That doesn’t mean the recharge infrastructure exists overnight, but those same stops are being converted to support the rollouts of electric car fleets (e.g. belgium is going to mandate corporate car fleets convert to electric from 2026).
I'm not a trucker, but if your source is https://transport.ec.europa.eu/transport-modes/road/social-p... I don't read it as mandatory, more like a recommendation.
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=CEL...
Article 7
After a driving period of four and a half hours a driver shall take an uninterrupted break of not less than 45 minutes, unless he takes a rest period.
This break may be replaced by a break of at least 15 minutes followed by a break of at least 30 minutes each distributed over the period in such a way as to comply with the provisions of the first paragraph.You'd have to pay 2 drivers even though only one works at a time for a small gain in time.
You might find a city with current regulations on this site.
https://urbanaccessregulations.eu/countries-mainmenu-147/fra...
The main savings come from fuel costs and maintenance. Eventually from autonomy as well.
Source?
Replacing short haul trucks with electric trucks makes many kinds of good sense all at once.
The same argument can be made for making school buses electric.
I've discovered recently that tire wear actually creates about as many particles as exhaust fumes, at least for cars. Tire wear is directly affected by vehicle weight.
Won't electric trucks weigh a lot more than classic trucks?
Actually, I checked now, and Volvo trucks for example, weigh somewhere between 10 tons and 24 tons, but 24 tons for the long cabin, sleeper, a ton of extra features, etc.
So the starting point of the Tesla Semi, for example, is 27 tons according to the article. That puts it at double the average Volvo.
And the worst part for the wire tear (and I think road tear), apparently it scales to the POWER OF 4 (!!!).
Now, trucks also have cargo, so I guess electric trucks will carry less cargo and then we're back at the same values?
But you are correct that a modal shift to rail makes a lot of sense.
It will just be an additional constraint, there are lots of loads which are limited by cubic volume rather than weight. However, it wouldn't work well for say bulk tippers which are almost always at their weight limits (and transporting lots of low value products).
I'm not sure about the braking argument. Trucks spend most of their time cruising along. They also have exhaust brakes and retarders to avoid using the service brakes on hills for example.
Not inside of cities and places were humans live.
> And the worst part for the wire tear (and I think road tear), apparently it scales to the POWER OF 4 (!!!).
That's very interesting. I'm a default sceptic, but would love to learn more, because if true, that could nullify a lot of the local air arguments. Do you have any sources for these?
Check all the subthreads and links, they're not that many.
The formula was actually for road damage, but my bet is on road damage being strongly correlated with tire wear.
Even better: in terms of particulates, tire and brake wear creates much more nowadays thanks to particulate filters on exhausts.
That being said local air quality measurements generally don't follow. The air around highways has an increased amount of PMs, but not by a significant amount.
The main difference in favour of EVs is the NOx emissions - diesel trucks produce a lot of that.
EV trucks should fix the issue when it comes to brakes. They can mostly regenerate kinetic energy back into charge in the batteries.
Request to all:
More posts about reducing these particulates (from tire and brake wear) please.
https://www.audi-mediacenter.com/en/press-releases/audi-urba...
Internal combustion cars do filter a lot of the ambient air already - a 2.0l engine at 2500RPM filters 150m3 of air per hour - that's as much as a small air purifier. It's just that it takes all this clean air and uses it for combustion, thus putting in more dirt than it filtered out.
Also, I'm wondering about tires which pollute less. Both in their production and usage.
To reduce particulates during use, I'm guessing tires will need to be tougher, less grippy. So might require better active suspension and braking systems to maintain current comfort and safety standards.
Also, from a pollution argument, this assumes that you have trucks that are all compliant and healthy. With EVs, there is no opportunity for a truck to have its emission control fail or just are grandfathered in due to age. There's PLENTY of semi trucks I see around where I live that seem to belch black smoke when they accelerate. Replace those with EVs (which, the value proposition would make itself for short-haul diesels should make itself) and you have a noticeably cleaner city.
That isn't even accounting for trucks that idle for long periods of time. When talking about local construction jobs, I've seen rows of semis idling downtown waiting for their turn to pick up rubble or deliver materials.
The school parking lot has solar panels over it, so I assume it charges at school.
I see this all or nothing argument when discussing new stuff. Same thing was said about passenger cars and quoted as one of the main reasons EVs would never catch on. It looks like a chicken and egg problem until you look at it less idealistically and more pragmatically. If you watch the presentation (and I hope everyone commenting here did that first), it's most likely that the charging infra is part of the package fleet operators buy. They showed battery+solar backed Megachargers that the fleet operators are likely to be using for the near term. With this in mind, those companies that are currently buying these trucks in high numbers, are also definitely buying the charging infra with it. So with this context in mind, charging infra isn't a problem right now. And just like Superchargers for passenger cars, they will only ever increase in numbers.
Slow charging is only a temporary problem and as evolution of Superchargers has made quote evident to date.
From my understanding of US laws and human biology, no one can drive 2000 miles non-stop without taking multiple breaks in tens of minutes each. In fact, Tesla Semi's range is 500 miles because it's right at the edge of how long a driver can safely drive non-stop and right before they are legally required to take a break, during which time they can charge the truck.
When did it become popular to start selling beta products? Did it begin when we all bought into social media?
Apple produced a computer, music player and phone that were a polished step up from what was happening before: build-your-own computer, music with insufficient storage and crap interfaces, and blackberries that only targeted business people.
Underpromise and overimpress me. Enough with this overpromising-because-have-to as if that's the only way to innovate or get investment. It isn't the only way and I wish investors would do a little more due diligence to get behind innovators who know what they are doing, not just throwing money at cool things saying they'll be ready by the end of the year over an 8 year period.
Tesla has consistently failed to meet the expectations set by its own management.
Calling it's driver assist Autopilot, calling its software FSD, repeatedly saying "FSD is coming next year" is overpromising, misleading marketing and lying
OK, finally an actual example and the one I expected.
TL;DR is that if Tesla was in fact doing anything the regulators found to be hurting the customers, they would be forcing Tesla to make changes (and they have re FSD in some minor ways). It's fun to make a big deal about nothing but no one is buying FSD and thinking, Tesla robbed me $10K. They get it, play with it, it doesn't do what they promised, they can get a refund for the FSD package, and even a full refund for the entire car. People tend to keep their Teslas, so that's a non issue.
Majority of people don't buy Teslas for promise of FSD (in fact, most don't even believe it). They buy it because right now, it's a great car. As far as delivering great cars is concerned (which is the vast majority of cases), Tesla has delivered time and again.
Also, Tesla has never lied about FSD, only missing deadlines. If anything, their progress has shown anything but any attempt to lie to customers. They are moving as fast as they can and no one in the industry comes close.
I'll be happy to see, for once, someone talk about misleading marketing about anything but FSD. You can take FSD away any day and it won't make a blip of difference to Tesla's sales or margins.
https://auto.hindustantimes.com/auto/cars/tesla-revises-exag...
https://www.caranddriver.com/features/a33824052/adjustment-f...
Also, regulators are catching up to "FSD" in many places, but they work slowly. They are also catching up on the promised ranges - unlike "mpg," there is no standard by which the range of an EV is required to be evaluated. All of these rules take a LONG time to put in place.
As far as a refund on the package is concerned, I'm not sure you can actually get one. A friend of mine paid the $10k as a "line jumping fee" to get his car 4 months earlier, and I assume that most informed buyers treat the FSD package the same.
> The Model 3 sedan was being described on Tesla’s Korean website claiming 'can drive more than 528 km on a single charge'. However, on its US website, Tesla describes Model 3's performance as "Go anywhere with "up to" 358 miles of estimated range on a single charge." 358 miles equates to about 576 kms, and much less than what Tesla claimed in South Korean markets. After local media raised the issue and the regulator stepped in, Tesla changed the range from ‘more than’ to a ‘maximum’ 528 kilometres.
What??!! 576km is not much less than 528km, it's more! So Tesla was in fact correctly indicating that the range is more than 528km, because it is! Either this is awful reporting or there is a mistake in there. Also saying "can drive more than" instead of "up to" isn't necessarily an exaggeration, it may simply be a mistake in wording of the website. I give them the benefit of doubt here because I've never seen Tesla advertise range like that. It's often a single number with a testing methodology suffix (like EPA). There is no "up to" or the like qualifiers.
As for the second link, super interesting content. But EPA has certified the range and all other manufacturers are free to do what Tesla does to make their range more appealing. Nothing fishy going on here as far as I'm concerned. Exaggerating range in context of a certification program is moot (unless you're cheating and Tesla is clearly not, according to this article).
> A friend of mine paid the $10k as a "line jumping fee" to get his car 4 months earlier, and I assume that most informed buyers treat the FSD package the same.
Really? You thought this was a compelling example?!!! Have you never bought an "as-is" item from a shop which was on display. You pay cheaper but you can't bring it back for refund if you change your mind. This is common practice in every industry. You wanna be treated differently, you give up some perks.
People who buy FSD package as a way to jump the queue aren't buying FSD, they're buying time and as such doubt they will care about functionality of FSD.
I was referring to people who buy FSD for its current and future capabilities.
Now, I’m not happy that Tesla is still calling the driving assistance software “autopilot” given some governments are criticising this name choice as misleading, but it’s not like the (limited and not ready) software is completely fictional — it can actually get people from A to B by itself, even if though it really isn’t at the quality level where this is a generally wise replacement for most humans, but only for, e.g. impaired humans in a medical emergency and even then it’s really only sane on highways (old story, but probably still illustrative based on the published safety statistics): https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/aug/08/tesla-mod...
However, considering Tesla as an EV company rather than as an AI company: it does what it says on the tin. There’s no secret gasoline tank hiding inside the batteries.
In my mind, this is the same as advertising "the human is only there for liability reasons" on an L2 ADAS system.
As to what Tesla is, the moment people accept that it's an EV company, I will be happy. The market currently does not, largely due to the insane promises of the company's CEO.
Let's not forget that Elizabeth Holmes was acquitted of defrauding patients. She was convicted of defrauding investors. What's the difference?
As for the whole Apple situation. If all companies tried to do what Apple does all the time, we'd be living in the stone age. Apple is an exception to the rule in that they're perfectionists in their tiny little bubble. Perhaps you didn't catch Apple's abondoned plan to build their own car. Did you hear about Dyson? Making an EV you can actually sell for profit is something even Apple, with all their money and talent, can't do and Tesla does like it's child play. Tesla has has the highest per unit margin of any automaker out there by factors of 3x and more. Apple does not hold a single candle to Tesla.
Teslas are still a luxury vehicle so it’s no surprise they’re able to fetch higher margins than say, Toyota, who’s main sales are economy cars.
Apples to apples and all.
And without having entered into major markets like Pickups, Semis and a number of others.
And they make their margin on EV, while many other companies simply lose money on EV and simply hide that fact. Or make minimal margin on the cars and lose money on EV overall.
Only a few years ago it was widely believed that you can't make money on EVs.
Tesla doesn't have dealers, so all the dealer profits go to Tesla.
At Plaid levels, a trimmed up Taycan is gorgeous by comparison and Lucid hit the Plaid where it counts ... and let's not even talk about Rimac.
Sorry, the fan boy belief that Tesla is far ahead of the competition is 18 months out of date now.
They are caught up when they start outselling Tesla (or heck become available so one can actually buy one).
Great cars (which I don't think Hyundai/Kia are by any stretch of imagination, from piss-poor software to poor charging infrastructure, but let's discount this for now) can exist at great prices all they want, but if I can't get my hand on one and the 500 or so that show up once every few month get gobbled up in seconds, they practically do not exist at all.
And mind you, the disparity in production is not gonna go away any time soon. They're all limited by battery production and unless they make their own batteries, Tesla has long been in the line to buy batteries from anywhere they possibly can, as much as they can. They don't screw around.
BYD is far more of a competitor to Tesla than Kia/Hyandai have been to date.
Your definiton ^ ...
And, in terms of sales, that might be your definition of 'caught up' but it's not mine.
Well-used analagy applies here: if sales are your KPI then I assume McDonalds is your idea of a fine meal. Sorry, no.
And your dismissal of Hyundai/Kia by definition singles you out as far out there in biased land. I've test drove all three (including Tesla) and done the research. The only reason I haven't bought an ioniq 5 is because I simply can't justify it at the moment (my work-life means it'll just sit in the driveway however much I want it). But they are all ... great cars.
I'll say Tesla are great cars with groundbreaking technology, if ugly. But the Hyundai/Kia are now the better cars (interior, build, comfort) and the all around package. Again, unless you count "sales" as the definition of 'in the lead'.
*Disclaimer: I have a driveway where I can charge over night. If you don't have this, perhaps the supercharger network means something to you. That appears to be the only advantage.
And many others.
> And, in terms of sales, that might be your definition of 'caught up' but it's not mine.
Good for you
> Well-used analagy applies here: if sales are your KPI then I assume McDonalds is your idea of a fine meal. Sorry, no.
Thanks for that analogy. Yes, one can brag all they want about the best Italian cuisine they had at a top bistro. It means nothing to most people if: they can't afford it, if they can't get a booking for months. McDonalds delivers round the clock, food that's safe and does it fast. I take McDonalds over all of so called "fine" food any day. I value my time and don't want to waste it, waiting on food.
> And your dismissal of Hyundai/Kia by definition singles you out as far out there in biased land. I've test drove all three (including Tesla) and done the research. The only reason I haven't bought an ioniq 5 is because I simply can't justify it at the moment (my work-life means it'll just sit in the driveway however much I want it). But they are all ... great cars.
I have driven all the above (some through friends and Ioniq 5 by asking a stranger nicely), in addition to BYD, Polstar and anything that's available to drive in Australia, multiple times for some. I've owned a Tesla for the past 2 years and have test driven every other model as well. The handling, software, ambiance and interior of all but Tesla (and specifically Model 3) is vastly inferior. As for handling, they all feel like they'll run away and off the road any moment. I'm sure I'll get used to them after longer drives, but Tesla's doing something there that gives me more confidence when handling.
If any of these was significantly cheaper as to make up for their shortcomings, I'd happily recommend them to friends and family. But as they sit right now, no frigging way.
> if ugly.
I don't know what you're talking about!
> But the Hyundai/Kia are now the better cars (interior, build, comfort)
Interior of all the cars above make me feel suffocated. Their build qualities are definitely good but virtually no one I know actually cares, unless shit's falling off the car. Tesla's quality is only getting better. As for comfort, Model 3 has the most comfortable seat of any car I've ever owned (out of 3).
hmmm only in the short term and at low frequency.
Eat Mc Donalds every day for 50y the analysis is way different.
So, actually, I'll be way more confident about my health (that's what it's called, not safety, food safety is about you not getting poisoned) eating at McDonalds, than at some rando uptown joint.
Then when they tried to climb on the vegan/vegetarian bandwagon, they had to quickly admit that their fry shortening had beef flavoring added to it, then switch to an entirely different shortening.
Since forever? You're comparing a new product category with already existing and optimized one. To keep close to the topic, think about the history of ICEs and cars in general: the first ones that got popular were all pretty much beta products.
> Apple produced a computer, music player and phone that were a polished step up from what was happening before: build-your-own computer, music with insufficient storage and crap interfaces, and blackberries that only targeted business people.
That's some pretty revisionist history. Apple made solid, polished hardware, in an established market with plenty of competition. About the only large leap they made was with the first iPhone, and it's considered both transformative and very much a beta version.
The original iPod was Mac only and FireWire, for goodness sake! People made do and it improved over time.
IIRC the same was the case back when Model S was rolled out - the range was intentionally developed to be a little above the legal limit of non-stop driving, which to me provided a pretty solid argument against range anxiety: there's hardly a way to run out of charge on a trip and be a safe and responsible driver.
As we know from many other subjects, anything short of federal regulation is roughly equivalent to “unregulated” for the purpose of internet hand wringing.
I can keep going...
I’ve never heard tell of this, but there it is. I wonder if it ever gets enforced.
When I do cross country drives I often drive 8-12 hours in a day. I stop to fill up and eat snacks while driving.
While these times are of course not enforced for private driving, they are a good measure for what is safe. Yes, you can drive 5 hours or more without a break, but you need to be aware that this is risky behavior.
Could it make it from San Diego to Anza Borrego and back?
I'd say the trouble with holding speed in predominately mountain roads I'm familiar with is that they tend to be filled with slower drivers.
1. https://www.indeed.com/career-advice/finding-a-job/how-many-...
Meaning that having 12 hour of fuel is pointless when you have to stop to piss/eat every 4-6 hours anyway.
Only a handful of companies run thousands of trucks and could afford a small scale experiment.
Package delivery is a different beast, the vans are guaranteed to spend the night at the base every night.
Many smaller companies have a small fleet of trucks for local deliveries to their branches, and some will be willing to take a look (even if just for the publicity, etc).
Inequality has only become worse under the old regime of subsidized private technology and manufacturing.
