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A Rivians "Dent" - EVA Wisconsin Road Trip
590 Plays8 months ago
Welcome to the Plug In For More podcast! Mike, Tom, and Bryant are here to help you on your journey to an Electric vehicle future. Each episode we discuss current events, trends, and a specific topic of education related to EV's. We bring together a diverse experience set, and pair it with guests who are experts in the field. For even more information on EV's, check out www.EVUniverse.com.
In this episode Mike, and Tom sit down with Jeremiah Brockman, President of the Wisconsin chapter of the Electric Vehicle Association. He brings us a preview into Wisconsin road trip event planned for the summer. For more information about this event check out: https://www.wisconsinevroadtrip.org and https://www.facebook.com/groups/1166336484317825/
Plus, Mike crashes his Rivian. We weigh the pro's and con's of the Rivian, Cybertruck, and Lightning.
Be sure to follow PIFM on our various social media platforms, for more exciting content on EV’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pifm_podcast/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PIFMPodcast
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Transcript
Introduction to Jeremiah Brockman and EV Universe
00:00:00
Speaker
Welcome back to the plugin for more podcast. Mike and I here today we're meeting with Jeremiah Brockman, who is the president of the Wisconsin chapter of the Electric Vehicle Association. He's going to talk to us about a fun event they've got planned. Mike, what do you got for us? One is I banged up the Rivian. So we can talk about that in a moment. And the Cybertruck and F-150 and my personal dilemma on what to do.
00:00:25
Speaker
Welcome to Plug In For More, brought to you by evuniverse.com. EV Universe is your one-stop shop for all things related to the electric vehicle. Here on this podcast, our goal is to educate, inspire, and hopefully make your transition into the electric vehicle marketplace a lot less intimidating. And now, here are your hosts, Mike, Tom and Brian.
US Electric Vehicle Sales Trends and Misconceptions
00:00:53
Speaker
Before we get into that, I know we were briefly discussing sales of EVs in the US and a lot of things that we see right now on the mainstream media are talking about how the sales are not going up that much, how it's like a doom and gloom for electric vehicles, all this kind of stuff out there, which I think is more click bait than anything else. And recently there was a really good article by the
00:01:16
Speaker
by Inside EVs that talks about non-Tesla sales and how they surged in 2023. I know you read that as well. What were your thoughts after reading that article? I think it just highlights the fact that there is a mainstream adoption happening. There are people who are interested in it. You're talking
00:01:39
Speaker
a significant increase in sales over the course of 2023 from 2022. And I think that's in mind with what we've been saying all along. Now, there's one quote in here I want to read. And what it basically says, according to sales data analyzed by Inside TVs, during the fourth quarter, this is the fourth quarter, so only a quarter of the year, 19 brands.
00:02:06
Speaker
mentioned below sold over 134,000 EVs. That's a 60% increase year-over-year and a new quarterly record.
Ford's F-150 Lightning Production Cuts
00:02:15
Speaker
So there's information that comes out about the F-150, Lightning and Ford cutting the production of that vehicle. Let's talk about that for a little bit, reasons why. So the increase
00:02:31
Speaker
year over year is up 60%, right? So why would Ford be cutting that production? Now I've got my thoughts, but what are yours? Well, I think that there's the entirely, it's entirely possible that Ford produced too many trucks in the first place. That could be one, but also two, there is other information floating around that there is a secret EV program that Ford is working on, that there's going to be some new lower priced options coming to market here in the next couple of years. Yep.
00:02:59
Speaker
Yeah. And I think it's the way I look at that. It's probably a combination, right? So anytime you're producing any type of product, anyone who has been through that process in any job knows that it's all about forecasting, right? So if they're expecting a certain number of sales, a certain number of, um, ramp period. And if they get that wrong, they're going to either have a surplus or a shortage of whatever they're producing. Now it seems like Ford probably has a surplus and that's why they had to cut the prices so much.
00:03:29
Speaker
even though they're still selling much, much, many, many more trucks than they have in the year before. So I think that's a big key. And yeah, you're right. I mean, if they're having trouble getting, let's say, batteries too, why put those batteries into a truck that's not selling that they're cutting the price on when they can produce three or four maybe lower priced vehicles have much smaller batteries?
