Word is the SAE NACS standard (J3400) will be out soon:
Pretty nice. Unbelievable that the J1772 standard didn’t support 277 volt charging already–it obviously has negligible cost and should have been of clear benefit.
Part of the argument against NACS in Europe is that many houses have 3-phase power, but relatively low current per phase (like 16 A), and so they really need 3-phase charging, but NACS only has split-phase.
But it occurred to me that you can get >2x the single-phase charge rate with a diode network that rectifies the 3-phase AC into ~500 V DC. Diodes are cheap. The car would need a higher voltage rating for its charger, and work with DC, but most likely the charger already converts to DC first and applies its own chopper circuit. And higher voltage is relatively easy to implement.
Ahh well, it’s too late for them now. At least we ended up with the nicer system.
Good to see that the SAE got this standardized so quickly. Standards bodies aren’t usually known for their speed. It probably speaks well for Tesla’s internal standardization process (i.e., it isn’t the usual hacky, informal mess that internal standards so frequently are).
Volkswagen/Audi/Porsche/Scout adopt NACS:
https://media.vw.com/en-us/releases/1774
That’s it, aside from Stellantis, which currently has no BEVs on sale in the US. I guess someone has to be in last place.
Getting back to EV plans…I’ll be in the market for a new car this summer. When I got my current EV, during the chip shortage, Teslas had something like a year lead time. Checking today, it’s more like a month.
As I was looking at their website, I noticed something I missed in the past, a lot of their cars are rear wheel drive.
Does anyone have an experience with these in the snow?
I understand the weight is distributed differently than it is in something with an engine in the front but I have to guess it’s still going to fishtail more than a FWD/AWD/4WD vehicle.
Some cursory searches on google says it handles really well in the snow as long as you get a good set of snow tires.
Snow tires would (almost certainly) be a deal breaker for me. I’ve got no interest in swapping tires twice a year.
I think only the 3 and Y come in rear-wheel drive, but they both have an AWD option. The S and Z are all AWD. At least that is my understanding.
The X is AWD. We don’t get much snow here, but it drives well when we get some. I’m looking forward to the Model Z 
DOH! 
Rear wheel drive is not great in snow, because if the vehicle starts to go sideways it will want to continue to go sideways. Acceleration in a FWD car tend to want to pull it straight because the center of mass is behind the center of the accelerative force.
The other reason FWD is better for low traction inly applies to ICE cars - the traction wheels are directly under the heavy engine. Of course in an EV the weight is distributed across the bottom of the car, so it’s not as much of an issue.
But you should probably swap tires. All-seasons aren’t great in really cold weather, and are only appropriate for locations that rately get a lot of snow, and don’t get particularly cold. And all-seasons or snow tires will kill summer mileage. I think just going from the low rolling resistance EV tires to all-seasons will cost you at least 10% in range, and as much as 20%.
I’m sorry, which part of that addressed my question?
They do, but it’s a considerable price jump. 39k to 46k on the 3 and 44k to 49k on the Y.
Chevy Blazer EV and Cadillac Lyriq will lose tax credit eligibility.
Goddam it–this is probably a dealbreaker. Car is still sitting in TN.
11 posts were split to a new topic: Canadian goals re reducing gas-powered vehicles
Moderating:
I’ve just moved several posts to their own thread, as they were a hijack to this topic.
@Sam_Stone , reviewing the thread, you have started a lot of hijacks. I would like to remind everyone that the topic of this thread is “what are your electric vehicle plans”. Posts about the overall electric grid, how much range other people need, etc., are not on topic. Please take general comments about overall take up of electric vehicles to a more appropriate thread.
That applies to everyone, but especially to Sam, who has largely posted off-topic here.
The dealer is offering us $5k off, so we’ll probably still do it. God knows when it will get here. Not impressed with GM’s logistics.
As I said at some earlier point, I tentatively plan on my next car being an EV, but here’s some bleak and rather surprising news that prospective buyers might want to keep an eye on: according to a large sample (330,000) of EVs surveyed by Consumer Reports, EVs have turned out to be much less reliable than one might expect. In fact, on average, owners reported problems at about twice the rate of comparable ICE vehicles.
This is surprising because in principle there’s less intricate mechanical stuff to go wrong, but it seems that much of the advanced electronics, including the battery and charging systems, are still so new that manufacturers are still learning to build them reliably. CR does mention that among the model years surveyed (2020 to 2023) the 2023 models seem to be doing best, but it’s unclear whether this is because the technology has improved or because problems haven’t yet developed.
It’s a really bad time to buy any non-Tesla EV. In a year, owning an EV that doesn’t use the Tesla/NACS charging system will be like owning a Beta video tape player when everyone else has VHS. Worse; Beta owners could at least claim they had the better product as it rushed to obsolescence. Not so the clunky and unreliable CCS charging systems. I bet the non-NACS EVs will depreciate faster as well.
Why can’t you just use an adaptor?
AFAIK, an adapter will enable you to use an NACS charger so you will be able to charge, but it won’t be the seamless process that Teslas and future EVs will have, where you just plug in and walk away/take a nap.
Here’s a video on the subject:
I’ve never owned an EV, so perhaps I don’t know what I’m talking about, but just how does the need to use an adapter make it not a “seamless process?”
Depends on how you drive. For my iPace, 99.5% of my charging is done at home (and probably all of it could be). My charging system works perfectly fine for me.
I do agree, Tesla has a great Supercharger network. For our rare road trips, we take the Tesla.