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

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[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!

 

[J Alynn]

So, the more I read about how the Harvester is actually playing out, the more I wish I would have reserved the BEV.

Less electric range, smaller battery, worse towing capacity, the complexities of the 4 cylinder engine. It all seems like we are getting an inferior version of what the Scout could be.

When I first heard about the Harvester concept and made my early deposit, I was imaging something more like a generator. I could drive into the mountains a few hundred miles, set up camp, turn on the generator and charge the truck for another full battery of 300-500 miles. But its just not what are we getting.

Thoughts, disappointments, disccusions?

Welcome. Until you lock down your order you may change your reservation so be co tentative in knowing that is an option

 

[J Alynn]

If you're charging once during a road trip, then its not a long road trip and you don't really know what its like. Its a lot more complex then just stopping once to charge. Try a 4000+ km trip and get back to me. I also didn't say anything about all the other advantages of a BEV, I agree with all your points there, my point was around long road trips.

Out of fairness I think you are in the minority as far as running that long without stops on a road trip and therefore what suits you, suits you but I think the majority (and I’ve seen this in previous threads/posts) run about 3-5 hours at a shot before breaks which is about when the BEV’s would need charging. Sure-there are those who run 8-10+ hours without stops and if that’s your thing I can’t stop you but that’s not the primary demographic most manufacturers are designing to

 

[J Alynn]

Eastern PA Community is slowly taking over the forums.

AMEN!

 

[J Alynn]

We are a very diverse group in Eastern PA and I think our micro climate/demographic is very similar to the country as a whole so maybe that is what we bring to the table

 

[J Alynn]

You and your scrapples and your shoofly pies and your roast pork sandwiches

Don’t forget whoopie pies (and now we can start the debate-what are they called in Boston? WP or that crazy Gob name they use in Maine

 

[J Alynn]

I’m sorry, I think I missed this. When you say 8-10 times each way, I have a couple of clarifying questions:

1. Were you charging to full/80% at each stop?
2. Were you, uh, driving with something heavy in the trunk or something to cause the usage of energy vis-a-vis the number of stops to be so frequent?
3. Was there possibly some kind of other problem with the truck?
4. Was there possibly an issue with the way you were driving (high speeds, lots of stops/starts, no cruise control, etc)?
5. As mentioned, did you encounter things like long lines and broken chargers, so some of these stops were more like missed opportunities/aborted missions than actual stops to charge?

While I’m pretty sure that I am absolutely reading as a smartass, and I apologize for not knowing any other way to ask, I am really not sure why you’d *need* to make that many stops?

Hey @Scoutsie , what people put in their trunk is personal and we should never ask. Our hobby does not need more scrutiny

 

[J Alynn]

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.

Jamie has already noted the battery chemistries and @strider is correct.

 

[J Alynn]

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

That’s often overrated

 

[RodorW]

more potential mechanical issues and regular maintenance but for some (and most people based on reservations), its worth the tradeoff.

Given the amount of people that aren’t educated in EVs, reserving for the brand, that will just gas and go with ever charging because they think L1 is to complicated (Like PHEV owners) and that Reservations are promised purchases. I doubt most of those reservation holders understand that it’s still an electric, let alone the genuine difference between the model. And I’m not talking about anyone on this forum, but I’ve been following Scouts since the debut in TN and I had no idea about this forum until last September, when I considering my reservation, so how many of 180k people are unaware of this community hub

 

[RodorW]

I swear it was in one of the interviews that they said that they were targeting 70mph steady state at least, and that the 350miles of range, and that they said it was going to be gas and go, not gas/charge and go.

But, to your point, we don't know what we don't know. I was mostly just showing that depending on where you live, the harvester could easily end up being cheaper on road trips than the BEV, because DC fast charging is surprisingly expensive (especially if people mostly hear how cheap EV's are to "fuel").

Of course the harvester will also have more maintenance costs, so its all a balance. Just trying to make sure people think it through for their circumstances is all .

To be fair I don’t think it’s quit cut and dry, some chargers are buggy, until someone called EA one of my regular chargers was accidentally free for 5 months, sometimes there’s discounts if you have a membership, on a road trip you may lodge and get to l1-2 overnight skipping the mass fees, and in the math you don’t need to always stop and top off the EV just 15 minutes or so and go for a while, there’s a lot more nuance to the 1-1 comparison if we’re saying 100% for both EV will look more expensive but it’s not that simple off the paper. If we took our three cars 600 miles to family
Volt, charge at home 3 gas stops
Bolt, charge at home 5 DCFC stops
Lacrosse, 4 gas stops
V $$35-45
B $45-50
L $80-100

 

[J Alynn]

Given the amount of people that aren’t educated in EVs, reserving for the brand, that will just gas and go with ever charging because they think L1 is to complicated (Like PHEV owners) and that Reservations are promised purchases. I doubt most of those reservation holders understand that it’s still an electric, let alone the genuine difference between the model. And I’m not talking about anyone on this forum, but I’ve been following Scouts since the debut in TN and I had no idea about this forum until last September, when I considering my reservation, so how many of 180k people are unaware of this community hub

I’m sure there are a lot of I’m guessing there are a lot on the unofficial Scout forum as well and don’t realize it isn’t the official forum source.

 

[Scoutsie]

Hey @Scoutsie , what people put in their trunk is personal and we should never ask. Our hobby does not need more scrutiny

Good gracious, sir, you are making me blush! Either you have given me the vapors or I have not dragged enough corpses to the river lately.

 

[J Alynn]

Would it not be fantastic if scouts storage capacity was show with body bags and disclaimer of the average size of adult male and female bodies and whether loaded in side to side or front to rear? Would be exceptional

 

[Scoutsie]

Would it not be fantastic if scouts storage capacity was show with body bags and disclaimer of the average size of adult male and female bodies and whether loaded in side to side or front to rear? Would be exceptional

Only Legs™, because it’s only legs.