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Ew - so they couldn't work with BMW and decided second best would be... CHRYSTLER??? Good lord, why. I haven't seen a Chrystler in my lifetime that looked good, let alone performed well.
 
Interesting stuff for sure, recycling the nuclear waste. Wind turbines are a good source of energy at the present, but I agree their needs to be massive investment and development in technology that is essentially saving the planet and environment.
I think hydrogen is a good fuel for cars, so long as it's no more dangerous than petrol / gasoline is in an accident. I'm still waiting for these hydrogen fuel cells we were promised in our gadgets years ago.


You can rest assured that Big Oil will do it's level best to kill off hydrogen. I hope they fail in their ambitions to undermine the next big step in green technology and transportation. This one of those situations where governments have got to lead and play footsy with lobbyists. Build the Hydrogen infrastructure and the rest will follow and that will create new high tech jobs.
 
where do you get Chrysler as a potential partner?

There are other brands in the FCA Group now: http://www.fcagroup.com/en-US/group/brands/Pages/default.aspx

"Earlier this week, Apple hired Doug Betts, former Senior Vice President of the Chrysler Group and the global head of operations leading product service and quality, continuing the company's hiring of automotive experts."

I'm just thinking that Chrystler and quality have never gone hand in hand - seems like they'd choose someone from a company which actually had a top notch quality product. Chrystler interiors have always felt super cheap and not ergonomic whatsoever to me. The couple I have driven have made me never want to own one. Of course I don't know anything about Doug Betts, maybe he's a great operations guy whos hands were tied by the bean counters at Chrystler.
 
"Earlier this week, Apple hired Doug Betts, former Senior Vice President of the Chrysler Group and the global head of operations leading product service and quality, continuing the company's hiring of automotive experts."

I'm just thinking that Chrystler and quality have never gone hand in hand - seems like they'd choose someone from a company which actually had a top notch quality product. Chrystler interiors have always felt super cheap and not ergonomic whatsoever to me. The couple I have driven have made me never want to own one. Of course I don't know anything about Doug Betts, maybe he's a great operations guy whos hands were tied by the bean counters at Chrystler.
When did you try their vehicles? Have you checked any recently?
Interesting how we try a product or service and the initial impressions are the ones that last forever, it happens with Apple products as well as with cars.
Both markets seem to have product lines focused on catering to people who only lease them in the case of cars, so they don't care much about reliability, as well as those who buy and replace their apple devices every year...
 
When did you try their vehicles? Have you checked any recently?
Interesting how we try a product or service and the initial impressions are the ones that last forever, it happens with Apple products as well as with cars.
Both markets seem to have product lines focused on catering to people who only lease them in the case of cars, so they don't care much about reliability, as well as those who buy and replace their apple devices every year...

It has been within the last 12 months that I've driven one. I'm not sure how having a product line not devoted to reliability/longevity makes for a good argument toward quality and certainly has nothing to with ergonomic functionality. Especially when companies like BMW and Mercedes have plenty of lease customers but don't use that as an excuse to skimp on R&D, great materials, ergonomically designed interiors and product life longevity. I certainly wouldn't want a vehicle who's design premise was based on it not lasting very long. That was my entire point. I don't mean to offend you if you're a Chrystler driver, I'm just observing that seeking input from BMW, a company whose name is synonymous with performance and quality, makes more sense and aligns more with Apple's commitment to both design and performance in its own products than Chrystler.
 
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Anybody who knows enough physics to know the terms harmonic and resonance should see that the whole idea of turbines causing illnesses via infrasound is utter BS. Sorry, but even living next to a somewhat busy street causes orders of magnitude more infrasound than turbines. There even are a lot of natural phenomena producing way more infrasound (rivers, rain, waterfalls, wind). It's easy to say what makes those people sick: The fear of the invisible. It's the same story over and over: Tell a group of people of some invisible "threat", and I guarantee you that someone will show up who's feeling it. What they are feeling are not symptoms of radiation, radio waves, air pollution or infrasound, but rather symptoms of stress caused by the constant fear.

I think perhaps you should move beyond knowing "enough physics" and talk about it with some qualified audio engineers. There is a frequency center near 18hz that causes near terror in most people who can experience it, manifesting first as anxiety and unease. As you mentioned, there are a wide variety of things that can cause it, but the most obvious one is air forced into a confined place. This manifests as the "helicopter effect" when you have one window open on an older car (newer ones have some dampening ability against this), but on larger scale any resonant chamber such as a cellar - with an acoustical load, like a rail line, surf, and yes, a turbine - can produce this. And oddly, even a sinus cavity can give you a following response. I can produce one a skull-filling resonance at will, by humming at a particular frequency in a particular room at my job. As I've mentioned earlier, the DOD has been experimenting with particular cps that produce these reactions for some time, and I'm fairly certain an LRAD detachment can produce the effect now.
 
