I am quite keen on the idea of an electric car.
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@neil@mastodon.neilzone.co.uk @steve@mastodon.nexusuk.org Yes. I refuse to pay £8/month to enhance the functionality of the buggy app to checks notes turn the pre-heating on, flash the headlights and unlock the doors. (Without the subscription, it logs trip mileage (except when it fails to), and presents you with a battery charge gauge in 'miles' which reflects the state of charge when it last successfully connected over Bluetooth.)
IMHO all three of these could and should be done with buttons on the keyfob. Two of them already are. -
I am quite keen on the idea of an electric car.
I am less keen on the idea of a car which spies on me.
Do you have the engineering skill to retrofit an old car with an electric motor?
You could be the guy fixing up a car in their garage AND the kook tinkering on something in their garage!
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I am quite keen on the idea of an electric car.
I am less keen on the idea of a car which spies on me.
@neil I pulled the fuse for wireless tech/onstar in my chevy bolt, so its a "dumb car" but still a sparky car.
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@etchedpixels @neil last time I looked something that would replace my Diesel is well over €25k even second hand.
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I am quite keen on the idea of an electric car.
I am less keen on the idea of a car which spies on me.
@neil I'd really vibe with a stick-shift BEV.
Or a hybrid where I could somehow control the power split myself.
Or an automatic with throttle-by-wire and an ECU which simply didn't spy on me
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I am quite keen on the idea of an electric car.
I am less keen on the idea of a car which spies on me.
@neil you can get a good idea of what each vendor collects here: https://www.mozillafoundation.org/en/privacynotincluded/categories/cars/
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I have an electric bicycle, which I love, and use as often as I can. But I am looking here for a car.
I kind of like the old Nissan Leaf, and it might *just* fit the bill, range wise. But I've also read various concerns. So I umm and aaah about them.
Newer electric cars leave me with a sense of "nice car you got there. Shame if we changed something about it or spied on you".
@neil The thing with the old leaf is they have a different charging socket (Chademo) that’s harder to find chargers for.
I’m really glad we didn’t buy one on that basis alone. We were in a toss up between a long-range Leaf and a Hyundai Ioniq.
We are really happy with the Ioniq.
It’s probably spying on us.
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I have an electric bicycle, which I love, and use as often as I can. But I am looking here for a car.
I kind of like the old Nissan Leaf, and it might *just* fit the bill, range wise. But I've also read various concerns. So I umm and aaah about them.
Newer electric cars leave me with a sense of "nice car you got there. Shame if we changed something about it or spied on you".
@neil I made a little terminology cheat sheet if that’s helpful:
https://rosswintle.uk/2023/06/my-simple-ev-terminology-cheatsheet/
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@neil but it's very different if you already have a car and a lifestyle which assumes easy access and regular use of one.
Not disparaging that at all - it makes more sense to go for an EV then. I hope you find one that isn't constantly calling home. A neighbour is selling their VW E-Up - I do wonder if that is also a spy, or is early enough not to be.
(Also they remind me of Yorkshire)
@sarajw @neil Yes to all this. I ran the numbers a lot when looking at EVs. If you can do it, not having a car is clearly the best thing. Even if you hire a few times a year.
If you don’t need it for work or mobility, you mostly buy a car for sheer convenience.
Our hand was forced when our old car only just got us home from a holiday!
Having an EV makes me feel much better about all my dad-taxi journeys. (Ask me about teaching a neurodiverse kid to cycle if you dare!)
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@nabeards @not_a_label @neil Out of interest, where are you getting those numbers from? Here in the UK £10k seems about the minimum for the draw conversion kits themselves, entirely ignoring fitting/equipment/labour costs.
@jsbarretto @not_a_label @neil a mechanic here in CR that does these conversions
It’s possible prices are fluctuating rapidly with the state of the world, this was about four months ago.
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I have an electric bicycle, which I love, and use as often as I can. But I am looking here for a car.
