headline is legit or full of shit.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Chris Burke]

Had they failed, the market they were building cars to satisfy would have been filled by another company.

Eventually, if all your "might"s and "maybe"s panned out, but since the short term effect would have without a doubt been a massive upswing in unemployment, and thus reduction in demand, it's not clear that any of those "maybe"s would work out as you have to assume they would for this not to be a horrible idea.

New jobs do not spontaneously appear to replace old ones, it takes time. The effect of losing jobs feeds back into the economy, causing the problems to escalate, and can stymie the eventual creation of the new jobs that were supposed to spontaneously appear so nothing bad would happen in the first place.

I know it's trendy and hip to be on the "The World Will End" bandwagon these day

Search/replace arguments have never been trendy or hip; they have always been lazy and stupid.

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[JWSmythe]

    A $50k novelty is still more affordable than a $100k novelty.

    As for economy and TOC, I'm staying on what most people consider the less than green side. I have a sports car that gets 26mpg. It gets me and up to 3 passengers and luggage or groceries from Point A to Point B quickly. MSRP was around $38k, and I paid $25k one year used. Now at 11 years old and 120,000 miles, if it were a EV or hybrid, it would have likely required two battery swaps and who knows what other changes. What's MTBF on the motors they use? How do the electronics stand up in hot climates? As a good old fashion IC motor, it's required 2 water pumps, an alternator, and 2 new batteries, and a few other little things

    I had a headlight fault in my car. It seems the ground wire to the headlights broke internally. 15 minutes and $5 in parts later it was fixed in the auto parts store parking lot. A friend of mine has a Prius. Hers has a headlight fault, where the headlights will just turn themselves off or flash, due to an overheating controller. It costs hundreds of dollars, and serious work to just get the light out. Google around for replacing a Prius headlight, and you'll see plenty of pictures where you have to take the front bumper off to accomplish it.

    My second car is a used full size SUV. That's my spare vehicle, in case the first one is down for some reason, and for transporting anything larger than my car will carry. I dare anyone to consider doing home renovations driving a Tesla Roadster. :) You won't even fit a stack of bricks or a few sheets of plywood in a Prius. :) The mileage isn't great, but if I can accomplish in one trip what would take 4 in a smaller car, the effective efficiency is better. And sometimes there is just no substitute for an urban assault vehicle. :)

Model S Alpha is sweet looking

[shinehead]

I would love to have one of these with a 5L DOHC 32V V8.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Wyatt Earp]

You aren't going through "a couple feet of snow" in a full sized truck either unless you have a snow plow on the front.

As soon as the snow is deep enough to start rubbing against your undercarriage as you go through it, you'll loose momentum and/or get high centered on it.

Even with snow tires and chains, in really deep snow you'll get stuck.

I've driven in 16 years of South Dakota, Minnesota and Alaska winters, time split 50/50 between front wheel drive and four wheel drive full sized.

I've excluded two editors in my time at slashdot.

[feepness]

The last was about ten years ago when some moron put that The Lone Gunmen were killed off in X-Files in the story title. Before it had aired on the West Coast. And this is well after TIVO was alive. I sat down to the TV, pulled out my laptop, and... boom. I can't remember the editor's name, but *ZAP*.

This story makes the second one.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[bigstrat2003]

And we instead provided no incentive to improve, ensuring that the pain isn't gone, merely delayed. That's such a commendable outcome!

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Wyatt Earp]

Equinox is classed as a medium CUV and both engines, 3.4 L LNJ V6 and 3.6 L LY7 V6, are pretty rock solid V6s.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Teancum]

I don't think it ever really got put together, and part of that is Tesla's fault, but there was discussion on the Tesla forums about after-market "trailers" that you could buy to be recharging your vehicle's battery with an electric motor while you were driving it. Essentially, it would allow you to stop at a gasoline station and refuel your vehicle with petroleum products (or bio-diesel if you want to be "Earth-friendly") and take those longer trips, but be able to use the same vehicle for the short daily commuter trips and avoid the petroleum altogether.

I sure hope that the Model-S gets a trailer ball plus some sort of plug on the back that can be an electric input device. It would be relatively simple to incorporate yet be able to make those long trips possible that you are talking about. You could even leave such a trailer at a hotel or friend's house if you were traveling for the small commuter-type trips once you arrive at your ultimate destination, or use it for a back-up power supply if you can't find a recharging station.

Essentially this turns the all-electric vehicle into a more conventional hybrid, but with the electric motor doing most of the real work and the gasoline engine is the back-up. The Volt and some of the other hybrid vehicles have some fancy transmission work to switch between the electric and gasoline motors more directly... something that isn't strictly needed.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Wyatt Earp]

Ferrari class?

Tesla Roadster - 0 to 60 mph (0 to 97 km/h) in 3.9 seconds, 14-mile (0.40 km) test at 12.6 sec giving 102.6 mph, top speed 125 mph
Ferrari 458 Italia - 0-100 km/h (62 mph) acceleration is under 3.4 seconds, 14-mile (0.40 km) test at 11.5 at 125 mph, top speed 202 mph

A Tesla Roadster isn't even Corvette Z06 class
2010 Chevy Corvette Z06 - 0-60 mph time of 3.6 seconds and 1/4 mile in 11.8 seconds at 122 mph, top speed 192 - for 25,000 less than a Roadster

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Teancum]

One nice side-effect of an electric vehicle is that the number of moving parts that are subject to mechanical failure is significantly reduced, and with considerable improvement in terms of reliability and longevity. There is the armature that can have bearings fail and the transmission system, but that is about it. Sealed bearings generally don't need to be re-lubricated except on a very long cycle and then there is the maintenance of the tires themselves. No need to change the oil, and the battery replacement is the only other major expense.

In terms of the expense of buying an electric vehicle, you have to essentially pay for the expenses up front rather than trying to nickle and dime those expenses throughout the lifetime of your vehicle unless you are the type who buys an extended vehicle warranty for every new vehicle purchase, where you sell the vehicle before the coverage runs out.

I don't know how that works for people who may or may not afford the $75k vehicle, but there are other factors to consider than just the raw sticker price on the showroom floor.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[h4rr4r]

CUV is a small SUV. Which is a poor form factor. I suggest neither engine has really been around long enough to say that. The LNJ being a Chinese import does not exactly fill me with confidence about the quality of that part.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Hal_Porter]

Why did that summary get approved? It's obviously false.

