Is the EREV going to be a flop?

[Gottesacker]

Let me preface my question as text does not convey tone. I am not trying to sound like an ass. My I ask why you would not fly to such distant locations?

I don’t know the answer for the other person, but I can tell you why I choose to drive to Nebraska and the Black Hills of SD every year from Texas instead of fly. The reason being, it’s significantly cheaper. I’m not buying 4 expensive plane tickets, then having to rent a car for a week. Might be a similar answer for the other person. I know a friend of mine thinks we’re crazy, but we also don’t earn anywhere near the money he does, so of course flying is no big deal for him.

 

[cyure]

I don’t know the answer for the other person, but I can tell you why I choose to drive to Nebraska and the Black Hills of SD every year from Texas instead of fly. The reason being, it’s significantly cheaper. I’m not buying 4 expensive plane tickets, then having to rent a car for a week. Might be a similar answer for the other person. I know a friend of mine thinks we’re crazy, but we also don’t earn anywhere near the money he does, so of course flying is no big deal for him.

Plus there’s nothing like a road trip with the family.

 

[strider]

I disagree… if they sit back and let other companies try new battery tech and it works… their launch vehicles will fail miserably. I feel like the next jump in batteries will be a giant leap (cliche, I know) so vehicles without them will lose almost all value.
Unless of course, new battery vehicles price themselves out of competition.

I have been driving EVs for 16 years. There has been a constant stream of "battery breakthroughs" in that time and exactly zero of them ever worked. Back in the 2010's it was the Lithium Air battery. Didn't work. Now it's solid state. Still doesn't work.

Don't get me wrong, tech has been steadily improving, driving costs down and capacity up (along with improving efficiency of the vehicles themselves so you don't need as much capacity to go the same distance) but they have been slow - a percent or two per year. I just don't see a "leap" in batteries coming any time soon.

 

[Logan]

Two points. The first Scouts will be with current battery tech. They are testing and purchasing now. We will not see new battery tech in these initial Scouts.

Second, and I want to preface this by saying this is just my experience. I am not saying anything is right or wrong about BEV or EREV. I am glad they have both as everyone has different needs.

As I was considering if a BEV would work for me I started timing our gas stop on longer trips, to Chicago for example. By the time we stop, get gas, re park, everyone uses the facilities, we get back in, turn on music, etc etc it was anywhere between 13 and 20 minutes. The 20 minutes was when we were buying drinks or snacks. With that knowledge and our driving habits I switched from EREV to BEV. I don’t want to deal with oil changes and maintenance on an engine anymore.

Again, just me and my observations. Everyone has to determine their situation.

I did this for the past 2 years in our PHEV. It really is useful. Also note the mileage, and the time between stops if you have it handy.

Our stops are generally ~10-20 minutes, with the ~20minutes being the longer ones, with other stuff happening (either traffic/pump congestion, waiting for the bathroom, something like that).

Link to the full trip report here.

Post in thread 'Scout! Hear me out!'

Jul 23, 2025

This is where the Harvester should be good for people like this. That still has 500 miles range. Even if we say it's lower at 420 miles doing 70 mph then that's still 6 hours of driving without stopping. Since we don't fully know how just topping the gas up will work, even if we say you only get 275 miles after filling up with gas and not charging, that's still nearly another 4 hours of driving at 70 mph. This would be 10 hours driving for a 5 minute gas stop. I don't know many people who could drive that long and not need at least a couple of stops at gas stations for rest breaks...

• Logan

• 

 

[LastDayScout]

I don’t know the answer for the other person, but I can tell you why I choose to drive to Nebraska and the Black Hills of SD every year from Texas instead of fly. The reason being, it’s significantly cheaper. I’m not buying 4 expensive plane tickets, then having to rent a car for a week. Might be a similar answer for the other person. I know a friend of mine thinks we’re crazy, but we also don’t earn anywhere near the money he does, so of course flying is no big deal for him.

Thank you for the answer.

 

[LastDayScout]

Plus there’s nothing like a road trip with the family.

Exactly, NO thank you!