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Wednesday, December 20, 2006

Comments

Crys

GM and Toyota both claim to have spent a lot of money on advertising campaigns for their respective electric vehicles. I'd like to believe them off the bat, but I cannot find evidence of any aired or published commercials for these electric vehicles. Without advertising, of course people won't buy the cars, because they don't know they exist. Could someone please point me in the direction of these advertisements, with evidence that they were aired or published, such as a magazine clipping (scanned of course) or something from a television station that verifies the airing of a commercial, a taped segment perhaps? I don't recall ever seeing any on any major stations.

Andymon

I tried for months to test drive an electric car. Both the EV1 and the Honda box that was showed in the movie. I live in Sacramento, CA. This should be easy. I was never able to jive my schedule with their specialists. Not that I didn't try. I visited and left my name and number at the Saturn dealership several times, and they never returned my call. It was not for lack of cars, as I saw as many as 8 cars on the Saturn lot on Fulton Ave.
I FINALLY got to drive a Rav4 EV last year through a connection at SMUD. The real range I got in the Rav4 was close to 60 miles. The speed governor kicked in at about 75 miles an hour. The action of the electric motor was noticably (but not rediculously) choppy when creeping at 1mph. Regenerative braking was weird and non-progressive. It was more natural to drive with regenerative braking switched off. The weight of the Rav combined with the super-low rolling resistance tires made for a meek performer. And to find a used one would cost over $20,000 in very good condition.
Still, NOBODY has given me a good reason for crushing over 100 EV1s that were in perfect running condition. It is an absolute waste. GM scuttled that ship and I feel Ford and Toyota would have, too if not for the bad press involved. What happened to EV1s going to museums and research centers? I'm not getting in to what GM should have done but didn't. I'm saying what GM DID do (crush the cars, Orwellian bleak looking commercials, refuse to let Customers buy the cars) should not have been done.

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