The Canadian Electric Vehicle thread

[Nouvellecosse]

Originally Posted by homebucket

Well whatever the reason is, the point is consumers are going to keep buying Teslas regardless of how childish Musk acts. They’re not buying them to show their support for Musk. They’re buying them because in their minds Tesla is the best product for their needs.

He didn't say that people were choosing whether or not to buy them based on their views on Musk. He's saying they should take that into consideration. And obviously that's true. One of the big selling features of capitalism is that despite its non-democratic and unequal nature, people supposedly can vote with their dollars. They can take an active role in shaping their world into the kind of place they want to live by taking an ethical stance on who they conduct business with.

[homebucket]

Originally Posted by Nouvellecosse

He didn't say that people were choosing whether or not to buy them based on their views on Musk. He's saying they should take that into consideration. And obviously that's true. One of the big selling features of capitalism is that despite its non-democratic and unequal nature, people supposedly can vote with their dollars. They can take an active role in shaping their world into the kind of place they want to live by taking an ethical stance on who they conduct business with.

That’s fine and dandy but again. The majority of people buying Teslas are probably oblivious or could care less about what Musk tweets. I’m sure if I polled all the people I know that own Teslas their reaction to his tweet they’d be like “umm who cares?”

[Nouvellecosse]

Originally Posted by homebucket

That’s fine and dandy but again. The majority of people buying Teslas are probably oblivious or could care less about what Musk tweets. I’m sure if I polled all the people I know that own Teslas their reaction to his tweet they’d be like “umm who cares?”

I don't understand the relevance? The whole point of an ought statement isn't to dispute what is, but rather to argue for what should be. The very act of making such an argument implicitly acknowledges that things aren't that way already, so responding by stating that things aren't that way is kind of pointless?

That being said, statements made on the forum are directed at forum readers rather than the public writ-large, and I like to think we're a little more thoughtful than the oblivious car-buying masses.

[homebucket]

Originally Posted by Nouvellecosse

I don't understand the relevance? The whole point of an ought statement isn't to dispute what is, but rather to argue for what should be. The very act of making such an argument implicitly acknowledges that things aren't that way already, so responding by stating that things aren't that way is kind of pointless?

That being said, statements made on the forum are directed at forum readers rather than the public writ-large, and I like to think we're a little more thoughtful than the oblivious car-buying masses.

Umm… ok….

Question for the thoughtful Tesla owners here. Any of you going to trade their cars in now because of Musks tweets?

[travis3000]

Originally Posted by homebucket

That’s fine and dandy but again. The majority of people buying Teslas are probably oblivious or could care less about what Musk tweets. I’m sure if I polled all the people I know that own Teslas their reaction to his tweet they’d be like “umm who cares?”

I own a Tesla. The cars are awesome. Musk should just stick to his job but we all know that's not going to happen. He is who he is (very opinionated).

I won't be trading in my car over a tweet. At this point in time there are no electric vehicles out there that can compete with Tesla. Trust me I did extensive research last year. If you want the best bang for your dollar (speed, range, features, price), you will buy a Tesla. Maybe if there were solid competitors I might be open to a trade in down the road.

But no Musks comments (while annoying) won't push me to any drastic decisions haha.

[Nouvellecosse]

I've been considering buying an EV for a few years now and Tesla is not on my list of considerations in large part because I no longer support the company. But not because of this specific set of Musk tweets. There's been a cumulation of things over the years.

[MonctonRad]

If I can nurse another few years our of my current ICE vehicles, I intend my next car to be an EV too.

Like you, I won't be buying a Tesla. I will go with a more mainstream brand with a local dealership. I currently admire the BMW X3 electric.

[homebucket]

Originally Posted by travis3000

I own a Tesla. The cars are awesome. Musk should just stick to his job but we all know that's not going to happen. He is who he is (very opinionated).

I won't be trading in my car over a tweet. At this point in time there are no electric vehicles out there that can compete with Tesla. Trust me I did extensive research last year. If you want the best bang for your dollar (speed, range, features, price), you will buy a Tesla. Maybe if there were solid competitors I might be open to a trade in down the road.

But no Musks comments (while annoying) won't push me to any drastic decisions haha.

I think most people are in agreement with your logic. I don't think there are many people out there that actually have a positive opinion about Musk, aside from the legions of fanboys. And whatever opinion they have is not enough to dissuade them from purchasing a Tesla.

Originally Posted by Nouvellecosse

I've been considering buying an EV for a few years now and Tesla is not on my list of considerations in large part because I no longer support the company. But not because of this specific set of Musk tweets. There's been a cumulation of things over the years.