Rivian Accident and Repair Process
00:03:50
Speaker
So switching gears real quick, do you think when you get your Cybertruck, it's going to be crash resistance against concrete pillars?
00:03:59
Speaker
So, um, maybe I hope so. Uh, so let's talk about that. Um, so I went to go one with the family to go see, uh, an old neighbor of ours, good friends, and, uh, pulled into a parking deck and got a little distracted as I was backing out. And, um, yeah, the Rivian dense, when you, uh, turn it into a concrete pillar.
00:04:23
Speaker
That's a heck of a dent.
00:04:42
Speaker
when I turned into that pillar, that only hit the door too. So it pushed the door in a decent amount, got the rear view mirror, but it really didn't hit any other part of the car, it's just the door. And so by the time you repaint and you replace the door mirror, you know, they're talking $12,000 for that full repair.
00:05:07
Speaker
I don't really think it has anything to do with being an EV either. I mean, when you look at it, I mean, there's nothing EV related in there. There's some driver assistance stuff that goes on with cameras. But it's, you know, this is nothing to do with a battery or a charging system. This is just a expensive fix. Which anytime out of body shop to get that type of a price point on body damage isn't that hard. No. Not really isn't. What type of shot are you using this normal body shop to get it fixed?
00:05:36
Speaker
Now this is a body shop that has worked on tessels for many, many years. Um, it's in the Raleigh area. It's called relentless, relentless collision. Um, and they're one of three certified Rivian repair facilities as well. So it's going through them. Um, it's been a really smooth, um, uh, process and yeah, I'm sure it'll be fixed really, really well. I did notice though, they had,
00:06:05
Speaker
five or six other Rivians there getting prepared for windshields and just other people banging stuff. I was surprised at that many Rivians being in the same kind of condition mine was. So I'm not alone.
Tesla Cybertruck Delivery and Comparisons
00:06:23
Speaker
So you might try to make fun of me and I probably deserve it.
00:06:26
Speaker
I'm not the only one who's done this. But for real though, the Cybertruck. Any news yet? Any VINs? Anything? Yeah. Okay. All the details on that. This truck has been ordered. I ordered the all-wheel drive version because I wanted the soonest one that would come out for content, for the company, everything that we can do with that.
00:06:50
Speaker
So December 21st, put the order in. I finished all my delivery tasks that I could do at that point in time within the Tesla app. And as of today, and we are recording on February 9th already. So all the way through January, I am still just sitting with a reservation number and this is in North Carolina. So they'd only been.
00:07:15
Speaker
delivered as of the time of this recording in Texas and California. And then I think one or two in Florida says not hit. Um, yeah, I don't have a vignette. So I'm probably going to stop over to the local Tesla store and see if they can pull any information on the bill date on that thing. Um, originally it was supposed to be here between January and March. Well, that's like three weeks away.
00:07:43
Speaker
And maybe they meant by the end of March, I'm not sure, but I hope not. Cause I'm getting a little, a little tired. Yeah. A little antsy in your pants. Yeah. A little antsy in my pants. I guess part of that's my own fault for having a repaired truck. Um, but okay. So let's also talk about what the other option for trucks. Cause I, after having one, I really want to keep on that one 50 lightning. So.
00:08:07
Speaker
The more and more I look at it and experiencing the space that there is in a F 150 massive frunk. I mean, just charge a little bit slower. Zero 60 times about the same between the, you know, the dual motor Rivian, which I've got the quad motor. So it is pretty darn fast. Um, but four seconds for the lightening and four seconds for the, uh, all wheel drive cyber truck. That's about the same.
00:08:32
Speaker
And the truck that lightning is more of a truck truck than anything else out there. It doesn't have a protective body, which maybe that's something I really need. Yeah, I don't know. That seems like kind of a sweet deal right now.
