G. David Felt

Gassed up the SS at Costco and in comes the twins, Toyota Matrix and Pontiac Vibe. I stated to the two owners that it has been a long time since I saw the twins on the road around here. Glad to see some still alive. Toyota Owner looked confused and asked why I said that, I explained, and he immediately denied it was co-built with GM. The Pontiac owner agreed with me and said it was a great little low maintenance auto he has owned since his parents had bought it new and gave it to him when he graduated college. I told the Toyota Owner you can look it up online as it is built alongside the Vibe in a factory that was 50/50 GM/Toyota. Again, he denied it was true as all Toyota autos are built only by Toyota as they are the best quality autos in the world. I laughed and said is that why they have had millions of recalls lately because they are the best in the world? The Pontiac owner laughed also and encouraged the guy to look online while he was gassing up. He did, his facial expression changed, and he once done hung up the gas hose, forgot to get this receipt that printed and just took off. Guess that bubble popped and deflated his day!

That is a good question, I know here in Washington they are not, they show up on the medical reporting as Medical/Surgical Covid positive afterwards. Right now, no hospital is doing elective surgeries, so anyone going in a hospital is for a valid surgical issue or for Covid. They are tracking it here separately to be clear on the cases of Covid only. I will look around the CDC reporting to see if they have an exception statement or clearly state the differences. Would be good to know.

No, not on Tesla. Cadillac has stated they will be on the LYRIQ.

Seems Tesla has revealed the refreshed Tesla S & X. Now comes with the Tesla Performance edition 3/Y headlamps which are adaptive headlights. CCS2 is now the global charge port, otherwise no real changes to the auto line. Tesla Model S Refresh Revealed In Taiwan With New Features (insideevs.com) Crazy that you pay 6 figures and now start to get the same equipment that comes on the less expensive 3/Y models. Charge port door is now the same as the 3/Y manual no release switch inside the auto. Rubber boot to cover the new CCS2 charge port to keep water out of it. Bet the rubber charge port cover becomes a top replacement purchase on Amazon.

This kind of thing is what makes this so sad as over 90% of those being hospitalized are the unvaccinated. U.S. reports record 1.3M Covid cases in a day as hospitalizations soar (nbcnews.com) At least 1,343,167 new Covid infections were identified on Monday, according to the tally, sweeping past the previous record of 1,044,970 cases that had been set on Jan. 3. So much of this could be avoided if those people would honestly look, use their brain and consider the science. Sadly, 30% of the nation medical staff feel this is overblown and are not vaccinated and with the Supreme Court reviewing the vaccination mandate, firings have been put on hold for Federal, State, County, city government jobs. Private sector is another thing as some companies have moved forward with vaccine mandates to keep your job due to at will employment. This also is why I am hearing from my sister and others who are nurses at hospitals: southern states have seen the largest shift in hospitalizations over the past two weeks, with the seven-day averages for hospitalizations in Louisiana up 341 percent from 340 to 1,501 over the past two weeks, while Florida has seen its average soar by 277 percent from 2,426 to 9,169, Why help those that want to fight the benefits of vaccinated, Private Hospitals are being asked by their own employees to prioritize vaccinated people over unvaccinated as the ones to help. A crazy world we live in now.

True, but even the Nissan Leaf info that has been shared from last year's Texas Winter storm show they did pretty good. It makes sense that an EV would only need to run the electric seats and or heat pump / heater to stay warm rather than run everything the way an ICE would.

