G. David Felt

Saw a 1995 Buick Road Master Special Edition Station Wagon with fake wood siding and all the trimmings, seen better days, driven by a boomer and even had the crazy bumper sticker of "Trump is My President" ?

The Hyundai / Waymo multi-year strategic partnership will see the Hyundai Ioniq 5 enter autonomous taxi service with the IONIQ 5 being built for Waymo on the Hyundai Georgia assembly line and testing to begin by late 2025 with Waymo customer riders having access in the 2026 calendar year. To quote Jose Munoz, global COO of Hyundai Motors and President and CEO of Hyundai Motor North America: “Hyundai and Waymo share a vision to improve the safety, efficiency and convenience of how people move. Waymo’s transformational technology is improving road safety where they operate, and the IONIQ 5 is the ideal vehicle to scale this further. The team at our new manufacturing facility is ready to allocate a significant number of vehicles for the Waymo One fleet as it continues to expand. Importantly, this is the first step in the partnership between the two companies and we are actively exploring additional opportunities for collaboration.” Chang Song, President and head of Hyundai Motor Group's Advanced Vehicle Platform (AVP) stated the following: “There is no better partner for our first agreement in this initiative than industry-leader Waymo. We recently announced the launch of Hyundai Motor Company’s autonomous vehicle foundry business to provide global autonomous driving companies with vehicles capable of implementing SAE Level 4 or higher autonomous driving technology.” AVP has stated the following: Hyundai Motor details a flexible response approach to market conditions and focus on electrification through its ‘Hyundai Way’ strategy Targeting 5.55 million annual global sales by 2030, up 30% from 2023 Aiming to sell 2 million EVs per year globally by 2030 Plan to introduce new EREV models, a new type of EV with a range of more than 900 km (559 miles) on a single charge, in North America and China Aiming to offer a full lineup of 21 EV models by 2030, ranging from affordable to luxury and high-performance Introducing enhanced next-generation hybrid system with improved performance and fuel efficiency Plans to expand HEV offerings to 14 models from the current seven; Genesis luxury brand will also offer hybrid models Continuously pushing for battery technology internalization; develop affordable NCM batteries and strengthen safety technology Plans to commercialize autonomous driving vehicle foundry business; to supply autonomous vehicles to global autonomous driving software firms Aiming to secure top-tier energy leadership during the energy transition period by strengthening Group-wide hydrogen technology capabilities across the value chain Plan to make a significant investment of KRW 120.5 trillion through 2033 to support the ‘Hyundai Way’ strategy Employ new target shareholder return (TSR) of over 35% and rollout of a share buyback scheme of up to KRW 4 trillion from 2025 to 2027 Per Hyundai, the strategic relationship will see an implementation across the Hyundai Family of auto divisions with Level 2 through Level 4 autonomous driving in both Hyundai and Genesis products starting in 2026 with EREV playing a prominent role in bridging the move to electrification for global customers. EREV are electric vehicles with a gas generator to optimize long distance driving. With WAYMO already have multiple self driving taxi services in select cities, this strategic partnership would imply that Hyundai is ready to leapfrog Tesla in having their auto's be truly self driving and with Waymo tech at a Level 4+ of autonomous driving, this would imply just that. Do you think Hyundai will Leapfrog Tesla? View full article

Toyota Motor Corporation has joined the IONNA network to support their EV auto's is the first part of what has happened with IONNA, but the next is that IONNA broke ground on building their first 10 Covered Stall Fast Charging station that will offer both CCS and NACS along with a place to relax and refuel the body. The 10 stalls will offer charging at up to 400kWs and 800+volt charging service. The location of this first station is APEX North Carolina. Ionna has also finally appointed a CTO for the company, this person is Jackie Slope as CTO of the new venture.   View full article

Watch out for who wears glasses. https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/other/college-students-used-meta-s-smart-glasses-to-dox-people-in-real-time/ar-AA1rATLI?ocid=BingHp01&cvid=c1b3480336dc49a9b1c3adc0c51611d3&ei=85

WOW, Thanks @A Horse With No Name for posting the videos, that area is going to be hit hard for years to come from this storm.