That inherently means short haul trucking which parent says is feasible. With long haul trucking, I’m almost never at a location owned by the fleet operator. Pepsi and Anheuser Busch may have long haul routes that are exceptions, but you can see from the other trucks they are buying they are doing a lot of short haul trucking. They’ve both also bought BYD trucks for the same locations that have a range of 125 miles, so they don’t need the 500 mile range for their activities.
You might see truck stops adding "public" chargers after that EV trucks become commonplace (in the same way that truck stops have fuel discount programs for member fleets) but how will EV trucks going to become commonplace if private operators using their own infrastructure are 99.99% of users?
Truck stops are thin margin. I don't see them making the investment without a need. Maybe if a big player (e.g. Swift, Walmart, etc) wants to convert to EV and kicks in a bunch of money to have their fuel partner make the capital investment. But I don't think that's going to happen until EVs are so good that it's a "profitably without nearly any doubt" type investment. You'll probably need to see a decade or two of short haul EV trucks and the accompanying refinement before that happens.
Don't forget that Tesla will probably end up building the most number of chargers over time. Charging is its own business with its own margins (e.g. Supercharger network). In other words, it's a source of net income for Tesla so as they build more trucks, they'll build more chargers as they've done to date with passenger cars and Superchargers.
What if it's not and solely powered by solar (just wondering - Megachargers most likely need help from the grid).
Maybe a huge charging station which has to have large buffer batteries anyway would benefit from a large solar-panel field nearby / above it, if land price is acceptable. That would be a natural extension of the solar roof business.
Chargers at truck stops can only be good for their margins, who would have to cater to people waiting for their trucks to charge on things they actually make money in (hint: it’s not diesel or electrons).
I'm not convinced we'll see electric trucks take over the world in the medium term but I'm sure they'll be visible on our roads in the next 10 years, if only in limited roles.
This is such a typical 1st nation problem,
While China battles droughts and build world's largest high-speed train network in 10 years.
Apparently maintaining toilets for truckers is beyond our capabilities.
Maybe that doesn't mean electric. But if you can get 500miles today at reasonable efficiency then this is one of the really really easy things to decarbonize early. All you need are truck stops with good charging every couple of hundred miles. There are other sectors that are infinitely harder and almost certainly won't work with electric barring unforeseen breakthroughs (e.g. aviation).
It might not be impossible but it's not easy by any stretch.
The parent put a weird disqualification on it that it will only work if demanded by the state. That’s a weasel word word of saying that it will be terrible and nobody will use it unless forced.
That said, if the price of diesel keeps up, there is a chance that Tesla trucks plus all the charging infrastructure will be worth it economically for short haul fleets.
I'm honestly surprised they didn't try to launch a truck in Europe first, it seems like a better market.
I suspect that charging infrastructure is going to be expensive, but cheap enough that if an operator has multiple trucks, the payback will be pretty fast and the low margins will incentive faster adoption for short haul trucking. Long haul is another beast entirely (don't hold your breath for that industry to come around before well into the 2030s), but short haul should eat this up!
Getting charging in place is critical, but nobody in trucking can afford to ignore that.
That could add up. Companies will be looking at these even if they just buy one to use as a yard shunter at first.
If the economics are there it’ll take off like wildfire.
https://electrek.co/2022/09/28/tesla-hikes-supercharger-pric...
Setting aside the cost of diesel for a moment, trucking companies didn't build the entire gasoline infrastructure, either.
The $$ savings may make installing the infrastructure in loading/storage bays worthwhile.
Most distribution centers, factories, etc where trucks load/unload at docks already have 3-phase power from the utility. They may need a transformer and service upgrade or for really large fleets they may even purchase 480 or KV power but when you compare it to the fuel savings its a total no-brainer. If you can save $50-80k per truck per year vs diesel that savings makes the EV trucks free. $1m for electrical upgrades? Sold. Will utilities need to perform distribution upgrades? Yes, but not all at once. They will do the upgrades as demand rises just like they do today.
As many others have noted in this thread it all comes down to your routes and logistics. For local and short-haul where the trucks return to a home base they are an excellent fit. Even if you need 50% more trucks because some of them are always on the charger as I noted the fuel savings make the trucks free so it doesn't matter at all.
It remains to be seen what the maintenance burden is. If it resembles passenger cars in any way I'd expect maintenance costs to be much lower since more components can be permanently sealed with lifetime sealed electric motors so no belts, hoses, bearings that wear out because someone couldn't be bothered to grease them, etc. Some consumables like brakes should also last much much longer.
Part of this is how the law catches up. In some states only a utility can legally sell electricity which means billing for charging is weird.
In a world with gas stations on every corner, your argument would suggest this is foolish.
So perhaps the owners don't consider it a huge amount of capitol. Or perhaps they've found a reason or two.
But if I operated a distribution center where dozens of trucks were parked at my docks pretty much around the clock, I'd do a bit of napkin math. 1000 square meters of rooftop solar feeding giant batteries connected to 10 charging stations selling juice at $.25/kwh to trucks who are stuck here for the next hour regardless.
And I don't have to pay Exxon a penny and I wouldn't need a constant stream of tankers refilling underground tanks?
Hand me another napkin. How much battery do I need? How often would I have to replace the cables that reach from the dock to the cab? How much do those cables cost? Hmmm. Hand me another napkin...
Yup, in the US, truck drivers have to take a 30 min break after 8 hours of continuous driving [0].
[0] https://www.fmcsa.dot.gov/regulations/hours-service/summary-...
But they don't have to solve every challenge at once. D-semis have been around forever and still haven't displaced trains. Obviously, they still have value. Where e-semis make sense, people will use them. Same for e-vans and e-bikes and e-tugboats.
And yes, people will still use d-semis and d-vans and gas scooters and horses. And clever people will keep finding ways to get the job done, whatever that job may be.
Infrastructure takes time; and you don't have to solve every use case at once.
