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(synthetic fuels) somebody would already be doing it (instead of digging for oil)... if it were cheaper.
Not an easy problem because all the energy that has to be put into the fuel ought to come from renewable sources... And the gap to be filled is huge: just look at oil+coal+gas in the graph here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_energy_consumption -
Synthetic fuels are the future. Bio, chemi, or whatever. So we can keep the cars we already have, and the Jumbos that can't fly with batteries.
The biofuels idea is a complete and utter fallacy and that is fact that was worked out 20 years or so ago. There have been ZERO developments in that time to change that. I would put money if I could there never will be either.
I have been running my vehicle on Used veg oil for 16 years and made tens of thousands of Litres of Biodiesel. As an individual effort, collecting USED oil locally and using Oil or sticks as a heat source for processing it works and works well efficiency wise Not taking into account the energy invested in methanol of Koh productions. That I do not know about but the fact USED oil is what the backyarders are using as against new oil for commercial production makes a BIG difference.
Commercial operations do not want to cook used oil because of the high and variable Tritation which means more Catalyst has to be used which increases costs , lowers production and increases waste by products in the form of glycerin. There is also the water factor. Oil needs to be dry otherwise the reaction produces soap not Biodiesel. Drying the oil is an extra and costly step for the commercial processor, not so big a deal for the individual Maker.
The back yarder can test the individual oil resources they have and mix the good with the not so good to get a reasonable tritation number and go from there.
There are other techniques such as prewashing the oil with the glyc from the previous batch which allows the left over catalysts still present in the Glyc to react with the next batch of oil but this is again a commercial negative as it requires more time, resources in the form of tanks and Mixers and of course more energy input which can cancel out any cost and efficiency benefit.
As a result at very best only a small, <10% of used oil was utilised generally in commercial production although I do know of one former producer in Cali that was all used oil. They like every other producer went broke when subsidies were withdrawn and closed up shop probably 10 + years ago.
When you clear vast tracts of rain forest to plant oil producing crops which are fertilised with fossil fuel derivatives and the whole production process is FF powered on an industrial scale, it's a green feel good hypocrisy.
At very BEST, the energy return is 1:1 which is in fact a negative. If you burn a litre of fossil fuel to produce a litre of bio fuel, you have in fact burned 2L of fuel and produced emissions which would have been the same if you just burnt the one litre of FF in the first place.
The problem is you are also using resources such as steel to build processing plants and vast tracts of forest particularly in asia HAVE been wiped out to grow these crops destroying natural habitats.
What was known at LEAST 20 years ago was in order to replace the oil we are getting out the ground now, You'd have to plant an area the size of the oceans which as anyone that went to school that day would know is a lot larger area than the land mass we have.
Yeah, there has been talk of algae and hybrid crops for 20 years since I got into the whole veg fuels thing and there is still talk and that's all there is. Nothing even close to anything that would produce a workable amount of fuel oil.
There is also Ethanol made from corn but again, the amount of ethanol you get if you planted all the ariable land for fuel alone does not meet demand and that means there is nothing left for food. Small problem there.
Biofuels is just another of those green ideals that gets gushed out by the preachers of the faith and parroted by the disciples who never have the smarts to think and question anything of the gospel they are read.
Seems the biofuels thing is old enough to do another go around as a new and Innovative idea.
It's a very dead horse that's never going to get up again no matter how hard it's beaten and hyped up.
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Why Tesla batteries SUCK!! -
Your information is way out of date. Nowadays they can make ethanol from agricultural waste so no extra land is necessary. The so called 3rd generation bio-fuels. There are several factories in the US doing that on an industrial scale. And yes, there is enough agricultural wast to make a significant amount of bio-fuel. The beauty of it is that by using plant leftovers food gets cheaper because more parts of the plants are used. One of the companies is POET-DSM: poet-dsm.com A few pages back I posted a link to an article from around half 2018 with the industry wide status of these 3rd generation bio-fuels. I expect a larger scale roll-out of these factories in the next few years because it turns out to be a very profitable business with a quick return on investment. POET-DSM alone invested around 300 million dollars.Synthetic fuels are the future. Bio, chemi, or whatever. So we can keep the cars we already have, and the Jumbos that can't fly with batteries.