Clearly the vetting and fact checking process was not up to samzenpus's normal high standards.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Wyatt Earp]

LNJ is a 60 degree GM V-6, it's been in constant production since 1980, sorry I missed the 4 cylinder, the LAF, its family has only been in production since the early 70s.

But you are right about the LY7, it's newer 2004-on

The LNJ isn't in the Equinox anymore, and when it was it was only Chinese and Canadian.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Teancum]

Paul Allen at least has made a small difference with his money, from the same source that Bill Gates got most of his money from.

While the action or inaction of Bill Gates on the philanthropic level may be questioned (The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation not withstanding) there are other people who also have money who have made a difference in this world.

Besides, Elon Musk got his initial seed money from computer software as well (Paypal) and as a matter of fact is investing into Tesla. In fact he was the original major investor into the project.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[bored]

Elon Musk, particularly with his experience at SpaceX, has become much more sold upon the concept of building everything in-house and reducing the number of external parts suppliers to the absolute bare minimum

You know, that is what is wrong with a lot of engineering in the US. Its being driven by MBA's that think that buying a part from a 3rd party is the same as designing it yourself. Its one thing to cobble parts from hundreds of suppliers together to build something fairly uninspiring. If your actually building something cutting edge or just unusual you quickly discover that things don't often go together in real life like they do on the white board. Time and time again some part of the system wasn't quite designed to handle the abuse your giving it. Sure its rated for X, but is it rated for X given constant load for 24-7, or is it rated for a pulsing load between X and 1/2 X.. Then there is the vendor problem, they sell the part with that rating, because the customer buying 100M of them asked for it, but doesn't really care. So you then have to basically test and analyze each part in sufficient detail that you might just have well designed it yourself.

Then of course are all the unexpected problems. Ok, so part Z won't work, and there aren't any alternatives and the vendor doesn't want to design/build a new one for your 1k parts run. So, you have this incredible time slip while you design/build the part from the ground up in house. If you had designed it from the ground up in house, to begin with it could have been included in the schedule, but now your waiting around for 6 months for a new design. The worse thing is when you get that fixed and it moves the problem area somewhere else and you have to repeat the whole process.

Engineering something like this requires very careful worse case planning. Time and time again though the pessimists worse case projections are ignored by the higher levels of optimists in management, especially if there is some kind of 3rd party funding. Maybe its a conscience choice, but it seems many startups run on the most optimistic schedules. Then when they fall flat the investors are given the chance of throwing it all away or putting in more money. Invariably they put more money in. So in the end, it comes down to asking for X and never getting funding, or asking for 1/4X, failing a few times and ending up paying more than X in the long run.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[WhiteDragon]

... unlike Chrysler and GM. Between automaker loans and clean-energy, get-off-oil money, there's got to be something to help Tesla out.

Failing that, guys, make cars people can afford. You make a bad ass Roadster. Now make a RegularCar, that I can buy for 75k, and I'll have one in the driveway tomorrow.

75k is a Regular Car? I can buy a house for that.

Re:just opened store in local mall

[Teancum]

It also saved Tesla some money so far as they didn't have to do nearly as extensive of an environmental impact study on the site, and the "cleanup costs" could be done as an ongoing thing rather than having to do it all at once before the next company can use the site. Since Tesla is doing automotive production at the site, it didn't even need to be rezoned, and they were somebody the community is gladly embracing in terms of getting jobs back in that part of the world.

Tesla was looking at building a plant in Los Angeles County (I think, at least So. California) and had even signed a "memorandum of agreement" before the NUMMI plant became available. For Tesla, it became a huge win for them as well even if that other poor town got screwed over in the process. Tesla also broke ground for another production plant in New Mexico that didn't work out ultimately, so in this case it really seemed to work out just right to be working with Toyota.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[h4rr4r]

Sorry, I thought the LY7 and LNJ both started in 2004. So is the only engine the LY7 then?

So we give money to Big GM and Dogge and not Tesla

[daniloreyes]

So we give money to Big GM and Dodge and not Tesla, funny, I wonder why?

It's a BMW 7 series

[HaeMaker]

If you can buy a BMW 7 series, you can buy a Tesla. Target market.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[vux984]

They aren't daily driver cars

Well the Porsches honestly can be. The rest ... not so much.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Wyatt Earp]

Until the 2010 model year, it used the LNJ, made in China for the Chinese and Canadian market and the LY7.

Now it uses the LY7 V6, which is a new technology V6, from 2004 on, and the LAF i4, which has been built in various versions since the early 70s for US, Australia, Brazil, Europe and the Middle East.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[tompaulco]

More importantly, at $50k-$70k, it's much more affordable than the $100k+ roadster.
MORE affordable, I agree. But affordable? Not by half. Honestly, I don't see how anyone can afford the price of the average new car these days. Maybe I am just in the wrong line of work, but with the price of the average new car approaching half my salary (and me being in the supposedly upper middle class), it is no small wonder to me that the auto industry is failing. How about building a car that a mere upper middle class wage earner can afford?

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[tsotha]

We'll all be long dead before fossil fuels run out, unless by "fossil fuels" you mean "oil". If we make the switch it will be over environmental concerns, not supply.

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[valkraider]

As for economy and TOC, I'm staying on what most people consider the less than green side. I have a sports car that gets 26mpg. It gets me and up to 3 passengers and luggage or groceries from Point A to Point B quickly. MSRP was around $38k, and I paid $25k one year used. Now at 11 years old and 120,000 miles, if it were a EV or hybrid, it would have likely required two battery swaps and who knows what other changes. What's MTBF on the motors they use? How do the electronics stand up in hot climates? As a good old fashion IC motor, it's required 2 water pumps, an alternator, and 2 new batteries, and a few other little things

(emphasis added by me)

"Consumer Reports decided to do a re-test a 2002 Prius, with 206,000 on the clock, and found that it delivered 46.3mpg, compared to 48.6 in the original test with a new car. Lower? Yes, but not bad for 206,000 miles."

I had a headlight fault in my car. It seems the ground wire to the headlights broke internally. 15 minutes and $5 in parts later it was fixed in the auto parts store parking lot. A friend of mine has a Prius. Hers has a headlight fault, where the headlights will just turn themselves off or flash, due to an overheating controller. It costs hundreds of dollars, and serious work to just get the light out. Google around for replacing a Prius headlight, and you'll see plenty of pictures where you have to take the front bumper off to accomplish it.

First, you seem to concentrate headlight bad luck around you, anecdotally.

