Linas.P

Well... I guess that is partially true. I don't like SUVs (not to be confused with true off-roaders) even if they wouldn't cause existential threat to cars I like. But there is a lot of truth in the statement - all the choices we make not only impacts us, it impacts other people. More cyclist on the roads = less space for cars, more SUV models = less models of other cars, somebody able to see more from their car = somebody seeing less and so on...It truth it doesn't have to be this way - we can extend cycling infrastructure without hurting motorists... manufacturers can offer more SUV models without destroying other established segments etc. but the reality is that everyone will do the easiest possible thing... just the way life is I guess. That doesn't mean existence of SUVs are not justified - there are many reason to own one. For example my father drives SUV as well (I actually going to try to get him into NX next time) and even thought he does not have bad back, he has steep hill to climb from his house to get to main road, meaning he needs 4x4 especially in winter, secondly roads in the area are very poor so extra clearance from is needed, finally he like to go fishing meaning again he often needs loads of space for fishing equipment and car to reach off-road locations. So he needs 4x4... why did he choose SUV in the end, well that is because he as well has to go into the city and drive on the highway at allowed 90MPH in the country and most 4x4 sucks at it... so SUV is nice compromise. But again - very few people, especially in the city has such needs, so this does not explain prominence of SUVs as a type of care for universally every buyer. Finally regarding extra tax for SUV... So we making big deal of ICE cars and goverment is hell bent to ban them and motorists are demonised for ruining the environment? Right? But long term studies shows that BEV cars like for like are just about 30% better for environment than ICE cars on average. Yet SUVs are generally 30% worse than normal car with same engine... don't you think it is strange that nobody has problem with this? And by all means - I appreciate that some people have valid reasons to own SUV... I am just talking about the majority who don't actually need one, but still buys one because "they want one". Perhaps if there would be meaningful extra charge people would at least consider if they actually need SUV before buying? Same like I consider whenever I want that 5L V8 car and do I really need it, because it will cost me extra £300 a year to tax. Maybe there is something else which would meet my needs without costing extra money... That is why I would support it.

But according to Gang... you are not allowed to say this because you don't own McLaren. End of discussion mate😁 I think apart of opening discussion about climate change (which is important) it as well relates to the topic quite a bit. For example I don't really need a car at the moment, but let's assume one day I will have the use case for car again. Secondly let's assume that by then I could not buy diesel or petrol and there is new Lexus IS on sale. If that Lexus IS is BEV, then I am out of luck because I can't own one, but if they would make Lexus IS Hydrogen car I would absolutely buy it and be very happy with it, because it would cover all my needs and I would not need to alter my driving at all. So it is valid discussion. Other thing which I found quite surprising is how "self-proclaimed environmentalists" are fighting against hydrogen technology. It would seem to me that anything that is better for planet than fossil fuel would get support. After all what is the difference whenever people drive BEV or Hydrogen car if that makes planet cleaner?! But for some reason we have few people who seems to be hell bent to deny viability of any technology as long as it is not BEV... this begs a question - are they somehow benefiting from it? Maybe they invested in it? why they are so scared about there being an alternative to battery technology and Tesla?

I don't think anyone needs justification why they getting SUVs, but let's face it - majority of people don't have back injuries. These cross-overs are being marketed to young people - they don't have back injuries... Luggage space is larger on SUVs... guess what - UX has none... it is far worse than my RC which is considered poor in terms of luggage capacity, so it is not luggage either. As for "higher seating positions allows for better view"... yes absolutely, because nowadays you have to sit higher, because everyone are in bloody SUVs... I can't go as far as saying it is selfish, but it is self-fulfilling. The more people buy SUVs, the more difficult it becomes for everyone else around to see, resulting in more people getting SUVs. It is like somebody standing-up in the concert "to see better"... guess what the guy behind him has to stand-up now... and soon we have everyone standing... So it is not a zero-sum game - for you to see more... I have to see less. And all this has nothing to do with tolerance, if we all could have the cars we like that is all good, but studently people like me who want "normal" car have nothing to choose. So it is not lack of tolerance - I am just upset that cars I like are not getting made anymore and then it is being blamed back onto "us" (car buyers) - apparently that is because we want SUVs. Not it is not the case - they (car companies) only make and market SUVs, so we can only buy SUVs... if they would make and market more other cars, we would buy more other cars. And I appreciate that with age and family SUV may be practical car... but before it was like you get hatchback when you are teenager, you go into coupe when you get to your 20's, then you go into estate or off-roader, when you get family... and when you get to middle-age crisis you get 911 (coupe again)... and when you past it then you get yourself large saloon. Now people go like - small SUV, slightly bigger SUV, mid-size SUV, sports SUV, luxury SUV... just depressing!