00:08:53
Speaker
had, by comparison, you're getting a lot of truck for the money by going with the lightning over the Cybertruck. Honestly, but the Cybertruck, I think there's a lot of value there. I mean, maybe not, maybe I shouldn't say value, but I think it's really cool. Like what it has, what it can do, what it means for the future electric vehicles, but like all that type of, I don't know, virtue signaling or whatever you want to call it probably doesn't much matter to the pocketbook so much, but it's pretty cool.
00:09:21
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, so that's the conundrum, right, is getting the Cybertruck for company uses and just moral promotion. What does that look like? I mean, you're going to stand out in the crowd for a while by having that truck. Is it worth the extra, let's say, $50,000 over getting a slightly used Lightning that is pretty well loaded up? I don't know.
00:09:51
Speaker
Cause frankly, the range isn't going to be any better. Um, and if it is, it might be just only a handful of miles and you're going to still have access to the supercharging network with the lightning coming up soon. So that's not really that big of a thing for what I need it for other than wrecking into, you know, concrete pillars. I'm not.
00:10:15
Speaker
I'm not so sure I'm getting that much use out of it. I'm not going to be off-roading this thing. And that's not even showing to be that great in the Cybertruck as of right now. You're listening to the Plug-In For More podcast. If you're looking for information on electric vehicles, electric vehicles components, or information on how to reduce your carbon footprint, look no further than evuniverse.com. evuniverse.com is your one-stop shop for all things related to electric vehicles.
Jeremiah Brockman's EV Journey
00:10:44
Speaker
Well, welcome, Jeremiah. Jeremiah Brockman. So we've known you for quite a while, but you're new to the podcast. And then you've done some work, actually, for EV Universe in the past. Big EV industry expert. You're the head of the Wisconsin EVA Association, so Electric Vehicle Association. Can you give us a little background on yourself, I mean, for the listeners on what you're doing now these days?
00:11:09
Speaker
Yeah, so actually my background is more in history, but we've had an EV since 2017. We started off with a Tesla Model S. Kind of funny, we actually went from diesel gate, took the buyback money, and then just turned around and bought a Tesla with it, doing the best that we could anyway. And then yeah, so that was 2017. And since then, I've just loved the car. I talked to whoever would listen.
00:11:39
Speaker
about the car, what it's like, what it would take people on test drives and just floor it and watch as they almost lose it in the passenger seat. So we are an all-electric household right now. We have a used 2012 Model S signature that we bought from, I like to say that we rescued it from a dealership in Ohio. If you drive down here to get it, it's going to take you a couple of days to get home.
00:12:09
Speaker
Well, that's not quite right, but it's, uh, but if you can get a deal on it, if you can get a deal on it, because they didn't know, I mean, that's not to say that I haven't taken advantage of that in the past with the model X that we bought that they thought it was a 75 D when it was a hundred D and they priced it at the wrong, you know.
00:12:32
Speaker
Wrong mark. Um, so we drove that one for two years and sold it for more than we paid for it. That was before the big price increase too. But yeah, I mean that, that's sick 100 that you are, it's not, it's not sick 100. I think I'm thinking of the roadsters, but, um, that signature model S you have, um, you talk about that a little bit. Cause I think that's got some neat features that the other model S's don't want. I mean, just being, again, one of the signature vehicles that has, I think different wheels on it. If I recall correctly, it's got some other.
00:13:02
Speaker
Nice touches to it Yeah, so the Excuse me, the signature model had like all the bells and whistles When that came out like the first I want to say 2000 is either 1500 or 2000 more signature models And so like it's got you know little trim pieces on the seat that are kind of red leather It's got a sunroof This one did not have a spoiler on it, which some of them do and yeah
00:13:30
Speaker
It did have some bigger rims, which I actually ended up trading out for smaller rims because you get better range. And then air suspension on it, which is amazing. It's such a smooth ride. Actually, I prefer the model at our 2012. We have a 21 model Y.
00:13:52
Speaker
that I actually prefer the older Model S to. It's mostly because of the ride quality, but yeah, that car is really, it's pre-autopilot, so like it doesn't have, it just got cruise control, it doesn't even have the adaptive cruise control that some of the newer cars have, you know, gas or otherwise.