Also anecdotally, I have a friend with a Subaru Tribecca that also has to remove the bumper to replace a headlight bulb. And since my friend didn't know that - he actually ended up causing $1000 in damage trying to do it without removing the bumper, but it still would have cost him $200 in labor to get it done. Now he knows what needs to be done and how to do it so he can do it himself without breaking things, but it is still a pain in the ass.

So I guess that negates your "green cars are bad because a prius headlight is hard to fix" argument.

I also read horror stories about the first generation of the VW New Beetle that required pulling the engine to replace a headlight assembly (I read in a forum about someone who lost one to a rock). Some times a design makes it hard to fix something. It has nothing to do with if it is a hybrid, or electric, or magic ferry dust, or powered by grinding up puppies and kittens. A bad design is a bad design.

My second car is a used full size SUV. That's my spare vehicle, in case the first one is down for some reason, and for transporting anything larger than my car will carry. I dare anyone to consider doing home renovations driving a Tesla Roadster. :) You won't even fit a stack of bricks or a few sheets of plywood in a Prius. :) The mileage isn't great, but if I can accomplish in one trip what would take 4 in a smaller car, the effective efficiency is better. And sometimes there is just no substitute for an urban assault vehicle. :)

Since your SUV is your second car you can still get a hybrid or electric car for your primary car for your daily use, and still have that SUV to haul those bricks and plywood. :)

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[c 0xFF]

I think it's ironic that Tesla has a store in Menlo Park.

Too bad it's Menlo Park, CA and not in NJ...

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[tompaulco]

I had an '88 Lotus Esprit Turbo that I bought for neighborhood of $17k and sold for about the same 4 years later. I would definitely do that again rather than spend $30k+ on a low end new car. Plus it got more looks than a brand new car.

Attila Dimedici in the News- FAIL

[rogerdugans]

Attila Dimedici has posted an article to /. and failed to understand the subject matter in a manner that is simply amazing.
Even more incredible is his attempts to reply to corrections with more inaccurate and contradictory statements.

This type of thing is not exactly new to Slashdot or other news websites but what IS new is the fact that he continues to defend his position with such vehemence even when faced with a complete lack of factual material to back up any statement he has made.

It has become increasingly obvious to this writer- and most readers of the thread- that Attila Dimedici is simply not attempting to understand anything on the topic but appears to be spreading fear, uncertainty and doubt on the subject due to a personal agenda.

What this agenda may be has come under discussion as well- politics, an "Opinion for Hire" situation or even possibly rank stupidity, but at his time there is no conclusive evidence for any one of the three possibilities.

What IS clear is that he knows little about anything in an automotive or business sense.

And probably should not be allowed to submit articles to Slashdot.

Re:Attila Dimedici in the News- FAIL

[Teancum]

What does amaze me is that the "editors" at Slashdot didn't bother reviewing what this guy wrote. I've had some (admittedly minor) factual details get corrected when I've had stuff posted for the front page for a /. story. In this case, the headline and the body of the text is so misleading and misses the point of the "news" that it does put the OP into a whole new class of misinformation.

The "news" of having the Roadster production discontinue was legitimate news, and this is certainly "News for geeks" and everything that applies to Slashdot. In that sense, I'm glad that this story ran as it was useful information and a reason I go to Slashdot in the first place. Beyond that little piece of information, however, the libel being written here by this guy is nearly enough that perhaps Tesla needs to put out a formal statement to refute the guy.... other than hopefully some other news agency that is alerted to this concept through Slashdot might just do a little bit more research than this guy.

I'd like to go through the firehose to see if anybody submitted something a little closer to the truth. Sadly, they can't stuff this particular genie back into the bottle.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[businessnerd]

Agreed. I bought a 2003 Porsche Boxster with only 10k miles on it for $20k. Expensive to maintain, though. It is also my daily driver, and an extremely enjoyable daily driver at that. However, I likely couldn't daily drive a Ferrari or Lamborghini.

Re:So we give money to Big GM and Dogge and not Te

[EmagGeek]

Tesla got something like $400M in bailout funds.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[DarkVader]

The range as stated by Tesla is about 55 miles at its governed top speed of 125 MPH. That's a pretty short distance, and given what this car is, I'd say 125 isn't an abnormal speed for someone to be driving this car. Even if you're staying below the speed limit to maximize range, you're only going to be getting under 300 miles. You're absolutely correct that you can't do NY-LA on a single tank of gas. But you can do it in 2 days with stops for fuel in any other car. You'd take over a week in the Tesla, because you'd have to stop for several hours every 200 miles or so.

The GM EV1 took care of the proof of concept years before the Tesla. It had the same range problems, but was clearly intended for short distance commuting, which the Tesla isn't. I stand by my statement that it's a really cool toy and technology demonstrator, but not much of a car unless you're only intending it as a commuter vehicle, and other options handle that better for far less money.

Would I want one? I'm not sure. I certainly could buy better cars for the money. Now, if I had unlimited funds, already had the other cars I'd want first, and wanted it as a 6th or 7th car, and already had a nice SUV with a trailer to get it to where I wanted to drive it, sure. As I don't have those yet, not so much.

If I were to consider an electric option, I'd have to pick the Chevy Volt. It's actually going to be useable as a car, since you've got gasoline backup power when the battery dies. It's too bad nuclear won't scale down to car size, though. Could you imagine only having to refuel every 10 years?

Tesla has declared bankruptcy

[EmagGeek]

It is absolutely true. Here is the story:

http://www.teslauniverse.com/nikola-tesla-timeline-1916-tesla-declares-bankruptcy

Still better than this pile of dogshit story.

Re:Tesla has declared bankruptcy

[Teancum]

Oh....... this is so damn good. I wish I had some mod points for this one!

You are correct, it is absolutely true and factual. It should be the next story about Tesla to get posted on Slashdot!

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[DaveGod]

Additionally power plants can be placed where air quality matters least (i.e. not in densely populated areas where people and cars are). That might not help significantly with climate change, but the redistribution would make a massive contribution to other air pollution problems. Currently we have great air where few people are and terrible air where lots of people are, which is obviously silly.

Furthermore, power plants can burn any resource a car can run on plus other things. A power plant running on oil might not consume that much less oil per mile driven than a car but the additional resource options can only improve resource allocation efficiency (a power plant would only run on oil if it was the best option).

Shifting demand for energy sources from car combustion engines to power plants also has supply implications. There are many fields that are not economically viable due to the risks of selling oil/gas on the market. Power plants have relatively stable demand and are more interested in stable supply: the risks involved in the marginal oil field become far less when they can secure 10 year contracts with pricing collars before investing capital. The supply chain can also be more efficient when dealing with fewer, larger customers. Plus we cut out the whole petrol/gas delivery costs.