Kudos to you for sticking with your guns, but I'd wager you're in the vast minority and if you had to buy an EV today, you'd likely end up with an inferior product. 5 years from now, you'd have more competitive options.

Originally Posted by MonctonRad

If I can nurse another few years our of my current ICE vehicles, I intend my next car to be an EV too.

Like you, I won't be buying a Tesla. I will go with a more mainstream brand with a local dealership. I currently admire the BMW X3 electric.

I'd wait for the second generation of mainstream brand EVs if you can afford to wait. Tesla has been doing this for a decade now, and the traditional OEMs are barely getting started and already multiple issues and recalls have arisen.

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by Nouvellecosse

I've been considering buying an EV for a few years now and Tesla is not on my list of considerations in large part because I no longer support the company. But not because of this specific set of Musk tweets. There's been a cumulation of things over the years.

I'm more concerned about their quality control and poor after-sales support.

Now that there are more mainstream options, that are starting to get to practical ranges, there's no need to get a Tesla to just get a practical EV.

[homebucket]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

I'm more concerned about their quality control and poor after-sales support.

Now that there are more mainstream options, that are starting to get to practical ranges, there's no need to get a Tesla to just get a practical EV.

Not a problem unique to Tesla.

Non-Tesla mainstream options are known to have quality control issues and poor after-sales support as well, some even more serious than a few panel gaps. As you can see, the issues plague multiple mainstream options.

[WarrenC12]

Originally Posted by homebucket

Umm… ok….

Question for the thoughtful Tesla owners here. Any of you going to trade their cars in now because of Musks tweets?

Nope. I would buy another Tesla tomorrow if my car was totaled.

I don't like plenty of what Musk tweets, but Teslas are still far ahead of any other offering on the EV market.

Let's not pretend the other options are saint worthy. Did we forget VW cheating on emissions testing... multiple times?

[WarrenC12]

Musk can't keep himself off twitter, like Trump in that regard.

Imagine if we got the daily musings of Bezos, Steve Jobs, or Bill Gates (when he was running MS in the 90s). I don't think they'd be much different.

[Nouvellecosse]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

Nope. I would buy another Tesla tomorrow if my car was totaled.

I don't like plenty of what Musk tweets, but Teslas are still far ahead of any other offering on the EV market.

Let's not pretend the other options are saint worthy. Did we forget VW cheating on emissions testing... multiple times?

Let's also not pretend that nothing being perfect is the same as everything being equal. It's basically like when people don't bother to vote because no party or candidate is perfect, or major moral or ethical violations of a candidate because they promised to lower taxes or something. I'd argue that the economy has an equal or greater influence over society compared to the government, and our choices as consumers are therefore equally important as voting. Obviously it's tough to scrutinize every transaction a person makes (I'm probably not researching the maker of my LAN cable or something) but a strong argument can be made for doing so for very large transactions worth tends of thousands of dollars.

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

Musk can't keep himself off twitter, like Trump in that regard.

Imagine if we got the daily musings of Bezos, Steve Jobs, or Bill Gates (when he was running MS in the 90s). I don't think they'd be much different.

Why would we care what people think? The issue is what they do and say. What people in the public eye choose to do and say is kind of important. If others are thinking the same things and not saying them, that actually makes their judgement and restraint more impressive, and shows by contrast why some people aren't cut out for the public eye. Imagine if say, a boss told an employee he wanted to bang her, and when she said that was inappropriate, he replied, "Well I'm sure all your previous bosses were thinking the same thing, but I'm just very open with my feelings"

But it's true that the more factors a consumer includes in their decision, the more challenging it becomes and the more likely it is to have to make compromises. That's the way it is with consumer choices regardless as there can be different products that do best in different areas such as cost vs features vs style vs reliability vs efficiency etc. Adding in the behaviour of the company or its owners is just another factor. But I realize that which things a person considers important varies from person to person. For me, labour relations is particularly important and companies that are anti-union are a NO. It's why I actually canceled my Amazon prime and stopped buying from them after their antics with the Alabama union campaign.

[svlt]

Originally Posted by MonctonRad

I will go with a more mainstream brand with a local dealership. I currently admire the BMW X3 electric.

Tesla has become commonplace and pretty "mainstream" nowadays in certain parts of the country, especially lower mainland BC. I would say their product line is as "mainstream" as a Ford or BMW in parts of Vancouver or Richmond...

[OldDartmouthMark]

Ethics are important to me, but it's difficult to judge a company's ethics by the tweets of its leader. IMHO, it is a hint that there are probably other things going on within the company that aren't great.

Things like the following. Disabling features that you 'use too much' to presumably save warranty costs? Just improve the damn quality instead of putting in a stupid software patch that is bordering on the creepy...

Tesla now monitors how often you adjust your seat position and will disable controls for ‘chronic abusers’

Now Tesla has taken a new approach that could fall into the “not good” category by monitoring how many times you adjust your seat.

Based on a review of the source code by hacker @greentheonly, the automaker recently added “seat abuse” metrics.

According to green, if you move the seat too much messages will pop up on the display like “Excessive use of seat track motor detected,” and “Seat track motor unavailable due to excessive use.”

Green did not say what the thresholds were to receive these messages, but it looks like if you ignore them, Tesla will even go so far as to disable the controls and put you seat adjustment jail with the message “Wait 5 minutes to adjust the seat position again.”

You are probably wondering why Tesla would implement a seemingly trivial thing like seat abuse metrics.

While we don’t know for sure, we do know Tesla collects a lot of data about their cars. They have likely seen an increasing trend in damage or failure of seat motors, and in an attempt to keep warranty costs down, decided it was a good idea to add this feature.

Things like this would/will keep me from buying a Tesla, and the fact that Musk is a bad character helps to reinforce my resolve. Like Nouvellecosse says, it's collective, not just one tweet.

[Truenorth00]

I don't get the idea that it's strange to not buy a Teslas because of Elon's tweets. People choose to support or not to patronize a brand for all kinds of reasons. It's certainly legitimate to pass on Tesla if somebody is annoyed by Elon's tweets.

Personally, I try to support small and local business in my daily shopping. And Tesla comes across as one of those brave startups that has now become what they professed to hate. Rivian, to me, is what Tesla was a decade ago. Hope they don't turn.

[homebucket]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

I don't get the idea that it's strange to not buy a Teslas because of Elon's tweets. People choose to support or not to patronize a brand for all kinds of reasons. It's certainly legitimate to pass on Tesla if somebody is annoyed by Elon's tweets.

Personally, I try to support small and local business in my daily shopping. And Tesla comes across as one of those brave startups that has now become what they professed to hate. Rivian, to me, is what Tesla was a decade ago. Hope they don't turn.

Tesla is a local business. Or at least it was until it moved to Austin.

But again, no one is denying Tesla has poor customer service and questionable business practices (from a consumer standpoint) or has a largely unlikable CEO. Despite all these considerations, from an objective standpoint, if you choose to follow your moral compass, you're ending up with an inferior product.

[homebucket]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

Let's not pretend the other options are saint worthy. Did we forget VW cheating on emissions testing... multiple times?

Exactly.

[homebucket]

Originally Posted by svlt

Tesla has become commonplace and pretty "mainstream" nowadays in certain parts of the country, especially lower mainland BC. I would say their product line is as "mainstream" as a Ford or BMW in parts of Vancouver or Richmond...

No doubt.

Tesla has now overtaken mainstream Mercedes in the luxury rankings, now up to 3rd. Mercedes sales growth is 2nd slowest among all luxury brands. Tesla, showing no signs of slowing down, is the fastest growing in the luxury segment is is poised to overtake both Lexus and BMW by early 2022. Both the Model Y and Model 3 currently outsell their respective 2nd place luxury competitors, the Lexus RX and the BMW 3 Series.

Tesla vs luxury/premium brands
Automotive News notes also that Tesla is strengthening among luxury/premium brands after passing Mercedes-Benz for third in September.

Considering the momentum, Tesla might be #1 by the end of 2021 or in early 2022.

Registrations in the U.S. - January-October 2021
BMW - 288,701 (up 32%)
Lexus - 272,094 (up 29%)
Tesla - 260,932 (up 68%)
Mercedes-Benz - 230,273 (up 9.1%)
Audi - 181,307 (up 27%)
Acura - 140,858 (up 31%)
Cadillac - 111,191 (up 14%)
Volvo - 106,383 (up 25%)
Lincoln - 78,967 (down 5.4%)
Land Rover - 69,843 (up 13%)
The Model Y and Model 3 were considered the two top-selling premium models in the U.S., ahead of the Lexus RX (98,297), Mercedes-Benz C-Class and BMW 3 Series.

https://insideevs.com/news/553972/us...-october-2021/

[travis3000]

I can say this regarding the customer service comments. I've needed Tesla service twice since I bought my car.

First time was for a flat tire. Second time was for a camera issue on the car (condensation in the lens).

Both times resulted in Tesla driving to my house, servicing my car in my garage for FREE, in an extremely timely manner: 3 hours for the flat tire, and 3 days for the camera issue.

I've had other car brands before and never once have I been able to A) get in that fast, B) not be charged and C) have them come to my house.