LeX2K

Ford claims the average commercial van drives 74 miles a day, having more range would waste energy carting around battery cells you don't need. I bet an EV van will save a small fortune in fuel and maintenance costs.

Striker223

No that wouldn't work well at all since there would be downtime on the route.....any serious use vehicle needs to able to run 24/7

AJT123

Yep, pretty stupid. It's already backfiring pretty badly. Techs are running out of range. Not even sure they're aware that any of this up north where it actually gets cold would be even more pointless.

AMIRZA786

That's definitely not a van for 24/7 use...but for a business or company that is running around the city it would work well. A Level 2 charger would fully charge it in about 3.5 hours and a fast charger in an emergency would be 15 minutes or less, so keeping it charged is really not an issue. Long distance or hours of driving would be a problem

AJT123

Lol or just fill it with gas at the beginning of the day. That would be easiest.

AMIRZA786

I can definitely see how that battery size is useful for certain scenarios. You are an Amazon delivery driver, you go from the Amazon facility and deliver around it's "hub". You are doing a lot of stop-n-go so battery use is at a minimum. Or you are some type of repair shop and you are servicing your local customers that are within that 74 mile radius. Get back to the shop in the evening, plug it into a Level 2 and 3 hours later it's charged for the next day.

My mechanic services a lot of vans for an HVAC company in San Jose, and they spend thousands on oil changes and other maint he performs. These would eliminate all these servicing costs. Of course my mechanic would probably not be too happy about that

AMIRZA786

Plugging is way, way, way easier. Park the van, in the shop at the end of the day, less than two minutes. Walk away, go home, and the next day it's fully charged or "filled up", whatever you want to call it

LeX2K

This extends to vehicles like buses maintenance and repairs are ridiculously expensive.
And cheaper. Plus these transports drive the same routes every day they know exactly what the range needs to be. Charging is far easier like you say, park and plug walk away.

AJT123

I think it's hilarious EVs are touted as so reliable when Tesla is second to worst.

Now are we starting to talk about EV busses and stuff? Yeah, easy peasy that would be.

AMIRZA786

You are mixing up reliability with fit and finish. Tesla's are extremely reliable. Fit and finish has nothing to do with reliability. My boss has already hit 150K on his Model X...zero issues except for fit and finish issues which Tesla eventually fixed. Tesla's are hundreds of times more reliable than any gasoline car. They have less than 200 moving parts while the least complicated ICE has more than 2000 moving parts that run under extreme heat and pressure

Striker223

They have more points if failure in other ways....just no engine idiots can abuse.

AMIRZA786

Those points of failures are usually very simple stuff like a control board...they don't usually leave you stranded and replaced easily at a very small cost. The more expensive components like drivetrain and battery packs are so robust that they have 10 year/100K warranties. I'm around a lot of Tesla owners, friends, family and co-workers, and other than minor annoyances like a misaligned fender (LOL, had to laugh at that), none have ever had any major issues. Even in the first 10 years, most of the early adopters had problems with stuff like screens, but none ever had a breakdown or major mechanical issue related to drivetrain/battery packs

Striker223

Uh most engines last 30 years and many companies now have 10/100k warranties. It's usually idiocy that kills engines, just today I was fixing a Kia (surprise surprise....) and the oil had gone TWO YEARS without a change and there was only 1.3 qts in the engine since the owner thought oil changes were a scam, she is a new to me customer and we had a talk after that. Turns out the car is on engine 3.....

AMIRZA786

Toyota doesn't, Honda doesn't, Mazda doesn't...I'm not saying engines can't last if you take care of them, but they have much more that can break and are under way more stresses. Case in point, my daughters 2006 Toyota Camry, right now has about 160K. In 2019 I had to change the power steering pump and all the hoses (power steering leak), and the radiator (radiator cracked) and everything associated with it like hoses. $3000 parts, labor. Previous to that I had to change all the belts (timing etc), water pump, sparkplugs, transmission fluid...$1500K. Just last month I had to change all the engine mounts...I had to Zelle my daughter $1500. And I'm one of those who takes care of my cars and changes the oil every 5K and performs routine maint.

In an EV besides the consumable stuff, there is nothing to break. The electric motors can go easily for 300K 400K, the battery packs if properly managed can go for 16 years. The way my brakes and rotors are wearing, I can easily go 100K before a brake job. On the hottest day if I drive my Polestar 100 miles at 100 mph, I can put my finger in the coolant and it barely more than room temp. In an ICE engine, heat and friction are the enemy, in an EV that's just no the case.

I might go through tires more though because of the extra weight

Striker223

Yeah and one battery is at least 2x at least vs that at it WILL happen. I also have a car older than that that didn't need anything like that, it all depends. An EV is simply more expensive to own as it sits right now pound for pound. You probably can't do 100 miles at 100 due to limited energy, I have done 120mph for more than 150 miles multiple times though since an ICE once warm is designed to be at that state no problem and has a insanely large energy reserve. There is SO much to break on an EV, you still have a suspension, body control systems, and on and on and on...the only things you don't have are the engine and trans. Everything else is still there and I only get 15% of my revenue from engines

The other major issue is that all that you paid for the gas car is only really $500 of parts and about 8 hours of time, there is no way to get parts for EVs or coding for the parts so right now and for the foreseeable future you are forced to pay dealer prices.