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I like one do it all vehicle. R4P starts at $40K, that is if you can find one. The $40K I saved by not purchasing a second vehicle buys an awful lot fuel. How many years will it take the R4P pay for itself? At current fuel prices, it would take 11-12 years for me. I don’t even know if I’ll be alive in 11-12 years, hell amazed I made it this far. lol!

Not to mention, much rather spend that $40K on having fun than some commuter car that I don’t want, just to save ¢20/mile. Sounds awful actually. I tried to like the Rav, even tried to talk my wife into it she turned her nose up at. Said why buy something you don’t like just to save on fuel? We don’t have any debt, we can certainly afford the gas, drive what you like….only live once.


Those who like to camp in a trailer, they’ll be stopping an awful lot. How long will the trip have to be because you have to stop and recharge every 90 miles?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-e55Vued028&t=1219s

 

Not upset, just think you're missing the point again. I'm agreeing and saying an EV may not work for you, because your use case is extreme, compared to most American drivers. Your extreme use case does not invalidate EVs for the majority of drivers.

Not extreme for you. But is extreme compared to most drivers in this country.

Glad we can agree on something, I'm not trying to sell you an EV, doesn't work for your use case yet. But for most people, they are a viable option.

You probably couldn't use an ICE mini cooper for your weekly mountain trip, where is the mini cooper bashing thread?

They do work for their intended purpose. Again, your use case is extreme compared to most drivers. Hate to break it to you, but most American drivers' primary use of their vehicle IS commuting and local errands and not much beyond that.

 

Not my fault most people haven’t figured out work life balance yet.

Yeah like I said, EVs are fine for commuting….can’t get too far off the grid though. Would love for them to work for me, but they don’t at this current time. Until they get on par with an internal combustion engine…nothing but a novelty.

Mini Cooper would indeed work, they get 38 mpg Hwy, 11 gallon tank. That is 418 miles in range…plus there are gas stations everywhere. I always have 10 gallons of fuel in jugs too. Even if the mileage went down to 25 mpg, still be at 275 mile range. My old 1st Gen would get 265 a tank, and that worked for me for the last 20 years.



The issue isn’t the vehicle itself, if it can tow a trailer anything will work for what I do. The issue is range and recharge time. Wouldn’t hate on the Mini for its range, would hate on it for other reasons, my sister has one, had nothing but problems with it. Do think it is a cool vehicle otherwise. Hell, think the Lightning is fricken cool, just doesn’t have the range to do the things I like to do. One of the main reasons I own a truck is to haul dirt bikes and camp in out of the way places. If it can’t do that it is worthless to me.





Don’t hate EVs, would love an electric dirt bike. The nearly silent operation is very appealing for trail riding. If they can get it to 80 mile range and quick recharge or quick battery swap, I am there!


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pDNrUpWsXw

 

PHEVs work perfectly fine off-grid as a soft roader. Not that I'm saying 'swap your present ride for one'.

You mean the Zero FX? With the 3.6 Modular + two extra batteries you can do a swap and have one charging all the time, and with two batteries in the bike you can get just about 90 miles of range. Military uses just about the same bike in Zero MMX format.

https://www.zeromotorcycles.com/fleet/military/

 

Didn’t think you were asking of me swapping, sounded like I should add one in addition to my Tacoma. Hell of a lot of things I rather spend $40-50K on. Like travel and exploring. I am self employed so if I drop that money on another vehicle will spend more time working to fill the hole it left in my bank account instead of out traveling and exploring around. Sounds like a miserable option to me just to save ¢20/mile.

That isn’t too bad! Considered converting to a battery chainsaw, because they are so much lighter, but you have carry so many batteries weight ends up about the same. Then Recharging them at camp at the end of the day, don’t want to run a generator all night.

 

But if you had an EV truck, you could recharge them silently from there


I consider myself the perfect EV truck/SUV candidate. The only barrier for me right now is cost and may need to do a heavy-up on the house for an at home fast charger. In a year or two, I think the cost point can get there (and I wouldn't want to buy a first model year of any vehicle anyways).

I'm a construction manager in a major metro area and suburbs homeowner. Need to be able to throw a plywood/drywall sheet or yard of mulch in the bed (or tow a utility trailer 15miles to home depot and back) and a ladder on a roof rack. My commute to project sites is 150 miles round trip at most and about 500 miles average a week, and need awd/4wd for undeveloped sites and winter. Bonus would be having secure front trunk storage, so I don't need to be taking a tonneau cover on and off. So DD requirements are easily met even just charging overnight at my house.

Hobby stuff - season ticket holder and tailgates for Maryland football games. Would love to use an EV to power speakers, TV, griddle, blender, lights, etc for a tailgate without having a noisy generator or lugging propane tanks.

Regular longer trips:
In-laws - 180 miles, always staying overnight, so recharge is not a concern
Camping - once or twice a year, 150 miles, some campsites have hookups or if not, there are chargers within 20 minutes of campgrounds.
Family beach trip - 585 miles, so still doable in a day with 1 stop to recharge and eat lunch mid way.
Ski trip - once or twice a year. 250 or 175 miles depending on destination, both would have recharging options at destination.