Interesting the FEAR EVs give to some as this editorial is pathetic, but understandable on how cherry-picking details fails the public in pushing writing like this out. Opinion | Imagine Virginia’s traffic jam but with only electric vehicles - The Washington Post You then have ones like this that use science to show that EVs actually do much better than ICE in a traffic jam like this. Yes Batteries loose more than gas, but use less power than ICE when idling and for Tesla they have Camping mode, so a blanket and heated seats keeps you warmer than running an ICE auto at a much cheaper rate. How Long Can A Tesla Keep You Warm In A Frozen Traffic Jam? "Dirty Tesla" Finds Out - CleanTechnica Some Quotes from real people stuck in the traffic jam. Tesla owners caught in the traffic jam and in one of the comments to his video, a user noted that a pregnant woman from the Facebook Tesla Divas group shared that she was stuck in her Tesla for 16 hours during the traffic jam. Her battery was at 74% and only dropped to 61% by the time she got home. She simply turned-on Camp Mode and slept. To answer the Washington Post’s question, the Teslas did pretty well during 18 hours of freezing temperatures. He noted that he used solar at home to charge his cars but included the cost of electricity for those who may not have solar at home. 12 Hour Check-in The Model Y battery level went from 91% down to 58%. It used 26.5 kWh at 0.16 per kWh, which would cost $4.22. The Model X battery dropped from 90% to 47% and used 43 kWh at 0.16 per kWh, which would cost $6.88. 18 Hour Check-in During this portion, he had lowered the inside temperatures of the cars to 60 degrees. The Model Y battery went from 58% down to 48%, with 8 kWh used at 0.16 per kWh costing $1.28. I agree with the Conclusion here: Although he didn’t include the results for the Model X at 18 hours, it should be noted that it cost under $10 to stay warm in freezing conditions. However, as he emphasized, with planning for emergencies such as the Virginia icy traffic jam disaster, one could survive up to 36 hours in their car. He also noted that both ICEVs and EVs have their advantages and disadvantages during emergencies, but I want to emphasize that the average American who owns a gas car and thinks EVs are ill equipped to handle emergencies probably spent more than $10 to keep warm during this event — much more. Typical misinformation, or FUD (fear, uncertainty, and doubt), often permeates the collective during disasters such as the one in Virginia. And the Washington Post — which is a news organization with access to research, information, and data — chose not to use that and spread the idea that it would have been worse off with EVs than without.

Lat night on the way home from running an errand, saw my first blue VW ID4 EV in the wild. Have to say they look better in person than photos and I like the lighting on the outside, the turn lights are an outline of the headlight, very easy to see, very quiet and looked good. Impressed with the look, just too small for me.

INFLATION!!!

@oldshurst442 Since I work with CDC, John Hopkins, Harvard Medical and Oxford all on the Covid front of research, they are expecting new versions that will require boosters this year. As such, the CDC has changed to every 6 months for a booster shot against Covid. Pfizer will have an Omnicron Booster out in May time frame. Moderna is expecting to follow a month later or so and right now we are hitting new highs in hospitalizations of 146,000 per day. U.S. COVID hospitalizations hit record high : Shots - Health News : NPR Omicron pushes U.S. COVID hospitalizations toward record high | Reuters COVID-19 Hospitalizations (cdc.gov) Sadly, we have new variants already taking hold. New COVID variant ‘IHU’ with 46 mutations detected in France (yahoo.com) New Potential Covid Virus Variants Of Concern (forbes.com) What do we know so far about the new Mu COVID-19 variant? | World Economic Forum (weforum.org) SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern as of 5 January 2022 (europa.eu) As such, I would say you need to expect another jab or two and that 2023 is the true year we will see things start to ease up as the world starts to reach towards what some call Herd Immunity. Getting Vaccines was slow during the Influenza pandemic of 1918, we are at least getting better about getting updated vaccines out and communicating it.

My Escalade was $194 this year, my SS was $212.

Thanks for posting this, it does make me realize that my auto tabs on like my Escalade have gone down every year, but this year it went up by $35 dollars as we have a lite rail tax being added to help pay for the system that is under construction and will open in 2024, working from Northgate here to the airport through Seattle, but south to Federal Way and North to Lynnwood open in 2024 so we will have that as a 40 year added tax to the auto tab cost.

Sheeple

VinFast is Vietnam's first Volume auto company, but it is not stopping there as this is a division of the Vingroup, the largest real-estate company and largest private enterprise in Vietnam. VinFast aims to make "Made in Vietnam" a household term by becoming the largest auto and motorbike brand in Southeast Asia. VinFast has a massive Billion-dollar factory in Hai Phong that opened in September 2019. They started with a local 5-person saloon car and 7 person SUV and added a 3rd small hatchback. Working with the Global auto design studios, Pininfarina, Zagato, Torino and Italdesign, VinFast believes they will have the best global desired 20 vehicle portfolio These were the original sketches that were released in 2019. We fast forward to 2022 CES show where VinFast unveiled three new models to join the existing models. The model lineup goes by the naming convention of VF5, VF6, VF7 which join the existing VF8 and VF9. The VF8 & 9 had other names but were changed for the 2022 model year to be in the same naming convention as the rest of the models. One would have to say not a very imaginative naming system. Very boring and bland much like who a few German companies name their autos. The VF 8 and VF 9 are taking reservations at this time for release in 2024 from manufacturing. The VF8 will start from $41,000 and the VF9 will start from $56,000. The prices do not include destination or the cost of a mandatory battery lease. Unlike many other companies, VinFast believes customers would rather buy the auto and then choose the size of battery pack they want and via the lease system be able to scale up or down on size to meet their needs. The VF8 & 9 will come with dual-motor powertrain making 402 HP and 472 lb-ft of torque. VF8 is quoted to have a 300-mile range, VF9 is quoted to have a 400-mile range at launch. VinFast has a current line of Autos and Scooters that are ICE, they are transitioning over to BEVs and BEVs are the only thing planned for the U.S. at this time according to their press release. One can look at their current lineup here: Homepage (vinfastauto.com) For the U.S. Market, VinFast has stood up the following web site: VinFast (vinfastauto.us) Currently the VF8 & 9 BEVs are listed on the U.S. web site as the VF e35 and e36. VinFast has their CES website here with videos: VinFast Global EV Day | VinFast (vinfastauto.us) The big question to ask is that many Chinese auto companies have announced they will enter the U.S. auto market and have failed. Will VinFast finally succeed? Next question to ask is how will consumers feel about mandatory battery leases? 'VinFast', Vietnam’s First Ever Carmaker, Unveils Logo - Logo Designer - Logo Designer (logo-designer.co) View full article

