G. David Felt

WOW, Seems Tesla is going cheaper after downgrading chips and parts in China made auto's but not lower costs in relation to the cheaper parts per China Government. Tesla's Terrible Year In China Is Not Getting Any Better (jalopnik.com) Tesla Is in Trouble With the Chinese Government After It Surreptitiously Downgraded the Chips in Some of Its Model 3s (businessinsider.com) Now sales have tanked for China almost 50% drop in orders. Tesla Motors, Inc. (NASDAQ:TSLA) - Tesla's China Orders Fall Almost 50% in May | Benzinga Stock taking the hit. Tesla Stock Price Dip After Chinese Sales Decline | HYPEBEAST Sales of alternative auto EVs are exploding, seems Tesla has a Problem.

Interesting speed video.

Seems the Hits keep coming to Tesla, per Musk, people who buy Tesla 3 & Y are not using their lumbar supports so bye bye they go but no price cut for the lost feature. Tesla has also removed all the radars in their auto's saying they can do full self driving with cameras only. So another safety feature Tesla talked about having Radar and Cameras in the past are gone and no you do not pay less. Seems for a luxury auto company, they are discontenting their auto's fast and rising prices with the blame on suppliers. Tesla Model 3 and Y Lose Adjustable Lumbar Due to "Almost no Usage" (motortrend.com) Interesting how as pointed out by the writer, Lumbar is one of those things you usually set and forget as it is not going to be tweaked daily so of course not much reporting in the logs. Tesla is starting to equal cheapness! ?

The Global Ocean has the largest amount of Lithium compared to other sources. Problem is that it is in extremely low concentrations. Scientists have cost-effectively harvested lithium from seawater - Electrek According to this story, seems scientists have come up with a way to harvest the lithium as well as a few other benefits. Is it too good to be true? That is a valid question, but seems the reviews of their science have been backed with positive reviews from peers. Scaling is now the next phase. If they can do this removing it from the oceans, getting other benefits also from filtering the ocean water, that would be a boon to lithium supplies.

Based on solid financial reviews, seems Tesla and the rest of the EV only companies are hurting. During the change over period, ICE will help finance BEV development and future growth. Ford and GM is both a recommended investment of $1,000 by Motley Fool for future growth that will be better than any of the EV startups. Tesla lost their biggest customer FCA that was buying Half a Billion a quarter in CO2 credits to offset the Ram, Jeep, Dodge and Chrysler lines. With the recent merge, they are now balanced by all the rest of the world tiny fuel efficient products. Hard for any company to replace $500,000,000 million a quarter loss like that and it was the bulk that gave Tesla a Profit. Next Quarter could be a red blood bath at Tesla as Sales are NOT going up as you have stated. Seems lots of people are interested in buying EV's but would rather have an established company with dealerships, service centers and a known history compared to Tesla. I do not see Tesla dying now, but as both Ford and GM roll out so many EV options over the next couple of years, this is going to hurt Tesla and we have all the other established auto makers also rolling out EVs. End result is Tesla is going to have to really step up and compete otherwise alternative things happen. GM and Ford Are Leaving Electric Vehicle Stocks in the Dust | The Motley Fool

Has a Glitch in the Matrix been found? Newsweek had this story on a reddit post, very interesting. Glitch in the Matrix' Found After People Spot 'CGI Water' Coming Out of Faucet (newsweek.com) The comments are amusing.

Pictures Please

Electric auto updates for the day. BYD, one of North America's largest school bus builders has announced their electric bus product line. The buses have a 155 mile range, more than enough for a typical bus route. They come in 35, 38 & 40 foot lengths with seating up to 84 kids and can be equipped with ADA liftgates. The buses much like what BYD sells in Europe will have bi-directional charging and BYD says that the electric school buses cut fuel cost and maintenance cost by 60% when compared to Diesel versions. I will say they are very nice compared to the school buses of the 80 I rode in growing up. BYD to Revolutionize Electric School Buses - BYD USA BMW has revealed their all-new I4 BEV sedan for North America with deliveries starting Autumn 2021. The first-ever BMW i4. (bmwgroup.com) You can find a very long list of firsts that BMW is claiming at the press release link above. There are also a ton of high res pictures and videos also. Just included two here of the HUGE kidney front end that is a Love Hate relationship I suspect for many. Tesla 3 was clearly the yard stick to measure by as this is a BMW clone pretty much of what Tesla Built. Interior dash Interior back with rear seats folded down. Not very flat for sure. Final news is from 7-Eleven. They had over the last couple decades moved away from having gas stations with their stores though one can find many around still. 7-Eleven has announced that by the end of 2021, they will have 500 Fast DC charging stations installed at select 7-Eleven stores. 7-Eleven has also stated that they are pushing to reduce their own CO2 emission by 50% by 2030 and this starts by having all Texas and Illinois stores powered by 100% wind energy. Florida stores will be powered by Solar energy. Other states will come online to support green energy as solutions are presented in each state joining their original state of Washington using 100% hydro power. Tuesday, June 01, 2021 PR: 7-Eleven Charges Forward with Installation of 500 Electric Vehicle Ports by End of 2022, Providing Convenient Charging Options that Drive a More Sustainable Future

