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Unless you've been in a hole for the last decade, actual electric vehicles are a thing! In this GemLog I'm going to ignore the non-green arguments about power generation and battery manufacturing. The point is: they're here.
Tesla Motors seems to be the leading manufacturer. They are making some very nice factories, and cutting costs with their own supply chains. If course when it came to their new cars, people and critics had their issues. They were legal, but Tesla has worked things out and the quality is getting better and better. Although their new product projections were a bit short, but the pandemic surely didn't help any of those deadlines.
My company (I'm still working for them) decided to conduct an experiment. The owner ordered two electic Ford Transits. We use the max height and length vans. They're big, but they're great contractor vans. Anyhoo, Ford advertised the vans with a 150 mile range. Keep in mind that Ford is one of the legacy vehicle manufacturers that didn't really want EV's to become a thing. Now they're playing catchup. Needless to say, the 150 mile range is likely a lie with a buffer of 10-20%. We recieved the first van earlier this Winter. Of course, one of our employees got stuck with a dead battery about 30-40 minutes away. This also caused a knee-jerk reaction to cancel the second order. Buyers remorse was sitting heavy with the first van as it was wrapped and had shelves and exterior strobes installed. So the van sat.
Recently I got to be the next guinea pig. I was attentive with the projected range, and at the time, it was estimating about 94 miles, fortunately I was only using about 14-20 miles throughout the day, with heat running. I've been using the van for several months now, but only on local projects (for obvious reasons). With our modest spring/summer weather, I've seen a maximum of 123 miles of projected range. I run the AC, even during break, and I don't have any issue with range. The van drives like a dream and the acceleration is pheonominal! The only real test is when we finally get a full outfit of tools and stock material loaded, how much will the range suffer?
Needless to say, I'm impressed with EV's and where they're going. Would I reccomend an EV for a contractor now? No, especially not from a legacy automaker. While I do have hopes for the Tesla Truck, I don't think it'll be the best for most contractors. The industry really needs to make a GOOD skateboard and slap whatever body you want on it. They need to start taking actual use into account for marketing. I am considering on getting an EV for my next personal vehicle, but at the moment, that's not even on the timeline. I will get to enjoy having no car payments for quite some time.
I recently read the Official Donut's log on the Framework laptop. If you don't know what it is: It's a laptop where it's designed to be customizable and fully user repairable. I'm quite impressed with what I've heard and seen, and I'm glad that someone is finally doing this. Linus from Linus Tech Tips invested a decent chunk of change, so he's been doing some promotional videos with them in their own flavor of videos. They're good and entertaining, but like the inevitable segway to their sponsor... They're all pro Framework.
Donut pointed out some points that give me some cause for concern for the product, but fortunately they should be able to fix them.
I would be curious to see how well Linux would run on a Framework laptop. I know it pretty much just works, but Framework is doing things differently, and I'm not a big software guy that's out of my league of knowledge. I know Apple won't let them run MacOS, because Apple. I also get it, OS licenses are expensive-ish and to cut costs AND keep a customer base, they chose what they did.
Hopefully Linus sees his article at some point, or perhaps Donut's log and proper actions are taken. Unfortunately, this is also a case of early adotpion and he gets to experience the unexpected.
Thank you Donut for your log! For the meantime I'll continue to utilize my Dad's old ThinkPad that I think at the moment could use a new battery.
I've always been skeptical about early adoption of new technology, and not that what I just wrote about. When I buy new things, aside from tools, I try to buy at least a tier or so below the top-tier. I feel that spending the money for the bleading edge has diminishing returns.
Choose wisely, make the best with what you have and what you choose.