The biofuels idea is a complete and utter fallacy and that is fact that was worked out 20 years or so ago. There have been ZERO developments in that time to change that. I would put money if I could there never will be either.
There is also Ethanol made from corn but again, the amount of ethanol you get if you planted all the ariable land for fuel alone does not meet demand and that means there is nothing left for food. Small problem there. -
Your information is way out of date.
It's not as out of date as that website. Last entry in their news page was 2017.
Nothing I can see where they are actually PRODUCING anything either. Untill they are, I'll take it as just and other R&D Fundraiser to get Hopeful but gullible investors in... Like a million of these other breakthrough potentially world changing ideas that come along every year... and fall flat or their arses.
There is always enough of this or that to power the world.... Wind, Solar etc.... Right up to the time to implement it and then it's a very different story. -
There is always enough of this or that to power the world.... Wind, Solar etc.... Right up to the time to implement it and then it's a very different story.
Yep. I like to do the maths to try to figure it out. For example: We consume 170e3 TWh/year (*) and we'd want (and we'll need when we run out of FF) it to be 100% renewable.
Let's imagine we could, with some chemistry magic, manufacture a synthetic fuel with (for simplicity) close to 100% efficiency: for every kWh of electricity we put in we get some amount of fuel that contains 1 kWh of energy. How many PVs we'd need to obtain that much energy?
If 10 square meters of fully irradiated PVs can generate 1 kWh/h (10% PV efficiency), then:
170000 TWh/year= 170e12 kWh/year= 170e12/365/24= 19.4e9 kWh/h => we'd need 10*19.4e9 square meters of fully irradiated 24h a day PVs. How much is that?
sqrt(19.4e10)= 440454 => a square of PVs whose side is 440 km, 24h under the sun (***).
How much do that many PVs cost? (**) 19.4e9*1000*0.3($/W)= $5.8 million millions. Or 1/3 the debt of the USA (18 trillion $).
(*) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_energy_consumption
(**) https://duckduckgo.com/?q=solar+panel+price+per+kw+evolution+chart&iax=images&ia=images
(***) I know, I know, that's not possible. The panels would have to be more than that, and scattered all over the earth. -
Why Tesla batteries SUCK!!
That Vid was so spot on!
Anything Said about The Tesla cult brings out the screaming fan bois that will make any excuse to defend the Religion of Musk.
I have several times put it to the Tesla cult members, Give me FINANCIAL reasons why Tesla will be around in 5 years Time"
I got all sorts of BS like they are innovators and invented the electric car and other non financial crap and the only remotely financially based excuse I have got so far was " they were a new company ( 10 years+ is new??) and all new Companies HAD to loose money for Financial reasons. "
YA! The people that defend the company clearly do not have the first basic clue of how a business runs and is structured but make out like they have been trading on the stock market for 20 years.
But, That is irrelevant. Tesla is perfect, can do no wrong and there is always a defensible excuse for every wrong doing that makes it right according to the fan Bois.
Tesla is by definition an actual Cult in every way.
The Hydrogen thing is interesting.
Company's like Honda are going down this road but I have yet to find how they can make it economically Viable and green at the same time.
I have tens of KW of electrical power to spare every day in summer and was looking for something to do with it. I built a fairly large scale Hydrogen generator. Despite being a Home made Job, the outputs I got were in line with the calculations for an industrial scale energy input/ gas output. They were basicaly, piss poor. Add to that the energy input required to compress the gas, the strength and cost of The Cylinders to store it and everything else and it's hard to understand how they can make this add up not only from electrolysis but other ways that use FF as the base input.
Having it as a by product is all well and good, scaling things up to meet global consumption or even a significant part of that is something VERY different.
The guys Comment in the Vid was spot on about flammability.
I'm not scared of gas like a lot of people are. Played with it a lot. The Hydrogen scared the shit out of me though.
I had a well Bled floating storage tank I was putting the gas I produced into. I was going to light some off straight out the tank and I thought no, better be careful and got a small Lunch bag And Filled that. Took it away, set a light to it and the resulting explosion from about 150Ml of the stuff had my ears ringing for hours and neighbors coming out to see what blew up. Literally.