The hey days of Tesla are behind them as more auto makers join the BEV market. Way superior options over Tesla. That is not to say that I am not grateful for Tesla pushing the EV market and they do have pretty solid powertrains, but that is where it ends. You can buy Tesla Power Trains and battery packs from various EV parts sellers like EVwest and use them in your own conversions, but the rest of Tesla Auto's seem to have found no market beyond his fanatic fans. Amazing the amount of parts from Tesla new, for sale. EV West - Electric Vehicle Parts, Components, EVSE Charging Stations, Electric Car Conversion Kits

@ocnblu is still around he was on here at 5:32pm on Sunday looking over things. Probably all the BEV stuff is making him a little upset in his tender tummy.

What else would you expect from a company that does not believe in BEV as they think the world should be Hydrogen.

Run Away

? Looking around and Tesla is NOT SAYING 750,000 miles of maintenance free driving. Cybertruck | Tesla Finally found the only places that mention that crazy figure and NO They do not quote Tesla, more of a Tesla Fanatic thinking Tesla can outlast everyone, but we have seen past and current quality and that is not happening with Tesla auto's. The Tesla Cybertruck Isn’t A Pickup — It's Much, Much More | CleanTechnica This is probably one of the best REALISTIC posts about Cybertruck. The person clearly states that the Heat Pump and Air Bladder system on the air suspension even if commercial grade will have to be replaced at 100,000 miles or at least rebuilt / serviced. Also an overall decent list of the service / replacement parts that would be needed on the Cybertruck. CyberTruck longevity | Tesla Motors Club Best part of this is that someone on the channel was stupid enough to say that Tesla's outlast all ICE. Another person posted a nice long list of competition trucks all between 461,000 and 872,000 miles on the odometer, verified via carfax listed for sale on autotrader at dealerships. Hard to have a GM or Ford that clearly has outlasted any current Tesla and for sale.

Key Lime Pie

Toyota has brought their First BEV that will go into production to the US for feedback from the public. BZ4X is their awd CUV with an estimated 250-300 miles of battery range.

German Car Watching

RIGHT! The Semi will change, but that is very long term, to quote @balthazar changing the trucking industry to pure electric will probably take till 2275 while new sales might end by 2050 based on countries that want auto's phased out by 2035/40 and commercial trucks by 2050 if it stands.

Taco Time

Very different than us Germans!

It seems they also need to get Texas to let them sell the auto without having to ship it out of state and back in via a very convoluted sales process that just adds to the money losing process. With China online, California online, Nevada online and Germany supposedly close to coming online as well as Texas, one would think they could get all those going now, but it would seem money might be an issue for financing those auto options. Let us also not forget that Tesla let go all of their PR department and it seems cut back to just about zero any marketing. Then you have service problems globally. Tesla might have stretched themselves way too thin. Eventually customers are gonna say screw Tesla, just go and buy from the Ford Dealer a Mach-e. I can get full service, warranty, etc. at my local dealership. Makes ya go Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm ?

Interesting observation is that Mercedes-Benzes went on sale with their EQC and after two months of sales in the top 10 list, they dropped off for May. Makes one wonder about their tag line of Best or nothing at all! ?

WOW, thanks for posting this, amazing that so many people watch these annoying guys. I had to skip through the video as it came across as a look at me I am peacocking and have a better life than you. Agree, no need for me to watch any of the other videos.