I kind of like the old Nissan Leaf, and it might *just* fit the bill, range wise. But I've also read various concerns. So I umm and aaah about them.
Newer electric cars leave me with a sense of "nice car you got there. Shame if we changed something about it or spied on you".
@neil Later eGolf (the range went up 2017+)? The 3G modem doesn't work anymore and uses the ABS for tpm so no radio sensors.
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@jsbarretto @not_a_label @neil a mechanic here in CR that does these conversions
It’s possible prices are fluctuating rapidly with the state of the world, this was about four months ago.
@jsbarretto @not_a_label @neil another difference may be the needed travel distance. Mine is pretty short here, around 100 KM per charge.
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@not_a_label @neil just curious what you consider affordable? I've looked into converting my 1988 Suzuki Samurai to electric, looks like it'll be about $12,000. The car cost me $5000 six years ago, so $17,000 for an electric car seems like a good price.
For comparison to something similar here, the BYD S1 Pro starts at $30,000.
@nabeards @not_a_label @neil And while you end up with an electric classic, you also end up with old safety standards and survivability.
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@nabeards @not_a_label @neil And while you end up with an electric classic, you also end up with old safety standards and survivability.
@andygates @not_a_label @neil again, dependent on your needs. I travel usually at 30MPH, fastest is 45mph. I spend a lot of time on dirt roads as well. The safety advances seem to be focused on high speed travel. Of course, everyone’s needs are different. But even a car from 2005 would have better safety than my 1988. And you can buy cars from 2005 for US $5000 still.
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@neil so the early Leaf is the car of choice then, as the 3G network turning off means it has no telemetry?
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I am quite keen on the idea of an electric car.
I am less keen on the idea of a car which spies on me.
@neil I've had two Leafs (mk.i & ii) Both had an opt-in function when you switched on. Range on the mk. ii is fine (40kWh) mk.i was not so good!
Now I have an eCorsa which does not have an opt-in so I assume it is reporting to base... On the plus side it does not seem to have any features that depend on this.
HTH
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I am quite keen on the idea of an electric car.
I am less keen on the idea of a car which spies on me.
@neil I for one cannot wait to read a blog post and/or updated Toot with ye answer
It's a question I would very much like an answer for but with not enough drive to replace my 2019 reg car; 5 years into owning a car from basically new feels far too early, maybe I'll actually do it in another 5, we shall see. Cars be expensive
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I am quite keen on the idea of an electric car.
I am less keen on the idea of a car which spies on me.
@neil It's not EVs in particular. Modern cars are all moving toward spying on their 'owners', packaging them, amd selling them to the highest bidder. Or altering the deal, so as you go belting down an Italian mountain road you get a message saying time's up--enter your credit card if you wish to extend your membership to include brakes for another year*
And we have put up with so much shite in the recent past, you could almost say we voted for this.
*OK I exaggerated, but not too much.
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@neil @artfulrobot @sborrill So your car actually does need a tinfoil hat faraday cage ?
@etchedpixels @neil @artfulrobot @sborrill
The last car I purchased, in 2021, doesn't appear to have any "telematics" or any kind of data uplink. It has GPS and sat radio receivers, but AFAICT, no transmitters other than NFC for the key fob.
Since I just ordered a spectrum analyzer, I could maybe try to find any other transmissions it might make, though if they were very brief and infrequent, I might not be able to detect them. -
@etchedpixels @neil @artfulrobot @sborrill
The last car I purchased, in 2021, doesn't appear to have any "telematics" or any kind of data uplink. It has GPS and sat radio receivers, but AFAICT, no transmitters other than NFC for the key fob.
Since I just ordered a spectrum analyzer, I could maybe try to find any other transmissions it might make, though if they were very brief and infrequent, I might not be able to detect them.@etchedpixels @neil @artfulrobot @sborrill
I think if it did have any two-way communication, they'd have tried to sell me optional services that use them, but none were offered.