Power plants should also be a little more efficient than they already are when there is greater long term demand. Bigger, more efficient plants, or more plants which should average out to being closer to demand thus less transmission loss. On the other hand perhaps the best sites are already taken so the additional plants would have to be further away, but I suspect they would just make existing plants bigger if that was the case.

I'm tempted to assume the only real problem is the battery. They're made of nasty things and the heaviness impacts efficiency and handling. Despite this efficiency is already a win and there does seem to be quite a lot of research going on. Many people seem to think it also causes a range problem but that will either be solved with fast charging stations or the batteries can be designed to be swappable, perhaps using some kind of leasing system, which should also allow some efficiency savings due to smoothing power plant capacity utilisation (i.e. it's better to swap in batteries that charged overnight rather than recharge during the day).

In short, even if fossils were the only power plant energy source, once critical mass is reached electric cars should solve many problems associated with cars and put a lot of little cuts in climate change and resource scarcity. These two require clean renewable energy, which itself is highly likely to require electric cars.

It's probably worth remembering at this point that the whole debate on powering cars is merely about managing symptoms. The real problem, and the one associated with many others (e.g. roads, accidents, traffic, time wasted non-productive and non-enjoyed) is the need to make a car journey. Nobody seems interested in fundamental solutions like good public transport and living near where you want to be.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[_Sprocket_]

I own a Roadster *and* have a deposit on a Model S.

I both envy and loathe you. More envy. When are you outfitting your roadster with a custom engine tone?

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Cliffy03]

They are stopping production of the roadster sooner than they planned for one reason: Lotus stopped selling their version over here too. It doesn't pass new airbag safety requirements, so they won't be able to use the body either. You can bet they would have liked to keep selling them but it is out of their hands at this point.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Teancum]

So restricting one of the most inefficient and wasteful uses of electricity isn't a bad thing, it saves money and resources and decreases pollution.

I don't know how much pollution it may actually save, and if it really was so wasteful wouldn't you think that you should just let consumers make up their minds on their own rather than trying to have a nanny state make up your mind for you?

People pay for electricity and expect a certain amount of light in order to read and do whatever else it is that they do at home and in the office. If they can find a way to save money by using something more efficient, don't you think they would go that route?

As a matter of fact, I did buy compact florescent lights before the law making them mandatory came out, because they were cheaper and typically lasted longer. More to the point, I think those outlawing the conventional Thomas Edison-style incandescent bulbs were premature on what was an eventuality anyway and should have simply let the process happen on its own. Besides, there are situations and environments where the new fangled bulbs simply don't work.

On top of that, I'm not sure that the trade-off of reduced carbon for increased levels of Mercury in landfills is necessarily a good thing. That has been documented many times here on /. as well as other places, so I don't need to go into more details other than to say the argument about reduced levels of pollution may be overrated. LED lightbulbs show a bit more promise than the compact florescent bulbs, and hopefully other options may become available. Legislating morality didn't have to happen for reduced energy consumption to happen for a given lumen of light.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[cayenne8]

So restricting one of the most inefficient and wasteful uses of electricity isn't a bad thing, it saves money and resources and decreases pollution

Strangely...I cannot for the life of me, think of any of the limited enumerated powers that the Federal US govt has in the constitution....gives them this power..?

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[cayenne8]

Honestly, I don't see how anyone can afford the price of the average new car these days. Maybe I am just in the wrong line of work, but with the price of the average new car approaching half my salary (and me being in the supposedly upper middle class), it is no small wonder to me that the auto industry is failing. How about building a car that a mere upper middle class wage earner can afford?

Well, avg car price in the US (I think on the CBS evening news the other night) was just under $25K.

So, if your salary is $50K...hate to say it...you are not UPPER middle class...that is at the middle maybe of middle class...maybe a touch lower in todays economy. $100K and up is more upper middle class....it sure ain't rich like it used to be in the old days.

Tesla is right on track and wtf Slashdot I'm gone

[Raineer]

Tesla's plan, from the very beginning of the company, was to create the Roadster (an overpriced concept), to generate the seed money to develop the technology further. Thanks to the rich folks who spent the 100k+ and supported this company, they were able to take step two which is the 50k luxury sedan. Step 3 is the 30k sedan, which was still part of their plan and where I have always hoped to come into the picture. I'm removing Slashdot from Google reader and not coming back. The site has been "on the decline" for a very long time, but it's just complete trash now.

Re:I've excluded two editors in my time at slashdo

[jdevivre]

The Lone Gunmen were killed off in X-Files
Uh sh..wha? DAMMIT!
Well I may as well throw away the friggin' DVD collection now. Thanks a bundle, feep. Ya jerk. ;)

Jesus, Slashdot is crap.

[aussersterne]

This summary is the exactly opposite of the article. It is not just poor journalism, it is borderline commercial defamation.

These days Slashdot a) gets stories more slowly than everyone else, b) very, very often completely misrepresents the article being presented and/or presents it with a strong implicit ideological position that immediately marks everything out as a political or economic discussion rather than a technological one, and c) is full of commenters that clearly have no first-hand experience with anything prior to 32-bit Windows and thus understand the "discussion of technology" in a way completely different from the way that I imagine it (it is, on Slashdot these days, the discussion of consumer electronics, commodity economics, and political regulation).

In short, this is disgusting and I'm tired of it. I think my clicks are going to go somewhere else.

Re:Jesus, Slashdot is crap.

[Teancum]

I think many commentators on Slashdot don't know of anything prior to Windows XP or OSX. Those who even realized there were 32-bit interfaces for Windows 3.1 are certainly few and far between.

Some of us olde tymers are still around though. I wrote some software on Hollerith punch cards back when it was still state of the art and even learned how to read the cards by sight without the crutch of the fancy lettering on the top of the card. A drawer of punched tape rolls was also something I fondly remember, trying to figure out where that cool Star Trek was at, giving a whole new definition of "folder" for "mass storage".

That said, I too am disgusted by this story and the misleading nature of the headline + story intro on the OP. It is a new low for Slashdot, where likely the editors really don't care either.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Dog-Cow]

That's not irony. Irony would be Tesla Motors displacing Ford or GM.

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[kheldan]

I'm not disputing that at all. But likewise you cannot dispute that people need to be weaned off vehicles that run off of fossil fuels, and it is my belief that that isn't going to happen until there are NO fossil fuels left to speak of. I had the greatest of hopes for the hydrogen fuel cell, but it's either not a practical technology to mass produce, or the oil companies have succeeded in burying it, which is sad.

