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The bright side is Tesla also wants to bring super capacitators to the market as soon as possible. But for now we are going to have to deal with batteries.

13 days ago on Bosch's $449 electric vehicle home charger is a bargain

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If need be, you can make a special welfare card for the poor that works at gas stations. In my city though, if someone is on welfare for example, they qualify for free bus/subway transportation. Those who are not on welfare but have low salaries can qualify for a half fare card.

I am not going to make a generalized solution as each city/state has to see what works for them.

But I do believe that we need to cultivate new industries and keep them inside the US. I am not trying to say to put more strain on the poor and there can be alternative options like I mentioned above. A disruption in the prices of oil will spur new innovation in technology and create jobs. I would rather create safety nets and push change rather then wait for the inevitable to happen.

13 days ago on Bosch's $449 electric vehicle home charger is a bargain 1 reply

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While it may seem like that is the case not exactly. Initially it will strain them but overall it will work out. The moment the status quo is disrupted, it also creates new opportunities. End of the day, people do not need lower gas prices or even lower taxes. They need jobs! For example, the rise in crude oil prices created a boom in green energy and shale oil development.

Unless the poor get higher paying jobs, all these things are just band aid solutions that does not fix anything.

13 days ago on Bosch's $449 electric vehicle home charger is a bargain

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This is looking pretty sweat, I thought it hit record lows when home depot was selling charging units at 650$ a few month back, I didn’t expect it to drop this quickly which is good news. The 240v 16amp is a bit weak at only 3.8kwh. but 593$ for a 240v 30amp is pretty good. That is 7.2kwh. No 40amp version though?

Overall that should be enough to charge a leaf in 3hrs and a Tesla in 10hrs or so. which is pretty good for the price.

14 days ago on Bosch's $449 electric vehicle home charger is a bargain

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So what? your electric bill will be a fraction of the gasoline bill. If you drive say 600k miles, on an electric car it will cost you like 20k in electricity. On a gasoline car it will cost you 80-100k in gasoline.

14 days ago on Bosch's $449 electric vehicle home charger is a bargain 1 reply

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I wouldn’t mind it costing more at the pump, then it would spur moving away from outdated technology.

And the reason the top 5% pay that much is because of the huge gap between the rich and the poor. The gap we have here in the US is at 3rd world country levels.

PS, so, can I thank myself in the mirror? lol

14 days ago on Bosch's $449 electric vehicle home charger is a bargain 2 replies 1 recommend

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Probably not, the charging is night charging. At night it goes like this, either sell the electricity cheaper or lose the electricity.

But I hear there is a 2k credit on the electric bill in california.

14 days ago on Bosch's $449 electric vehicle home charger is a bargain 2 recommends

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Well, depends where you live, some places have better infrastructure then others. But good news is solar panel prices are dropping rapidly. So we can offset the load by getting a lot of the power from solar. I hear solar city has a unique model of letting people install solar panels and leasing them until they are fully bought out which is becoming popular.

14 days ago on Bosch's $449 electric vehicle home charger is a bargain 2 replies 2 recommends

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Because a lot of companies have most of their investments in gasoline. To add to that, battery prices are high and capacity is low. (though price has been dropping and capacity has been going up).

It also doesn’t help that a lot of people are ignorant about batteries.

14 days ago on Bosch's $449 electric vehicle home charger is a bargain

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Or batteries last pretty long already. What needs to happen is battery price needs to come down. As far as solar power, it would have to be like a coating or something. Otherwise the added weight would counter all the benefits. But in 10-15 years, most new cars sold will probably be EVs.

14 days ago on Bosch's $449 electric vehicle home charger is a bargain

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Not really, for example, right now they are at 17% gross margins. They plan to hit 25% gross margins by end of the year. That is already 8% covered right there.

15 days ago on Tesla turns first profit in its 10-year history

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I think you are a little confused. Let us start with the basics. The constitution limits the power of government. The government is allowed to ONLY perform things that are within the bounds of the constitution. Most government assistance generally falls under “general welfare clause”.

As far as banks and investors, so you know, they would all be bankrupt by now if not for the government. So how is that suppose to work?

Also, the government does not print money, all they do is mint coins. The money is printed by the Federal Reserve and despite its name, the Federal Reserve is not a government agency but is a private corporation owned by the banks.

The government is not throwing away money in green technologies, during a study done over the past 30 years the investments the government did in green technology actually paid off very well. (yes with the failure and all, that is what happens when news love to sensationalize a few companies out of the many).

But I will tell you something, we are in a very bad position because most of our economy is fake. If the government stops spending, our entire economy and our currency will collapse. That is not to say that we should continue spending. But we can’t stop spending unless we get out of this fake economy.

15 days ago on Tesla turns first profit in its 10-year history

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He can run both companies just fine. Its not like he is personally doing everything. He is not the kind of person to give up on 1 or the other. Also, all the companies he owns work together. The battery technology used in the Model S is the same battery used in the Space X Dragon. The setup of twin chargers for the Model S is done by solar city. So everything he does works out together.

Later on he also plans to make a Hyperloop which is a Maglev Train.