Norway has been in the news lately and not just a little but across a wide range of news organizations. Norway has been very embracing of the move to EVs supporting just about every version that has come out from small EVs that would remind one of a Golf cart and illegal on the roads in the US to the luxury level of Tesla with the X and S auto's. Norway has even been leading the world in the change over of their countries taxi fleet to EVs. One benefit to the taxi owner is the ability to write off half of the auto cost in the first year and the rest in the second year as long as the taxi travels over 100,000 kilometers per year. This allows private taxi drivers to purchase their own luxury ride to use as their work tool every day. Tesla was the first to build out a very extensive network of charging infrastructure to support their auto's allowing owners to drive their EVs in any type of weather even very cold snowy winter. As anyone in sales would know and to help everyone else understand, single month sales, and quarterly sales sales cannot always clearly show a trend about the success of a company. Even bi-yearly sales numbers while getting close to be considered a trend by some is not enough to state that a company has been a long term success. Tesla ever since they started to sell auto's in Norway back in 2009 with just 13 sold has pretty much had a captured market to themselves especially since Norway has been trying various ways to push a clean green agenda going back into the 1990's. Tesla sales spiked in 2019 at 18,798 EVs sold before plummeting as VW introduced the much more affordable ID.4 and other luxury makers such as Audi with their e-tron came on the market in 2020. As per the jalopnik story, Tesla did not sell many auto's in association with other auto choices till recently making the sample size very small in auto markets around the world. Norway then becomes an even more important picture on EV sales as a country that was in many ways the first to embrace EVs, will be the first to phase out all new ICE auto sales starting January 1st 2025. Currently contrast Diesel auto's that sold in 2011 with a 75.7% market share to only 8.6% market share in 2020. A market where there are more EV options at various price points than any other market has transformed their auto market. Lately, Tesla sales have not been that great and Ford Motor Company is off to a hot start with their Mustang Mach-e. Yes one can contribute this to the Ford EV being a new model but keep in mind that a year ago new auto sales had BEVs make up 43.1% of sales, this year, BEVs are averaging 60.4% of new auto sales with Ford having sold 1,384 Mach-e in May for a 10% share of Norways auto market. Toyota RAV4 hybrid is in second place and Skoda's electric Enyaq is in third. Currently in the top ten EVs sold in Norway, Tesla is coming in at 6th place. Let's let the monthly numbers speak for what is being sold in Norway: May 2021 top 10 best-selling auto's in Norway. April 2021 top 10 best-selling auto's in Norway. March 2021 top 10 best-selling auto's in Norway. We then have no numbers, but a list was produced of the top 10 auto sales and unlike March, Tesla was in 8th place for auto sales in February: The clear observation is that Tesla is NOT the dominant auto company in Norway and a concern for the CEO and company one would think. Clearly now that real competition is showing up, Tesla is going to have to address concerns about fit n finish, service, warranty issues, etc. In 2019 Tesla dominated the market for BEVs: Per Norways largest news covering the auto industry, December pretty much saved the year, but even then shows some very interesting changes from 2019. This on top of the full 2020 year showing that Tesla is only #6 in auto sales in Norway. At this point, Tesla needs to deliver on a low end solution of BEVs for Norway and the world if they are to remain competitive and survive it would seem. This would be the time for a Model 2 and even maybe 1 to come out of Tesla giving low end solutions for auto buyers that currently cannot afford higher priced auto's. Ford Is Beating Tesla In One Of The Most EV-Saturated Markets In The World (jalopnik.com) • Norway: Tesla car sales 2009-2020 | Statista Ford's electric Mustang tops Norway car sales in May | Reuters Ford's electric Mustang tops Norway car sales in May | Nasdaq Historic December saved car sales | Dn View full article

You had me wonder what the pay out is and according to the various listings about how YouTube pays based on subscribers and the ads, it comes out to about $5 per 1,000 views. This is one of the clearest layouts on how this works if you want to get to the details. How much youtube pay per views - the best guide for 2021 - AudienceGain Ltd So if all 1.14 million subscribers watch at least once per episode, you would have 1,140,000 divided by 1,000 = 1,140 *5 = $5,700 per video they post. Not sure how often they post videos but lets go with once per month would equal $68,400 per year. Not enough to pay for the huge house, land and fancy auto's in the video. Even if we go to 4 videos per month, that would still be $273,600 gross per year and taxes have to be paid on that income. I could be wrong, but I still think money is coming from other sources as I just do not see they affording a luxury life off a YouTube channel. Yes some social media stars have become millionaires and they have million of subscribers, but I think that is far rarer than the norm. IMHO