I guess in some way that makes sense - because we cannot enjoy our cars anymore (goverment does everything in their power to ruin it), then it no longer matters how car actually drives or how it looks. The only remaining criteria becomes "to be mediocre/universal from all aspects"... that is what cross-overs are doing - they sort of wants to be coupe and sport, sort of wants to be practical, sort of wants to be economical, sort of want's to go off-road... but in reality they just suck at everything. But that doesn't really matter anymore, because soon we will only be allowed to drive once in a week at most... so what is the difference of how your shopping trolley looks like, or how it handles? This as well coincides with increase of the drivers who don't really know if they want to drive at all or don't they... and obviously in rapid decrease in true motoring enthusiasts.

This is true, but I don't see the link between cars getting bigger and people driving SUVs... big part of the trend of cars getting bigger are safety regulations, crumple zones etc. For example it's true that current BMW 3 series is bigger than BMW 5 series from early 90's, but that is why if you want spiritual successor for BMW E30 M3, you get BMW M2. If you want Golf GTI mk1 you get Polo/Lupo/Up GTI. Up even comes with that tartar/half-leather interior as an homage to original Golf GTI. This one is epic... really made me laugh!

Fiat making 500L is just cashing in on the trend... that however doesn't mean Fiat 500 isn't a successful car in it's own right. As well you are free to give a better example if you think mine is bad 🙂

Long past it mate... last person who tried to counsel me on SUVs got hurt! 😁 There is distinction between SUVs and Off-road Utilitarian Vehicles... I have no issues with later. If you drive in the middle of nowhere and you need to wade rivers and climb rocks to get home - have an off-roader no issue with that. You want it to be luxurious, so that once you eventually get onto motorway is not entirely terrible to drive at speed over 50MPH. Fine. That is where Range Rover (in 1969 actually) comes in - capable off-road vehicle and not entirely sucks on road, apart of being awful for fuel economy and wobbly around the corners making everyone inside sick on anything but straight road. If one lives in the sticks - that is fair compromise to make. As well note - it was specifically designed for off-road and was not intended to be luxurious at all... just barely not entirely suck! It is considered that first which was specifically designed as such is 1984 Jeep Cherokee XJ. What separates it from say Classic Range Rover... Range Rover is body on frame design with ladder chassis, SUVs are considered the off-road vehicle with Unibody construction. Meaning they are no as capable on the road and not as rugged. Now regarding "bigger things cost more"... yes generally that is true... except what makes most cost in cars are individual components fitted on the frame i.e. engines, electronics, sensors etc. Whenever to set-up the line which stamps the coupe body, or set-up a line which stamps SUV body costs the same. The extra metal which needs to go into SUV when line is set-up is cheap as well. Last time I have checked 1-ton of machined steel was like £400. So if SUV has 250kg extra steel in it's structure... this is £100 worth of price difference. Yet similarly spec'ed SUV could be as much as 25% more expensive as similar car i.e. £45k vs £60k. So would SUV cost more to produce than car... yes... marginally, but it is priced significantly higher. I think to close that - first of all crossovers have no off-road advantages over similar cars... For example Yaris Cross would be identically capable off-road as Yaris (and that is not capable at all). Secondly, most of buyers for these cars lives in the cities and never drives off-road anyway - so why own SUV?

Definitely F-Sport dials. In my opinion it transforms the car and it is far more important than exterior. After all the most time you spend is inside the car and the standard dials on IS300h are very ugly and remind me of early 2000s hybrid... But F-Sport dials makes the car feel so much more modern. As for the buttons, I am not sure if they were different between F-Sport and other trims, but I remember there was some issue controlling the F-Sport dials with standard buttons. Cannot remember what it was, but maybe pressing "menu" button didn't move the dial to the side as it should or something like that. So perhaps F-Sport wheel was not needed, just had to be programmed correctly. So indeed - consider yourself lucky, you must have probably one from couple of cars which exists with this mod, maybe even the only one!

