4 ms·

Isn’t that the rivian R1? Incredibly capable off-road. One of a small number of stock model cars to complete the Rubicon trail

by dalyons 10mo ago

jandrewrogers 10mo ago
The Rivian has pretty limited range. The Scout looks promising though. People out in the ranch country, oil patch, some mining areas, etc often want a reliable 600-ish miles unloaded. That’s why extended fuel tanks are a common option. Even without an extended fuel tank, you can often achieve that with an ICE and a jerry can. EVs have great potential as 4WD off-road vehicles. In a lot of ways they are more naturally suited to it. Their main weakness is range and loiter time. In many contexts it will be days before you’ll be able to get to a charging point. The killer feature of ICE in this context is the tremendous range and simplicity of extending range if you need more. Fuel is very compact, easy to bring with you, and available from other vehicles if you run short. An EV that can augment its range indefinitely with fuel is probably the sweet spot. I think we’ll get there relatively soon.
- ericd 10mo ago
  I guess you could strap a few kw generator in the bed with some jerry cans as backup. Would take longer, but if by loiter time you mean time out in the field where you’re not moving, then maybe that’d work. Would be cool if there was the equivalent of siphoning gas from one to another. Is there electric infrastructure in the places you’re describing? If so, should be really easy to throw down some moderate-speed L2 chargers in various parts as a last resort. They’re incredibly cheap and don’t need much maintenance.
- dalyons 10mo ago
  i was assuming the person i was responding to was talking about recreational offroading, not ranching, oiling or mining in the middle of nowhere. A max pack rivian has a 400ml range, which is plenty for the vast majority of recreational adventures.
  - EdwardDiego 10mo ago
    Holy hell, that's 640ish km, that's plenty - and yep, I'm not from a large continental country, 640 gets me to the other side of my island and 2.5 times, and to the northern or southern end once.
  - jandrewrogers 10mo ago
    That’s fair. There are “recreational offroaders” in the sense of urban bros that do casual offroading on well-developed trails with associated infrastructure. That is the nerf version of offroading in the US. Some of those trails are cool on their own merits, I don’t want to take away from them. The US has vast regions that casual tourists never venture into and have no infrastructure that are nonetheless economically important or excellent for exploring. If you stay near the Interstates, you’ll be able to manage with electric vehicles. But the best parts of the Mountain West are pretty far from the Interstate Highways. The deep Utah, Nevada, or Arizona wilderness is phenomenal but you’d be an idiot to attempt that with an EV. Just getting caught in a mountain pass during a blizzard in May or September could be enough to cook you. I’m not against EVs in any sense but the tech is still pretty risky for the realities of the Mountain West of the US. I have learned many lessons the hard way about how you can be stranded or die in the Mountain West that makes me cognizant of the limitations of EV currently. I am bullish on EV, I’d love to have one if it met my technical specs, but they aren’t there yet.
    - EdwardDiego 10mo ago
      I'm from NZ where 640km range is plenty, for even our gnarliest terrain, so I'm stoked. I have to say, this is a bit dismissive out of hand. > urban bros that do casual offroading on well-developed trails with associated infrastructure. Yeah, no, that's not what I'm talking about. Not everyone commenting here is from the US. I'm talking about things like driving up braided riverbeds to places like this, Mathias Hut, just downstream of a glacier or two. [0] Or like this, Avoca Hut, in an isolated valley two days walk in otherwise. [1] Or some of the very rugged routes on the West Coast of the South Island / Te Waipounamu. [2] Trips like this in the Southern Alps. [3] Or Napoleon Hill. [4] 640km range would get me to that route, from the east side of my island via an alpine pass [5], through the route, and back home again, on one charge, which is awesome. We don't have the same scale of distance as the USA, that's true, but we have the same scale of challenging terrain, so please don't be so quick to dismiss our use case as "urban bros doing casual offroading", just because the distances are lower, please. As for well developed 4WD trails, lol. I used to be a ranger in a national park here, and American tourists were routinely gobsmacked that our tramping (hiking) routes (trails) didn't have bridges, (and also, often didn't have an actual track or trail, you just picked your own way up the riverbed) and you'd have to walk through the rivers - and no, don't take your boots off, because you're going to cross that river another 5 - 10 times, you just have to accept you're going to have wet feet, welcome to NZ hiking. So if we don't have that many well developed hiking trails, we certainly don't have well-developed off-roading trails. [0]: https://dea83hfeh03sc.cloudfront.net/media/3171/conversions/3752-large.jpg https://dea83hfeh03sc.cloudfront.net/media/3171/conversions/... [1]: https://www.doc.govt.nz/thumbs/hero/contentassets/10442f8efa2141f29b5bad66ec93837f/avoca-hut-1067.jpg https://www.doc.govt.nz/thumbs/hero/contentassets/10442f8efa... [2]: https://nz4wd.co.nz/article/hard-drive-denniston https://nz4wd.co.nz/article/hard-drive-denniston [3]: https://www.stuff.co.nz/travel/destinations/nz/97642423/breathtaking-scenery-highlight-of-west-coast-4wd-trip https://www.stuff.co.nz/travel/destinations/nz/97642423/brea... [4]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OnZ6dMg4yvs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OnZ6dMg4yvs [5]: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/56/Arthur%27s_Pass.jpg https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/56/Arthur%2...