In a Stroke of genius I THEN came in and looked up the flammability ratio and kicked myself for being Complacent.
the slightest bit of oxygen makes the stuff go bang and it is extremely energetic.
The only thing I have seen like it is Acetylene and oxygen in perfect mix. Put that in a sandwich bag and be a good distance away if you want to keep your head on your shoulders!
I bled off the hydrogen, put that exercise down as a learning experience and converted the setup to Methane and used the extra solar power to heat the slurry and produce loads more gas than I had done with the Hydrogen.
The beauty of the methane is it has a very narrow range of flammability in air and a MUCH lower risk of Deflagration.
For mine, the margin in methane burning and going bang is way too narrow. You want something to go bang easily in an IC engine but the production and storage factors are not a straightforward issue with methane.
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No, 3rd generation bio-fuels are for real. This is the 3rd party article I mentioned:
Your information is way out of date.
It's not as out of date as that website. Last entry in their news page was 2017.
Nothing I can see where they are actually PRODUCING anything either. Untill they are, I'll take it as just and other R&D Fundraiser to get Hopeful but gullible investors in... Like a million of these other breakthrough potentially world changing ideas that come along every year... and fall flat or their arses.
http://www.ethanolproducer.com/articles/15344/zero-to-10-million-in-5-years
Obviously there is a strong competition in this area because it is a highly lucrative business. This means that you won't find much detailed information on manufacturer's websites. The article from the link states this as well and has based much of it's information about volume on what has been reported to the EPA. The article also states that major problems have been overcome and several industrial scale factories are up&running. -
Why Tesla batteries SUCK!!
That Vid was so spot on!
Anything Said about The Tesla cult brings out the screaming fan bois that will make any excuse to defend the Religion of Musk.
I have several times put it to the Tesla cult members, Give me FINANCIAL reasons why Tesla will be around in 5 years Time"
I got all sorts of BS like they are innovators and invented the electric car and other non financial crap and the only remotely financially based excuse I have got so far was " they were a new company ( 10 years+ is new??) and all new Companies HAD to loose money for Financial reasons. "
YA! The people that defend the company clearly do not have the first basic clue of how a business runs and is structured but make out like they have been trading on the stock market for 20 years.
But, That is irrelevant. Tesla is perfect, can do no wrong and there is always a defensible excuse for every wrong doing that makes it right according to the fan Bois.
Tesla is by definition an actual Cult in every way.
The Hydrogen thing is interesting.
Company's like Honda are going down this road but I have yet to find how they can make it economically Viable and green at the same time.
I have tens of KW of electrical power to spare every day in summer and was looking for something to do with it. I built a fairly large scale Hydrogen generator. Despite being a Home made Job, the outputs I got were in line with the calculations for an industrial scale energy input/ gas output. They were basicaly, piss poor. Add to that the energy input required to compress the gas, the strength and cost of The Cylinders to store it and everything else and it's hard to understand how they can make this add up not only from electrolysis but other ways that use FF as the base input.
Having it as a by product is all well and good, scaling things up to meet global consumption or even a significant part of that is something VERY different.
The guys Comment in the Vid was spot on about flammability.
I'm not scared of gas like a lot of people are. Played with it a lot. The Hydrogen scared the shit out of me though.
I had a well Bled floating storage tank I was putting the gas I produced into. I was going to light some off straight out the tank and I thought no, better be careful and got a small Lunch bag And Filled that. Took it away, set a light to it and the resulting explosion from about 150Ml of the stuff had my ears ringing for hours and neighbors coming out to see what blew up. Literally.
In a Stroke of genius I THEN came in and looked up the flammability ratio and kicked myself for being Complacent.
the slightest bit of oxygen makes the stuff go bang and it is extremely energetic.
The only thing I have seen like it is Acetylene and oxygen in perfect mix. Put that in a sandwich bag and be a good distance away if you want to keep your head on your shoulders!
I bled off the hydrogen, put that exercise down as a learning experience and converted the setup to Methane and used the extra solar power to heat the slurry and produce loads more gas than I had done with the Hydrogen.
