Comment by epistasis | Hacker News Reader

Comment by epistasis | Hacker News Reader

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We had some visitors to California from out of state recently, and the rental car place gave them an electric car (not Tesla), without basically any education about how to deal with them.

I'm a huge fan of electric cars, and will probably never buy anything except EVs in the future, but man are you right that the non-Tesla experience is bleak.

Charging was incredibly stressful. Few CCS chargers, each with a tiny number of charging spots (4-8), with many chargers broken, and the rest fully occupied.

I know it will get better, but I can't believe how bad it is at the moment, and can't believe that car rental companies are handing EVs out without much much more handholding.

(Edit: plus, the car navigation system had zero knowledge of how to plan a long route with charging. That's table stakes for an EV, and criminally bad management that they'd ship a car that didn't have full knowledge of the chargers out there and also how to route. Traditional US car manufacturers are absolutely incompetent and will not survive competition with Chinese manufacturers unless they clean house on everything software related.)

> Traditional US car manufacturers are absolutely incompetent and will not survive competition with Chinese manufacturers unless they clean house on everything software related.

Legacy American car companies have been fully non-competitive with foreign brands for decades. Their continued existence is completely due to tariffs, and it’s not close. I see no reason to think congress would suddenly allow them to be threatened by Chinese companies.

Moreover it's not clear how long china will be able to continue subsidizing the electric cars the way they do.

More subsidies than the $7,500 per vehicle subsidy that the US government gives for our EV vehicles?

To be fair you can’t really use this type of subsidy for price dumping in foreign markets like China is doing in Europe and would love to do as well in the US.

Wages and hence manufacturing costs are higher in the US

are you sure they are subsidizing them and not simply producing them more cheaply?

China are subsidising the entire supply chain.

https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_24_...

It's a moot point. China won't be able to continue to do this for much longer.

I mean, we already nailed them out once.

For those who aren't aware it's a 25% tarrif, so most manufacturers don't bother even trying to sell in the US. That's why almost all European/Japanese brand cars are 30+ years old over there.

I find it entertaining when my US colleague come visit and are amazed at all the options. I drive a new Toyota Hilux, and they weren't even aware they made them anymore. For a country that once prided itself on being the land of the free market capitalist, it's a shame the decision makers are so scared now of competition.

Back in the 2000s, VW released the Sirroco. I was graduating from uni, and it looked like the perfect car for me. I would have moved heaven and earth to own one. Alas, VW hemmed and hawed on homologation for North America and ultimately, it did not happen.

I do wish we had EU-level options here.

? You mean the Scirocco that's been around since the 70's?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_Scirocco

The US never got the 3rd gen models. There were plenty of 2nd gen models back in the day, but they're getting a bit old- I haven't seen one on the road for many years.

Apologies for the typo. I should have rephrased it as “re-released”.

Third-gen didn’t make it to North America because it would have eaten away at the Golf/Rabbit market share.

We haven't been the land of the free in a while, but we repeat it enough and then keep electing the uniparty in to keep it moving.

Itjumped significantly when the Federal Reserve was founded, backed by a national and originally-unconstitutional unapportioned direct income tax to feed it money. DC suddenly had a way to tax anyone and everyone without repercussions. Then FDR played with fascism and instituted many new agencies interested in managing the economy.

The welfare state LBJ started began the individual competing with free government money, and we've had nothing but an explosion of regulations tied to taxes or grants thanks to these categories and the hope of managing an economy to utopia.

> Then FDR played with fascism

That's a gross misrepresentation of history. Politically, FDR can be most fittingly described as "European-style Social Democrat". He was not "playing with fascism", he literally was the President during the war against the literal fascists in Europe.

Fascists can fight wars with other fascists, so that's not a counter to the argument.

I think it's a debatable point, but if I were to steelman the argument, LBJ significantly expanded federal authority through his Great Society programs, concentrated control at the expense of federalism, massively expanded the surveillance state to target civil rights leaders and anti-war activists, and advanced an aggressive foreign policy through military action.

Meanwhile, he was glad-handing Congress to exert stronger, central control over the government.

I'd be hard pressed to call any one of those actions fascistic, but if you believe that any parts of modern America are, then those greased the wheels to them. Certainly seems enough to have justified the descriptor of 'flirting with' imo

> For those who aren't aware it's a 25% tarrif, so most manufacturers don't bother even trying to sell in the US. That's why almost all European/Japanese brand cars are 30+ years old over there.

