I think it's perfect! I've fantasized about getting an old Nissan Hardbody, stuffing the bed with batteries and putting 2 overvoted forklift motors under the hood.
This is basically a reliable, commercially viable version of that concept.
I want a hilux champ to do odd jobs around town. It will never make it here because it doesn’t meet safety standards, I really wish the nanny state would let me make my own decisions.
Submissions don't turn gray from getting flagged. Even [flagged][dead] submissions (if you have show dead on in your profile) show up in the same color as every other submission.
I'm the weirdo who still likes crank handles. They are actually faster at opening/closing windows. And one less set of electronics to fail.
Americans complain about the lack of affordable cars, but can't be bothered to buy anything with less than 4 doors and AWD and 20 inch wheels. So good luck to these guys.
I'm very curious how they are managing "no screens".
I thought all vehicles in the U.S. were required to have rear-view cameras for safety. I'm curious how they are getting around that.
Edit: I now see that the article speculates that maybe there's a screen in the rear-view window for this. But I can't find anything concrete.
My understanding is that the regulations require a certain amount of rear visibility, either directly in the mirror or via a rear-view camera. But the former likely wouldn't be possible with the bed in the way.
The basic protocol from an AC charger to your car is, "hello, I have X amps available, don't take more or you will trip my circuit breaker". The car responds by charging at or below the current advertised.
When you charge in a context where the car unlocks the charger (i.e. Tesla Supercharger), the protocol must divulge the car's certificate, signed by the owner of the charging network (like mTLS). There would be privacy-preserving protocols for this, but they are not used in practice.
It has a reasonable profile instead of engineering based on overactive pituitary glands. A truck that doesn't make roads more dangerous feels unamerican.
I want a cheap ev with less than 150 miles of range for city use. With traffic here I'm literally never driving more than 100 miles a day, and virtually never driving more than 50 miles a day. I can charge at home, I don't care if it takes 12 hours.
But I'd want that car to be under $15k. That car doesn't exist, at least not in the US, so I'm still on an old ICE.
My current car is worth at most $5k, and I spend maybe $500/yr on gas.
The car exists, you just have to look at used. About three years ago I bought a gently used 2013 Fiat 500e for $8k. It gets ~80mi range in the summer (a little less in the winter though). Super fun, drives like a gokart. Plugs into 110 and charges overnight.
My wife uses it for commuting and it's our standard "run to town" car. We have an ICE vehicle for trips.
There is a nonprofit near me that has some trucks they use for hauling trash, weeds, and some misc equipment on occasion (they do habitat restoration). They rarely go more than 20 miles in a day. This would fit their needs perfectly, assuming they could cheaply charge it. They probably could figure something out, they already have a van with an RV style charger hooked up.
This truck only offers 150 miles in the base model. That's the problem. If you consider the round trip distance, unless you have a chance to charge it at your destination or reliably on your route it gives you about a 60-70 mile practical range from home. And that's if you do a there-and-back with no detours.
GP is pointing out that anything less than 300 is not practical, and they're not wrong. 150 miles, in particular, is just too low to be used for anything other than a basic commuter vehicle. It's useless on highways (try driving I-70 through KS in this thing) and if you change job sites more than once, you're likely to run out of range in one work day. Traveling between cities is going to be unreliable if you're not able to stop and charge at your destination. Live in Colorado Springs and want to go to Denver? You probably have to stop and charge before coming home.
The average US citizen drives 37 miles per day. A vehicle like this would satisfy the needs of the majority of the populace for the majority of their activities. With lower prices renting specialty vehicles for road trips or whatever makes a hell of a lot more sense.
I bet the lack of screens makes it a no-go for a lot of truck drivers. Without a screen, and backup cameras, pickup truck drivers will find it much, much harder to back into parking spots, especially the narrower parking spots in urban parking lots.
This particular truck pictured appears to have a footprint about the size of a Toyota Camry, but with far greater rear visibility due to the additional headroom and no rear seat.