I actually don't buy this claim i.e. "that they are reacting to demand". I think it is exactly manufacturers to blame that they marketed SUVs... if they would have marketed something else people will want something else. Take for example Fiat500 - it is not SUV, but Fiat did a lot of job in marketing it and it is selling like hot cake relatively speaking. The truth behind why car manufacturers wants to sell more SUVs is that SUV cost no more to make than coupe or saloon, but generally by being bigger can be priced higher. Simply said SUV has higher profit margin. It is little bit far fetched, but it is manufacturers (or some manufacturers) who are pushing SUVs and thus are marketing them for last 2 decades. Therefore after 2 decades of brainwashing now people actually prefers SUVs. As for parking spaces - they don't fit because majority of parking spaces does not meet requirements. It is considered that parking space should be at minimum 2.4 x 4.8 metres. It is almost never 2.4 metres wide not to mention UK standard is already one of the smallest in the world. In US you can park car sideways into parking space and still have some space to spare 😄 (although that is probably the only positive thing about US). Finally, I am with you when it comes to "normal cars" - I just hate SUVs and it is sad that normal cars are disappearing, I consider that SUVs are overall almost "anti-social". Indeed with majority of cars nowadays being SUVs you simply could not see anything in front of you... and that has domino effect. People want to see where the yare driving and thus they are getting SUVs as well. For this reason I would support additional "SUV tax", rather than considering it "normal" car.

Probably like Exec IS300h with F-sport dials 😁 - as rest of the cabin looks the same I doubt there is anything to see. Although, I wonder if they fitted F-Sport steering wheel or at least additional buttons to control the dials?

For autonomous cars it is the reality already, for the rest that is what Automatic Speed Limiter (ASL) is for. Mandatory from 2022 in Europe, but Volvo already fitting them since 2019 or 2020. For now it only beeps and could be overridden, but it was discovered it collects the data and not only this data could be used against you, but as well it could be uploaded automatically and access by police. This is a little bit of speculation, but it does not require much imagination to see that anything which is digitally stored on the car which itself is always connected to the internet, could leave the car and could be access by the parties you don't want to access it (police, insurance... maybe even hitman who is after you 🥶). Speculating further, I wonder if that has anything to do with Volvo chinese owners... you know how it works in China... you go over the limit, it updates in you social credit score and next day you figure out you can't find job or rent a flat... amazing life.

Not at all... That is if UX was too big for someone... somehow...

Hi Pasi and congrats with you purchase. You are absolutely right - F-Sport dials were never an option on any trims except of F-Sport. There were few members on this forum who have tried retrofitting them (not straightforward job at all), but to be fair I could not remember where they ended-up. So perhaps you got one of their cars (or somebody else who manage to retrofit dials). In either case that is definitely not a factory job. So I guess consider yourself lucky if the dials works as they suppose to... but considering car can still be warranted, I don't think warranty will cover it if dials stop working.

I think there are many good points... especially that business have invested in this technology and they want to get their money back... and even if that is not the best solution they will stick with it because of the money. Likewise it is true that hydrogen is currently struggling because of infrastructure. BEVs took existing infrastructure no matter how flawed and thus the have head start. It is not fault of Toyota that our goverment(s) where possible will take opportunity to do nothing and for that reason we don't have hydrogen network. Now to say train has left is little bit premature, because based on current known reserves we we simply don't have enough lithium to replace every car with BEV. Even considering our currently limited market and production it is estimated that we will run our of lithium in 17-50 years. I am not even talking about consequences of mining all this lithium it what is currently extremely polluting process. https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/is-there-enough-lithium-to-maintain-the-growth-of-the-lithium-ion-battery-m As this article concludes - cars will not be for everyone in future... and you know we can continue to dream, but the reality is - everything leads into this. They want to take our freedoms away and squeeze us into stinky public transport. OR we can join that chap which set-out to walk 200 miles... because we may go back to the stone age in future and will do a lot more walking... So inevitable we need alternatives as BEVs are just not sustainable as single type of car. And what is the resource we have abundantly on our planet... yes that is water and water can be converted into hydrogen... I think I know the answer to the questions... what is next big thing... Now again you were very quick to dismiss viability of hydrogen... but just for a second consider this - do you know why BMW allowed Toyota to use Z4 as a basis for Supra? It was a deal that Toyota will allow BMW to join their hydrogen research and share technology in the future. For now hydrogen may not be main focus, but you can rest assure it is plan-B in everyone's pocket. Finishing, on rather sad note - the reality as always going to be the following: goverment will encourage the wrong thing, everyone will jump on it (like it was with diesel), we will develop wrong technology and in 15 years time everyone will realise that we wasted all this effort... as not only we run out of lithium, but in process mining it we have destroyed the planet even more than it was before and now we have fleet of aging BEVs which we can't replace and all that infrastructure to charge them which we will need to convert to something else. This has happened with diesel quite recently so not so hard to remember and this will happen again if we continue to look into all the issues without understand the context and making single issue solutions... like in this case BEVs addresses CO2 issue and only this issue alone, without looking to wider impact.