 

Not if the truck is dead. Current tech I can’t even get to my favorite camp spots, I disperse camp, no hookups. Campgrounds make no sense to me, why leave one neighborhood to go to another one in the woods? Point of camping to me is to get away from people, around them during my work week…need my alone time. Last thing I want is a bunch of screaming kids running around and dealing drunk people. Ya know!? Have done camp grounds in the past and find them horrible.

Winter sports is backcountry XC Skiing and Snowboarding, no resorts or hookups for me.

Cost and range is it for me. It would be nice if I could recharge with solar or even portable hydro. Tend to camp next creeks and summer is always sunny in Idaho. Unfortunately physics are against it. Could do a generator, but the size of the generator you need to do it isn’t cost effective, weight of it would kill range too. Sort of makes sense if you’re only burning fuel every once and awhile, then until you run the numbers. Is it really worth it? Not to me.

https://bikerumor.com/vanlife-can-you-charge-an-electric-vehicle-with-rooftop-solar-panels/

Maybe when Toyota comes out with the solid state batteries, the range issue would be resolved…don’t see them getting any cheaper though as the cost of most everything is through the roof. Only way for it to come down is an economic crash, then most people are too broke to buy anything.

Saw two Rivians this week, they sure do look awfully cool to me. Just not $80K cool. So many other things to spend the other $41K on buying the Tacoma instead. Think mine was $39K OTD.

It is funny, I am posting a bunch of EV motorcycles on my FB page and get a lot of heat from traditionalist friends. On here I question EV trucks and their practically for my personal use…and get fussed at. Can’t make anyone happy. lol!

 

Fleet operators could benefit from a BEV truck, as long as there is enough time to charge that truck overnight, it's probably a rare circumstance that anyone runs a pickup truck 24/7. BEV, wouldn't work for a fleet that needs that vehicle 24/7.

If I wanted to reduce fuel costs, I would drive a fuel efficient vehicle, perhaps a hybrid.

 

Agreed, and I hope Ford can get the PRO (their base work truck) trim to a number that makes sense for fleet operators.

Most of my company's fleet trucks are take home vehicles, so we likely would need to offer some kind of incentive or voucher for employees to install a charger at their residence, OR have charging capability at the construction site (not unreasonable either, as we typically have to install temp power infrastructure at the start for construction and trailer purposes). Most of the fleet vehicles are used for quick jaunts during the day, like trailer to site, or one end of the site to the other, not being actively driven around.

 

PHEV truck, then. Best of both worlds.

Also I do like my ego chainsaws for light duty work. Couple trees max, but I'm not lumberjack-ing all day, it's just to get past an obstacle or clear some storm damage or whatever.

No hookups at my local resort, just dry camping. That said, I'm also more of a XC guy...

 

Nah, buying a new ride for 'savings' is stupid. Mine replaced our old 2003 TDI Jetta when it started getting 'old car problems' after about 18 years of ownership. So we're gonna keep this one for at least a decade, if not more.

 

10 years? Wow. If I can get a lightning pro without getting bent over then I wouldn’t hesitate to get rid of this Prime.

 

That would be ideal! Now if they only built it.

Have been converting all my home yard tools to battery. On trail still has to be gas, have cleared 100 down trees in a 10 mile section before. 4-5 tanks of gas in the saw. Forest fires have devastated large swathes. So every season it takes a small army of us volunteers to clear trails.

Nice!

Gotcha. Honestly it would be nice to have one for commuting and the other for trips only. Of course it would be the Taco for running around town, and a F350 or Sprinter for traveling.

 

Yeah I'm thinking one or two trees max before I'm turning around and going home, we've gotten some fires out here too though.

That said, a PHEV taco around town would be pretty good. Just put the battery between the frame rails and go hybrid FWD + eRWD, but in a way that would give a motor per wheel and/or rear lockers. Should be able to sneak it up to 400HP that way easy.

 

Would love for a battery saw to work since they weigh next to nothing, give it time they will eventually out perform gas.

Yeah, can’t wait to see what they do with the ‘24 Tacoma. Not sure if it will be PHEV though, guessing it will be more like the Tundra.

 

Hyundai ioniq6 starts at $42k long range version 380 miles range.

 

Inventory is so difficult right now, trying to trade my wife’s car for an electric vehicle. 90% of our daily driving is under 30 miles, doesn’t make sense to have two gas vehicles. Basic answer we get is put money down today, we’ll call you next year, and let you know what the price will be. Hyundai, ford, all of them have the same answer.

 

https://www.notateslaapp.com/news/851/tesla-teases-solar-powered-range-extender-trailer-with-starlink-at-ideenexpo-in-germany

 

https://www.yahoo.com/news/man-took-retrofitted-electric-1964-131500536.html

 

Electric cant haul?

https://www.reddit.com/r/electricve...an_does_a_quiet_tractor_pull/?utm_name=iossmf