It's much more common to park a truck backed in than a car, in order to load the bed e.g. from a loading ramp or dock. The backup camera is great for lining the bed right up to where you are rolling on the cargo.
You _can_ do it without a camera, but the camera saves a ton of time.
Yes. A parking camera / screen is a straight up improvement compared to relying on windows and skill.
People who complain about screens are usually not complaining about that but rather about common functionality that used to be a single physical button now is buried deep inside a buggy menu system.
> Yes. A parking camera / screen is a straight up improvement compared to relying on windows and skill.
Car screens and I don't get on. At all. For backing up, what works for me is a full check first and directly viewing while backing up, augmenting with mirrors.
There's a niche here given the prevalance of smart phones.
The last tow truck I took a ride on (modern, tilt tray, full lifts, etc) was operated by the driver who happily and easily juggled two phones ... he had one in a cradle, the other hand held, used the cradle one to look up routes, bid for jobs, and general map operations.
At lights or when refueling he was talking on the free phone while cross referencing via text and map searches on the cradle phone.
Additionally the truck console had screens for reversing, etc.
Point being .. we live in a world where it reasonable to have physical control, screen free, relative "dumb" vehicle that still has a diagnostics bus and rear cameras and distance sensors that can accessed via the drivers phone or tablet.
With cable | wifi and auth or some kind the operators smart device can upload music to the cars sound system and the vehicle can return infomation and visuals from sensors .. perhaps.
Article mentions backup cam is required now. Still, can't think of a reason I'd back into a space in a parking lot. Don't think I ever have. If I needed to for some reason, I'd lower the tailgate.
>Still, can't think of a reason I'd back into a space in a parking lot
I back into spaces almost exclusively. reason: I see that I can do it when I arrive, and realize that exiting forward will be a breeze regardless of the future conditions (you are backing into an empty space, and forwarding into a space with other moving cars that are out of your control).
it's one forward lap and one backward lap, same difference, in addition to which I find steerability/maneuverability is much better with the "steering" wheels in the back, because after you get the forward aligned to enter the slot, you can simply steer away after that.
You can get into a smaller space by reversing in. In the UK there are parking lots where I would never attempt driving in forwards because it would take multiple back-forward movements to achieve it due to the width of the space.
> Still, can't think of a reason I'd back into a space in a parking lot.
Safety. Several organizations that have automotive fleets recommend it for that. Pulling in backwards is safer because everybody can see everybody while that is occurring. Pulling out forwards is safer because you have much wider field of view and you have to do less maneuvering.
Liability. If you are pulling out forward and someone doing 50 in the parking lot hits you, you have a much better chance of them being at fault. If you get hit backing up, it is almost always considered your fault irrespective of how stupid the other driver is being.
The majority of pickups I see in Denver and NoCo parking spots are backed in. This behavior seemed to come on very suddenly, maybe 3 years ago. I rarely saw it, and then suddenly, 3 out of 4 pickups are backed in. Puzzled me until I realized that a rearview camera with the green/yellow/red markings on the image made all the difference.
I kind of like it, but re-use is the way to go, Problem is you get Tax credits for buying new EV but just a shit tonne of regulations and no money to convert your old truck; that was New Zealand five years ago. I really hope other countries have it easier as most older gas trucks are easy to convert to EV's at the end of their lives by a decent amateur.
I have a 1990 Hilux pickup working just fine as my daily driver, but it cost about US$20K to convert and with only 100KM range it is only effective as a second vehicle. Good news though is with a couple of future battery swaps it will only get better and should outlive me.
I think it's perfect! I've fantasized about getting an old Nissan Hardbody, stuffing the bed with batteries and putting 2 overvoted forklift motors under the hood.
This is basically a reliable, commercially viable version of that concept.
Jerry rigs everything did just that with an old army humvee. https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL0vZL9uwyfOFezIOiBjkdW3...
I want a hilux champ to do odd jobs around town. It will never make it here because it doesn’t meet safety standards, I really wish the nanny state would let me make my own decisions.