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[Chris Burke]

Hey, thanks for the math!

Question: What is the efficiency of the batteries?

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Teancum]

The GM EV1 took care of the proof of concept years before the Tesla. It had the same range problems, but was clearly intended for short distance commuting, which the Tesla isn't. I stand by my statement that it's a really cool toy and technology demonstrator, but not much of a car unless you're only intending it as a commuter vehicle, and other options handle that better for far less money.

The huge difference between the GM EV1 and the Tesla Roadster is that the Roadster went to a Li-ion battery system and the EV1 used a conventional Lead-Acid battery for its energy storage system. The EV1 hardly had the "same range problems", as its driving range was considerably smaller, by a whole order of magnitude.

I admit that this driving rang issue is a big deal, and something that has plagued electric automobiles since they were first introduced. As a matter of fact, Thomas Edison tried to get electric automobiles working and couldn't, where they even pre-dated the introduction of gasoline and diesel engines. The slow to adapt technology has always been the energy storage media.

If you are trying to compare the Tesla Roadster to other high-end automobiles, I'd have to agree that it doesn't really quite compare very well. For those who demand top performance and want to kick some behind on the German Autobahn, the Roadster isn't likely going to be giving you all of the performance you want or demand (even though I've read some blogs from German Roadster owners who have had fun on the Autobahn). It is a bit of a waltzing bear right now so far as it is amazing it works at all and even more amazing that it can even go onto the Autobahn without getting a ticket for being too slow.

When the Roadster is compared to other electric automobiles, however, it blows away the competition. Nearly all other electric car manufacturers simply can't compete, including the hybrids. In fact, I just saw a movie trailer that made fun of the fact that a guy doing a drag race with a Prius had the police officer questioning the sanity of the person driving the car.... wondering just why anybody would think it would have any chance of winning at all. The Roadster shattered the myth that an all-electric car can only have the performance of a golf cart. That guys like you are trying to complain and suggest that at least it is approaching the performance of high-end automobiles.

BTW, I'd like to know just who is a regular Roadster driver and "regularly" drives at 100+ mph? It sure ain't California, where many of these things are sold. The CHP would love to pull a Roadster over just for the fun of teasing the driver, much less writing out a speeding ticket.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Smidge204]

If they can find a way to save money by using something more efficient, don't you think they would go that route?

I'm sure you'd like to think so, but if you rely on the general public to be well informed, rational agents then whatever you are planning will fail spectacularly. Sometimes people do things a certain way because it's the only way they've ever known, and will actually respond with hostility is anyone even suggests there's a better way. These people need to be tricked or coerced into doing things that are objectively for their best interest.
=Smidge=

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Lifyre]

Or most of the 2010+ Ford Fusions... Of course that transmission was a joint venture with GM.

And from my limited experience with the Rangers the manuals hold up pretty well.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Lifyre]

Strangely this is one of the clearest cut uses of the commerce clause I've seen recently. They're regulating the efficiency of products sold across state lines. In theory (theory because I doubt it will ever be put into practice) if these bulbs were made in State A and only sold in State A then the feds would have much less to say.

Of course Article 1 Section 8 probably could be argued to apply as well.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Lifyre]

If mercury in CFL's is a concern it may be heartening for you to know that using a CFL actually causes less mercury to be released into the environment over the lifetime of the bulb. That is also if you throw it in the trash and DO NOT recycle it. YMMV depending upon the exact source of your electricity but that holds true for the average bulb using average electricity in the United States.

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[slimjim8094]

Li-ions are 80-90% efficient. NiMH is a bit worse, 66%. Li-polys are 99.8% efficient, and NiCDs are 70-90%. So all these batteries don't waste much, but some do better than others.

I also forgot to mention that batteries+motors are significantly lighter than engine+transmission, so you'll probably be about 500 lbs lighter, which saves more energy.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Smidge204]

The range as stated by Tesla is about 55 miles at its governed top speed of 125 MPH. That's a pretty short distance, and given what this car is, I'd say 125 isn't an abnormal speed for someone to be driving this car. Even if you're staying below the speed limit to maximize range, you're only going to be getting under 300 miles.

The Ferrari F40 gets approximately 1 mile per gallon when driven flat out, for an effective range of about 30 miles. You'll never see the Top Gear people pushing one off the track, though. And to the best of my knowledge the current Tesla range record is a hair over 347 miles, so there's that I guess.

Driving the ~2,800 miles from NY to LA in 2 days, assuming you actually stop to sleep and eat, requires an average speed of over 70 miles per hour. That's kind of a stretch to be realistic, yeah? And the required driving for 20 hours straight per day (assuming 8 hours total rest overnight) with less than an hour total rest to break it up is very ill-advised. I think you're being way too optimistic. Even in you're i a hurry it'll take at least three days, four or five if you're sane.

Recently a couple of guys in Great Britain drive their Tesla Roadster from John o' Groats to Land's End - a famous route of 875 miles - in two days. Now sure that is technically not as fast as a gasoline powered vehicle could do it, but again the limiting factors of max average speed and driver fatigue start to come into play at that point. Overall this argument just isn't as strong as you might think.
=Smidge=

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Teancum]

If mercury in CFL's is a concern it may be heartening for you to know that using a CFL actually causes less mercury to be released into the environment over the lifetime of the bulb.

I'm curious about how that works, unless there is a nuclear process going on within CF lights that I'm not aware of. Mercury is an element, and as such does not changes its nature or character through normal chemical means or merely being bombarded by electrons. Perhaps the electron excitation creates some more "exotic" Mercury compounds that are more tolerable to living creatures?

Is it instead that by using the lightbulbs that the Mercury simply seeps out slowly through the glass and into your house as you are using it? That is a bit more concerning to me by itself and a pollution source that concerns me even more than having the metal get into landfills.

The local recycling center that I do use on a pretty regular basis doesn't do CFL recycling, although they do have a "hazardous materials" area that accepts unused paint and electronic devices. Sort of odd and perhaps that is a local issue, but it is something I've noticed.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Teancum]

I would rather trust a million people to "do the right thing" eventually than to trust a bureaucrat to tell me what that right thing to do is.

My point is that economics alone could have been a sufficient driver in the market place, and that rather than outlawing the bulbs simply placing a tax upon them might have been a better way to deal with the situation. Or perhaps a dozen other strategies. Unfortunately, it is the process of flat out making them illegal that is the most concerning to me and something that is to me even offensive.