The beauty of the methane is it has a very narrow range of flammability in air and a MUCH lower risk of Deflagration.
For mine, the margin in methane burning and going bang is way too narrow. You want something to go bang easily in an IC engine but the production and storage factors are not a straightforward issue with methane.
I don't know if they will survive but they have made a profit two quarters in a row now. Time will tell.
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With all the lay-offs and restructuring it seems likely that Tesla is being made ready to be sold. That is more likely to happen with a company which looks good on paper.
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With all the lay-offs and restructuring it seems likely that Tesla is being made ready to be sold. That is more likely to happen with a company which looks good on paper.
Volkswagen!
Anyone know much about the life and claims of Nikola Tesla? The claims Nikola made are not unlike (modern) claims of Elon Musk.
Tesla claimed he had a Pierce Arrow car fitted with an electric motor and vacuum tubes which tuned into the power of the universe for power. If history is to repeat itself there should be a fire sometime soon at Tesla Motors research facility which will destroy all Elon's "magical" research. And one has to wonder if one day Elon just like Nikola will say he's communicating with aliens. (Nikola was reveled he was communicating with Martians.)
One has to ask what is Elon Good at? Disruption. He did it to the banking/credit card industry with PayPal. He's disrupted the power industry with solar. He's tried to a John F. Kennedy with the space program or a President Busch with his trip to Mars. And he's disrupted the car industry with electric vehicles. How many car companies will be producing EV cars? And some have gone so far to say they won't be producing any ICE cars anymore.
Can we STOP with the silliness of biofuels. They has some patented method for collecting silage for farmers they are trying to license. I live in California one of the largest agriculture producers in the world any from what I can tell not one biofuel producer, and we have 30 of them), is using this "great , new, wonderful" biofuel technology which will power the word with biomass. If it increased biofuel yields as you say why is it not one company is using it? One has to conclude it does not work as well as you think it does.
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No. Some Chinese company. European and Japanese car manufacturers are banking on bio-fuels and/or hydrogen.With all the lay-offs and restructuring it seems likely that Tesla is being made ready to be sold. That is more likely to happen with a company which looks good on paper.
Volkswagen! -
No. Some Chinese company. European and Japanese car manufacturers are banking on bio-fuels and/or hydrogen.With all the lay-offs and restructuring it seems likely that Tesla is being made ready to be sold. That is more likely to happen with a company which looks good on paper.
Volkswagen!
Really? Please provide the names of the Chinese. European and Japanese car manufacturers are who are specifically making cars which run on bio-fuels?
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Quote
Give me FINANCIAL reasons why Tesla will be around in 5 years Time"
Easy.
- Near Monopoly in the BEVs markets where the model 3 is sold, in a booming market.
- 20-30% profitability
- Over half a million customers waiting in the line.
- production figures of approx half a million units/Year -
One has to ask what is Elon Good at? Disruption. He did it to the banking/credit card industry with PayPal. He's disrupted the power industry with solar. He's tried to a John F. Kennedy with the space program or a President Busch with his trip to Mars. And he's disrupted the car industry with electric vehicles. How many car companies will be producing EV cars? And some have gone so far to say they won't be producing any ICE cars anymore.
1) For umpteenth time, PAYPAL is NOT Elon's child: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PayPal#History and TESLA is NOT Elon's child: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla,_Inc.#History
2) In what way has he disrupted the power industry with solar? Because Solarcity is totally irrelevant in its market.
3) Electric cars are a pain in the ass and expensive. Nobody wants them except rich weirdos as a second car, if at all... -
There are several Chinese companies who are potential buyers. The comments about European and Japanese car makers make no sense at all., though. Bio-fuels don't require special cars, and hydrogen cars are still more of a compliance project than a serious market development project.
No. Some Chinese company. European and Japanese car manufacturers are banking on bio-fuels and/or hydrogen.With all the lay-offs and restructuring it seems likely that Tesla is being made ready to be sold. That is more likely to happen with a company which looks good on paper.
Volkswagen!