If it doesn’t meet safety standard that protect the driver of the vehicle, that’s one thing. But unsafe cars are sometimes unsafe for the other car.
Price comes with a depressing caveat.
That just means 27500 MSRP, still very low compared to the 70k-80k existing US options.
Looks like is designed as a custom platform. The sort of things the kiddies will go mad over and build all sorts of custom rides. Bring it on!
many of us would like to repeat and relive the tech magic like that of PC circa 90-ies and into 2000s.
>The myth of the sub-$25,000 electric vehicle has been around for more than 10 years now,
Equinox EV is MSRP 33.6K before 7.5 tax rebate. Looks and sounds like a decent modern compact SUV.
I accidentally flagged the post. Mods, please ignore the flag. The car looks great.
You can unflag things you flag and there's no time limit on it. Just go to the top of the page and click on "unflag".
did that but it still showed up greyed out. So replied for good measure.
Submissions don't turn gray from getting flagged. Even [flagged][dead] submissions (if you have show dead on in your profile) show up in the same color as every other submission.
I'm the weirdo who still likes crank handles. They are actually faster at opening/closing windows. And one less set of electronics to fail.
Americans complain about the lack of affordable cars, but can't be bothered to buy anything with less than 4 doors and AWD and 20 inch wheels. So good luck to these guys.
> I'm the weirdo who still likes crank handles. They are actually faster at opening/closing windows.
Absolutely. Only one vehicle here has electric windows but that car was given to us. The other 6 vehicles are hand crank.
Definitely easier and less cognitive overhead when wanting it just open an inch or two!
Rather than remembering the exact right amount of pressure for that mode on the switch
Says no screens, but I'm interested in the absence of surveillance as well. If there's no telemetry/forced-apps I'd be interested.
I've asked before but still not sure how much information is given to a charger when you plug in an EV?
I'm very curious how they are managing "no screens". I thought all vehicles in the U.S. were required to have rear-view cameras for safety. I'm curious how they are getting around that.
Edit: I now see that the article speculates that maybe there's a screen in the rear-view window for this. But I can't find anything concrete.
The Verge reports that the rearview camera will be on "a small display behind the steering wheel as a gauge cluster."
https://www.theverge.com/electric-cars/655527/slate-electric...
My understanding is that the regulations require a certain amount of rear visibility, either directly in the mirror or via a rear-view camera. But the former likely wouldn't be possible with the bed in the way.
I feel ya but sabotaging telemetry still feels possible. De-screening a car seems solidly out of reach.
The basic protocol from an AC charger to your car is, "hello, I have X amps available, don't take more or you will trip my circuit breaker". The car responds by charging at or below the current advertised.
When you charge in a context where the car unlocks the charger (i.e. Tesla Supercharger), the protocol must divulge the car's certificate, signed by the owner of the charging network (like mTLS). There would be privacy-preserving protocols for this, but they are not used in practice.
It has a reasonable profile instead of engineering based on overactive pituitary glands. A truck that doesn't make roads more dangerous feels unamerican.
> Will younger generations actually plunk down $20,000 or more to own a Slate vehicle that won't go into production until the fourth quarter of 2026
Not worth devoting any brain cycles to this thing if it’s that far out still given how fast the situation in the US is changing.
Indeed - pretty much every single EV maker gets its most important physical bit, the batteries, from BYD.
C’mon you can’t be building ev’s in 2025 with less than 300 miles of range
I want a cheap ev with less than 150 miles of range for city use. With traffic here I'm literally never driving more than 100 miles a day, and virtually never driving more than 50 miles a day. I can charge at home, I don't care if it takes 12 hours.
But I'd want that car to be under $15k. That car doesn't exist, at least not in the US, so I'm still on an old ICE.
My current car is worth at most $5k, and I spend maybe $500/yr on gas.