My point is also that adoption was happening even without these coercive laws, and that it froze in place technologies instead of trying to encourage inventors and others who might have come up with something better in the marketplace of ideas. Now we'll never know, which to me is the real tragedy.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Lifyre]

Two main ways it works and I'll try to post a reference or two at the bottom but basically there are several forms of mercury. Some of which are highly toxic and some that are basically inert. The mercury in a CFL is actually bound to the glass over the life of the bulb. CFL's generally contain about 4mg of mercury (some are as low as 1mg but my numbers all assume 4mg) about 10% of remains unconstrained. If you recycle the bulb properly there is little to no environmental release of that mercury.

The largest difference though it when you consider the source of the electricity powering the bulb. As I said YMMV but in the U.S. the average mercury emission is about .012mg/kWh. Over the life of a bulb (about 8000 hours for a CFL) that amounts quite a bit. There is about a 4mg per bulb advantage to the CFL. If 100% of the mercury remained toxic and you used a bulb with 4mg it would only be about 0.3mg better to use the CFL. That also doesn't account for other pollutants that may be released with the extra electricity.

While not necessarily an unbiased source they're numbers can be verified independently:
http://www.energystar.gov/ia/partners/promotions/change_light/downloads/Fact_Sheet_Mercury.pdf

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[JWSmythe]

Since your SUV is your second car you can still get a hybrid or electric car for your primary car for your daily use, and still have that SUV to haul those bricks and plywood. :)

I could, and I've considered it, but I haven't seen anything that's what I want (i.e., something that works) at a price that is affordable. That's most of what I was trying to say, even if it didn't come out quite that way. Pricing is very important. If lots of units are sold, and they are popular, then when those drivers upgrade to the newer model years, those used vehicles will again be on the market.

Unfortunately, most of us don't have wads of cash laying around to blow on whatever. I bought my SUV for $1,750. It had some mechanical problems, which I repaired, bringing my total investment to $2,800. It's book value is $6,800.

Lets compare the current market value for first (US) model year of various hybrids... I'm using my area for these comparisons, on KBB. While the actual pricing could be argued, I'm using them for all the prices here. They're all being compared with standard equipment only.

2004 Toyota Prius $13,920.
2000 Honda Insight $6,575
2003 Honda Civic Hybrid $8,085
2007 Lexus GS 450h $32,365
2007 Nissan Altima Hybrid $17,550
KBB does not list the Tesla Roadster at all.

These days, even for people who have jobs (only 75% of the population now), dropping even $7k on a car is more than they can safely dispose with. Of course there is financing, which the dealerships will be happy to offer. Unfortunately, knowing the state things are in, who would consider financing a new or used car, paying the interest, and risking losing their transportation if they should miss a payment. Ya, it's a tough game. The few people I've known who have purchased vehicles recently (including the SUV referenced above) were all paid with cash. Of course they were all used, and each needed something (tires, tuneup, or whatever). Still, a few thousand out of pocket is much safer than tens of thousands in payments and thousands in interest.

On my primary vehicle, I paid almost double for it, including all the interest payments across the life of the loan. Even still, I found myself without work towards the end of the payments. I had two payments left to make, and they were ready to repossess it when I was 2 weeks late paying. I called to arrange things with them, and to give myself time to borrow the money from friends and family. The "negotiation" the finance company offered was for me to tell them the address it was at, so they could pick it up. And if you're wondering, it was the finance division of the big 3 US auto manufacturers, not some rip-off buy-here-pay-here.

With BS practices like that, I'm never financing a vehicle again.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[timeOday]

The interesting new thing about the Prius in 2012 is the Plugin model - you can recharge it from the wall (instead of the gas engine) and drive for about 13 miles on battery alone. Since my commute is only 10 miles each way, and since (believe it or not) certain parking spots where I work have electrical outlets, I might be able to go for a very, very long time without buying any gas.

Though as a commuter car, a Leaf might be better, since hauling a gas engine around is a lot of dead weight unless you need it. I really wish the battery-only cars had modular packs so you could take just as much battery as you need - say, 30 miles for me, round-trip, with a generous safety margin.

Where I would really like a more efficient vehicle, though, is to replace the minivan my wife drives around town. Unfortunately I don't see any good options there.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[stabiesoft]

Um, no the volt uses exactly what you describe except under some very specific circumstances. In fact one of the complaints people make of the Volt is it uses this "trick" to increase performance of the car under these high speed/hard accel cases. Under normal circumstances it drains the battery to near empty, and then starts the engine and recharges/supplies juice to the electric motors. I think your thinking of the prius which uses the weird transmission that directly connects the small engine to the drive train. I think both are fine methods, with maybe a slight preference for the volt because full electric operation is normal for commuting. The trailer idea for the S is an interesting one. I'd need more info before I could really comment. It might offer an elegant solution if the extra weight doesn't turn the car into a slug.

Image

[SuperKendall]

Since the performance doesn't compare, the Leaf serves just as well as an image car as the Model S (and yes I have seen pictures of the Model S).

I have doubts that the ModelS can really match refinements people used to buying a Mercedes would not be in for this car.

To me Telsa has always been about courting the technical, not the luxury, crowd. I admire what they have done and are trying to do but I just don't see how the current plan can work.

Reference?

[Kupfernigk]

I'd be interested to see the reference for that. The Toyota hybrid drivechain by design assumes that there are two prime movers because it is designed to split power generation. Obviously a 100% electric drive doesn't need to do that. There is no "Tesla's tech": it just uses very ordinary electric drive; battery, electronics, motor, transmission. Totota have built millions of these, millions of reliable units with liquid cooled motors and electronics. Tesla have built hundreds.

The moderation on this thread shows how badly the fanboys want Tesla to succeed - but the example of other niche manufacturers is that you either have to be extremely niche and conservative (Morgan) or get bought out by a sugar daddy (Lamborghini) - it's reckoned you need a project team of 300-500 engineers juust to design a new volume car, depending on how much work you have to do on customising the powertrain. And yes, I have worked in vehicle R&D.

Re:Reference?

[Andy Dodd]

http://www.toyota.com/concept-vehicles/rav4ev.html

"The second-generation RAV4 EV demonstration vehicle represents an important milestone in Toyota’s unique collaboration project with Tesla."

Re:Was the Roadster ever supposed to be profitable

[trout007]

You are missing the point. The Tesla WAS the R&D.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[BasilBrush]

I don't know how much pollution it may actually save, and if it really was so wasteful wouldn't you think that you should just let consumers make up their minds on their own rather than trying to have a nanny state make up your mind for you?
People pay for electricity and expect a certain amount of light in order to read and do whatever else it is that they do at home and in the office. If they can find a way to save money by using something more efficient, don't you think they would go that route?

