Your next car

[Jackalope]

Daytripping trucks are going to be the first huge success for electric vehicles, imo.  You know where they start and stop every night, they have consistent downtimes, you know the regular distance between the points..and their operational costs can be reduced much more significantly than private vehicles can be by a switch to electric.

That's why teslas trying to get their trucks out there ahead of it.

FedEx and UPS are already rolling out electric trucks. Not quite the daytrippers you're referring to but pretty close. IIRC they already have fleets of hybrids.

[The Grand Nudger]

Daytrippers (and otr drivers) already move alot of weight for fedex, feeding the point delivery vehicles (mostly from or to or between major airports between flights - there's another big spot for electrics/hybrids/alternatives..dream big right!).  I briefly drove otr as an owner op for swift on a combined fedex and georgia pacific contract.  That's part of what happened to my first marriage, lol.  

My fuel account was soul crushing on a daily basis.  5-6 miles to the gallon on average and 600 miles a day, 21 days between home.    6k USD per month, if I took a week off, in fuel alone. Even a small decrease in that large number becomes hugely lucrative when you multiply it by the trucks in your fleet.

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-as far as teslas trucks, just to finish the thought, they may not live up to all the hype that tesla has for them...but their operational projections are solid as a rock and lead to an immediate rush on the model.  

It's all going to hinge on how well they can deploy their charging stations. If they fail at that, they'll set electric trucks back..if they succeed..you can forget about pete and volvo and frieghtliner and all the rest. Daytripping trucks spend alot of their time at a dock, so that pressure is reduced, somewhat.

*for reference, I was getting 1.25 a mile, so for every 6 miles I drove, half of the distance was just covering the gallon of gas. I couldve elected to take on a partner - and I did try my hand at being a driver trainer..but then I'd have to shell out 30 some odd cents of every mile to that driver and the gas. All for the privilege of waking up to a near jackknife on a regular basis, lol.

[Aegon]

Subaru xt6
Increasingly rare and getting more expensive though...

[onlinebiker]

I don't think I ever seen that Roo... 

Some reason, it reminds me of this..,.



10 points if you know what it is...

[Angrboda]

I've already put down a payment on my next ride:

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[Gwaithmir]

[Drich]

Daytripping trucks are going to be the first huge success for electric vehicles, imo.  You know where they start and stop every night, they have consistent downtimes, you know the regular distance between the points..and their operational costs can be reduced much more significantly than private vehicles can be by a switch to electric.

That's why teslas trying to get their trucks out there ahead of it.

they've had these truck since 08 with smyth electric and various other bigger brands. the smyth trucks are what I put my electric reefer on that could run 12 hours on an 8 hour charge. (they didn't want an all electric truck being run by a diesel reefer. so the reefer had to be electric as well, and the charge and discharging/power management system of the truck had to jive with power needs in the refrigeration the truck itself had two huge 1000 lb lithium battery banks and could only drive something like 80 miles until you put on several thousand pounds in weight then the mileage came down to 20 miles unless you were using the AC or heater. which again droped the range down into the low teens. these truck have since gone out of business. there are however some decent med size hybrids. which cost 2x as much with again severe weight limitations. which is a big deal in transport.

the technology keeps getting better several times a year which is why I'm saying wait till they do the next gen stuff rather than making patches to make the 2008 stuff work more efficiently.

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I've already put down a payment on my next ride:

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those are craazy expensive.. you could buy like 100 honda accords for the cost of one of those... plus parking must be terrible.

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I changed my mind I need one of these!

[The Grand Nudger]

they've had these truck since 08 with smyth electric and various other bigger brands. the smyth trucks are what I put my electric reefer on that could run 12 hours on an 8 hour charge. (they didn't want an all electric truck being run by a diesel reefer. so the reefer had to be electric as well, and the charge and discharging/power management system of the truck had to jive with power needs in the refrigeration the truck itself had two huge 1000 lb lithium battery banks and could only drive something like 80 miles until you put on several thousand pounds in weight then the mileage came down to 20 miles unless you were using the AC or heater. which again droped the range down into the low teens. these truck have since gone out of business. there are however some decent med size hybrids. which cost 2x as much with again severe weight limitations. which is a big deal in transport.

the technology keeps getting better several times a year which is why I'm saying wait till they do the next gen stuff rather than making patches to make the 2008 stuff work more efficiently.