Tesla semi was production ready in 2020 - as far as i remember. and was more efficient than train. And whatever other lies musk said back then.
Musk is prolific deceiver, I dont trust a single thing coming out of his mouth nor his websites.
Also car is often an expense - bigger or smaller - its not a tool that needs to make money. A tool that can make or break a business.
Tesla cars are notorious for its expensive repairs. Its a huge cost and risk switching to it.
This is the response I hate. Detractors say that to argue against any adoption. It's not a claim any sane proponent (Musk is not sane and no one should listen to him) will make. Will it work eventually for (most) use cases? Yea! But likely not everywhere. Just like there are edge cases Gas or Diesel still don't work well. That doesn't mean to ignore potential where it makes sense.
I bought a commuter car. That's it. When I bought; was more of a novelty as I didn't know anyone else with anything similar.
I repeatedly got angrily shouted at while driving (in a relatively major city), coal-rolled; and heckled by strangers and family members around the dinner table about how poor of a decision I made. 3 years later; I have a nice/fun/convenient commuter car that hasn't needed any maintenance and the trade in is higher than I paid for it. Is it for everyone? No. But that doesn't mean there is a void in value.
It purposefully wastes diesel which is already much more expensive than gas. It's dangerous for a variety of reasons. It's illegal in the US and parts of Canada, though apparently not well policed. It's stupid.
I'm sure you have reasons for downplaying this, but I would follow this with "and told them, in your face losers", or something to that effect.
Saying "saving money and hassle" isn't for everyone is suspicious to say the least. Why wouldn't it be for everyone?
Why would I ~ever mention it when it's somehow contentious? Family member in question has a truck that costs ~50% more. Why would I care?
> Saying "saving money and hassle" isn't for everyone is suspicious to say the least. Why wouldn't it be for everyone?
I never told anyone it saved money. I paid ~50% more for an electric Honda Civic. For my area/family group I was a new-tech adopter. I wasn't getting told, "You wasted money!" I was told, "That death trap will explode/catch on fire/not make it through the snow, battery will randomly empty, etc", harangued on the absolute basics on simple fallacies.
> Tesla semi was production ready in 2020
I guess you've never missed a deadline. That's not lying. It's miscalculation.
> and was more efficient than train
A Semi convoy is expected to be cheaper than a train and they re-iterated that in the latest event. No evidence to the contrary so far.
> And whatever other lies musk said back then.
Promised 500 miles. Delivered 500 miles. Turned the impossible (according to pretty much everyone, from Bill Gates, to CEO of truck making companies who joked that Tesla Semi will be breaking laws of physics) into late. Still not lying.
> Musk is prolific deceiver, I dont trust a single thing coming out of his mouth nor his websites.
He doesn't have websites. He has companies that have websites.
> Tesla cars are notorious for its expensive repairs. Its a huge cost and risk switching to it.
Is that why Hertz, that puts the most number of miles on a passenger vehicle has ordered 100000 Teslas, 20% of its global fleet, because it loves to waste money on cost of repair?
I can't recall Tesla ever being fined for misleading marketing, ever.
It's coming:
Tesla Is Sued By Drivers Over Alleged False Autopilot, Full Self-Driving Claims [1]
Tesla faces U.S. criminal probe over self-driving claims [2]
California regulator claims Tesla falsely advertised Autopilot, Full Self-Driving [3]
[1] https://www.carandbike.com/news/tesla-is-sued-by-drivers-ove...
I'll listen when any of those actually results in Tesla being found at fault after a final decision.
Trying to figure out have I broken some rule here? Or is this topic really controversial?
That said, negative karma on such comments is usually transient, and for that reason, HN guidelines recommended that you don't complain about downvotes. Such cases typically self-correct after a few hours.
In 2017 at the event he said they already had the technology to do truck automated follower convoys today (2017), it was only stopped by regulators. Seems like a complete lie given what we know of how their technology played out and even the single track tesla in tunnels in vegas still use drivers.
On Tesla's own website since around 2016 they said the cars could operate on their own but they only have a driver there for legal reasons (opening scrawl to the video at tesla.com/autopilot). Complete lie, the Nvidia stack and the software Tesla had for it couldn't do it, nor could several later stacks over the years. Regulators weren't what was stopping them unless they are saying they at Tesla are murderous psychopaths and would kill if it weren't illegal.
Some people love eating shit cuz techno guru said its ambriosia, and they love it.
Just stick to your ambrosia and don't try to shove it down my throat.
Sure, there are plenty of valid criticisms to make about Musk. I'm sure he'd even agree with a lot of them. But the level of obsession people have with hating him is clearly irrational. There's more anti-Musk sentiment than anti-Putin sentiment!
It's as if people were left feeling empty by Trump's disappearance and then latched onto Musk as the new target for their manic vitriol.
It's reminiscent of what happened in ancient Athens when some public figure would become the target of a citizen mob and then be banished[2] or executed[3].
Often the mob would quickly come to regret their decision, which is likely what would happen if Musk went away. Many of these same people would quickly realize the value of having Musk around to advance space exploration, pro-environment technology, brain injury technology, etc.
It may be that once these people have become accustomed to hating some public figure in this way that they have trouble letting go of the addiction.
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Two_Minutes_Hate
I've has the exact same thought. The timeline fits, and it's exactly the same mob of people. Not saying I didn't dislike Trump, but not spending all my time hating him on Twitter.
When Musk came to public notice he was a fast-talking, confident, seemingly self-made rich tech autodidact who had personally created industries through sheer force of will and a vision.
He talked to a certain type of person who grew up with sci-fi and optimism for the future through technological advancement, only to see a disgusting anti-intellectualism and fatalism take over during the Bush Jr. years. He really spoke to me and I thought he was the real deal.
