Hacker News Reader

Comment by thedrbrian | Hacker News Reader

Genuine question. What makes the model Y desirable? To me it’s just a funny looking , awkwardly proportioned minivan with a weird interior. It’s not hyper aggressive like a German car or cheap and handsome like a Mazda. It’s just an egg with a load of seats.

View on HN

If you want an EV that can do everything an ICE car can do, including reasonably convenient road trips, it's still the only option. (The delta is not quite as strong in the European or Chinese markets, but it's still there.)

Things that people like about EVs and Teslas specifically: 1) The driving experience is very special. Startling acceleration, single-pedal driving, near-silent low speed operation. 2) Operating costs are very low. Next to no routine maintenance, inexpensive "fuel". 3) Class-leading safety due to low CoG and lack of engine in the crumple zone. 4) Great software that is updated frequently over the air. 5) Arguably the best proto-self-driving/advanced driver assistance that gets better over time. 6) Hands down the best charging infrastructure and experience.

The build quality issues are real, but tend to be overblown by the media. The looks, inside and out, are definitely polarizing. I personally love the minimalism but would like better materials. But it's inarguably different, and for lots of people that's exciting in and of itself.

> single-pedal driving

Is that why I always see Tesla cars continually flashing their brake lights? Is it even possible to just coast?

Maybe they brake automatically - “regenerative braking”? I remember when I was test-driving Model S, the driving experience was very different from an ICE car, because as soon as you took your foot off the pedal, it started braking quite noticeably. To get an equivalent experience to an ICE car, you had to keep the pedal pressed ever so slightly (or change the settings).

Maybe regenerative braking is also when the brake lights turn on.

Maybe... there's some kind of threshold of deceleration that triggers the brake lights when pulling off the throttle but I don't know what it is. It could also be autopilot on.

Yes you can coast normally if you disable regenerative breaking. If its on, your car slows down a lot faster than it would if you were just coasting, so it triggers the break lights when you remove your foot from the gas

It may be, I ride the accelerator so it doesn’t often trigger the brakes unless you let off by a lot then the regenerative braking really kicks in. So if you let off the accelerator enough it triggers the brake lights because the motor is “braking” and charging the battery.

Can’t quite do everything an ICE can do. Gas cars have superior range on the whole, especially in cold weather conditions. Also you’re much safer finding a gas station on off-routes than a supercharger station.

I was in Atlanta during snowpocalypse of 2011. Georgia had TONS of Nissan Leafs because of a tax incentive that made it close to $0 to lease it. The highway had lots of stranded leafs because the battery died due to heating the car.

That isn't really germane to a conversation about Tesla cars. The lowest-range cars Tesla ever made had more than double the battery capacity of a 2011 Leaf (and unlike the 2011 Leaf, they all have battery-warming tech).

The parent I replied to was discussing the cons of electric vehicles vs ICE cars....so, very germane.

My comment was also referring to the drain on the battery due to resistive heating used to warm up the cabin...not range efficiency on the battery due to cold temperature.

My Googling shows that Tesla went away from resistive to heat pump in the model Y...so, I think my comment is germane to Tesla except model Y.

EV is better for daily commute , charge at home , always full tank , so you DONT need to search for a charger/gas station at all. I used Public charger 4 times since I bought the car . You don’t need to change oil , warm up the car etc .

Interesting you list a lot of things about Tesla and not the model Y. I want an LC500 convertible because I think it looks fantastic and it’ll be fun to drive. But I want that car not just a Lexus.

And 4) could go either way:) no one is able to disable bits remotely on most cars, or at least until BMW get their subscription service going for heated seats and radio stations.

The Model Y is desirable just because it's a Tesla SUV/crossover that's more affordable than the X.

Tesla have got EV infrastructure figured out. Here in the UK if you want to go for long journeys you need distributed high speed charging. Teslas are also efficient with the electricity and have decent range, while being pretty fast. Those are the plusses anyway...

Model y Performance owner, maybe because most of the “aggressive” ICE German cars are slower compared to model Y which is still SUV with big trunk etc ? Whenever I get into German car I feel like I’m in 80s, so many obsolete details . I like minimalism . I want my car drive fast , with good sound , easy to load stuff. Electric car is so much better for daily commute .

The statement about not being handsome like a Mazda has some irony in it, as the Tesla head designer, Franz von Holzhausen, previously was a lead designer at Mazda, before he joined Tesla.

Speaking for myself, I actually quite like the design of the Teslas. They are very smooth and have a quite different approach than most mainstream makers. I dislike especially the overly edgy brutal look with huge radiator openings, which has crept into the car market since 2010. Maybe it is me being a physicist, but I can also appreciate how the design maximizes aerodynamic efficiency, even if that means other compromises. Which is partly responsible for Teslas leading in range tests. As I like simple elegant shapes, I appreciate how from the front edge of the windscreen to the very back of the car, there is a single smooth curvature of the roofline.

Mazda doesn't make any EVs at all.

They do MX-30.

I just Googled it and...it doesn't appear to be out?

“First Edition from £27,495^ now available to pre-order. Deliveries starting early 2021”

https://www.mazda.co.uk/cars/mazda-mx-30/

Not sure how much “out” does it have to be to be considered “out”.

>handsome like a Mazda

Wow

"Muh technology." Anyway, on the upside none of my techie friends will be able to give me shit for owning an Italian sports car. Or if I do, I'll laugh at them for owning an ill constructed and expensive golf cart.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com