Electric Cars

Here’s a nine-second clip of a concept car the company says will kick off a “bold new era for Acura design” next week at Monterey Car Week. Acura’s future models will feature the new design language, starting with the fourth-gen RDX Hybrid Acura revealed a prototype of earlier this year.

Ford says its Fathom electric truck will start at $28,350, just a few thousand more than Slate’s. There’s good reason to be cautious about how long that lasts.

The massive $16.8 billion chip facility, which is being built by Tesla and SpaceX with help from Intel, will be located in Grimes County, population 29,268. After securing over a billion dollars in tax breaks from two rural school districts, SpaceX says it will break ground later this year. The fab will supply AI chips to power Musk’s plans to build a “robot army” that includes self-driving cars and humanoid robots, as well as for the data centers he plans on launching into space.

The automaker only announced the new 4-door electric sedan last spring and it’s already adding a new variant. The Mercedes-AMG GT 53 will be a new high-performance model arriving in US dealerships in 2027. Mercedes has used the 53 badge for its electrified 3.0-liter turbocharged inline-six engines. Now it will be applied to an all-electric sedan with a dual-motor 800V architecture, 536 horsepower and 590 lb-ft of torque, and a 0-60 acceleration in 3.4 seconds.

“Fake news,” is how he responded to a Wall Street Journal report on the possible sale of Tesla’s business in its second-largest market:

There are few things more Japanese than the kei minicar, which is now under threat from China. Starting today, BYD’s all-electric, five-door Racco is available to buy locally for less than ¥2 million (about $12,200) with a range of 210 kilometers (130 miles).

Now that BMW has shown off its M Concept Neue Klasse, M division head Frank van Meel talked to Autocar, saying that the future M3 EV’s “heart of Joy” controlled quad-motor setup could create racing and driving dynamics that the combustion engine M3 doesn’t match:

“When I logged into my Tesla account and view my lease/contract with it, it loads a PDF which just shows the Book of Enoch?” the anonymous owner said in a Reddit post (first spotted by Electrek). “What do I even do with this? Lol.” The Book of Enoch is a 2,000 year old apocalyptic religious book about angels and demons, so it’s anyone’s guess why it would pop up for a Tesla solar customer looking for their lease. AI-prompted mixup seems like a likely bet.

The extending roof panel on the Solarky SunV provides up to 300W of solar charging for its 10.2kWh LFP battery. And its aluminum chassis and plastic panels make it so lightweight, that it can go about 150km (93 miles) before a recharge — or up to 200km (124 miles) with enough sunshine, according to the company. It’s already on sale in markets including Thailand and Indonesia.

In the spirit of other EVs that deviate significantly from established designs, Range Rover revealed the first images of its (camouflaged) electric GT, which looks nothing like the boxy SUVs the UK-based automaker is mostly known for. The saloon-like grand tourer will be “the most technologically sophisticated Range Rover vehicle ever created,” Range Rover boasts.

Props to Fred Lambert at Electrek for catching this: the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is requesting from Tesla all information about a document called “Radar Saves Us” in its investigation into Full Self-Driving crashes. The details could prove that Tesla knew its camera-only approach to autonomous driving was flawed, which could trigger another massive recall for the company.

So far, most electric vehicles have looked more or less like cars. But recently, a few companies have looked to another, smaller mode of transport for inspiration. The Verge’s Andy Hawkins explains why companies like Amble and Chip are reinventing the golf cart, in the hopes of creating an entirely new kind of street-legal vehicle. As long as the speed limit stays low.

Tesla filed an NHTSA crash report that lists the driver as “Remote (Commercial / Test),” which Electrek says is a first for Tesla. It’s one of numerous accidents with Tesla’s robotaxis in the past year, and involved a Model Y hitting a tree stump while trying to get out of a dead end road.

Ferrari says the “Chassis 0” version of the polarizing Luce is an “unrepeatable opportunity,” and will go on the auction block during Monterey Car Week in August. The Jony Ive-designed Luce sparked a mixture of fascination and confusion when it was revealed in May. And now you can own the first production version, assuming you have more than $1.1 million at your disposal.

Not what anyone expected — or wanted — but a Tesla-branded balance bike is now available for the junior edgelord in your life.

After months of rumors, Honda finally confirmed that it’s killing off the electric Prologue SUV in the US after just two years of sales, CarBuzz reports.

Last month, Slate Auto said its barebones electric truck would start at $24,950, but that amount excluded the destination charge, so it wasn’t the actual final price customers would end up paying. Today, Slate spokesperson Jeff Jablansky emailed to let us know that the freight charge will be $1,450, calling it “the lowest among all pickup trucks in the U.S., because we believe that trucks should be affordable.” That means the total price of the Slate Truck will be $26,400 before factoring in local sales tax. Still pretty cheap!

In 2024, a dealership in Colorado offered a lease deal on the electric Fiat 500e that sounded too good to be true: $0 down, and $0 a month. Aside from taxes and insurance, the tiny Italian EV was essentially free. Two of the lads at the YouTube channel TFLEV were able to get in on the deal before it went away. So, 18 months in, how did it go? In a new video, they describe the ownership experience of an EV they call “essentially pretty fun” with a lot of flaws.

As telegraphed earlier this year, Governor Gavin Newsom signed legislation today creating a $3,500 point-of-sale rebate for the purchase of a new electric vehicle priced up to $50,000. Used EVs sold for up to $25,000 get a $1,750 rebate. Automakers headquartered in California aren’t subject to price caps. Naturally, Tesla fans are mad.

Polestar is down for the count, global EV sales hit 2 million in June, and China’s electric vehicle industry continues to make news this week. Here are some notable headlines:

The EV startup is teaming up with Crayola on a special lineup of wraps for its paint-less electric trucks. Colors include Cerulean, Fern, Jersey Tomato, Razzmatazz, and Dandelion. Why they didn’t think to include Burnt Sienna is beyond me.