Then, slowly and over the course of years we started learning that he was a charlatan who's success was the result of luck, connections, or usurpation. He promises and promises and a lot of the big promises turn out to be laughably impractical or unrealistic to the point that no person learned in the applicable fields would take it seriously.
We learn about the subsidies that underpins the success, we learn about the terror that he puts his employees through, we learn about how he treats his family, and how he uses real people's lives and serious events as ways to increase his publicity and image with no concern for any negative effects on others.
The real 'ah-ha' moment for me was when he accused the British diver who risked his life and career to rescue trapped children in an underwater cave of being a 'pedo', because they didn't want to use his useless submarine idea.
And all the while, whenever he announces something, the fans and public rant and rave about a new revolution -- "vacuum tube transportation", "going to Mars in 5 years", "exactly like trains, but instead, cars!", etc. When we mention the problems with these ideas, and that Musk isn't really the best person to be advocating things that he knows nothing about, the fans retaliate with personal insults. "You are just jealous"... etc...
And then when he starts to lose popularity he turns 'free speech' and starts catering to a very unpleasant type of crowd (in many people's opinion). When you start appealing to the right-wing because your reputation took a nose-dive, then you are, um, "not a good person".
After a while it becomes a binary thing -- Musk == bad. I have to stop myself from thinking that way, but every time there is a raving fan talking about the new thing he is a genius at, it rears its head again.
Hope this helps you out a little.
But for the other transportation needs, when I replace the 40mpg commuter, I'm all for it. When we bought the commuter, due to covid math, it was an $8k purchase plus trade. An EV would have been a $25k purchase with trade and I really didn't want to incur that much debt.
No. Sorry. People do work with trucks. Tens of millions of people work in professions that it is necessary. More still do home projects or have hobbies that require high tow capacity like hauling an RV or a boat or other trailers. I drive an F350 to haul my fifth wheel. It actually gets 20 mpg when I'm not towing the RV.
As you gave an anecdotal response, I'll respond in kind. I actually traded in a Tacoma for my EV. I miss the bed ~5x/year. I didn't need a truck; but i liked the option value. I'll likely get another Truck in the next vehicle cycle in a few years.
> The vast, vast majority of truck owners use it in some way that a passenger vehicle is completely unsuited for. That there exist a handful of urbanites who drive a truck for the looks alone does not discount this fact.
No one claimed otherwise. I feel like we've become a nation of, "This isn't right for me so it isn't right for anyone" bigotry.
Also, the pollution is a massive issue in the cities, but a guy rolling coal in pudunk nebraska isn't a threat to the ecology, because there's so much ecology. I hate it, it's reprehensible, but it's leff of a factor...also, we're down in the trenches complaining about our neighbor, when the top polluters globally aren't the cars in the metroplex.
> It'll cost more...
Yea, everything will. We didn't account for the negative externalities of using fossil fuels properly. Now we're starting to. You also have the rest of the world being lifted out of poverty and there's nothing we can do about it and we'll have to adjust to simply not being as wealthy.
Now these machines never left our service area. They were always parked in the same lot every night. Putting in charging infrastructure in that lot would be trivial, and would almost certainly cost less than maintaining our own diesel storage and pumping infrastructure (which we did do because it saved us so much of our working day to be able to fuel everything up in the morning instead of having to drive to a truck stop before starting the work day).
A lot of trucking is local or regional. Those will be the markets that EV makes the most sense for. Where the trucks normally go back to the same lot every night, and the owners can cheaply put in slow charge infrastructure. Could we get EV trucking working for long-haul (a kind of trucking I've also done in the past)? Sure. It will require fast charge infrastructure though. 500 miles is a lot of range, but in long haul trucking, very often you operate in two driver teams, and your truck is always moving. Fast charging could solve that too, but perhaps the solution is to reduce the number of miles that freight spends on the road. Multi-modal shipping could be expanded. Use trains to cover large distance, and try to keep road transportation of freight to the regional level and local level. This is already an option that exists. Multi-modal is already a sub-industry in trucking. This seems like the most logical option to me, but I'm not an expert. Just somebody who has lived the industry for a few years.
Just to put some numbers out there, the semi battery pack is probably around 850kWh-1MWh. Imagine if this gets drained every day and a company has 10 trucks, the trucks have roughly 10-12 hours to charge (~6pm to 6am). So you'd need 1MW of electrical capacity.
This is equivalent to about 20 modern US homes (200A*240VAC) and not that crazy in the scheme of things. A medium sized factory in the US probably has a grid connection around this size depending on what they do.
If the ROI is there, they'll do it. If it's not, they won't.
The problem with these people is that they will go to great lengths to explain to you why your technology won't work in their specific application and feel smug because they think they've cleverly identified a flaw that you didn't think of.
5 - 10 minute battery swap vs however many minutes charging. Sure it reduces the load carrying capacity and/or range a bit, but it should still be viable for many heavy goods vehicles. Swapping makes it easier to manage battery condition and vehicle utilisation. Over time battery provision/swapping could be outsourced, so the transport company can focus on trucking, not on batteries and their needs.
That's one way to look at it. The other is that you can't pretend that real, tangible, identifiable problems don't exist. And Tesla has a habit of ignoring those.
>Slow charging is only a temporary problem and as evolution of Superchargers has made quote evident to date.
What have the Superchargers proven? That under increased load the locations can become completely overwhelmed? Even with EVs having a single-digit market share?
I haven't met a single person in my neck of the woods that thinks waiting 30 minutes to "fuel up" is remotely reasonable. And that's state-of-the-art. We have a ways to go.
>In fact, Tesla Semi's range is 500 miles because it's right at the edge of how long a driver can safely drive non-stop and right before they are legally required to take a break, during which time they can charge the truck.
Let's wait for some real-world testing before making claims to Telsa Semi's range.
Tesla definitely has a habit of ignoring problems, but in all cases I'm aware of, they're non fundamental issues that can be addressed along the way. They see the bigger picture and aren't focusing on non-crucial details.