00:14:11
Speaker
So it's just cruise control. And then, of course, it's got the big screen. And interestingly, though, it does not have cup holders in the back. But yeah, so it's like it had all the bells and whistles. And it's really, as far as I know, there's only been one battery replacement. But I'm not for sure, because Tesla won't tell me what the service history is. They say it's a privacy issue, which I don't necessarily understand.
00:14:36
Speaker
As far as I know, it's only had one battery replacement, and that was in 2015, it sounds like. How many miles are on it, Jeremiah? We've put, oh, I'm trying to think. I think it's about 135,000. It's plugging along just fine. Actually, we had the car in to have the brakes cleaned.
00:15:00
Speaker
Just because Tesla recommends you do that every so often. The mechanic who is not affiliated with Tesla goes, have you ever had these brakes changed or anything? Because they look brand new. It's just like, well, we got the regen going and you don't have to use the brake pedal as much. That's my daily driver is the 2012 Model S.
00:15:26
Speaker
And my kids, when my youngest isn't motion sick, my kids love how quick it is because that's just, that's a rear wheel. And so when you match the throttle, you, you squawk the tires a little bit. And so they really enjoy it too. I bet they do. You know, so the model S and the model Y, I mean, there's, obviously there's a bunch of new things on the market. And we typically will ask other people, you know, what's their favorite thing that's coming out? Is there something that you're interested in that maybe not ready to pull the trigger, but really holds your interest?
00:15:57
Speaker
So we're pretty sure we want a truck next, but the Cybertruck is just...
00:16:06
Speaker
God awful ugly. I mean, bless your heart if you like them and you have one and all that stuff. But it's, I mean, I always like to say, like people like bulldogs and bulldogs are ugly, so it's not necessarily a bad thing. Hang on, time out. I just want to stop you right here. So not only did you just insult the truck that I have on order that I'm waiting for the VIN, but then you went out for bulldogs and I went to Ferris State and that's my alma mater you're going after too. So back to back.
00:16:35
Speaker
I feel like you and Tom ganged up on me before they call here. It's just kind of universal understanding of things. Universal understanding, yeah. So there's a reason why Tom was being quiet for most of this call. We don't like Ohio. We don't like Ferris. Cybertruck's hideous. The Rivian has dumb headlights. I mean, all these things. Although I will say one of the trucks that we're looking at is the Rivian. Just because I don't... I personally don't...
00:17:06
Speaker
Well, and it's not on the market yet, the Chevy Silverado 1500. Yeah, the Silverado EV. I think that's coming out this year, if I'm not mistaken, but yeah, it's just we're more leaning towards the Rivian or Ford. I mean, I'll give you my unsolicited opinion on this. I mean, having a Rivian, the one thing I wish I
00:17:31
Speaker
took into account was how small it is. It's really not big enough, I don't think. I've got two kids, and I know you've got kids as well, having a dog in the rear seat. There's not much room for long road trips. That's kind of the killer, and the bed's a little bit smaller than what I'd like. The F-150, frankly, I think if I was going to do it over again, I'd probably wouldn't get a Lightning, because the range isn't that much different, and the cargo capacity is just that much bigger. The frunk is massive in that thing.
00:18:01
Speaker
I mean, don't get me wrong, the Rivian is pretty fantastic as far as how it drives and the interior is gorgeous, but especially it's bigger. If you want to do truck stuff. Yeah. If you want to do truck stuff. Yeah. And that's the one thing we were kind of, cause we have two, you know, full like big dogs. Um, we have a couple of labs and then yeah, our kids, but, um, so there's the Rivian still in the running cause there's not much, uh, not many times when we have both the kids and the dogs in the truck or the car at the same time.
00:18:33
Speaker
We do have family that's pretty far away from both on my wife's side and my side, so the range is more appealing.
Wisconsin Electric Vehicle Road Trip Event
00:18:42
Speaker
You've got a really, really cool event coming up with the EVA in Wisconsin, so that hasn't been done before. Walk us through what that is. I know you and I have worked on it, but for the listeners out there that don't know, that want to participate or may want to participate, give us some details on that.