No. People make most of their decisions without any rational thought whatsoever. They do things according to drives and emotions of the subconscious. Even when they are aware of what's in their best long term interests, they often do things against it.

For example their wouldn't be such high obesity levels if people made rational decisions about what they eat. But for the most part they don't make rational decisions. They eat based on drives of hunger, emotion and habit. And they end up fat, unhealthy and unhappy.

With lightbulbs, it's even worse as it's a Tragedy of the Commons scenario. If people don't tend to make rational decisions about their own best interests, what chance of them making them as their tiny part of a global best interest. Even if they were aware of all the arguments.

People buy incandescents because they always bought incandescents. It's a habit.

By the way, your use of the phrase "the nanny state" is a big flag to suggest you aren't being rational even here. The state is a state - everyone understands what it is. It needs no analogy. The insertion of the word "nanny" is bringing in emotional baggage about an entirely different relationship, that of the nanny and the child. To be rational, you should judge every case on it's merits. You shouldn't pre-suppose that the state making a particular decision is bad. Yet that is what people who use "the nanny state" phrase do.

Besides, there are situations and environments where the new fangled bulbs simply don't work.

There are exceptions in law for those areas where only incandescent bulbs make sense. If and when low power technology comes along that can replace those applications, then they can remove those exceptions.

Weren't they going to suspend?

[BlueCoder]

Please correct me if I'm wrong. Could this article be mistaken? Weren't they going to suspend the roadster for 2 or 3 years to produce the model S? Seems to me the article might be inaccurate. If Tesla is able to make a profit on the Model S I expect the Roadster will be back as a new model. The whole point of the Roadster was to gear up for production slowly; to work out the kinks and push the tech. I think Tesla's big goal is sublease their tech and or produce the electric subsystems for other manufacturers. Producing the cars themselves is a fallback position so auto makers can't strong-arm them. If Tesla makes it 10 years in the auto market they will be standing on solid ground. Unless the company is closing it's doors and going bankrupt I think it's likely we will see the Roadster again and leaner and meaner than ever before.

Re:Weren't they going to suspend?

[Teancum]

Roadster production is being done with a whole plethora of 3rd party sub-contractors and a very complex supply chain, not the least of which is the fact that the main chassis and a good number of the components are being produced through Lotus and their parts suppliers. In addition, a fairly substantial part of the Roadster was also outsources as well.

The Model S represents an attempt by Tesla to bring much of that production "in house" where the base chassis and other critical parts are going to be manufactured at the NUMMI plant in California. That takes time simply to set up the production lines, much less be able to design, build prototypes, and be able to pass all of the Department of Transportation requirements necessary to be legal to have the vehicle on the road in the first place. Since Tesla is also going to aim for higher production numbers, the standards they have to meet are also a little bit higher than it was for the Roadster. The DOT is a little more forgiving for "untested" parts and designs when they are in low production numbers or for custom-built cars, but production cars have different expectations.

Lotus was retooling their production line anyway at the production plant where the Roadster was being made, which was going to require some significant engineering and essentially a whole new vehicle by the time they were done. Simply put, it was easier for Tesla to discontinue the Roadster rather than trying to redevelop the whole thing.

BTW, I would have to agree with you that I find it highly unlikely Tesla is going to give up the "sportscar" market in favor of the more mid-sized luxury automobiles market that the Model S is targeting. Given the nature of Elon Musk and many of the existing customers who have been buying the Roadster, I would expect a really kick-ass model coming out or at least announced a little bit after the Model S is put into formal production. It may end up costing even more than the Roadster does right now for the really high-end customers who don't care about the $100k price tag because that is easily affordable for them. In fact, I'd dare say Tesla may go for perhaps something more like $300k or higher but with a performance curve that really screams. That, of course, is going to take some time to develop.

The other issue is that Tesla has now become a "public" company, due to the IPO they had somewhat recently. That also changes the nature of the company in some subtle but interesting ways because they can't really be acting like a small entrepreneurial start-up company any more. Wall Street simply won't let them. Still, the telling thing is that with this announcement to discontinue the Roadster, the stock price of the company went up. Shouldn't that say something about what the shareholders think of how Elon Musk is running the company?

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[trum4n]

I must correct you, the Volt is NOT and electric car. It's a hybrid. BIG difference.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[poetmatt]

1: electricity is not free
2: a battery based car will not last 150 thousand miles on those batteries, absolutely guaranteed. If you're lucky, you might have to replace the entire set of batteries every 25-50k. Hint: the cost for this is probably 10 grand. Why do you have to replace them? Well, if you'd like to be able to go more than 40 miles before the batteries die as they reduce in capacity over time, this will be kinda needed.

So while battery based cars are good for the environment in some senses, don't think it's some magic fucking savings.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Thumper_SVX]

I just have to post this;

My 15 year old SVX is currently at 147K miles, and despite the front wheel bearings going bad (which I'll replace next weekend) the car's still going strong. Never a lick of engine trouble, and I only put a Forester transmission in it because the first one had a reversing problem and I wanted the faster takeoff from a 4.44 rear end.

All cars have their problems. Subarus are actually dead easy to work on and I've owned a couple of them as well as my SVX. They've also been among the most reliable I've ever owned. Try a BMW some time... while I loved the 330i I had for a while, it got expensive to keep running.

Oh and there's a reason they have high used value; because they're good cars that generally have better reliability than a Honda. Quite frankly the reason the Chevy Equinox has a low resale value is because it's crap.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[s73v3r]

Also, am I the only one who finds it ironic that a company named Tesla has a failed business model?

Maybe, but that's probably because you're the only one that thinks its failed.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[s73v3r]

No, we'd be in full recovery by now. Constantly saving big companies like banks or GM makes all the other companies nervous because they know the Tax Hammer will have to come down eventually to pay for all this.

Except you have nothing to guarantee that. Not to mention, you make NO NOTE of all the people who would have lost their jobs. Most of them would still be unemployed.

Again, your "Free Market or Bust" rhetoric might sound nice, but you have NOTHING to back it up. There is nothing to lead anyone to believe that we'd be recovering any better than we are, and more things to indicate that we'd be worse off, with much higher unemployment.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[s73v3r]

And yet, none of that was any refuting of the point, which is that had GM and Chrysler simply gone under, the economy would be even more fucked than it is now.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[s73v3r]

Had they failed, the market they were building cars to satisfy would have been filled by another company. Those companies would have had to hire extra workers to fill the demand. There might have been enough demand that an investor would have bought the vacated factories to build cars. Maybe someone like Tesla. Instead we have the corporate rulers that ran the company into the ground still at the helm.