VinFast is Vietnam's first Volume auto company, but it is not stopping there as this is a division of the Vingroup, the largest real-estate company and largest private enterprise in Vietnam. VinFast aims to make "Made in Vietnam" a household term by becoming the largest auto and motorbike brand in Southeast Asia. VinFast has a massive Billion-dollar factory in Hai Phong that opened in September 2019. They started with a local 5-person saloon car and 7 person SUV and added a 3rd small hatchback. Working with the Global auto design studios, Pininfarina, Zagato, Torino and Italdesign, VinFast believes they will have the best global desired 20 vehicle portfolio These were the original sketches that were released in 2019. We fast forward to 2022 CES show where VinFast unveiled three new models to join the existing models. The model lineup goes by the naming convention of VF5, VF6, VF7 which join the existing VF8 and VF9. The VF8 & 9 had other names but were changed for the 2022 model year to be in the same naming convention as the rest of the models. One would have to say not a very imaginative naming system. Very boring and bland much like who a few German companies name their autos. The VF 8 and VF 9 are taking reservations at this time for release in 2024 from manufacturing. The VF8 will start from $41,000 and the VF9 will start from $56,000. The prices do not include destination or the cost of a mandatory battery lease. Unlike many other companies, VinFast believes customers would rather buy the auto and then choose the size of battery pack they want and via the lease system be able to scale up or down on size to meet their needs. The VF8 & 9 will come with dual-motor powertrain making 402 HP and 472 lb-ft of torque. VF8 is quoted to have a 300-mile range, VF9 is quoted to have a 400-mile range at launch. VinFast has a current line of Autos and Scooters that are ICE, they are transitioning over to BEVs and BEVs are the only thing planned for the U.S. at this time according to their press release. One can look at their current lineup here: Homepage (vinfastauto.com) For the U.S. Market, VinFast has stood up the following web site: VinFast (vinfastauto.us) Currently the VF8 & 9 BEVs are listed on the U.S. web site as the VF e35 and e36. VinFast has their CES website here with videos: VinFast Global EV Day | VinFast (vinfastauto.us) The big question to ask is that many Chinese auto companies have announced they will enter the U.S. auto market and have failed. Will VinFast finally succeed? Next question to ask is how will consumers feel about mandatory battery leases? 'VinFast', Vietnam’s First Ever Carmaker, Unveils Logo - Logo Designer - Logo Designer (logo-designer.co) View full article

So how do you make the extreme wealthy that is far more conservative and not the ones to spend money actually spend money on these expensive 6 figure EVs? Tech workers are the main supporting area of BEVs and that is the growth area of high middle-income folks, not the wealthy. As such, I think you are overestimating how many of the 1% class will embrace BEVs. Selling BEVs to the ultra-conservative 1% crowd is a much bigger challenge than selling to the high-tech crowd.