Interesting CR study that coves some interesting EV info. Link if the PDF file does not download for you: https://u21687886.ct.sendgrid.net/ls/click?upn=u001.iadG0tRuH77wgV7bNCoWhASAFSn33kVtnWJwXtsBJtZgaCIGY7Biv6-2BOW9IV-2FQ0UZA7FiiNnXrJ5v-2B-2F9GYH4R1fAGH1Zvfbeoex0DmBKwvRTlkz6RdcQ0eJOZ9UHL7gmtr3-2FjwG2F-2BwfiY-2B5nzb4PoBqGq4q3nSlgV48Wcpfok1WDLXgDxPHQEop0zyjDwzXlajepR0sHAmYYQPwxoWzaEdrMEpmV8WXHZkD552ZHUc-3DIke3_pnbeO0JlXQ32WaBds8sgBijUCJQzc2xGazVUgDNadr2YudLZUvvenMSodUeRKm6DR5wO7VlD3j8RJjqcgJIch6W-2BymDtWQ-2BsKesbjyvG739KTczQpM5-2Fn0h7lrRehTUpZU4Kf2HI-2F0tEidnXyKJRLZTNNMYduK-2FK-2BpO0mssDgHRQz9fXlHfNPL1cDoTQGVGTOkSG71lt6JQ9VlQgHUase1Yx5vFLPRmhUJdn20lAeR54nyCCLeo6-2FCQvwZvKhi7ciYb-2F4reLQ1bOX82c7CckMmlLUiXspkMPh2NWByB6c5RnRdOsNUaNLYo-2FnqGMC03z CR’s+Guide+to+EV+-+PHEV+Ratings-October+2024.pdf

Very interesting read. I have always felt that immigrants helped this country, and the facts are proving that out. Most immigrants start their own business than take existing jobs. This is some interesting facts that help explain how we continue to grow our GNP. Are immigrants taking jobs from 'native' U.S. workers? Here's what economists say (msn.com)

Some will love the Mach e Rally

Ford wants to be your EV choice! A Ford Survey was conducted from September 13th to 17th, 2024 covering a total of 2,007 respondents and highlighted the following: Most respondents do not understand how home charging works. Most respondents do not know where you would buy or how to get a home charger. Most respondents do not understand how you go about getting the charger installed. All respondents had no idea what the cost might be or if it was affordable to have a home charger installed. To quote Ford: "Ford believes it will take more than jumbo rebates to truly break through with the estimated 19 million people in the U.S. interested in electric vehicles. It will take – you guessed it – convenience, peace of mind, and expert service. It will take a modern-day version of the friendly filling station, only this time you “fill ’er up” at home." Ford Power Promise Anouncement today is the following, Home is where the charge is, On-the-Road charging with confidence, Battery Confidence, Ongoing support and guidance Ford Power Promise Fact Sheet.pdf Ford has been focused on making public charging easier with the joining of the Tesla Supercharging station network added to the Ford BlueOval Charge Network and now they are taking this one step farther as federal rebates will not be enough for the bulk of folks looking to move over to an EV. People loved their old Bronco's, F100, F150 pickups, SUVs and cars, but gone are the days of stopping at a gas station and having the windshield cleaned, tire pressure checked, quart of oil added if needed by a team of attendants. Now you have to pump your own gas and pay an attendant sitting behind a plexiglass wall as you get your lottery tickets and energy drinks. People want less maintenance and easier filling up, Ford Power is going to deliver that with Home Charging and a superior experience via the BlueOval charge network. Ford Power Promise Gives Electric Vehicle Customers New Confidence | Ford Media Center View full article

Maybe time to rethink this. Have you looked at the lease cost on an F150 Lighting? Ford is now paying to also include besides the GOV rebates, a level 2 hardwired charger at home. Ford Power Promise Gives Electric Vehicle Customers New Confidence | Ford Media Center Going to write up a quick story on this now.

@A Horse With No Name Thank you for posting that video, WOW, that is crazy the amount of water that came down. We had a Category 5 Atmospheric River storm that was expected to hit Oregon and Washington last week, at the last minute the storm pushed north into Vancouver BC up to Anchorage Alaska with over 6" of rain fall per hour over a 24hr period, flooding and so much crazy water. Lucky it hit mostly uninhabited space.