Teslas trucks, from 2017, not 2008. Just a cursory glance at the googles tells me that smith shuttered up..in 2017. Teslas have a 300 and 500 mile range, respectively.  Reefers are probably going to be gas for a long time.  The big draw is the reduced operational costs of the truck, not the trailer.

For comparison -

Introduced in 2006, the Newton electric truck was Smith's first produced, new-technology, electric commercial vehicle. The Newton was available in three GVW ratings: 7,500 kg, 10,000 kg and 12,000 kg. Each was available in a short, medium or long wheelbase.[65] The truck was powered by a 120 kilowatt electric permanent-magnet motor and driven by lithium-ion iron-phosphate batteries with A123 Systems modules. Smith offered 80 or 120 kWh battery packs.

Customers in Europe included TNT Express,[66][67] TK Maxx,[68] DHL,[69] Balfour Beatty,[70][71] Bunzl,[72] A.G. Barr,[73] the Office of Public Works[74] in Ireland and Celtic Linen in Dublin.[75]

Red-and-white truck
Smith Newton electric van operated by TNT Express in Oxford, England
Frito-Lay was a major US customer, with 176 Newton delivery trucks in operation by January 2011 (about one percent of Frito-Lay's total fleet).[76][77] Other American customers included Coca-Cola,[78][79] AT&T,[80] Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E), Staples[81] and the U.S. Marine Corps.[82]

Newton was named Green Commercial of the Year in the electric-vehicle section of Fleet Transport magazine’s Irish Truck of the Year Awards 2010, sponsored by Castrol.[83] The Newton was sold worldwide in October 2012 and available with three payload capacities, from 6,100 to 16,200 pounds (2,800 to 7,300 kg).[84] The lithium-ion battery pack was available in several sizes, with a range of 40 to 100 mi (60 to 160 km)[84] and a top speed of 50 mph (80 km/h).[84]

So, looking at those stats, it's easy to see why that truck didn;t catch on. It failed to meet the operational requirements/averages of daytrippers. Teslas trucks still don't meet OTR requirements, ofc.

Since Tesla brought their truck out well below what people had expected it's price point to be, and since the average cost per mile by kwh is roughly half the average cost per mile by diesel, and since the cost of fuel is roughly 50% of the average earnings per mile..it's a damned attractive piece of equipment, if you can get one, lol. I'm sure that the next gen will be better (and you may have to wait so long to get a tesla truck the next gen is out, lol)...but this one is already better than a deisel if your operational requirements are within it's specs. At 180k for the truck (compared to 100 for a diesel), and at the average cost of 60k a year in fuel, alone...it pays for itself in short order.

I don't think I'd rush out and trade a volvo in for a tesla if I'd just bought a truck, but if I was in the market...it would be on the wishlist. Daytripping is a drivers holy grail..home every night, OTR is shit work and a shit life, lol.

[Drich]

well, 1 in 08 I help create the 12 hour electric reefer that will recharge on 8 hour cycle running/6 hours if charge only, on a 20ft box body.. Again this was done on the smith platform and can be adapted to tesla. and in 08 these truck were almost 200K where as the mitsu equlivant was 50 to 60 k Some companies are mandated to be silent, or green especially when delivering uptown nyc @ 4am. this company was being fined 1 million dollars a day for delivering with diesel trucks and diesel refers. before i was bought out of the project this company had 30+ of these electric reefers, but only 4 smith trucks. the rest were on hybrid chassis.

[The Grand Nudger]

Super cool, man.  You already indicated the problems that you ran into with that platform and their 120.  Teslas are rocking 800-1k.  Imagine what you could have done with that. It would be an interesting refit, but I don't think that tesla is aiming at box trucks. They want that 40ft daycab business, lol.

(we've finally found a common interest, refridgerators on wheels, lol)