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The Coda Electric Car at the Detroit International Auto Show (Video)
Last week Timothy Lord looked at the Tesla Model S. He also took a quick look at the CODA electric car. Like Tesla, CODA is based in California. Like Tesla, CODA is building purely electric, "plug-in" cars. But unlike Tesla, CODA is making a bland but practical sedan that can go up to 150 miles on a charge and costs about $37,000. That's not exactly a Kia-competitive price, even though Tim says it looks kind of like a Kia. But it's 100% electric and costs less than a Tesla -- really, hardly more than a Nissan Leaf. And it has a fully-usable back seat and a decent-sized trunk. And unlike the Nissan Leaf, it's made right here in the good old USA.
I went to Cracker Barrel for breakfast this past weekend. Oddly enough, they had three electric car charging stations near the front entrance. I had to laugh because in all three parking spaces was parked a gas guzzler. For the concept to work, you'd need to instate laws to ticket non-electric vehicles or put the spaces so far away that fat people would stay away from them. Unfortunately, you only need an IQ of about 50 to drive and absolutely no manners whatsoever, so it's going to be a difficult problem to solve.
Final assemby is in the USA. Most of the chassis is made in China, and the rest of the parts are sourced from various places around the world.
Unlike, say, a Hyundai which is almost entirely made in the US.
And if you buy one you are going to need to hire an electrician. And if you rent or live in a condo/apartment try finding a 240v plug in the parkade. Or a landlord that will let you install one. And power in 15c a kW/h plus transmission charges 33c per kW/h.
The car is made in China. All that CODA does is install a UQM motor (American made with Chinese parts), Chinese made electronics and a chinese made battery.
This car is 99% Chinese.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Well lets get the standard arguments out of the way so newer, more interesting discussions can happen
1) It ONLY GOES 150 MILES? I always drive 151 miles per trip, even if its only to the corner store I drive around the block 604 times because I love to drive! Why my commute is over 5 hours per day, each way, because I'm a True American (TM) and you "30 minute commute" people are wimps, democrats, terrorists, or whatever..
2) If it can't charge in 5 minutes its dead to me. I only sleep in 3 hour shifts before moving to a new location because the T9000 is after me, so it would never get a chance to charge and I only travel to and from places that have no AC power service because otherwise my tinfoil hat sparks excessively.
3) One model vehicle cannot meet the needs of all buyers, therefore all electric vehicles are useless, because one model of gasoline car meets all human needs. What you say, there are more than one model of gas vehicle? Oh.
4) It doesn't work too well below -40 degrees C/F so I can't buy it. Sure, I live in southern Florida, but I'm worried about resale value. Oh you say my gas vehicle doesn't work too well at -40 either? So what, everyone knows that, I just felt the need to point this out about electrical cars, because I'm sure none of you lowly serfs would think of that yourselves.
5) My gas car's SLI battery was carefully engineered to fail in 3 years to maximize corporate profits, and surprise, surprise, it fails every 3 years. I'm sure an electric car will fail in 3 years too, and I don't care if the average Prius battery was engineered to last the life of the car, and in fact it does last the life of the car, you can't force me to think so I won't. Nahh naahhh nahhhhhh! I don't believe in engineering and you shouldn't either.
6) I will not be satisfied until an automated robot tentacle snakes out of the wall and plugs itself into the charger socket, mostly because I want to watch youtube videos of what the tentacle inserts in women wearing miniskirts. I don't care if everyone north of the mason dixon line already has a block heater and battery heater and battery trickle charger and they perfectly successfully use it every time it gets below zero, because I'm certain no one will ever be able to plug a car in when they park, after all, I don't, so no one in the whole universe every has, can, or will.
7) What is the charger connector going to be, there is no standard. I don't care if there actually is a perfectly good deployed standard which I could find on wikipedia if I wanted, I just like to post this every singe time there is an electric car article. Also, did you know there is no standard low voltage DC connector? Oh wait, there is. Oh how I love to post this over and over.
8) Thousands of american military personnel have died for oil, and its disrespectful of their memory not to burn as much gasoline as humanly possible, after all you don't want their relatives to think they died for nothing. My Chinese imported yellow support the troops ribbon sticker on the trunk of my 8 MPG SUV absolves me of all guilt, much like purchasing a pre-reformation indulgence.
I think that'll do it, does anyone have anything NEW to offer to the standard lineup of /. electric car stories?
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger