Crown

As we all know,  there is always a statistics that will support an argument. Absolute numbers for Germany will certainly show a different picture. But raising sales that much despite all the bashing and incompetent organization shows something, no ?

schmoell:

As we all know,  there is always a statistics that will support an argument. Absolute numbers for Germany will certainly show a different picture. But raising sales that much despite all the bashing and incompetent organization shows something, no ?

There are a number of people within the organization that believe they are changing and saving the world despite the fumblings by the guy at the top of the org chart.  Waiting for the livestream of the Model S tackling the Nürburgring next week!

one way or another 

schmoell:

one way or another 

Have especially enjoyed reading the numerous comments on the various blog sites of Tesla fans wishing that 1) Musk cheats or 2) Musk rolls out a revised Model S.   The comments range from removing battery cells to lighten the car-nope that won't work and will result in a slower car-to introducing a battery pack utilizing 21700 cells versus the current 1865 cells.  That won't work either because the car isn't designed for the taller 21700 cells and would require a massive redesign.  Other suggestions include using a three motor configuration.  Again, this is fraught with numerous development issues.  I guess they can dream.

If I were Porsche I would find out the date and time and send a Taycan Turbo S with a factory driver to the Ring and troll the heck out of their fast lap attempts with it... a Taycan videobombing their onboard fast lap videos overtaking them would shut Musk up 

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⇒ Carlos - Porsche 991 Carrera GTS

Even a modified Model S, that turns out to be faster, would be a disaster for Porsche. It's unlikely, but hey, it's fun for everyone, isn't it ? Just relax and enjoy the show 

Still waiting for Musk to make his transcontinental trip with his family using FSD.  One recalls Tiff Needell's Tesla Model S venture and how even a heavily modified Model S had problems when driven aggressively by an old guy.  It is one thing to run simulations on the Team Tesla x-box by his keyboard jockeys versus running a car on that track.  

vantagesc:

Elon's tweets aimed at Porsche the last few days made me chuckle.  

Natural defence mechanism. 

When a creature feels threatened, first choice would be to display aggression first. 

But it really is unnecessary, as the Taycan and all Teslas lives in different parts of the EV segment. 

His own Model 3 did more damage to the Model S sales than the Taycan will ever do. Why buy the much more expensive Model S when a Model 3 at a fraction of the price will do 90% of what the Model S can do and they basically have the same interior. 

Carlos from Spain:

If I were Porsche I would find out the date and time and send a Taycan Turbo S with a factory driver to the Ring and troll the heck out of their fast lap attempts with it... a Taycan videobombing their onboard fast lap videos overtaking them would shut Musk up 

--

⇒ Carlos - Porsche 991 Carrera GTS

You know, Manthey is just RIGHT THERE by the Ring.......

Pretty sure the Manthey garage have a Taycan Turbo S somewhere. 

Whoopsy:

vantagesc:

Elon's tweets aimed at Porsche the last few days made me chuckle.  

 

Natural defence mechanism. 

When a creature feels threatened, first choice would be to display aggression first. 

But it really is unnecessary, as the Taycan and all Teslas lives in different parts of the EV segment. 

His own Model 3 did more damage to the Model S sales than the Taycan will ever do. Why buy the much more expensive Model S when a Model 3 at a fraction of the price will do 90% of what the Model S can do and they basically have the same interior. 

Another example of Musk's flawed business thought processes.  The Model 3 is an infinitely better car than the Model S.   He also should have future proofed the Model S and Model X so they would be technologically superior to the lower cost models.  Of course, he set the designs in such a way that minimized cost effective component sharing across platforms.  Plus he needed the Model Y instead of the Model 3 as crossovers, versus sedans, is the hottest market segment.  

"If Tesla's Planning a Nurburgring Lap, They Forgot to Tell the Nurburgring" (Road and Track)

Yesterday, Tesla CEO Elon Musk tweeted "Model S on Nürburgring next week." But Nurburgring organizers say the automaker hasn't contacted them, and that there probably isn't any lap time available for them...

(6 September 2019)

Last night, Tesla CEO Elon Musk tweeted that the automaker would be doing something at the Nürburgring next week with a Model S. He didn't offer any further explanation of his plans or what he hopes to achieve, but it's fair to assume he wants to contest the 7:42 'Ring lap time achieved by Porsche's new electric car, the Taycan Turbo S. But if Tesla wants to set a record next week, it's still got lots of work to do—including scheduling track time with the folks who operate the Nürburgring.

Model S on Nürburgring next week

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) September 5, 2019

A representative for the German track told Road & Track in an email that "Tesla did not send us a record request and did not rent an exclusive time slot." The representative further said that the Nordschleife is "fully booked through the season," and added, "I think that there is no availability for Tesla to set up a record attempt in the next days."

R&T asked a Tesla spokesperson for more information on what Musk was referring to, or what the automaker has planned for its visit to the Nürburgring, but we received no response by the time of this writing. 

A Nürburgring insider tells R&T that Tesla has a car leaving California today headed for the German track. When asked if Tesla could get exclusive track time, the insider said that was highly unlikely this late in the 'Ring testing season—manufacturer track time is usually scheduled far in advance. "Tesla doesn't have a presence there," the source told us, "so I'm not sure if they actually know that."

Even if Tesla secures exclusive track time to make a timed lap attempt, it won't be easy to beat the Porsche Taycan's lap time. While the fastest Model S's 2.4-second 0-60 time beats the Taycan Turbo S's 2.6, the greatest challenge in taking an EV around the treacherous 13-mile track has to do with battery life and temperature.

And even if you have a great car, setting a quick time isn't a given. The weather has to be just right, tires have to be properly warmed, and the driver has to know every little nuance of the track. Just ask longtime Corvette engineer Jim Mero, or the guys behind the independent Viper ACR lap record attempt, how difficult it can be.

Porsche has tons of experience setting fast Nürburgring lap times, and a huge asset in the form of factory racer Lars Kern. The Model S Performance is a quick car, but Tesla has no prior experience attempting to lap the Nürburgring. It's hard to imagine the automaker could go out and beat Porsche on its first visit to the track. That doesn't mean it isn't possible, just that it's a huge undertaking. And none of that will be possible if Tesla can't secure exclusive track time.

Link:  https://www.roadandtrack.com/car-culture/a28942079/tesla-model-s-nurburgring-lap-attempt-porsche-taycan/

You can't make this stuff up... seems like the theory of him tweeting from a smoke filled room filled with lava lamps and sitar music  high is gaining ground 

I'm going to grab some popcorn and make myself confortable for this one....

⇒ Carlos - Porsche 991 Carrera GTS

Carlos from Spain:

You can't make this stuff up... seems like the theory of him tweeting from a smoke filled room filled with lava lamps and sitar music  high is gaining ground 

I'm going to grab some popcorn and make myself confortable for this one....

I could try to make it up but the antics of Musk are much beyond my storytelling abilities.  However, this echoes my experience with him about fifteen years ago.  

My guess is, that they will run a Tesla around the ring on AP, since this is the biggest differentiator between the two cars from a Tesla POV

“That doesn't mean it isn't possible, just that it's a huge undertaking.”

Anything is possible... But why take a heavy family car on a race track? This is not how 99% of Tesla owners drive their car, and it wouldn’t make me want one even if it is a few seconds ‘quicker’ than another car. I have driven Porsches for years and I love them, so I am interested in the Taycan - as a customer I have no interest in a Tesla, it’s for a different customer base. 

any way Musk has made that the whole car industry is chasing him...gonna be fun to see what is going to happen??!?!?!

993 c2

CGX car nut:

vantagesc:

Elon's tweets aimed at Porsche the last few days made me chuckle.  

Probably made from a smoke filled room with lava lamps and sitar music playing in the background.  

Was that a Frasier reference ? 😂

Enmanuel:

CGX car nut:

vantagesc:

Elon's tweets aimed at Porsche the last few days made me chuckle.  

Probably made from a smoke filled room with lava lamps and sitar music playing in the background.  

Was that a Frasier reference ? 😂

More of a generalized old pot head statement.  

CGX car nut:

Enmanuel:

CGX car nut:

vantagesc:

Elon's tweets aimed at Porsche the last few days made me chuckle.  

Probably made from a smoke filled room with lava lamps and sitar music playing in the background.  

Was that a Frasier reference ? 😂

More of a generalized old pot head statement.  

Got my hopes up for a second. 

schmoell:

According to [1] new car registrations in Germany for Jan-Aug compared to 2018 [2]: Audi -4.9%, VW -6.7% , Porsche -18%, Tesla +412%

[1]  https://www.auto-motor-und-sport.de/verkehr/neuzulassungen-august-2019-marken/
[2] it's not entirely clear from the article if they meant 2018, but anything else doesn't make sense in that context

412% sounds great but maybe we need to look at it with a different perspective:
 

In August 2019, 313.748 cars were newly registered in Germany.

How many Tesla? 514.  Case closed.

RC (Germany) - Rennteam Editor Lamborghini Huracan Performante (2019), Mercedes E63 S AMG Edition 1 (2018), Mercedes C63 S AMG Cab (2019), Range Rover Evoque Si4 Black Edition (2019)

Top Gear: Everything you need to know about the Volkswagen ID.3

When it comes to building and, crucially, selling motor vehicles en masse, Volkswagen has a bit of a knack. It shifted well over 20 million Beetles and then, in the Seventies, introduced a car called the Golf… you may have heard of it. Seven generations, an eighth coming later this year, 35 million sold so far. Now we arrive at the ID.3, a car VW says marks the beginning of its third era (hence the name) and with any luck will sweep all of that Dieselgate nonsense under the carpet once and for all.

This isn’t a toe in the water like the stopgap e-Golf and e-Up, it’s the first model on a new, bespoke MEB electric car platform (that will sprout 27 EVs across four brands) and a full-blown assault on world domination. The plan is to sell hundreds of thousands of ID.3s every year – a lynchpin in the VW Group’s ambitions to sell two to three million electric cars a year by 2025. For reference, the group sold just over 10m cars globally in 2018, so that’s quite a slice. This isn’t a drill – Wolfsburg is all in.

But let’s take a step back for a moment. There must be a secret to mass-produced success. A reason, beyond massive stockpiles of cash, why VW knows how to move volume… and I think I’ve found it. Steve Jobs said, “Innovation is saying no to 1,000 things.” Warren Buffet, the American gazillionaire, backs him up: “The difference between successful people and really successful people is that really successful people say no to almost everything.” And that’s where VW’s genius lies.

The reason the answer to “What car should I buy?” is more often than not “A Golf” is because it’s never been swayed by fads or fashion. We groan when VW reveals a new-generation Golf that looks exactly like the last-generation Golf, then go out and buy them in droves, because a Golf isn’t fancy – it just works.

Same philosophy here. Unlike the Honda E, an electric city car adorned with more gadgets and trinkets than you’d expect on an S-Class, and with a price to reflect it, the ID.3 is an exercise in saying no. No to cameras for wing mirrors that bump up costs, and don’t work nearly as well as glass. No to a radical design beamed down from 2030 or a retro mish-mash, instead a gentle rethink of proportions to suit the natural architecture of an electric car. No to dangling carrots and only offering more power with the biggest battery pack and, as a result of all that, no to pricing it in a way that plants seeds of doubt in the minds of already cautious early adopters.

It is, going by our first encounter in a sweaty studio deep in the bowels of VW’s HQ in Wolfsburg, the electric car that gives you the fewest reasons not to buy one. Fast enough, cheap enough, big enough, inoffensive enough, rangey enough, tough enough and desirable enough to let you jump straight from petrol or diesel to electricity with minimum anxiety. Interesting enough to make you feel like a pioneer, normal enough to cause barely a ripple in your everyday life.

Its footprint on the road is pure Golf – a few mm longer, a few mm wider, but nothing you’d actually notice. It’s taller though, 70mm loftier overall than an e-Golf and you sit 17mm higher, to accommodate the vast slab of lithium-ion beneath your backside. Wheelbase is a full 145mm up on a Golf because between the wheels is where you put your batteries, and with no engine up front, short overhangs and a stubby nose are fine. You won’t find a frunk under there, though – the space is taken up by the aircon unit, a 15-litre box required for the augmented reality head-up display hardware (think whizzy satnav from the A-Class with graphics overlaid onto a front-facing-camera feed, but projected onto the windscreen, although we’re yet to actually have a play) and a jumble of power electronics. 

The motor, I’m pleased to report, sits on the back axle, making this a rear-wheel-drive hatchback. Behave – it’s for weight distribution purposes, not skids. Twin-motor four-wheel-drive versions of the MEB platform will follow soon, but not for the ID.3 – 4WD is being saved for rest of the ID brood – multiple SUVs (as previewed by the ID Crozz concept), a saloon (ID Vizzion) and a resurrected camper van (ID Buzz) – all of which are go for production. We might even see a production version of the ID Buggy if VW has a rush of blood to the head.

Back to the ID.3. There are three battery options to choose from: 45kWh, 58kWh or 77kWh, equating to 205, 260 and 341 miles of range according to the WLTP test, and two power levels – 148bhp and 201bhp. Maximum range is not just better than direct rivals – it’s right up there with the Tesla Model S. There won’t be trim levels in the traditional sense: all cars get the same digital instrument panel and 10-inch central screen, for example. Instead, your battery and power output combination dictates the base price, then you add options on top of that. Including whether you want 100kW fast charge capability – enough to add 161 miles of range in 30 minutes. Welcome to a new world of things that manufacturers can charge you for.

To begin with, only ID.3 1st editions will be available to buy – you know the score – a fully loaded version costing from around £35,000 after the £3,500 UK government grant, only offered with the middle-sized battery and the higher power level. First deliveries of those start next summer, with the full range, which should start from £25,000 in the UK, following a few months after that. Keep your eyes peeled for the configurator – VW says it’s infinitely simpler and more fun than speccing a Golf, and then goes and ruins it by calling the process ‘ten clicks to happiness’. Barf.

Inside, it isn’t full Tesla, but it’s heading that way. The central screen, tilted towards the driver and mounted proud, because flush in the dashboard would be more than an arm’s stretch away from you, is underscored by a series of touch-sensitive, haptic-feedback buttons and sliders. No physical moving switches, just smooth annotated surfaces. Same for the thumb panels on the wheel and the headlight controls to the left. Your instrument panel sits on the steering column, so moves with the wheel when you adjust it, and features a rotating rhomboid of a gear selector. I’m sure we’ll get used to it eventually.

The boot is big, identically big as a Golf, but the back seats are a league above in terms of knee and headroom. It’s positively airy back there. Same in the front, to be fair. With no transmission tunnel to house, you get more cupholders and cubbies in the low-riding centre console than you’ll know what to do with, but still a sense of space between the seats that a combustion engine car can only dream about. Did VW consider adding a third seat option in the front? There’s space for it, and yes they did toss the idea about, says Christine Leuderalbert, head of product marketing… but decided against it in the end.   

TG Link:  https://www.topgear.com/car-news/electric/everything-you-need-know-about-volkswagen-id3

Video Link:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTMFamylaDQ

Why do electric cars (save the Taycan) have to look so neutered and feminine? 

⇒ Carlos - Porsche 991 Carrera GTS

Carlos from Spain:

Why do electric cars (save the Taycan) have to look so neutered and feminine? 

Matching the core clientele.  

Carlos from Spain:

Why do electric cars (save the Taycan) have to look so neutered and feminine? 

This is actually what EV manufacturers don't seem to understand: EVs need to look like normal cars, not like some futuristic thing with a weird shape.

RC (Germany) - Rennteam Editor Lamborghini Huracan Performante (2019), Mercedes E63 S AMG Edition 1 (2018), Mercedes C63 S AMG Cab (2019), Range Rover Evoque Si4 Black Edition (2019)

RC:

Carlos from Spain:

Why do electric cars (save the Taycan) have to look so neutered and feminine? 

This is actually what EV manufacturers don't seem to understand: EVs need to look like normal cars, not like some futuristic thing with a weird shape.

One reason I bought the e-Tron. It just looks like.............a Audi.

Right, forgot the E-tron, that one looks good, like the Taycan... the rest look like something Ned Flanders would drive 

⇒ Carlos - Porsche 991 Carrera GTS

And don't even get me started on EV colors and wheel options, UGLY.

According to AMS [1] Tesla has two S P100D at the ring running on Cup 2 R tires. Electric power is provided by a big diesel engine that runs day and night according that article. Tesla will get the ring exclusively for 2 hours on Sep 21st and 45min on Sep 25.

People from the Tesla community are already making jokes about this and consider a situation, where the car needs service and they'd have to wait 2 month to get an appointment.  

[1]  https://www.auto-motor-und-sport.de/elektroauto/porsche-taycan-tesla-model-s-nordschleife-rekord-2019/

schmoell:

Electric power is provided by a big diesel engine that runs day and night according that article.

The irony 

⇒ Carlos - Porsche 991 Carrera GTS

Old tech saving the day