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It has been within the last 12 months that I've driven one. I'm not sure how having a product line not devoted to reliability/longevity makes for a good argument toward quality and certainly has nothing to with ergonomic functionality. Especially when companies like BMW and Mercedes have plenty of lease customers but don't use that as an excuse to skimp on R&D, great materials, ergonomically designed interiors and product life longevity. I certainly wouldn't want a vehicle who's design premise was based on it not lasting very long. That was my entire point. I don't mean to offend you if you're a Chrystler driver, I'm just observing that seeking input from BMW, a company whose name is synonymous with performance and quality, makes more sense and aligns more with Apple's commitment to both design and performance in its own products than Chrystler.
No offense at all. I'm not justifying it, I don't like it that most products are nowadays "disposable". My point is that many Apple products have terrible reliability too, and are not easy to repair too.
 
Where I live, the grid is largely supplied by some of the world's filthiest brown coal power plants. As a result, you'll produce more CO2 per kilometre in an electric vehicle than in an ICE-powered vehicle. Sad but true; that's just how bad brown coal is.

http://www.drive.com.au/motor-news/petrol-cars-greener-than-electric-20120705-21ifc.html
http://www.drive.com.au/motor-news/green-smack-for-electric-cars-20111209-1omdk

However, we also have the OPTION to purchase 100% 'GreenPower' from our electricity company - and I personally already do (for a few cents more per kilowatt-hour, it's a VERY cheap way of reducing environmental impact). This means that the power retailer has to purchase the amount of energy we buy from them, from a certified renewable source, usually a wind farm (no large-scale solar here yet). This provides revenue to the wind farm additional to the legislated minimum requirements - or at least, that's the idea...

Therefore, an electric CAN be worse, in terms of CO2 emissions, than an ICE (to the annoyance of fans of the former), but as others have already noted, it is also possible for an EV to be very much cleaner. It really depends.

I look forward to converting my old vehicles to electric when their current donks wear out.

Cheers, A.
 
the next big step in green technology and transportation

Both battery and fuel-cell EVs are only as green as the ultimate source of their energy. Just as most electricity is currently generated from fossil fuels, so is most hydrogen (mainly from natural gas). That said, the current infrastructure for low-carbon electricity generation and distribution is far more advanced than any existing 'hydrogen infrastructure' - plus, its useful for things other than cars.

You can rest assured that Big Oil will do it's level best to kill off hydrogen.

Really? I'm not convinced that it isn't Fossil Fuels inc. pushing the hydrogen idea as a distraction, since they're pretty much in control of hydrogen production and the 'hydrogen infrastructure' is a spookily similar business model to the current 'gasoline infrastructure'. C.f. electricity, where any bozo can stick up a solar panel or wind turbine or choose a "green" electricity supplier*.

(* Interesting conundrum: if you had a filling station with 'regular' hydrogen pumps and more expensive 'green' pumps both selling the same hydrogen from the same tank but with a promise that for every unit bought from the green pump they'd manufacture one unit of hydrogen using low-carbon energy... would people go for it? Technically, its no different to signing up with a green electricity provider, but would people accept it psychologically?)
 
Why choose the i3 over the Model S?

Why carry around all of that range (weight) and size (Tesla Model S has nearly the same footprint as a Toyota Sienna minivan) when you don't need it? I have the range extender if I ever need to go long distances, my commute is 2.2 non-bike-friendly one-way miles. If I bought a Model S I guess I would only have to charge it once a month or so? lol As it is now I only charge about once per week depending on usage.

Plus price, yes, of course. My car has every option and I got a great deal on it, plus when the lease is up I hope to get incentivized to buy it like Nissan is trying to incentivize Leaf leasee's to buy their Leaf's, I've read up to $7,000 off at end of lease. If that happens with my i3 I will have paid $40k for a $56k MSRP car. Truthfully I hope to negotiate a bit more off at the end of lease, $12-$15k. Hopefully the 200 miles Bolt and Model 3 will be out at my lease end, dropping the cars residual value down even more allowing me to snatch it up really cheap.

Nice!

Where are you planning to take the trip?

Any difficulties to charge it?
Are you in the U.S.?

If in Europe here are some difficulties as reported by DW:
http://www.dw.com/en/nine-reasons-germany-is-an-e-car-nightmare/a-18609436

We are flying to Tampa, FL for a week, not driving, although we could. I bought my car in Atlanta, GA and drove it home to Memphis, TN (~425 miles) using the range extending (REx) motor the car has. I have no difficulties charging the car, yes, I am in the US.