That is why I never even read threads if they have escalated into more than 2 pages before I see them. By now you should have learned the lesson that disappointment was inevitable 😄

This is absurd. Why would I buy car which I don't need? Do you understand what word "feasibility" means? We actually had similar conversation here about Lexus 200t engine. I always said it is 💩, but there were people who said - "how could you know if you don't own it". For one I knew exactly why and secondly eventually I bought RC200t (because of reasons) and everything I said about the engine being 💩 was absolutely correct, to some degree I was even slightly disappointed that my statements were so accurate (because I had slight hope it will not be as bad as I thought). "So do you own hydrogen car? No? Why don't you own it? Then you can't say it is bad or would not be feasible!" That is idiotic and not constructive argument, because then we can only have conversation about the things we own.

This is absolute nonsense claim - why should I have one? This is purely feasibility consideration. As I said before I have previously considered BMW i8 and found it to be not feasible to own, because I can't charge it! Simple... Which part of it you don't understand? There are currently no hydrogen car which I like (I want coupe), because basically there are are only few cars on sale today - Toyota Mirai and Hyundai Nexo. However, the fuel itself is feasible because I live 5 miles from Rainham hydrogen station. I don't need to own the car to be taken seriously when talking about feasibility of the fuel itself. I know for a fact and it is fairly obvious that if tomorrow I would have to buy either BEV or HCV, HCV is the only one which I can own. Not even "prefer to own", but "can only own", because I can't own BEV. Besides I neither need a car at the moment (I actually don't have one for last couple of months), but as well I don't mind running ICE. Pollution form cars is just a scape goat, I am not saying it does not matter, but being at 2.4% globally (2.1% diesel and 0.3% petrol) I somehow don't feel guilty at all using petrol car (after all me switching to EV would reduce 0.1% of pollution). Finally, your question about "where is the experience of hydrogen car owners"? That is stupid question as well. Why it is stupid? Because there is no experience to talk about, it is like difference between owning petrol vs. diesel car (or maybe more correctly LNG), the experience is exactly the same as if you would have petrol car. The reason anyone is even question BEV is because experience owning BEV is significantly different because owner has to consider charging time all the time. On HCV you don't care - it is same as petrol, when you low of hydrogen you drive to the station and in 2-3 minutes you have 400miles range. Like if you compare first Mirai, then it would be identical to owning Prius... I doubt Prius owner would see any difference if one day they would be given Mirai. However same Prius owner would see significant difference going into Tesla Model 3... both positive and negative. Do you really think police would run fleet of Mirais if they would be unfeasible? https://www.autoexpress.co.uk/toyota/mirai/102985/fleet-of-11-toyota-mirai-police-cars-to-enter-service-with-the-met James May had both Mirais, you can check on his experiences yourself -

For some time... yes. But eventually it will not be practical. I would say in ~10-15 years from ban ICE will become ~sort of classics and collectables, not really something you could justify just driving around. But maybe I am just worrying to much - I can own hydrogen car without much issues today, if they have at least 100 (although potentially it could be like 2000-3000) hydrogen station by 2030 it won't be an issue anymore. And BEVs will look funny by then with their dirty batteries... we will think for ourselves - "how could have we been so short-sighted and caused another diesel gate". 😄

