Next-gen Cars Charging Toward Us Overnight

My reward for passing my driver test in the 1971 driver training Chevelle was to be allowed to take my dad’s 1960 army-green Studebaker Lark station wagon for a drive around town.

I didn’t care. Suddenly being legally licensed to drive a vehicle alone was not lost on me. This moved me a long way up the ladder toward adulthood. There’s something fabulously cool about the freedom of driving, especially when you are one of the first in your class to get your license. It helped that my dad had been my driving instructor. It was the only time I was happy to be a teacher’s kid. He had to be proud, though. I got a 98 on the test – two points off for driving too slowly. OK, I was cautious.

Cars provided bonding amongst the Johnson boys and our dad. Cars always provided something to talk about. Each fall, Dad would take us to the car dealers in town to see the new models, none of which he could afford. I remember Jorgensen Chevrolet, Tesdall Ford, Quinn Chrysler-Plymouth, McCoy-Curran Dodge, and Warden-Crandall Studebaker/Rambler. The new car smell, free pop and hot dogs, color brochures, and innovative features we didn’t know we needed made it a great time.

Each car I’ve bought over the years provided more and better features than the previous ones. I remember thinking I’d never buy a front-wheel drive car and now I wouldn’t want a car with at least that but prefer all-wheel drive.

But it wasn’t until the recent Earth Day that I reached a spiritual enlightenment about the future of cars. Included in the events of the day was a car show of electric vehicles (EV) and hybrids (electric and gas combination) in downtown Red Wing. I had been reading about them but figured the price was too high and the technology not yet ready for the masses.

Well, they are still expensive and they are still evolving. But we have begun a seismic shift away from the cars we have lived with our entire lives. All the cars I’ve ever owned have been powered by an internal combustion engine (ICE). I’m starting to think that might not be the case with my next car.

The EV/hybrid car show was expected to have a couple models. I think there were 15, many of them owned by members of a Tesla car club who sounded like sales staff in the way they described them. And they were only too happy to have you sit in them. One owner explained that, once on the highway, his Tesla basically drove him to Red Wing without intervention. Now, remember that some of these cars cost $100,000 or more. If I could afford one, I’d show it off, too.

There are less expensive EVs, like the 2017 Chevy Bolt that city council member Evan Brown drives to Northfield each day. He loves it and said it handled the winter just fine. He laughed when I asked what the maintenance requirements are.

“The owner’s manual lists three things,” he said. “Rotate the tires every 7,500 miles, replace the passenger compartment air filter every couple of years, and replace the car’s coolant every 150,000 miles.”

This means no oil and filter, no transmission fluid, no trips to the gas station (except for lottery tickets and Red Bull), no spark plugs or valves, no muffler, no catalytic converter, no timing belt. Think much lower maintenance costs and saved time. And they don’t pollute like ICE cars. Their energy can be created from renewable energy. Some EVs have trunks both in the back and front (frunk). EVs do have expensive batteries but they are proving to last up to 20 years. 

The cost of electricity to charge an EV is like buying gas for as little as $1 a gallon. You can charge an EV overnight in your garage so it is always “full”. And full can get you 250 miles or more. Quick charging stations are popping up everywhere so a cross-country trip is not out of the question. A recent news report explained that a quick charging station was being set up somewhere in rural Minnesota that is powered by solar panels in an adjacent cow pasture. And the solar panels are elevated so cows can go underneath it for shade.

Since electric motors basically have access to full power at all speeds, they don’t need gears like ICE cars. Some electric cars can do a quarter-mile in less than five seconds. Remember, too, that these cars are famously quiet. You may not hear one coming up the street.

With either an ICE or EV car you will still have to deal with shocks (potholes don’t go away), wipers, corrosion, steering, vehicle damage, and other issues common to a car’s suspension and body. But by eliminating most of the engine and drivetrain costs, EVs appear to be an easy choice.

Car manufacturers must realize that EVs are the future and that the demand for ICE will be melting away. Hybrid cars are just practice EVs so will disappear. There will be a need for ICE vehicles for awhile but as technology improves, why bother with an old technology with so many moving parts that wear out? Jobs that support ICE cars will be lost but that is always the case with major breakthroughs in technology. There will always be ICE enthusiasts, especially for classic cars, because they love tuning them, the sound they make, and showing them. I get that.

For the rest of us, EVs will radically change our lives. They will become affordable. I’m waiting for the EV that will drive me to the store and back on command. Later, I expect one that just goes to the store for me.

I wonder if there was a car show in Red Wing about 100 years ago that demonstrated the amazing ICE cars. They must have looked awesome next to a team of horses hitched to a buggy.