----

Further, I love the back doors. I am a professional student, or it seems like it, its very easy to put my backpack in the back seat or anything back there, get in and keep on trucking. Lots of i3 owners have said the back doors are great if you have kids, we don't, our dogs seem to like them as well, the "dip" allows them to have better sight outside. The styling of the car really grows on you, or it did for me, I didn't much care for it at first either but I did follow it from concept to production, signed up for the i3 "event" where they were touring the country from dealer to dealer just as they were starting to come out. Took one home for an extended test drive (3 days) last fall, was actually quite disappointed in the car, but I was charging it wrong. Then when I heard about some crazy deals being had on left-over 2014's I decided to go for it. I missed a white 2014 by about 2 days. But I ended up with my number one color choice in a 2015 in the end.

If you haven't driven one yet, you need to, the way the car drives is amazing.
 
Why carry around all of that range (weight) and size (Tesla Model S has nearly the same footprint as a Toyota Sienna minivan) when you don't need it? I have the range extender if I ever need to go long distances, my commute is 2.2 non-bike-friendly one-way miles. If I bought a Model S I guess I would only have to charge it once a month or so? lol As it is now I only charge about once per week depending on usage.

Plus price, yes, of course. My car has every option and I got a great deal on it, plus when the lease is up I hope to get incentivized to buy it like Nissan is trying to incentivize Leaf leasee's to buy their Leaf's, I've read up to $7,000 off at end of lease. If that happens with my i3 I will have paid $40k for a $56k MSRP car. Truthfully I hope to negotiate a bit more off at the end of lease, $12-$15k. Hopefully the 200 miles Bolt and Model 3 will be out at my lease end, dropping the cars residual value down even more allowing me to snatch it up really cheap.



We are flying to Tampa, FL for a week, not driving, although we could. I bought my car in Atlanta, GA and drove it home to Memphis, TN (~425 miles) using the range extending (REx) motor the car has. I have no difficulties charging the car, yes, I am in the US.

----

Further, I love the back doors. I am a professional student, or it seems like it, its very easy to put my backpack in the back seat or anything back there, get in and keep on trucking. Lots of i3 owners have said the back doors are great if you have kids, we don't, our dogs seem to like them as well, the "dip" allows them to have better sight outside. The styling of the car really grows on you, or it did for me, I didn't much care for it at first either but I did follow it from concept to production, signed up for the i3 "event" where they were touring the country from dealer to dealer just as they were starting to come out. Took one home for an extended test drive (3 days) last fall, was actually quite disappointed in the car, but I was charging it wrong. Then when I heard about some crazy deals being had on left-over 2014's I decided to go for it. I missed a white 2014 by about 2 days. But I ended up with my number one color choice in a 2015 in the end.

If you haven't driven one yet, you need to, the way the car drives is amazing.
I wish I had a 2.2 mile commute. Sadly I get trek 60 miles (one-way) for my job. I am looking at getting the Model 3, but may consider the Bolt if it has all to same tech stuff that the Model 3 is supposed to have.
 
Takata airbag?

No. Not in 2016. Now you're just being silly. :rolleyes:

Honda:

2001-2007 Accord
2001-2005 Civic
2003-2005 Civic Hybrid
2002-2006 CR-V
2003-2011 Element
2002-2004 Odyssey
2003-2008 Pilot
2002-2006 Ridgeline
2003 Acura CL
2002-2003 Acura TL
2003-2006 Acura MDX
2005 Acura RL

BMW:

2000 - 328i
2001-2006 - M3
2002-2003 - M5
2002-2006 - 325Ci
2002-2006 - 325Cic
2002-2006 - 330Ci
2002-2006 - 330Cic
2002-2005 - 325iT
2002-2005 - 325XiT
2000-2006 - 325i
2001-2006 - 325Xi
2001-2006 - 330i
2001-2006 - 330Xi
2002-2003 - 525i
2002-2003 - 525iT
2002-2003 - 530i
2002-2003 - 540i
2002-2003 - 540iT
2003-2004 - X5 3.0i
2003-2004 - X5 4.4i
 
I wish I had a 2.2 mile commute. Sadly I get trek 60 miles (one-way) for my job. I am looking at getting the Model 3, but may consider the Bolt if it has all to same tech stuff that the Model 3 is supposed to have.

Do you have the ability to charge at work? If so, check out the i3, you won't regret it! Last I heard the Model 3 won't be here until 2018, might as well lease an i3 for 2-3 years in the meantime.
 
Do you have the ability to charge at work? If so, check out the i3, you won't regret it! Last I heard the Model 3 won't be here until 2018, might as well lease an i3 for 2-3 years in the meantime.
Not in either garage my company will pay for. Nor does the Pentagon itself have charge ports for vehicles.
 
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