00:18:59
Speaker
a fundraiser for our chapter. Let me back up just for a little bit. For those who don't know, the Electric Vehicle Association is a national nonprofit organization. We're all volunteer. I think we've got maybe one or two people at the national level who get paid like an accounting and a tech person. Otherwise, our national president all the way down to me and other officers, we're all volunteer.
00:19:26
Speaker
I wanted to do a fundraiser for our chapter that was fun to do. Wasn't just, you know, like a, you know, go to a parking lot and have a raffle or a brat. Well, although brat fries are great. I love brats. Um, so, um, you're in Wisconsin. Brats and cheese, baby. Um, don't forget, don't forget the beer. Yeah. So. Yep. Um, it started off actually, I wanted to do a race, an EV race. Um,
00:19:54
Speaker
around the state of Wisconsin, but then I kind of got to thinking and I, you know, I talked to you, Mike and my wife and several other people and they were like, well, you really want to do a race when, you know, there might be some safety issues there. And so I eventually backed off of that. And now it's a road trip. It's much more calm and kind of easy going.
00:20:13
Speaker
But basically what we're going to do is start in Madison. It's only EVs just because plug-in hybrids would have kind of a massive advantage with the range anyway and filling up quickly and all that stuff. Plus a bunch of other boring details I won't get into, but we're just doing EVs. We're starting in Madison. We're kind of going counterclockwise and we're going to work our way around the state and stop at various towns around the state.
00:20:41
Speaker
and do checkpoints. And basically, you know, the EV team or group or whatever in a particular car will drive into the place, take a picture of the business that's sponsoring that particular checkpoint, you know, post it on all their social medias and drive on to the next one. And then, so it's gonna be a two day event, August 9th and 10th. And on the evening of August 9th, we're gonna have
00:21:09
Speaker
One of those free car shows I mentioned earlier for people in the Wausau area. And then we're going to stay overnight in Wausau and then continue our trip around the state of Wisconsin, also ending in Madison on the evening of the 10th as well. So we're going to have like a dinner slash reception slash, you know, what went wrong, what went well with this event kind of thing. But.
00:21:33
Speaker
So yeah, and then we're hoping to do several things with the funds that we raise from this event. One of the main things I want to do is make scholarships for people who live in Wisconsin and want to go to a, it'd be a trade school. I don't think any four-year colleges have like mechanical, you know, programs that I know of. But like if any Wisconsin residents want to go to a tech program and learn how to work on EVs, that's something we'd love to help with.
00:22:03
Speaker
There's also, I would like to do some things with like charging infrastructure, kind of helping out with rebate type stuff. We still have to kind of work out the kinks with that particular thing. And then another thing that I'm kind of thinking I would like to do, and this is all kind of up for suggestion and, you know, I kind of, as the president of the chapter, I'm kind of, my door is always open kind of a guy, but another thing I'd kind of like to work into the,
00:22:30
Speaker
what we do with the funds is helping either police stations and or school districts get charging equipment for any electric vehicles that they utilize for their day to day. These are things that I will eventually get like a committee of chapter members, because we do have, we have a Facebook group, which is obviously free to do Facebook, but then we have paid chapter members. And so of those paid chapter members, we have officers and we have
00:23:00
Speaker
I'm trying to put together a committee to figure out who would get what funds where, so it's not just me deciding unilaterally who gets what money. How do you envision this event going? If you're in your head, you're planning this out. I'm guessing, obviously, you haven't done it before, but what makes this a victory? What makes this a win for you at the end of the day? A win would be everybody. We start in Madison, leave at 8.30. Everybody goes around and it's nice and neat and orderly.
00:23:30
Speaker
You know, no accidents and it's pure fun for everybody and there are no kind of negative interactions with anybody, especially kind of in our free car show up in Wausau. It's pretty rare at those shows that people are kind of rude or anything like that. Usually what happens is people are very curious or they just don't interact. That's the most common thing. But that would be just pure success for me.