> What have the Superchargers proven? That under increased load the locations can become completely overwhelmed? Even with EVs having a single-digit market share?
I'm referring to speed of Superchargers increasing over time. Newer superchargers don't have the drop in charging speed problem when two adjacent stalls are used at the same time.
> I haven't met a single person in my neck of the woods that thinks waiting 30 minutes to "fuel up" is remotely reasonable. And that's state-of-the-art. We have a ways to go.
Well your neck of the wood aren't the current intended audience. Thanks to everyone else who's buying the cars at their current state. They are enabling a future where your neck of the wood can have cars that charge in a few minutes. Oh, and I'm one of them. You're welcome.
> Let's wait for some real-world testing before making claims to Telsa Semi's range.
OK.
Holy shit. This is some top-level smug right here.
I understand you saying this is largely a software problem. Taking this at face value, I trust no other transportation related company but Tesla to deliver the best possible software for route planning (or anything really given they're just as big a software company as are in hardware -- see AI day presentations to get a feel of just how large a software effort they're running) if that is indeed a barrier to companies putting orders in for the Semi. I may even have heard them mention something about that in the presentation.
I know software and I know Tesla's involvement in it. Based on your comment, I'm going to assume, they put maximum emphasis on route optimization, more than any other industry (which is probably false anyway). With that assumption, Tesla is in as good a position as a software company could ever be to hire the expertise (or outright purchase existing companies) and make the best software for fleet management IF that means they'll sell to significantly larger customer base.
So give out some years. Production capacity isn’t that high anyway, mostly because of battery production capacities.
Pretty big “if” they’re chief. While they very well may not have any demand issues, I’m going to go out on a limb and say they’ll probably will have supply issues. Launching the production of a new model is no walk in the park and the organization already seems to have problems with QA on the existing models.
So, I would not dismiss their ability to execute on what they've announced here. They are obviously well aware of supply chain challenges and have been heavily investing in solutions for that. And they obviously waited with this until they had the logistics and manufacturing in place. And it seems that they are re-using a lot of components they already have - like their drive train and batteries. And they do have a lot of new production capacity coming online.
So, no, financial scrutiny is not why Tesla sells vehicles. It does because of the hype, the status symbol, the better design, and lies of self driving. And these don't really matter for trucks (except stock market rewarding hype, just like Bitcoin mania). So no, Tesla won't dominate the niche of short haul trucks that EV trucks have opened up.
This advertises a 500 mile range, which at 60 mph is 8h20m of driving. And a 70% charge in 30 minutes.
Does the US trucking industry routinely have people drive for 8h+ without even a 30 minute break?
> An ELD is an Electronic Logging Device that became compulsory in 2017 in the US for commercial driving operations required to keep hours of service records. If a driver has eight or more days worth of duty status logs (out of 30) they will be required by law to use an ELD.
https://www.optac.info/uk/eld-vs-tachograph/
https://www.fmcsa.dot.gov/hours-service/elds/eld-fact-sheet-...
The conditions are quite harsh, compare them with this:
https://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/work/work-abroad/rules...
US:
- max 11h driving after 10h of rest (that sums 21h, so I guess you can drive 14h a day)
- rest 30min every 8h of uninterrupted driving
- max 60h driving a week
- max 9h driving a day (10h driving allowed twice a week)
- rest 45min every 4.5h of uninterrupted driving
- max 56h driving a week. max 90 every two weeks.[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hours_of_service#Enforcement
> But for everything else, these vehicles require a fundamental reshaping of transportation in America. Not saying that’s not possible, but it ain’t happening any time soon.
Electric trucking doesn’t have to (immediately) take over the entire industry. All that counts is for that first part to be large enough. You see that with electric shipping, too. Short-distance ferries may already be economically feasible. That shipping stuff around the world on battery power isn’t, and maybe never will be, doesn’t matter.
Only at HN:
1. Credit card processing is a razor thin margin business
2. Trucking is a low margin business
3. Retail is a ultra low margin business
4. Airlines don't make money
5. Phones is a low margin business
6. Desktops don't make money
7. Cars is a money losing venture
But, then how come all of the above companies built empires?
By leveraging credit on those consistent low margins and not being ran as badly as most software companies that could not function without 50+% margins or infininte free credit.
Or by coming up with an adjacent industry that does make profit. (airlines, desktops, phones not made by the korean or fruit companies)
Or being owned by the company making the profit , after said company realised how much they were spending on 3PL when they already had HR/depots/etc that could be used for trucking companies.
Scale based on insane amounts of venture capital and debt. If you're running 450M transactions a day like Mastercard, you only need a few cents per transactions in profit and you have a money making machine.
For example, car companies hand out huge bonuses to employees who figure out even a dollar in lower costs - at the scale of, say, Toyota with 8.6 million cars a year [1], that amounts to 8.6 million dollars more in profit. Give the employee in question a hundred thousand, the employee is happy and the beancounters even more.
Or airlines... when your average plane will always have a number of no-shows (around 5% [2]), it is more profitable to overbook and in the rare case that it does go wrong, pay off someone with 500$ in cash.
[1] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wirtschaftszahlen_zum_Automobi...
There's a New Jersey deli that was worth $2 billion recently. Theranos, a total fraud, got to $10 billion with nothing.
And with 400 miles it's already that far that you're not anymore in the country I live in (the Netherlands).
I do see an issue that these truck stops will require massively more electric power and some investment. (Please lets build more nuclear plants).
And in terms of maintenance and fuel cost these trucks should outperform diesel trucks by a wide margin and make up the capx different multiple times over.
He picked up a load in the morning, drove a few hundred kilometre highway/city route with a dozen stops during the day, and parked back at the depot at end of day.
Perfect for the Tesla Semi.
