On the Fence after watching Mach E's thermal system nightmare

[Vulnox]

To OP, definitely drive both, and get on the highway and use BlueCruise (if activated) and AutoPilot. We were very likely going to try a MY a couple years ago despite being with Ford for a while. Tesla does have test drives, and we went to a test we scheduled to try a MY. My wife and I both really disliked it. All the menu jumping to get to basic features on the center screen, AutoPilot behaved worse than even my at the time 2019 F-150 Lariat with just adaptive cruise, no instrument cluster sucked since it made it more difficult to just have line-of-sight view of what the state of the car is.

Also as others mentioned, missing some basics like cross traffic alert (unless that changed recently, I haven't kept up as much lately), the interior felt like a sterile doctors office compared to the alternatives from other BEV manufacturers. It just wasn't for us.

I was still tempted, as the SuperCharger network is the remaining shining asset in Teslas portfolio in terms of competitive advantage. But even your MME would have access before likely too much longer. But aside from chasing some of the deals on a Tesla, like the mid-$20k RWD Model 3 you can get now after tax credit, Tesla doesn't have any vehicle that isn't bested by someone else.

So again, get out and drive both. We have had our 2022 for a year now, no thermal issues or HVBJB issues, or any issues at all really aside from a small rattle I fixed myself. Love the car.

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[timbop]

What cold? I live in Las Vegas, the desert SW.

By the time I make coffee, drink several cups, respond to these posts or make new ones, wake my spouse up, walk the dog, shower, and eat something, it's 60 degrees in December before I head to the casino.

Where does the OP live?

Does it hit -20?

https://www.recurrentauto.com/research/excited-about-lfp-batteries

It doesn't matter where you or the OP live: you are posting recommendations that are read by everyone on the forum, not a PM and did not qualify your statement. Since you live in the desert and don't know: the efficiency starts to fall off in the positive 40's, not negative 20. That statement is based on two and a half year's real world experience driving an ER Mach-E in the Midatlantic - a region with relatively moderate winter temperatures. I routinely drive from the Philly area to Cape May, and there were times in the winter that I had less than 15% when I got home and once I had to turn the heat off. Recently a couple of DCFC have gone into service along my route, but when I first got my car I would not have been able to make the trip in a SR battery. In the summer I've gotten home with over 35%.

There are other members here who can attest to concerns over the dearth of DCFC out west. @dbsb3233 routinely drives from Colorado to Vegas, and with his experiences of unreliable and sparse DCFC coverage has had concerns making the trip in his ER. Presumably the forthcoming Tesla agreement will alleviate some of those concerns, but only V3 chargers will support CCS1 adapters.

As for your assertion with which I took exception: regardless of temperature, if you think the difference in the real range achieved is 30 miles you are mistaken.

 

[Ghost Ryder]

The first poster summarized best. If you want a Mach -e, I would look for a HVJB “lemon” crazy value for the money.

The problem with lemon cars is that you save when buying then give it all back when selling. It all evens out in the end.

 

[Ghost Ryder]

BTW, how much is autopilot from Tesla?

And you left out how the madman running his mouth on Twitter daily can affect your Tesla's value.

Free. Autopilot is included in the price of the car.

It's obvious that you are a Tesla Hater. Which is your right. But if your opinion is so heavily clouded by Elon, and can't evaluate a product objectively, then you really don't contribute much to this conversation. Which is discussing which car is better.

 

[Ghost Ryder]

Hmm, I still love my MME, but buying one isn’t a prudent financial decision.

Buying is fine, it's the selling part that is not prudent. Keep it for 200k miles, and don't worry about depreciation, as all cars will approach zero.

 

[dbsb3233]

Why buy the extended range NCM battery for $7,000 more? It has a 310 mile range, but you're only supposed to charge it 90% unless going on a trip. You can safely charge the 250 mile LFP battery to 100%. So on a daily basis, you're only getting 30-35 miles more of range for all that money.

https://www.fordservicecontent.com/...ingEnabled=False&userMarket=USA&buildtype=web

Local driving is rarely what people need the extra range for. It's traveling. You're right if the car won't be used for traveling (some people road trip their ICE and keep the EV for local use).

That doesn't mean the SR can't be used on road trips, of course, but the extra 25% is quite significant on long road trips because it's on the upper end. It's really more like 30% more of the practical drive range after subtracting a reasonable safety buffer at the bottom that most people like to avoid dipping into.

That's even more significant when you assume only charging to 80% on DCFC stop along the way. (I assume the charge curve still drops off at 80% for the LFP battery?)

Subtract high speed penalty on highways, and potential cold and headwind losses, and the potential for some long DCFC gaps or broken stations, and I'm very glad I paid $5000 extra (at the time) for the ER.

But, we road trip a LOT. From 1800-4000 miles per trips, 6-7 times per year. It was a no-brainer for us. For people that road trip very little, or not very far, or stick to well-covered routes, not so much. As DCFC expands and fills in, it becomes less important too. Still more convenient, but less important.

 

[onepunch]

This! Drives me nuts too.

People never complain about the other tools they use in life are depreciating assets. Refrigerators, utensils, mattresses, TVs, audio equipment, furniture, mechanics tools, all depreciate just as much or more than automobiles do.

Any economic evaluation of an automobile purchase should be judged solely on how much it costs to drive on a per-mile basis, that's it. The longer one amortizes the initial purchase cost over miles driven is the biggest determining factor of how much a personal automobile costs to own and operate. Resale factors into that calculation, but keep the vehicle long enough and the deprecation falls out of the calculation.

Thats because you will likely never resell your mattress or your TV, so resale value is completely irrelevant. Virtually EVERYONE will resell their vehicle at some point.

Look, I agree with the overall sentiment that vehicles are not investments. However, lets say there are 2 vehicles that perform similarly, and after 3 years vehicle #1 loses 20% of its value and vehicle #2 loses 60% of its value, it would be ignorant to not at least take that into consideration when making your purchase decision.

 

[Ghost Ryder]

Define autopilot, please. This says $15,000. Has that changed?

https://electrek.co/2022/09/05/tesla-raises-full-self-driving-price-to-15000-is-it-worth-it/

Autopilot has always been included in the price of the car. People mix up auto pilot and FSD when they are two completely separate features. Until recently, they operated on two completely different software programs.

Autopilot is free and is most equivalent to Ford's Blue cruise.

FSD (Full self driving) which is self driving on city streets including making turns, stopping at lights, etc (essentially enter an address and the car will take you there) is 12k.

 

[RickMachE]

Thats because you will likely never resell your mattress or your TV, so resale value is completely irrelevant. Virtually EVERYONE will resell their vehicle at some point.

Look, I agree with the overall sentiment that vehicles are not investments. However, lets say there are 2 vehicles that perform similarly, and after 3 years vehicle #1 loses 20% of its value and vehicle #2 loses 60% of its value, it would be ignorant to not at least take that into consideration when making your purchase decision.

One big problem in vehicles is that rarely do two vehicles perform similarly, or look similarly, or provide the same overall functionality or enjoyment. And, you need to look at initial cost before evaluating lost value percentages.

Historically, we kept our vehicles for a long period. 8, 10, 12, even 15 years. We likely won't be doing that in retirement, but also don't really evaluate resale at all. It used to be that vehicles I owned ended up costing (purchase minus resale plus maintenance) about $2k per year at most. Then one cost just over $1k over 3 years. Then the 2021 Mach-E that we resold at a year made us a profit. With $60 - $80k vehicles, no more of that.

But you only live once, right?

 

[GreaseMonkey]

Automobiles are not investments. Drives me nuts when people talk about them as a financial vehicle ?

Cars are not investments, but they are not disposable either. Your description for how you make a purchase decision is not mainstream. Most people purchase cars based on total cost of ownership: purchase price and depreciation being the most significant factors. Cars are often the second most expensive purchase we (common folks) make.

Mach-Es are currently more expensive than MY and sell for less, making the total cost of ownership significantly higher. The latter is a fact, proven many times on numerous threads. You can personally ignore it if you want, but you can’t claim that it is irrelevant to the purchase decision of the vast majority of people.

 

[RickMachE]

Math has never been my strong point, but is there a 30% difference in these numbers?

Standard Range (Usable Battery Capacity 72kh)

Extended Range (Usable Battery Capacity 91kWh)

And, I think there's more to this discussion. The "what about taking trips" thing gets injected a lot as a defense, but those are exceptions, not the norm. You can only charge the NCM 90% most of the time to protect it, is the norm.

What should also get talked about though is speed and power. We bought a 2WD, which delivers better range, and we don't exceed the speed limit, or go zoomie, zoomie.

I get it that some of the youngsters on here want the go-fast experience, but like an ICE vehicle, there's a big range penalty on that, too.

26.4% to be exact. 91/72 - 1.

"Zoomie, zoomie". "youngsters on here want the go-fast experience"? LOL

We don't drive 80 or 90 (although on a recent trip in Utah the speed limit was 80 so we did), but the acceleration at any speed with these vehicles is thrilling, no matter your age (we're retired).

On a trip, you go from 80% down to 10-20%, then back to 80%. That's effectively using 60 - 70% of the battery. If you take trips more than once a year, or longer than a few hundred miles, an SR of any battery type is illogical.

 

[RickMachE]

Cars are not investments, but they are not disposable either. Your description for how you make a purchase decision is not mainstream. Most people purchase cars based on total cost of ownership: purchase price and depreciation being the most significant factors. Cars are often the second most expensive purchase we (common folks) make.

Mach-Es are currently more expensive than MY and sell for less, making the total cost of ownership significantly higher. The latter is a fact, proven many times on numerous threads. You can personally ignore it if you want, but you can’t claim that it is irrelevant to the purchase decision of the vast majority of people.

I'd disagree with that statement hugely. Most people don't know what depreciation is, nor how to calculate total cost of ownership. Most people buy vehicles based on EMOTION. Most people get in front of the salesperson and finance person and lose all track of numbers and buy all sorts of add-ons.

This forum isn't comprised of most people.

 

[dbsb3233]

Where we are in this conversation is we have your opinion, and we have the numbers from Ford themselves. I'm choosing to go with their information.

The numbers on what, range? Range numbers from the EPA (via automakers) are mostly city driving in good weather. Range rarely matters for city driving because most people drive <70 miles/day locally.

Where range matters is traveling long distance. That usually means highways, which means high speeds where the EPA numbers don't fit. Can easily subtract 20% off EPA for high speed penalty. And another 10-20% if it's cold out. Then factor in maintaining a safety buffer on the bottom end, and usually capping refuels at 80% on en route DCFC. A 250 EPA range shrinks to maybe 100-140 mile practical road trip legs (after the 1st leg from home leaving at 100%).

 

[Ghost Ryder]

Math has never been my strong point, but is there a 30% difference in these numbers?

Standard Range (Usable Battery Capacity 72kh)

Extended Range (Usable Battery Capacity 91kWh)

And, I think there's more to this discussion. The "what about taking trips" thing gets injected a lot as a defense, but those are exceptions, not the norm. You can only charge the NCM 90% most of the time to protect it, is the norm.

What should also get talked about though is speed and power. We bought a 2WD, which delivers better range, and we don't exceed the speed limit, or go zoomie, zoomie.

I get it that some of the youngsters on here want the go-fast experience, but like an ICE vehicle, there's a big range penalty on that, too.

This is a huge point. EVs are greatly affected by speed. There's a huge penalty to range when going 80 vs 70mph.

 

[DYohn]

Is this all blown out of proportion? Would you buy another Mach E knowing what you know now?

Yes, and yes.

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