Says who? Who's going to buy the cars? Remember, we were still ass deep in recession; NOBODY was buying cars.

Maybe 10 years from now, the demand might have kicked up, but that'd be far too late for all the people without jobs.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[s73v3r]

This is the same mindset that gave us a trillion dollar stimulus to keep unemployment under 8%. Unemployment is still higher, were trillions more in debt, and people are now out of work on average longer then during the great depression.

Because business isn't hiring, because there is no demand. They're not going to hire new workers when they can just squeeze the ones they have for more productivity.

Its a recovery when Obama is out of work.

As opposed to all the job-creation measures that the Republicans have proposed?

Re:Sad, but not unexpected

[s73v3r]

Well, for one, more states are instituting laws which require their power utilities to get increasing % of their power from renewable resources. If you don't think that's going to decrease the reliance on coal, you're dreaming.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[tompaulco]

if your salary is $50K...hate to say it...you are not UPPER middle class...that is at the middle maybe of middle class...maybe a touch lower in todays economy. $100K and up is more upper middle class....it sure ain't rich like it used to be in the old days.
Well, median income for the US for 2007 was 31,000, so I would think that that was considered middle class, and that roughly twice that would be upper middle class. However, that may not be the case. it could be that median income is solidly lower class, which pretty much means our country is all kinds of screwed up.
In fact, I just looked at the poverty levels as described by the federal government, and there are several categories of families where the median income earned in the U.S. falls below the poverty line.

Wrong, it is refuting

[SuperKendall]

had GM and Chrysler simply gone under, the economy would be even more fucked than it is now.

Nope. It would have been worse for a short time, would probably still be worse in a localized area, but it would be MUCH better all over.

The point given is refuting what you say because unions are dragging everything down, bankruptcy for GM would have meant the union would have had to take cutbacks whereas right now they continue to drain GM, and through GM the rest of the country.

Re:Wrong, it is refuting

[s73v3r]

Nope. It would have been worse for a short time, would probably still be worse in a localized area, but it would be MUCH better all over.

Again, stop saying what you don't know. You have no proof, no evidence to offer up to that other than, "Free Markets are GOOD!" The fact of the matter is, having that many people unemployed, especially at a time when the rest of the sector was not doing well either, would have been disastrous for the economy. Not to mention the domino effect it would have on suppliers to GM.

The point given is refuting what you say because unions are dragging everything down, bankruptcy for GM would have meant the union would have had to take cutbacks whereas right now they continue to drain GM, and through GM the rest of the country.

[Citation Needed]

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[SuperKendall]

Except you have nothing to guarantee that.

And you have nothing to say it wouldn't have happened. while here we sit in the middle of a very real recession that IS happening and IS getting worse.

All we truly know is that the action didn't help anything. So given the money it wasted it should never have been done. By EITHER party.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Teancum]

The trick with the Volt, and while I haven't crawled under and see it myself I've seen it reported in trade journals, is that the Volt as well as most of the other hybrids decide to "solve" this issue by having a transmission that can directly take power from the internal combustion engine and apply it directly to the wheels. That was a design consideration on the part of GM. They may have made some changes since I originally read the articles about the engine, so take that with a grain of salt and that was at least the early design concept being used when the internal diagrams for the Volt engine started to be made public.

Just think of the Rube Goldberg type contraption it takes to get that to happen. It takes what could be a simple motor that can last for years without maintenance (like the motor of your refrigerator) and adds in all of the complications that come with internal combustion engines along with all of the maintenance that goes with it. The nice thing about the trailer is that it doesn't have to be "certified" as strongly like a production automobile engine requires, it could be built by "after-market" companies very easily so there would be some competition driving the cost down further (also meaning that the Tesla or electric car manufacturers don't even have to spend engineering resources to worry about it), and if it fails you can still operate your vehicle safely... at least long enough to find a safe place to park or even to physically get to a repair shop instead of being stranded on the middle of a stretch of rural highway.

There have been Diesel generators for "electric trains" for decades now. In fact they are called "Diesel-Electric" locomotives so far as they simply have an electric power plant on board the vehicle that also is essentially an electric locomotive. For something like a locomotive the scale of operation and the efficiencies that come with power generation for that much electricity are sufficient that it is a very effective solution. Essentially it is just like the trailer idea I mention, but the trailer is simply incorporated into the vehicle itself. For those areas where the traffic is heavier and the rationale for off-loading the generating facilities can be made, overhead wires or a "3rd rail" is implemented that can provide the power generation in the first place but the Diesel-Electrics can operate in more rural areas where it isn't economical to string those power lines. This isn't a particularly novel idea in other words or even something that at least other other transportation systems have ignored, but it is a bit new for automobiles because the scaling factors to make a smaller engine are harder.

BTW, "3rd rail" electrical systems for automobiles have also been suggested and even developed on an experimental basis. Unfortunately the infrastructure costs and the fact that it would be a disruptive technology offering little short-term benefit (even if the long-term benefits might be huge) are reasons why it hasn't been done yet and possibly ever. It also doesn't solve the problem for rural areas as something like that could only be done in a large city or on something like an Interstate Highway and also be prone to failures.

After Working Saturday Overtime @ Tesla...

[Angry Butterfly]

Two different friends tell me they hear Tesla is in trouble... when there is so much demand for the car and the technology that since I started working at Tesla I've hardly seen my friends because I've been working crazy hours to get the last roadsters out the door and the Model S on the road. The Roadster is going away because Lotus isn't going to be making the base for them anymore, and as a result, people are clamoring to get them while they can. There are a lot of people working very hard at a company doing wildly well and some jerk writes a couple lines that are straight up lies and now we're a "Failure"? I'm glad so many people actually read the article, which says, as many other people pointed out, the exact opposite of the summary.

Re:These guys are actually innovating

[Shotgun]

If NOBODY was buying cars, why are we taxing the people, thereby putting a strain on the economy, in order to pay people to build cars? Why don't we bring back all the buggy whip manufacturers while we're at it?

What is OP trying to accomplish?

[esaruoho]

Why is the original poster so negative - so hostile - towards Tesla Motors? What is he trying to accomplish and why?

Re:More energy needed to make gas than for electri

[Paul Fernhout]

Yes. :-)