00:24:00
Speaker
you know, ending up our trip in Madison on the night of the 10th, I would just like, you know, any feedback from anybody, really, that would be just to take into the next one, because I am hoping to do this year after year, or maybe every other year, we'll see how it goes. But one of the things that I think will be interesting is in the future when the charging infrastructure catches up in Wisconsin, because we've got
00:24:29
Speaker
It's like 60 planned from the infrastructure plan that's going through our state government right now. Then we'll be able to expand our route into other parts of the state that we really can't get to right now. How many vehicles are you anticipating or prepared to have? I'm anticipating right now about five. Ideally, at least 10 Tesla and 10 CCS cars.
00:24:59
Speaker
We'll see I mean, I'll take whoever you know wants to participate and I should I guess one thing I should mention too It's if you're driving in the road trip, there is kind of an entry fee since it's a fundraiser If you're just riding along there's not so one thing that I'm also trying to kind of work into the the event is how do we get people who are either on the fence about EVs or Don't like EVs but are friendly about it to ride along with somebody and just see what the experience is like
00:25:28
Speaker
Is that something I'm working on too? I hear the numbers. My only concern would be if you have 10 cars or let's say 20 cars all riding together, when you get to destinations, how do you anticipate charging locations going? Do you have enough spots for everyone to be topping off? That's something that I really struggled to plan for when I was
00:25:52
Speaker
doing the kind of early iterations of this event.
Managing EV Charging Challenges for the Event
00:25:56
Speaker
But eventually, I think people will just have to kind of... And the strategy will be different for everybody. Some people will want to drive till they're empty and some people will want to stop for lunch and they'll charge then. And so I'm hoping people kind of stagger charging.
00:26:14
Speaker
And then we do have, so I'm working on a room block of hotels up in Wausau. One's at a supercharger and one is like a mile down the road from an electrify America station. So I'm hoping that will kind of help with that as well. But yeah, I mean, the more cars we get, it would be kind of potential for a lot of congestion, but that's something I'm kind of working on too. That's a good problem to have though.
00:26:41
Speaker
So if someone listening right now wants to be a part of this event or at least check it out, can you give us some information on where they can go to find that? Yeah. So we've got an event website. It's wisconsinevroadtrip.org. And so I'm updating that as we go here, but you can also check us out on Facebook. I've got an event section on our Facebook group. So that is...
00:27:08
Speaker
So that I'm trying to think because we had, we used to have a private group and I switched it to public so I had to make a new one. So it is electric vehicle association dash Wisconsin chapter is the new one. And I'll make sure that we get a link to all those in the show notes and people listening now can click on that and it'll be available to them. Yeah. And I just want to, I do want to mention too, um, so I mentioned the entry fee for everybody. Um, everybody's welcome. Even if you don't live in Wisconsin, it's open to anybody.
00:27:39
Speaker
Um, and then, um, every EV, you know, even if you have a Nissan Leaf and you want to give it a go, I don't recommend that, but, um, that might be a little challenging. Uh, but yeah, any, anybody's welcome. Do you have any Machis yet? Um, no, but I have a verbal commitment from a, um, uh, a lightning owner. Okay. So, all right. All right.
00:28:08
Speaker
And then we've got, I've also got a verbal from, uh, somebody who has a Volkswagen ID four as well. Okay. Cool. Is there anything else that we didn't cover with the Jeremiah that you think needs to get out there? Um, I don't think so. Um, I guess, um, um, yeah, I guess that's really all, all I got. I, I.
00:28:32
Speaker
touched on the organization that we have at the state level and then at the national level. I guess I could mention this. If anybody wants to join and be a dues paying member of the chapter, you can do that as well. If you go to myeva.org, there's a tab on there where you can select Become Involved. You can join our chapter. That's also how you can get a hold of me if you ever have a question. People do that all the time.
00:29:01
Speaker
email questions about what's going on in the state with EVs, what kind of electric vehicle would work for my situation, that sort of stuff. And I've even had people reach out for things like press events and research that they're doing and that sort of stuff.
00:29:18
Speaker
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00:29:35
Speaker
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00:29:52
Speaker
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