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CNN Replicates John Broder's Drive In the Tesla Model S
karlnyberg writes "Adding a third voice to the conflict between Tesla's Elon Musk and New York Times Reporter John Broder, CNN/Money's Peter Valdes-Dapena drove from DC to Boston (primarily to test the SuperCharger network). As he says in the article: In the end, I made it — and it wasn't that hard. ... As for the Supercharger network? Turns out that works, too.' He expands on this a bit: 'Looking back on the trip, it would be even easier if Tesla would install one of their fast-charging Superchargers along the New Jersey Turnpike. (These charging stations can fill up a nearly dead battery in Tesla's longest-range cars in about an hour, which is enough time to stop for a meal.) Tesla's working on that, spokeswoman Shanna Hendricks said. But the first priority was to install enough to make this trip, even if you had to take it easy most of the way. But I didn't have to take it that easy, which is good because the Model S provides a pretty amazing mix of smooth and silent performance along with brain-squishing acceleration. So even if you're not driving from Washington to Boston, it's an impressive car, all on its own.'"
On one side you have John Broder who it seems like wants to see this tech fail for some reason or the other (This is just my personal opinion from reading his prior articles). That is the kind of mindset he was in before he even started test driving this. On the other side you have Elon Musk who wants to sell people this new tech which will obviously have some issues in the beginning (which Musk would rather not talk about instead and blame everyone else for it.) . The truth probably lies somewhere in the middle. However, Musk's blog post was so convincing I almost find myself not rooting for John Broder at all!
To me, 270 mile range sounds fantastic (my car only gets 210 miles to a tank). I know charging points aren't yet as ubiquitous as fuel stations and that's the point of these tests, but seriously 270 mile range is more than enough for most people to do 95% of their regular driving without even considering range.
Its been previously stated that powering the Tesla S to max range is equivalent to burning 3 gallons of gas.
Compared to the usual 10-12 gallon gas tank of a car, that's pretty much a win no matter how you get the electricity (as long its not frm baby farts; while smelly, they arent very large or practical for a pwoerplant)
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
A gasoline-burning car is probably less polluting than a coal-burning electrical plant.
There are huge advantages in economies of scale when centralizing pollution controls. For example each gasoline powered currently car has to carry around a certain mass of equipment in order to comply with current pollution standards. Removing that mass from a moving vehicle and putting it in a fixed location gives you an instant efficiency gain as you no longer have to waste energy carting it around with you.
In addition, centralizing the power distribution of cars to current power stations allows you to flip over to a different primary source sometime in the future, without upsetting the consumption side. So while it may use fossil fuels now, that doesn't mean it still has to 10 years down the track. Think of it as refactoring the hardware to aid in future system changes.
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I just think this Tesla company is getting all a lot of hype for a car that the overwhelming majority of people won't be able to afford.
Most of the equipment you take for granted in your car (air conditioning, airbags, ABS, traction control, etc.) started life in cars the overwhelming majority of people couldn't afford.
Now a lot of it is mandatory even in cheap cars.
No sig today...
And frankly, at least for me, there's an element of rooting for the underdog here. Tesla is doing what the big dogs said couldn't be done, and shouldn't be done, and they're doing it way better than what the big guys are doing. I haven't crunched any numbers, but I'll bet Tesla have accomplished way more (in terms of advancing the technology) with their time and $$ investments in the roadster and sedan than say GM has with the volt or Nissan with the leaf, despite those mega-corps having much more experience building cars.