Really? Please provide the names of the Chinese. European and Japanese car manufacturers are who are specifically making cars which run on bio-fuels? -
BYD comes to mind. The Chinese EV market is huge: https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeldunne/2018/03/30/chinas-electric-vehicle-leaders-who-are-they/#70652e2730b6
Really? Please provide the names of the Chinese. European and Japanese car manufacturers are who are specifically making cars which run on bio-fuels?
No. Some Chinese company. European and Japanese car manufacturers are banking on bio-fuels and/or hydrogen.With all the lay-offs and restructuring it seems likely that Tesla is being made ready to be sold. That is more likely to happen with a company which looks good on paper.
Volkswagen!
European and Japanese car manufacturers who's cars can run on bio-fuel?: Simple: all of them. They have been making them that way for decades already. It is so common that it doesn't even get mentioned. -
BYD comes to mind.
There are several Chinese car makers who might reasonably buy Tesla, and probably would if the finances and regulatory conditions are right, but why BYD? Its such a poor fit. -
One has to ask what is Elon Good at? Disruption. He did it to the banking/credit card industry with PayPal. He's disrupted the power industry with solar. He's tried to a John F. Kennedy with the space program or a President Busch with his trip to Mars. And he's disrupted the car industry with electric vehicles. How many car companies will be producing EV cars? And some have gone so far to say they won't be producing any ICE cars anymore.
1) For umpteenth time, PAYPAL is NOT Elon's child: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PayPal#History and TESLA is NOT Elon's child: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla,_Inc.#History
2) In what way has he disrupted the power industry with solar? Because Solarcity is totally irrelevant in its market.
3) Electric cars are a pain in the ass and expensive. Nobody wants them except rich weirdos as a second car, if at all...
1) Never said PayPal was Elonn’s child. I sad he disrupted the banking industry. Take a look at the Wiki entry about Elon and what it has to say about PayPal.
2. Solar industry has been around for 60 years or so or about the time Elon was born. It ws at his suggestion that his relatives create Solar City with his help. Not sure where you are but Solar City marketed solar panels and the financing of solar panels like crazy in parts of the US. There are so many people where I live who have with solar it has really disrupted the power company’s business model. N They now have too much power at peak solar hours and not enough power during peak usage times. Look at what Solar City and the other solar companies did to disrupt the power industry in Nevada.
3) Why do you say electric cars are a pain in the ass and expensive. Teslas are on the expensive side but there are mid-priced affordable EVs. You have to admit Elon and Tesla Motors has lead to the disruption of the automobile industry. Fifteen years ago were any of the big auto manufactures talking about EV? The apparent success of Tesla has disrupted the automobile and automobile racing industry. EV cars are i
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Lack of range, charge times, variable range depending on weather and fine me an electric car which has a tow-bar so you can haul a trailer or caravan. Hauling a trailer or caraven probably requires a different gear ratio to have enough torque at low speed. Since electric cars have a fixed gear box this won't be easy to fix.
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Lack of range, charge times, variable range depending on wheater and name an electric car which has a tow-bar so you can haul a trailer or caravan.
The Tesla X is rated for towing 2250 kg, which is not surprising when you consider the torque electric motors offer. The Tesla S seems to be rated a bit lower, but I'm not sure which version of the model S the figures I have seen apply to.
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The Tesla X is a rare exception (and you have to run it in 'trailer mode'). And 2250kg is with the small rim. With large 22" rims you may pull much less weight.Lack of range, charge times, variable range depending on wheater and name an electric car which has a tow-bar so you can haul a trailer or caravan.
The Tesla X is rated for towing 2250 kg, which is not surprising when you consider the torque electric motors offer. The Tesla S seems to be rated a bit lower, but I'm not sure which version of the model S the figures I have seen apply to. -
Why do you say electric cars are a pain in the ass and expensive.
Because I suffer the one I've got :-) -
All cars have conditions attached to their towing capacity. The Tesla X is no different. The Tesla models 3, S, and X all have tow ratings. The model 3 is only rated to tow 418kg, so its more for small trailers than for caravans. The model S and X are rated to tow serious caravans. Considering their enormous torque and high power output I wonder why their tow ratings are so low? The Nissan Leaf is smaller and less powerful, but its rated to tow 1500kg. The Audi E-Tron is rated to tow 1800kg. The Korean electric cars and the Jaguar i-Pace don't have tow ratings. Most of the other electric cars, like the Zoe, are pretty small, and you probably wouldn't want to try towing with them,.
