quote:

Originally posted by FenderBender:

quote:

Originally posted by mike28w:
What about parts and repair ?? Will NAPA or Autozone be carrying parts or will this eventually turn into another Yugo or Smart car ??

where do you think their after market parts are coming from?

I recently moved to a town of 3500 people....the only mechanic there flatly told me that he won't do anything with my 2008 BMW except change oil and tires...... I doubt that he will work on a Chinese EV

He'll go the way of the dodo over time as ICE vehicles become just as complicated, makers add so many electronic computer driven bits that other than tires gas brakes and oil there won't be much a general mechanic can do without some changes to the laws on right to repair.

There's not a lot to fix on EV's just tires, brake pads, rotation, cabin air filters.

quote:

Originally posted by HRK:
If anything perhaps it will wake up the US Automakers and get them the ability to be competitive with reductions in any costs we can,

Back in the 70's Japan was dumping cheap motorcycles into the US and destroying the USA motorcycle companies. Lucky that the government decided to stop that and it helped HD survive.

You can see how these points contradict one another, yes?

My point is, most all tech got much cheaper.

It’s the nature of tech.

Cars are wildly more complex - and EVs are inherently simpler in many ways - but it seems like they’ve been getting more expensive.

Modern manufacturing shouldn’t use enough labor to make that much of a difference in price.

I think how things work here is you buy a new 20-25k Chinese car, drive it until it has issues/interior wear, then sell it to a significantly lower economic level who tries to cobble it together/keep it going.

This is how cars were back in the 50s or so, TMK.

I think that’s what Tesla is trying to get to.

An electric car is, fundamentally, a pretty cheap thing, other than the battery, and those prices are rapidly falling.

Now, I don’t know why the suspensions are worse in the Chinese cars, and the noise level seems higher - even with laminated glass windows etc.

But I don’t think it’s that hard to fix. (I’ve been riding a lot in the regional version of Uber.).

I think we really need a reworking of the car industry.

GM is producing Buicks in China, and then importing them into the USA! What we REALLY need is a 'reworking' Union Labor!