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Why are legacy car makers so behind in the EV game?

That's a very pertinent point because it always used to be the case that Chinese manufacturing undercut pretty much everything (and certainly the UK) because the labour cost was dirt cheap. In the EV world however, they are building cars in high tech factories using high levels of automation. We could do that if only there was a willingness to invest in the technology and infrastructure.
If you look at the Mini or Land Rover factory you find an extermely high level of robotics and automation. It was fascinating watching the Mini engine sump "gasket" being printed on the bottom of the block
 
Your absolutely right when you say the big companies have to plan well ahead, and no-one knows yet what new innovations/technology will come along making their products suddenly obsolete.
For example, did anyone see fifth gear recharged the other night. Vicky & Jason were testing the latest Neo EC8 EV, and the flat battery was swapped for a fully charged one automatically by machine without them having to leave the car. The process took less than five minutes which is comparable to filling up with dinojuice. If that turns out to be the future, it makes all our current EVs obsolete. If you’re investing billions for world-wide sales, it makes sense to wait a bit at the moment.
 
Ford did bring out an electric focus in 2013. It was terrible as the put most of the batteries were in the boot, which is one of the main things you buy a focus for. And it only had 22kwh of batteries, which for a car that size means, 75ish miles. And no CCS, so couldn't really be used for long journeys. Top gear (the mag) reports there are only 10 in the UK that are still running in 2021. ( Forgotten electric cars: the Ford Focus Electric )
So of course, in there management brains, "no sales = no one wants electric cars". When it really is: "no sales = rubbish car". If they better designed it like the leaf (ie new platform, not retrofit a petrol car), they would have had a challenger to the leaf, tesla etc
 
put simply they have to much investment tied up in dead dinosaur juice engines and see lower profit due to less servicing costs (no cam belts oil changes, plug changes) and all the other reasons to get you back into a dealer or shop to remove notes from your wallet
Absolutely bang on !.
We all have a lot to be thankful for to the Tesla group, without there intervention we would all still be buying fossil cars.
Legacy manufactures have had to join the party or go home !,
They tied to convince us all that self charging hybrids was the answer to future driving needs.
Yeah - Right 💩!.
 
Tesla blew past the "not viable" claims of the major ICE based manufacturers forcing them to look again at the advancements made far quicker than they probably would have done otherwise.

Those manufacturers in turn have developed solutions that bring the EV down into the reach of far more people than just the ones with pockets deep enough for an original Tesla. To be fair to them theirs is an expensive car but in part that has led to things like the Supercharger network.

Battery swap solutions for general use requires that A) all manufacturers adopt the same module design as well as the same interface within the car to take that module and B) all cars have approximately the same range which is a feature that differentiates price bands for vehicles.

Yes technically it can be done but the infrastructure costs would massive which would be hard to fund.
 
Put simply.

Western legacy manufacturers plan for the present and build cars for a 5 year production run before changing the model, base platforms & engines for 10 years. Their profits come from spares & services not the sales of new cars. They have invested interests in the past, legacy and oil. Their debt exceeds their ability to pay the repayments so no money exists to invest

China & Tesla plan 20-30 years ahead and update their productions runs frequently to adapt to the latest technology, ways of improving reliability & reducing costs. They have no interest in the spares & servicing business as their profits come from new car sales. They have no interest in the past, legacy or oil. Investors abound, debt is small.

Many legacy manufacturers will not be here in 10 years, GM is noted as the most vulnerable.
This is a very interesting and clearly informed post. I would like to see The UK Government investing in a competitor to Tesla and MG and making a long term investment including design, manufacturing and financing. Thus keeping our money here in uk and bringing foreign currency through export sales. This must be worth a shot. I said in an earlier post future generation are going to have to pay for COVID and maybe this could be a one off chance to kill two birds with one stone.
As Alb said in an earlier post manufacturing is not now about labour rates but actually about buying technology, most of which is developed here in Uk. I would love to see a Union Jack on my next EV car, wouldn’t you?
 
One of the effects of Covid has been to highlight the pitfalls of our current service based economy. With the cries of distress from the likes of the nail technicians(?), hairdressers, pubs, club and sandwich bars none of which are really needed they do provide tax revenue which is all past governments (of all colours) have cared about. The same pound has bounced from service A to service B to service C and in many cases back to A, each time generating tax.

Most of the references to industry on the news was about work coming in and out, not on their ability to work, we need more industry in this country full stop.
 
Tesla is an outlier case, not many other new Western manufacturer has been able to start fresh with a now in use product range.

In terms of making manufacturing in the UK the support industries are no longer here, like they were in the past, where every bit of of the car would have been from UK sourced parts, not sure there is many manufacturers that make all the small bits here (like all the small electronic bits that make up the circuits) etc. Also we don't seem to produce the calibre of people in enough quantities, who have the patience and persistence to do a quality job. Now China at present is not hindered by these issues. And the EV adoption has come at good time for them and they are going to make killing!

Until we get an education in system in place and a government who can plan long, I doubt we'd produce anything other than celebrities en mass.
 
How far back in time would you need to go when you would have chosen to buy a brand new 100% British made family car? And what would it have been?
Remember when the Japanese were making cheap copycats of Western cars and motorbikes and everyone laughed? Then look what happened. Then the Chinese did the same, and now look what's happening.
Britain had it's day with the industrial revolution back in Victorian times, and now it's the turn of the Eastern world to pick it up and fine tune what we started. They're very clever with electronics and have the mines for the raw materials and have invested lots of time and money creating routes around the world to sell their wares.
 