Well I guess the answer - if you often do trips in excess of ~300 miles then BEV is not for you, so this is kind of exceptional case as well. That is all not a problem assuming you can choose the car which suits your needs - ICE, BEV etc. But in 2030 when we all have to have BEV that will become a problem. Not everything what is possible makes sense - it was possible for me to have 4 people (some may argue even 5) in my RC, but would it make sense to do 2000 miles Eurotrip in such car with 4 people?! NO! As well you looking at Tesla long range and using Tesla Supercharger, which is literally the best case scenario. Somewhat more realistic, but not even average BEV would be looking at Modef 3 Standard Range with 278miles (average BEV has ~200 miles range) : https://www.tesla.com/en_GB/trips#/?v=M3_2020_StandardRangePlus&o=Granada, Spain_Granada GR AN@37.1773363,-3.5985571&s=&d=Aalborg, Denmark_Aalborg DK@57.0488195,9.921747 I don't know how about you, but 39 hours doesn't sound practical for me (not to mention in average BEV it would probably be closer to 48). And I am not even going to go into the topic of speed... with ICE you could do in excess of 90MPH for most of the trip ignoring whenever that is legal or not. But with BEV you will be stuck at 60... maybe 70 max. Compare that to average ICE: https://www.google.com/maps/dir/Granada,+Spain/Aalborg,+Denmark/@46.7762951,-5.7860525,5z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m18!4m17!1m5!1m1!1s0xd71fce62d32c27d:0x9258f79dd3600d72!2m2!1d-3.5985571!2d37.1773363!1m5!1m1!1s0x464933b25fdf3d0d:0x4eb1b46a2eec26c3!2m2!1d9.921747!2d57.0488195!2m3!6e0!7e2!8j1627425600!3e0 Not only it is already 10h shorter trip because no time is wasted on charging, but I would bet you I can do it in under 22-24h with 6 stops! Grand Touring you know!

but what is not true about it? If you can get to Fast Charger the charge time depending on the car will be between 30-120min, depending on your car range you may need to stop every 100-250 miles. If it is slow charger, then you will need 6-12 hours to charge, meaning you will need to get some accommodation... unless you think sleeping in the car for 12 hours if worthy of the amazing BEV experience. Now I am sure nobody would take their BEVs for Eurotrip, unless there are fast chargers on the route, but again it is just level of absurdity you want to go to. By making absurd statement that charging electric car on trip is the same as refuelling petrol car, or stating that it is ok not to have charging point at home, because we don't have petrol stations at home either... you inviting equally absurd responses... Fair I guess...

As well I said "before chargers were installed in Fort William" and as you already quoted I said "almost"... Yes sure it was possible to do it using slow chargers for 6 hours on each stop, which isn't practicable. Same as it is not practical to refuel your petrol car from jerry can at home. So this is all the question of where you draw the line of absurdity...

But that is clearly irrelevant... we all know that long trips in BEVs are manageable with some forward planning and accepting that charging will add extra hours to the trip. 4 extra hours once in few months is inconvenient, but not end of the world, but extra hour every day is a showstopper. Could you not see this? Seems obvious enough...

Charging away from home on long trip is one thing, maybe little bit inconvenient but doable... it is possible to plan the journey so that charging coincides with resting or sight-seen, but to do it every day before going to work, or before going home is completely different story. We both know this comparison is ridiculous... home refuelling at home isn't relevant because it takes minutes and it does not impact your day planning or route. Home charging is big deal, because the charging itself take long time and may alter route and planning significantly. With over 300k private charging points + 42k public ones + however many people have access to at least standard socket and considering the fact same household may own multiple BEVs it seems like we have just about enough charging point for 800k cars... The tiny problem is - we need just 40 times more for all of us.

Charging BEV away from home is as ridiculous as charging ICE with jerry can at home. And we both know it. You say "if you can't charge at home you change charge elsewhere" just to prove your point as well. So why is this hypocrisy? You want to play this game let's play this game, but we both know that this is ridiculous...

So great for him - he is one in ~300k people in UK who can do it ( ~0.1% of all motorists)... as well if we are joking like that - technically I can refuel at home, because I can have jerry can with petrol and refuel my car literally anywhere. Obviously, I would not do that because it is just easier to go to petrol station. And that is my point - most of people in UK don't live in the house where they can recharge electric car and thus it makes ownership of BEV not viable option. It has nothing to do with liking or not liking the answer. I asked you answered. The reason I asked question, because that is what makes a difference. Would he own BEV if he could not charge at home - most likely not! Regarding petrol station vs. charge point - you know they are nothing alike and are not comparable. One takes 2-3 minutes to use another takes 30-60minutes to use. As well not, electricity is cheap because it is not excessively taxed for no good reason. 85% of fuel price is duties and taxes. It is just a matter of time when EVs will be charged in some way.