16 days ago on Tesla turns first profit in its 10-year history

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Then stop listening to 3rd parties who make generic claims with no information and get some info directly from the source:

http://www.teslamotors.com/blog/teslas-closed-loop-battery-recycling-program

http://www.teslamotors.com/de_AT/node/3855

16 days ago on Tesla turns first profit in its 10-year history 5 recommends

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Easy way to spot someone who is lying and never read the report:

“Q1 non-GAAP net income was $15 million, and $11.2 million on a GAAP basis. Non-GAAP basic EPS was
$0.13 and $0.10 on a GAAP basis, using 114.7 million weighted shares outstanding. On a fully diluted basis,
non-GAAP EPS was $0.12. GAAP diluted EPS was $0.00, as net income has been adjusted to exclude the
one-time non-cash gain of $10.7 million from the elimination of our Department of Energy (DoE) warrant liability
as required under GAAP”

Effectively they are still profitable even after the one time 10.7 million warrant reversal.

16 days ago on Tesla turns first profit in its 10-year history 8 recommends

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First of all that is a concept car, 2nd of all it says 500km, 3rd of all its not a sedan, and 4th of all it cost a million dollars.

18 days ago on Elon Musk in talks with Google to bring driverless tech to Tesla cars (update) 2 replies

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The calculator calculates the cost of buying a Tesla vs a gasoline car in terms of monthly payments. So it is saying that financing a model S is same as financing a gasoline car for 580$ when you factor in overall costs.

If you uncheck all the options, it will show you upfront costs. But in no way is the calculator “misleading”.

20 days ago on Tesla's Elon Musk apologizes over Model S financing calculator: 'we didn’t get it quite right'

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What in the world are you smoking? This is not an advertised price, this is just a calculator! You can customize the calculator how every you wish. Is making calculators something that is fine-able in your country?

20 days ago on Tesla's Elon Musk apologizes over Model S financing calculator: 'we didn’t get it quite right' 1 reply

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Because they increased the buyback cost of the car from matching Mercedes S class or 43% to beating BMW, Mercedes, Audi, Jaguar and Lexus or 50% whichever is higher. That is a cost to themselves.

21 days ago on Tesla's Elon Musk apologizes over Model S financing calculator: 'we didn’t get it quite right' 1 recommend

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There is actually a chart for up to 2600 cycles:

http://23.21.184.60/evtv-word-press/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/PANASONICCYCLELIFE.jpg

It reaches 70% at a little over 2600 cycles. So 750,000 miles should be easily possible.

21 days ago on Tesla's Elon Musk apologizes over Model S financing calculator: 'we didn’t get it quite right' 1 recommend

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2 reasons:

1) supply and demand, they can only make 500 cars a week and they get all sold out instantly. If your limited by supply so it makes more sense to sell luxury models where margins are higher.

2) economies of scale, since there is not enough production yet for competitive prices. Things are costing more then they should. As Tesla and EVs ramp up production, prices on components will drop and the savings will then be passed to the consumer.

22 days ago on Tesla's Elon Musk apologizes over Model S financing calculator: 'we didn’t get it quite right' 1 recommend

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Yes, the batteries will last you 15-20 years and around 300k-750k miles. They can guarantee 50% easily. Because lets take the lower end model costs around 70k. At 50% value it is around 35k. They can then easily sell these at 35k-40k to people who normally could not afford a 70k-100k car.

22 days ago on Tesla's Elon Musk apologizes over Model S financing calculator: 'we didn’t get it quite right'

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The tax credit is not price based but battery capacity based. Whether the car is a 100k car like the Fisker or 28k car like the Nissan Leaf. As long as the tax credit is equal to everyone, I don’t see how it matters what the base cost of the car is.

22 days ago on Electric car manufacturer Coda files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy

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Incorrect, Fisker was approved for a 529 million loan but they failed to reach all conditions so they only managed to get 193 million. The DOE then managed to seize 21 million for now. And may still get more depending how things go.

No tax credits were “lost”. The non-refundable tax credits were given to consumers, not the company.

22 days ago on Electric car manufacturer Coda files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy 1 reply 2 recommends

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You mean continues to succeed. As Tesla is already succeeding.

22 days ago on Electric car manufacturer Coda files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy 1 reply

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What he is talking about is the experience should be fluid that any driver can learn their car without using a manual. That is not to say that you will not require the manual to do advanced tasks. It is just saying that the basics should be obvious.

But that said, I think he is saying this so that people who are used to gasoline cars are more confident to give it a shot. A lot of the problems EVs face is people are not even willing to try one. So he is trying to raise the bar to make them more socially acceptable.

29 days ago on Tesla addresses 'bricked battery' concerns with nigh-unconditional warranty 1 recommend

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The unlucky person who had their Tesla Roadster battery brick does not even apply to the Model S. The Roadster was a limited edition prototype. It had no thermal management or battery management. Bricking a Tesla Model S battery is really really hard unless your doing it intentionally.

The reason why Tesla is doing this is simple, to quench worries. I would be surprised if even 0.001% of cars have to use this service within the 8 years.

29 days ago on Tesla addresses 'bricked battery' concerns with nigh-unconditional warranty

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The best way to rob a bank is to own one ; )

29 days ago on Tesla addresses 'bricked battery' concerns with nigh-unconditional warranty 4 recommends

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It is common knowledge to an extent. Its one of the things you learn if you buy one and read the manual or listen to instructions. I am sure putting in anti-freeze into a car is not common knowledge either until you actually own a gasoline based car.

29 days ago on Tesla addresses 'bricked battery' concerns with nigh-unconditional warranty