Correct, Dealers do not pay MSRP, but they also do not pay the dealer invoice, this is a paper shell game as they get the OEM Hold back amount which on some auto's is a percentage and on others is a set amount that the OEM refunds to the dealer when said auto is sold. I think at this point, everyone here knows the basics of the dealership, the pricing games played. The point that many here have stated is it would be nicer to have the option of buying direct from the OEM rather than a Dealer, pay their MSRP (Manufactured Suggested Retail Price) rather than haggle at the dealership. Yes, in the past Pre-Pandemic and Chip shortage, one could haggle if they are prepared from the Dealer Invoice, taking in to account the hold back and order up the exact auto they want. Sadly most, 99.9999% of people do not have the ability to save, prep and plan to do this, as such they accept what is on the lot to buy/lease be it new or CPO. Yes I started this multiple page discussion / debate due to my hatred for AMV 2nd stickers and what I perceive as a piss poor business practice that States should investigate as it had led to manipulation and what I believe is a rip off of the consumer. I also will go on record that at this point, the dealership laws of states are not only out of date, but OEM auto companies need to drop saying MSRP and just go with MRP. Ensure there is a fair profit to the OEM and if they want dealers to survive, a proper profit for them and make it where they lose their dealership franchise if they do AMV stickers on new auto's. I am willing to bet that the majority, more than 2/3rds of the U.S. population would be happy to see a new auto announced, pricing and know going to the OEM store, online or a franchise location that the price they saw is what they will pay. I think this topic has played itself out and encourage us to move on with other topics. IN ALTERNATIVE FUELS PROPULLSION RANDOM news: Toyota will have their solid-state battery first out in the Prius Hybrid line, not in BEV @ 2025 Interesting talking points: 2:45 Toyota admits problems with hybrids 4:08 Toyota admits ineffective petrol cars, 10 MW. Imagine how many miles a BEV can do with 10 MW. A question I would ask him is if Toyota is to be the Solid-State Battery leader, then why have they been lobbying so hard to halt the push of BEVs, Mileage standards and Pollution Standards?

Sheep

What I love for the most part about Washington, mild winter weather, solid health care and a pay as you go state, so no state income tax, just a basic 10% sales tax. Nice part is you can be just a few hours from the core of Seattle and be very rural and still only be 30 min from the downtown of smaller surrounding cities. I DO NOT handle heat well at all, so I will never move to the southern states. For me, it would appear that we will stay in this house till death do us part as the wife wants to stay close to the kids. Good thing I bought back in 1999 as it was cheap and this was rural then, now considered Suburbs.

Hey BIFF, Wanna re-think that statement as I would not say sales #'s in the U.S. is good. Based on just the U.S. and Canada Numbers, the G-Wagon should be discontinued based on your posted past statements about other auto companies. More interesting is that Mercedes-Benz no longer breaks out the G-Wagon as it is part of the G-Class of SUVs and so one has to wonder how many they really sold? Seems their starting to make it grey to really see how many sales by model number. Mercedes-Benz sees strong demand as high-end and electrified vehicle sales surge - Daimler Global Media Site I will say that MB had greater than other auto companies drop in sales. Interesting is that MB USA still breaks down the model numbers in reporting compaired to the Parent Company web site. so G-Class it would seem is the G-Wagon of past and still not that great of sales numbers. If the parent company site is using the same, then the G-Class / G-Wagon sold just a little over 41,000 globally. Which still is nothing compared to other SUVs here in the US by sales numbers alone. So then I think that GM is on the right path to success as the Escalade has been selling well in both standard and ESV numbers globally. So seems MB G-Class is finally catching up to Cadillac.

@surreal1272 I find it speaks volumes when SMK is presented with facts and yet he chooses to ignore my post that shows he is full of BS and move the goal posts with an ever-changing Apples to Oranges comparison and excuses while attacking American Business. Seems he needs to move to Germany.

I myself would rather have a GM or FORD store, check out the item and decide if I want to pay the price they are asking and if not move onto another company. Dealerships are hell to deal with and the public has made this very clear as well as states where they have sued and forced a dealership to sell due to the sleaze tactics they have taken against people.

YOU ARE SO FULL OF BS!!! GM has plenty of rides selling north of $100K and GMC is proving under the Denali to be one of their best profit margin lines of auto's. Ford #'s for 2021 show more people are choosing Green Mach-e to quote their own press release of numbers: December 2021 Press Release (ford.com) Mach-e sold 27,140 for 2021 increase of 904,566.7% Mustang sold 61,090 for 2021 decreased 14.2% Meanwhile Mrecedes-Benz really is not increasing sales in the US, Van sales dropped 20+% in 2021 and EV sales for the US is a pathetic 443 EQS sold. GLOBALLY, Sales are down 5%, to quote the MB press release on their BEV's: Deliveries of Mercedes-Benz plug-in hybrid and electric passenger cars reached a record 227,458 units (+69.3%) of which 48,936 were Mercedes-EQ battery electric passenger cars (BEV) (+154.8%). Including smart and Mercedes-Benz Vans, total BEV sales rose above 99,000 units. The bulk of this was China with Europe coming in second and still MB does not have anything for the masses in Europe.

Interesting read, looked at the pdf and I do question some of the findings, but a good read nonetheless. https://www.roadandtrack.com/news/a38698676/does-anyone-want-an-electric-car/