It was the 1960's that the UK last made any world leading cars and could sell them abroad.

The Land Rover, Mini, E Type Jaguar etc
 
I always found it somewhat incongruous the number of films of all types and genres had a Landrover Defender type (original) appearing in it somewhere. From all those set in deepest Africa to one on a little Greek island (Mama Mia)
 
Absolutely bang on !.
We all have a lot to be thankful for to the Tesla group, without there intervention we would all still be buying fossil cars.
Legacy manufactures have had to join the party or go home !,
They tied to convince us all that self charging hybrids was the answer to future driving needs.
Yeah - Right 💩!.
self charging hybrids are a nice stepping stone to full EV via plugin hybrids

there are three big problems preventing mass EV adoption

1:- cost of the vehicle compared to a ICE engined variant
2:- perceived lack of charging infrastructure, most don't realise it is cheaper and more likely 90+% of charging will take place at home
3:- range anxiety

so if you can make the jump to Full EV in one step then fine, if not many would prefer a more gentle path of HEV > PHEV > EV
 
self charging hybrids are a nice stepping stone to full EV via plugin hybrids

there are three big problems preventing mass EV adoption

1:- cost of the vehicle compared to a ICE engined variant
2:- perceived lack of charging infrastructure, most don't realise it is cheaper and more likely 90+% of charging will take place at home
3:- range anxiety

so if you can make the jump to Full EV in one step then fine, if not many would prefer a more gentle path of HEV > PHEV > EV
The "self-charging" hybrid is a lie perpetuated by Toyota to cover the fact that its a Petrol powered car & they backed the wrong horse! Hybrids were a thing 10-20 years ago, now they are worse than a Petrol car. PHEVs have a narrow market for those who do short trips withing it's small range most of the time & rare longer trips. They are otherwise incredibly expensive & complex to own.

1 - EVs have a lower cost of ownership than ICE equivalents.
2 - This is promoted by the legacy industry to protect its market
3 - Range anxiety no longer exists, it's will the charger work & be available anxiety now!
 
the term self charging hybrid is a weird one and i agree misleading
but it is accurate as they are self charging, they use regen braking and a starter generator to charge a much smaller battery than a Full EV (mine is 1.56KWh compared to 28KWh of the Full EV version of my car)
but having owned one for 5 years+ they are a compromise but still a fair improvement in economy and emissions over a full ICE car, so a piece of the puzzle to reduce greenhouse gas emissions

the thing is range anxiety is still a thing, as many full EV's on the 2nd hand market still have a range of only 120-150 miles, so many who buy 2nd hand to reduce the amount of depreciation of a new car will still suffer from it

i agree with point 3 " it's will the charger work & be available anxiety now!" as now EV's are taking off due to better range and lower cost EV's like the MG 5 and MG ZS, the issue is the charger networks suffer from lack of maintenance due to low usage so chargers can be out of service for some time

the other issue is many chargers at supermarkets / shopping centres are only fast chargers, not rapid chargers so too slow to charge Full EVs with good range

the next challenge is supplying enough batteries for new EV's and recycling the old Batteries when end of life or due to vehicle being totalled / written off
 
Agree with the “stepping stone” theory mentioned above. Not intentional but I’ve ended up taking that route.

1. Honda hybrid- rare option of a manual linked to hybrid and worked brilliantly. 2010 model and it made me think why doesn’t every petrol do this.

2. Mercedes PHEV - swapped my wife’s 2.5l petrol for a PHEV, keep the benefits of nippy acceleration but losing the running cost. Both of us found ourselves going “aww” when we run out of electric and it flips to ICE.

3rd will be the MG ZS… whenever it arrives!!
 
I understand Siac is owned by the Chinese Goverment. I wonder why it is that the Chinese Goverment can be so successful when ours couldn’t even make anything successful out of the entire British car design and manufacturing industry in British Leyland. I would love to be able to buy a British EV designed and built here with parts made here and export it everywhere. The profits could save future generations from the massive financial burden COVID is going to dump on them.
If you ever get bored watch the American Factory on Netflix. It’s a documentary about when a Chinese firm bought out a failed US car plant. Quite insightful. The Chinese management were really frustrated that US staff couldn’t be enforced to do extra hours, work through lunches etc.

I do get your sentiment. I’ve owned 4x British built cars (Astra, Auris, Civic and Mini). Aside from the latter, all have been impressively well built, engineered and reliable.
 
management were really frustrated that US staff couldn’t be enforced to do extra hours, work through lunches etc.
Precisely why some European and US manufacturers have moved some of their operations to China.
 
I don’t like to idea of being dependant on foreign manufacturers for ever and would dearly like to see a British designed and built EV. It‘s rather like our current dilemma on Energy, Petrol etc, where we are now held to ransom with suppliers being able to charge what they like when they like. I want to see a car built here for the benefit of everyone, not just a few wealthy shareholders. A National Wealth Fund or something like that. If Solar and air/ ground heat pumps et al were also part of that fund it could lead to some joined up thinking for once, we all might benefit over the long term and it could assist in our climate change agenda.
 
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