The Tesla X is a rare exception (and you have to run it in 'trailer mode'). And 2250kg is with the small rim. With large 22" rims you may pull much less weight.Lack of range, charge times, variable range depending on wheater and name an electric car which has a tow-bar so you can haul a trailer or caravan.
The Tesla X is rated for towing 2250 kg, which is not surprising when you consider the torque electric motors offer. The Tesla S seems to be rated a bit lower, but I'm not sure which version of the model S the figures I have seen apply to.
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These statements are so incorrect I'm not sure if you were serious or trying to be funny and have a lend.QuoteGive me FINANCIAL reasons why Tesla will be around in 5 years Time"
Easy.
- Near Monopoly in the BEVs markets where the model 3 is sold, in a booming market.
Have you ANY idea how many new EV's are about to rain down on the market in the next 12 Months let alone 3 years?
Tesla Couldn't make a profit ( except for 3 quarters in 10 years which no where near covers total losses and expenditure) when they had the market to themselves. You really think they are going to be OK when they are going up against the automotive power houses and the likes of the Koreans and Europeans?
If you do, I'd like to ask how many Tesla shares you own.Quote- 20-30% profitability
Supposedly on the Model 3 but over all operating costs apart from the last 2 quarters have put them well in the red. The last quarter was a scrape though, the quarter before that was a lot of Book Cooking, let see how they go over the next 12 Months. If they can be posting profits I might change my mind But I trust NOTHING Tesla or Elon say without evidence of it being sustainable and not a one off.Quote- Over half a million customers waiting in the line.
NEVER had half a million customers waiting. All the backorders for the cars they are producing, IE, NOT the model 3 $35K model which they have touted but NEVER have made and I suspect never WILL make ( that mean the thing was yet another LIE and bit of Marketing BS) Have been filled. Further more Tesla has been having sales and lowering the prices of their Vehicles. This is not the behaviour of a car co with more orders than it can supply.
There are also many pictures and evidence of thousands of cars sitting in holding yards and evidence these holding yards are getting much larger rather than the cars being there for the short term between delivery and customer pick up.
The only orders they have are for the Model 3 $35K Vaporware Version and the normal lead time productions for custom orders.
No one ATM thinks they have ANY significant back orders.Quote- production figures of approx half a million units/Year
The latest production figures and estimates I can find done last month show production at a bit over 320K units per year. That's a big difference from 500K.
Those numbers are an absolute drop in the ocean in vehicle manufacturing terms.
GM sold nearly 300K cars in December 2018 Alone. Toyota did 220K and Ford did 219 K, also JUST in December. Tesla did 20K.
Honda, Nissan Subaru, Kia, Hyuandi and a whole bunch of the Europeans wiped the floor with them. Bear in Mind, this is US ONLY so the numbers world wide would multiply that. Tesla is selling token numbers outside the US ATM.
Given the new EV offerings By Hyundai, Kia, Merc, Jag and others that are all poised to release EV's this year or have already, You would be a brave man to bet on tesla at this stage although I tend to believe you are probably a lot more misinformed than anything else.
Add to that Tesla has only 3 Models and 2 of them are close to 10 years old, their offerings are limited, expensive and plagued with problems like Build quality and servicing and repair is an absolute joke thats even being lambasted hourly on the fan Boi Tesla sties.
The hero worshipping only has so much reach and when the non fairydust believers and and the Fleet market go to buy vehicles, Tesla is not even going to make the list for these buyers.
For a company that doesn't even advertise, had scarce showrooms, scarcer servicing and repair centres and a CEO/ Leader taken to be a crackpot at best and an outright liar by most to go up against the manufacturers that are producing well built Vehicles at half the price or less, have a dealership in every populated area with servicing, advertising and brand loyalty and recognition, makes NO financial sense to back in anyone with a realistic Views eyes.