There are hundreds of trucks doing similar routes just in our metropolitan area.
There is a huge potential market for these trucks.
I've seen some fleets plan their fuel stops using software to take advantage of fuel card discounts they get at certain gas stations, which helps stretch the single digit margins you mentioned. I can see this kind of software being extended to EV charge planning as well.
Werner Enterprises for example has 13k employees, 8k trucks, and $700M in revenue. And they're a small fry in shipping. JB Hunt has 30K employees and $12B in revenue. Swift Transportation has 22K employees, 23K trucks, and $6B in revenue. Schneider Transportation has 19K employees and revenues of $5.5B.
Many of these companies have in house developers working on custom logistics packages to optimize every single detail of their operations. It's a very small margin business.
> Trucking is a single digit percentage margin business.
This is a basic economics problem then. The cost of writing the software. The cost of hydrocarbons. The cost of electricity. The cost of time. The cost of maintenance. The cost of breakdowns.
I don't know too much about long haul trucking, but I know a decent amount about vehicles in general, and I have an engineering degree so my knowledge of physics is better than average.
I have yet to see a compelling reason why non-electrified trucks will survive. If you only look at the cost of breakdowns and fuel, and compare it to the cost of time, those breakdowns will pay for themselves. Completely leaving aside self driving technology. Even if we have to pay for drivers for the next thirty years. It does not matter.
Everything else will bend around the basic economics of electrified trucking. The law, the charging stations, the software, the schedules, everything. When an industry has such tiny margins as you correctly observe, an entrance of a technology can that can only serve a niche, but at extremely wide margins compared to existing players, will absolutely dominate.
There is a reason Pepsi is one of their first major buyers. The soft drinks are in the cities. But as these trucks dominate there more research will go into supporting them elsewhere. Fast swappable batteries, MASER charging along highways, more charge points per truck.
It doesn't matter. All these problems will be eaten by the massive wave of cash coming towards them by the early entrants that applied the technology where it was most suited in the short-term.
And then after that we'll get self-driving and it will be truly lights out for the legacy logistics companies. The only question is where in the five to fifty year period that will be.
Probably other niches too, but the vast majority seem like ev is the future.
My personal dream is that not only is port to industry fully on rails, but local distribution is rail-oriented also, to the point that a significant proportion of deliveries to shops in cities are made using pallets or trolleys loaded on freight trams. I do understand that the unusual nature of America makes this sort of change nigh-impossible, but maybe they could ship their semi-trailers on trains?
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modalohr (second picture shows it best) [2] As in this image: https://forwardermagazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/Pic...
If there are genuine advantages to EV trucking, then I don't see how any of this matters. This isn't a heavily regulated industry and there's very little barrier to entry. If you can save money on shipping by buying a bunch of Teslas and converting long hauls to relays, then someone will just do it regardless of whether the existing players are "ready to figure it out".
Now, are there advantages? We'll see. A lot depends on what happens in the fuel markets in the coming years. But the long term trends point away from diesel for sure.
Short hauls:
1) Are at slower speeds which for most EVs means greater efficiency.
2) Have more stop and go driving which is more efficient in EVs compared to ICEs. I don't have the papers handy but IIRC there can be more pollutants generated in the acceleration phase of a vehicle, another reason EV makes sense for short hauls.
3) Park at the same facility at night which can have charging setup. Long hauls, unless specific corporate routes, do not have charging infrastructure.
Just add a diesel generator to the back. Problem solved. :)
Imho the biggest global challenge is electric supply. And I mean globally, not US + Canada. If we want EV trucks and cars globally we need way more nuclear power than we have right now.
It is all fun and nice to fill USA, Canada and some wealthy countries in Asia, Oceania and Europe with EVs. Will that change a lot in term of climaye change if other countries cannot develop and decent charging network, are struggling already with energy demand or still rely mostly on coal to produce electricity?
Uh... I worked for one of the largest LTL companies in the US for years, and to my knowledge all of their road drivers were "home every night". Several runs out West were "hook and turn" - two trucks drive toward each other half the day, meet in the middle, swap trailers, and drive back home.
Further, a 500mi range is starting to get awfully close to the "11 consecutive hour" DOT Hours of Service limits.
Imagine a remote controlled truck and then, later, a fully autonomous truck.
This is what Tesla is aiming for here, they just have to begin somewhere.
This Semi is not a truck, is a data collection tool.
For some customers in some settings this already make sense as it is, but the goal is hit the road and start collecting data as soon as possible.
If that in mind, now imagine a fleet of 20 trucks being remotely monitored by a single driver. Does that make sense for you in terms of logistics and economics?
I work for a large public utility generating electricity. We switched our fleet to electric trucks years ago, and not because we're an electric company - frankly our bean counters don't care about that! It all came down to lower operational costs, higher reliability, and vehicle longevity. Being an electric company we don't have to worry about charging infrastructure, but still - the electric vehicles proved to be significantly cheaper to operate, and not just in fuel costs.
That’s how I expect this evolution to happen. Timelines are difficult to predict though. Looking at the current momentum I really expect the poitn where most new trucks are EV to happen within a couple of years at most, not a decade.
Basically none of them are operationally able to go from 15 minute diesel fill ups on any corner to the infrastructure and load planning EVs require. Like they literally don’t have the software or expertise to plan the loads around electric needs without losing money on every load.
Trucking is a single digit percentage margin business. These trucks are more expensive, require infrastructure that doesn’t exist, charge slower, and don’t go anywhere near as far as diesel trucks. And no fleets in North America are ready to figure out converting a 2000 mile long haul over the road route into 5 400 mile EV relays.
Short haul loads? Sure. In places that demand EV on certain timelines (like California).
But for everything else, these vehicles require a fundamental reshaping of transportation in America. Not saying that’s not possible, but it ain’t happening any time soon.