BMW has a 23.000-employee plant in South Carolina that produces X model SUVs for the entire world [1]. Volkswagen has an even larger presence [2]. No tariffs apply on these.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BMW_in_the_United_States

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volkswagen_Group_of_America

"That's why almost all European/Japanese brand cars are 30+ years old over there"

This is just completely incorrect. Most of European and Japanese cars are not 30+ years old in the US.

As of this year, it's a 100% tariff on Chinese EV's, not 25%.

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases...

I find the inverse interesting too. US Brands trying to sell in foreign markets. India, for instance, has a lot of Asian and European brands. But the two American brands we did have, Chevrolet and Ford, had to leave India. They were decently popular back when they were here. And I still drive a Chevy Spark from 2012.

Ford is trying to make a comeback now though

Tarrifs exist to protect higher wage jobs here in the US. There are no tariffs on foreign makers as long as they produce the cars or truck in the US.

“Completely due to” was meant in the sense of “fully reliant on” not “solely reliant on”. Tarrifs are not the only tool used, and US companies would simply not be allowed to fail, period.

> Traditional US car manufacturers are absolutely incompetent and will not survive competition with Chinese manufacturers

Oh they won't have any trouble. They may lose international market share but the US government will keep raising tariffs ad infinitum to protect the US automakers no matter how far behind they get, or how expensive the vehicles get. We already are giving them 100% tariffs against BYD/etc. You might think that's absurd but the steel industry has received tariffs up to 266% against Chinese steel, so there's a lot of headroom left to continue to price out international competition.

There's really no pressure for the US automakers to do better or innovate or actually compete.

Chinese companies can do the same thing Toyota and a bunch of other European and Japanese brands did.

Open factories in NA and make their cars here. If the US companies are so incompetent they should still be able to outcompete them while paying several times higher wages and not getting any subsidies from the CCP.

Everybody (including outside the West) is raising tariffs against Chinese steel.

It’s shocking. I’ve had a non-Tesla electric car for about 5 years and the public chargers have always been garbage. The new ones are garbage too. If they do finally work, they charge at 1/4 the quoted speed. I had free charging for a while and even that was not enough of an incentive to use it.

Same experience in the UK. Just within London you have a dozen charging networks, they all have their own shitty apps, they require you to add your credit card and create an account and half the time they simply don't work and just give you some garbage error message like "charging failed".

Don't even get me started on Oxford. We arrive to a charging station and it turns out it is exclusively for electric taxis. No mention of this anywhere online.

It boils down to trial and error, and then remembering which specific charging points tend to work. For a completely new piece of infrastructure with no legacy cruft, the industry has made a complete and utter mess of it.

90% of the ones I use have a card reader, and not found one that doesn't work in the past 2 years, of course I'll check on zapmap comments first

Most UK chargers are on Electroverse now I think?

Interestingly it is a very different situation in Germany and other surrounding countries.

I've been driving electric since 2022 (non-tesla) and I have never charged with a tesla Supercharger. They have been either more expensive than my contract or in locations far way from the highway or gas stations.

The situation in Germany right now is extremely good, almost every gas station by the Autobahns has 150KW+ chargers available (and most of them non-Tesla). No need to plan stops anymore. And at the moment Plug-and-Charge is also working in Ionity and other stations. My BMW is able to store several contracts and I can choose beforehand which ones to use without having to resort to any app or RFID cards.

Charging is now as easy as with Tesla, but with full market competition and many extra locations.

I've had a non-Tesla for three years now. I've never had a single problem charging at a public DC fast charger. Every time I've managed to find an open and working stall. Every time it worked either with plug and charge or took credit cards on the dispenser. My car isn't 800v so it doesn't do the full 350kW but it has always been about the speeds my car can charge at.

I'm in North Texas and have mostly encountered chargers in Texas. I can't speak to charging elsewhere.

> If they do finally work, they charge at 1/4 the quoted speed

Just to confirm, 1/4 of the quoted average charging speed of your car, 1/4 the quoted peak charging speed of your car, or 1/4 the max supported speed of the charger? Few cars can actually charge at the 350kW max charge rate available. And then on top of that those cars don't actually sustain that peak rate very long, and only when it's been preconditioned and already at a low state of charge. If you're rolling in at 50-60% SoC and especially if you didn't precondition you probably are looking at only being able to charge 100kW or so. That's not the fault of the charger.

Teslas don't charge at 250kW the entire time either. They too have charge curves and need preconditioning to hit max charge rates.

Hertz walked back their big bet on EVs. They don’t make good rental cars. For day to day use where you can charge at home or go to places you know they are great.

For long trips to unfamiliar places, not so much.

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