Electric Vehicles

Northvolt and Volvo Cars initially formed Novo Energy in 2021

In Malaysia, the EV will be known as the TQ Wuling Bingo. Being a Completely Knocked-Down (CKD) vehicle, this means that Bingo EV can be sold here at a much lower price than RM100,000 floor price than the government currently imposed on fully imported Completely Built-Up (CBU) EVs.

100,000 MYR = 23,781 USD

I snagged a 2025 Ioniq 5 to replace my 2021 Chevy Bolt yesterday and already put 150 miles on it. I'm kind of blown away and wanted to share some things that stood out.

1. The car is wide. Much wider than the Bolt. Gonna take some getting used to.
2. Not sure how I lived without a power lift gate until now. It was great when loading laundry and groceries into the trunk.
3. The driver seat can lay completely flat - flatter than the zero gravity mode that you may have seen. Perfect for napping while waiting at the laundromat, and I'm looking forward to trying it while car camping.
4. You can pull the car forward and backwards with the keyfob while standing outside of it. Already used it twice - once to pull out of a tight parking spot, once to center myself after street parking a bit crooked.
5. The surround view is incredible. It made parallel parking an absolute breeze.
6. Autopilot is scary but works. I was only brave enough to use it on the highway with no other cars around.
7. Auto-parking doesn't seem to work very well, but I'll have to play around with it.

Overall I'm super happy with the car and keep looking for excuses to go somewhere. Happy to answer any questions.

Summary:

Hull 096 [the ferry] is equipped with more than 250 tonnes of batteries and an energy storage system (ESS) with more than 40 megawatt-hours of installed capacity.

The ESS [Battery] is four times larger than any previous maritime installation in the world and is connected to eight electric-powered water jets.

"It's the future of short, sea shipping," Incat founder and chairman Bob Clifford said. "Today, the technology is good for 80 to 160 kilometres. It won't be long until it's good for 320km, and maybe in 10 years' time it's good for 640km. So the advancement of electrical ships is going to continue. [...] From the ship's berths in Argentina and Uruguay, a full charge was expected to take 40 minutes"

I don't own a Tesla and never will for obvious reasons, but I'm curious: are all the parts on a Tesla car Tesla-specific?

Or said another way: can you buy a Ford alternator, Volkswagen door latch mechanisms, Toyota shock absorbers, or Brembo brake pads to service a Tesla car?

Most car brands made by the same large manufacturer share a lot of parts, so you're never really stuck even if one of the brands disappears. And small independent car makers usually shop around for OEM parts from other manufacturers to keep costs low. But Tesla is neither of those things, so I'm wondering if they decided to make all their parts custom so you have to buy spares from them.

It doesn't affect me, but if I owned a pre-Sieg-Heil Tesla, seeing as though people boycott the brand around the world, I'd be worried to be left SOL if the company tanks or pulls out of my country. Particularly since they don't seem to be exactly falling over themselves to design for repairability.