I agree, do not buy it when it already needs new shocks and not just the one, replace them all. Have them check the alignment and ball joints, if it has been driven on a bad blown out shock, there could be other suspension issues. Just be cautious.

@surreal1272 @ccap41 The CyberJUNK is a joke and IMHO a alpha test that people are paying for so Tesla can figure out how to build a so called truck. Rivian is so far superior in this manner. Tesla Cybertruck breaks down after going through car wash | The Independent Another story on the car wash problem. Can You Put a Cybertruck Through a Car Wash? (dailydot.com) Seems according to Tesla, one has to go through a very detailed change to use an auto wash, they recomment washing the CyberJUNK by hand. Cleaning (tesla.com) What a joke, I just pull into a touchfree auto wash in my EV9 and it gets nice and clean and I drive away, no need to do all this crap and yes the EV9 has auto sensing wipers, but just one turn on the stalk and it is off and they are already hidden out of the way.

Looking good Robert! Relaxing to recharge the soul as they say.

Industry standard to turn over the table as otherwise you sit there having another cup of coffee and they generate no money. They want you to leave asap so they can get another seating of customers to order their food. All about the turnover rate of a table to make money. The days of yor when you would sit for another 30 minutes to an hour enjoying your coffee what not what modern places want.

Kia has announced plans to have access to Tesla Charging stations and the converter starting in January 2025. KIA AMERICA TO OFFER NORTH AMERICAN CHARGING STANDARD (NACS) ADAPTERS IN EARLY 2025 (kiamedia.com)

So the tires on my EV9 are rated at 50,000 miles and I have not noticed really any wear in the almost 9000 miles we have driven so far. Both the AWD and the RWD have snow mode which was tested in Norway by Kia where they developed it so I will know more as I use it to go skiing this year, but reviews have been solid about those with RWD in Snow having no problem getting around. Yes this is on an AWD, but I see plenty of reviews you can read about the RWD. One thing this guy points out is that the EV9 has all the physical buttons that so many of us have pointed out for basic use stuff. https://www.caranddriver.com/reviews/a61108648/2024-kia-ev9-land-awd-reliability-maintenance/ Reviews for the All Season Tires on the EV9 seem to be very solid. Kumho Crugen EV HP71 Listed as #10 on the list. https://www.bestproductsreviews.com/kumho-tires?targetid=dat-2336599648382060:loc-190&matchtype=b&device=c&campaignid=424505904&creative=&adgroupid=1356798789474024&feeditemid=&loc_physical_ms=109642&loc_interest_ms=&network=o&devicemodel=&placement=&keyword=$ALL&target=&aceid={aceid}&adposition=&trackid=us_all_top_1_1&mId=407-132-4411&trackOld=true&msclkid=c08099c18ca914a0792dff32ea83ff1d

ChargePoint Gets $19M Funding to Install Fast Charging Ports (yahoo.com) Very cool that all 248 DC fast chargers will be able to handle pushing power up to 500kW to an ev and they will be dual charging poles allowing 2 evs to charge at the same time. Faster charging, less time sitting around.

@ccap41 While I think the Lincoln is not bad for what they have listed, the question I would ask is what is your monthly budget for car payment as the lots have plenty of steel on them and right now there are lots of options including leasing on some very nice options. Compared to what I am paying, Kia EV9 start @ $299 a month for a 36 month lease with with them having over 300 miles of range, the EV9 is far nicer and more enjoyable to drive than the Lincoln or my SS was. Kia is also giving you the first 1000kW of charging at Electrify America so that is 10 charge ups if you do the full 100kW battery pack or if you always just do the 18 min to 80% it will do you well. Worth test driving and checking out as there are some great deals on the leasing of an EV. Otherwise if the other person does not take the Lincoln, I would then consider it but be aware that premium fuel is what I would put in it, synthetic oil changes and things will start to need repairing. I am seeing lots of discounts on buying too.

This is very cool and exciting technology Solid-state battery with 1,070 Wh/L energy to be game-changer for EVs (interestingengineering.com)

Very cool

Gambling is like flushing your cash down the toilet. I only go to Vegas once a year for the tradeshow, otherwise, a place I can do without.