Isn’t that the rivian R1? Incredibly capable off-road. One of a small number of stock model cars to complete the Rubicon trail

by dalyons 10mo ago

Isn’t that the rivian R1? Incredibly capable off-road. One of a small number of stock model cars to complete the Rubicon trail

jandrewrogers 10mo ago

The Rivian has pretty limited range. The Scout looks promising though. People out in the ranch country, oil patch, some mining areas, etc often want a reliable 600-ish miles unloaded. That’s why extended fuel tanks are a common option. Even without an extended fuel tank, you can often achieve that with an ICE and a jerry can. EVs have great potential as 4WD off-road vehicles. In a lot of ways they are more naturally suited to it. Their main weakness is range and loiter time. In many contexts it will be days before you’ll be able to get to a charging point. The killer feature of ICE in this context is the tremendous range and simplicity of extending range if you need more. Fuel is very compact, easy to bring with you, and available from other vehicles if you run short. An EV that can augment its range indefinitely with fuel is probably the sweet spot. I think we’ll get there relatively soon.

ericd 10mo ago
I guess you could strap a few kw generator in the bed with some jerry cans as backup. Would take longer, but if by loiter time you mean time out in the field where you’re not moving, then maybe that’d work. Would be cool if there was the equivalent of siphoning gas from one to another. Is there electric infrastructure in the places you’re describing? If so, should be really easy to throw down some moderate-speed L2 chargers in various parts as a last resort. They’re incredibly cheap and don’t need much maintenance.
dalyons 10mo ago
i was assuming the person i was responding to was talking about recreational offroading, not ranching, oiling or mining in the middle of nowhere. A max pack rivian has a 400ml range, which is plenty for the vast majority of recreational adventures.
- EdwardDiego 10mo ago
  Holy hell, that's 640ish km, that's plenty - and yep, I'm not from a large continental country, 640 gets me to the other side of my island and 2.5 times, and to the northern or southern end once.
- jandrewrogers 10mo ago
  That’s fair. There are “recreational offroaders” in the sense of urban bros that do casual offroading on well-developed trails with associated infrastructure. That is the nerf version of offroading in the US. Some of those trails are cool on their own merits, I don’t want to take away from them. The US has vast regions that casual tourists never venture into and have no infrastructure that are nonetheless economically important or excellent for exploring. If you stay near the Interstates, you’ll be able to manage with electric vehicles. But the best parts of the Mountain West are pretty far from the Interstate Highways. The deep Utah, Nevada, or Arizona wilderness is phenomenal but you’d be an idiot to attempt that with an EV. Just getting caught in a mountain pass during a blizzard in May or September could be enough to cook you. I’m not against EVs in any sense but the tech is still pretty risky for the realities of the Mountain West of the US. I have learned many lessons the hard way about how you can be stranded or die in the Mountain West that makes me cognizant of the limitations of EV currently. I am bullish on EV, I’d love to have one if it met my technical specs, but they aren’t there yet.
  - EdwardDiego 10mo ago
    I'm from NZ where 640km range is plenty, for even our gnarliest terrain, so I'm stoked. I have to say, this is a bit dismissive out of hand. > urban bros that do casual offroading on well-developed trails with associated infrastructure. Yeah, no, that's not what I'm talking about. Not everyone commenting here is from the US. I'm talking about things like driving up braided riverbeds to places like this, Mathias Hut, just downstream of a glacier or two. [0] Or like this, Avoca Hut, in an isolated valley two days walk in otherwise. [1] Or some of the very rugged routes on the West Coast of the South Island / Te Waipounamu. [2] Trips like this in the Southern Alps. [3] Or Napoleon Hill. [4] 640km range would get me to that route, from the east side of my island via an alpine pass [5], through the route, and back home again, on one charge, which is awesome. We don't have the same scale of distance as the USA, that's true, but we have the same scale of challenging terrain, so please don't be so quick to dismiss our use case as "urban bros doing casual offroading", just because the distances are lower, please. As for well developed 4WD trails, lol. I used to be a ranger in a national park here, and American tourists were routinely gobsmacked that our tramping (hiking) routes (trails) didn't have bridges, (and also, often didn't have an actual track or trail, you just picked your own way up the riverbed) and you'd have to walk through the rivers - and no, don't take your boots off, because you're going to cross that river another 5 - 10 times, you just have to accept you're going to have wet feet, welcome to NZ hiking. So if we don't have that many well developed hiking trails, we certainly don't have well-developed off-roading trails. [0]: https://dea83hfeh03sc.cloudfront.net/media/3171/conversions/3752-large.jpg https://dea83hfeh03sc.cloudfront.net/media/3171/conversions/... [1]: https://www.doc.govt.nz/thumbs/hero/contentassets/10442f8efa2141f29b5bad66ec93837f/avoca-hut-1067.jpg https://www.doc.govt.nz/thumbs/hero/contentassets/10442f8efa... [2]: https://nz4wd.co.nz/article/hard-drive-denniston https://nz4wd.co.nz/article/hard-drive-denniston [3]: https://www.stuff.co.nz/travel/destinations/nz/97642423/breathtaking-scenery-highlight-of-west-coast-4wd-trip https://www.stuff.co.nz/travel/destinations/nz/97642423/brea... [4]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OnZ6dMg4yvs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OnZ6dMg4yvs [5]: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/56/Arthur%27s_Pass.jpg https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/56/Arthur%2...