The car exists, you just have to look at used. About three years ago I bought a gently used 2013 Fiat 500e for $8k. It gets ~80mi range in the summer (a little less in the winter though). Super fun, drives like a gokart. Plugs into 110 and charges overnight.
My wife uses it for commuting and it's our standard "run to town" car. We have an ICE vehicle for trips.
Absolutely would buy again.
There is a nonprofit near me that has some trucks they use for hauling trash, weeds, and some misc equipment on occasion (they do habitat restoration). They rarely go more than 20 miles in a day. This would fit their needs perfectly, assuming they could cheaply charge it. They probably could figure something out, they already have a van with an RV style charger hooked up.
At 60 mph, it would take 5 hours to go 300 miles. I do that much driving in a day maybe once or twice a year. It's not a big deal.
This truck only offers 150 miles in the base model. That's the problem. If you consider the round trip distance, unless you have a chance to charge it at your destination or reliably on your route it gives you about a 60-70 mile practical range from home. And that's if you do a there-and-back with no detours.
GP is pointing out that anything less than 300 is not practical, and they're not wrong. 150 miles, in particular, is just too low to be used for anything other than a basic commuter vehicle. It's useless on highways (try driving I-70 through KS in this thing) and if you change job sites more than once, you're likely to run out of range in one work day. Traveling between cities is going to be unreliable if you're not able to stop and charge at your destination. Live in Colorado Springs and want to go to Denver? You probably have to stop and charge before coming home.
The short range limitation will also be amplified when carrying a lot of cargo or towing.
The average US citizen drives 37 miles per day. A vehicle like this would satisfy the needs of the majority of the populace for the majority of their activities. With lower prices renting specialty vehicles for road trips or whatever makes a hell of a lot more sense.
I bet the lack of screens makes it a no-go for a lot of truck drivers. Without a screen, and backup cameras, pickup truck drivers will find it much, much harder to back into parking spots, especially the narrower parking spots in urban parking lots.
This particular truck pictured appears to have a footprint about the size of a Toyota Camry, but with far greater rear visibility due to the additional headroom and no rear seat.
It's much more common to park a truck backed in than a car, in order to load the bed e.g. from a loading ramp or dock. The backup camera is great for lining the bed right up to where you are rolling on the cargo.
You _can_ do it without a camera, but the camera saves a ton of time.
Yes. A parking camera / screen is a straight up improvement compared to relying on windows and skill.
People who complain about screens are usually not complaining about that but rather about common functionality that used to be a single physical button now is buried deep inside a buggy menu system.
> Yes. A parking camera / screen is a straight up improvement compared to relying on windows and skill.
Car screens and I don't get on. At all. For backing up, what works for me is a full check first and directly viewing while backing up, augmenting with mirrors.
Eyes-on is me being as safe as I can possibly be.
Yeah no that's how parents used to run over their own kids
Now they're running over other people's kids due to being distracted by the screen.
There's a niche here given the prevalance of smart phones.
The last tow truck I took a ride on (modern, tilt tray, full lifts, etc) was operated by the driver who happily and easily juggled two phones ... he had one in a cradle, the other hand held, used the cradle one to look up routes, bid for jobs, and general map operations.
At lights or when refueling he was talking on the free phone while cross referencing via text and map searches on the cradle phone.
Additionally the truck console had screens for reversing, etc.
Point being .. we live in a world where it reasonable to have physical control, screen free, relative "dumb" vehicle that still has a diagnostics bus and rear cameras and distance sensors that can accessed via the drivers phone or tablet.
With cable | wifi and auth or some kind the operators smart device can upload music to the cars sound system and the vehicle can return infomation and visuals from sensors .. perhaps.
Article mentions backup cam is required now. Still, can't think of a reason I'd back into a space in a parking lot. Don't think I ever have. If I needed to for some reason, I'd lower the tailgate.
>Still, can't think of a reason I'd back into a space in a parking lot
I back into spaces almost exclusively. reason: I see that I can do it when I arrive, and realize that exiting forward will be a breeze regardless of the future conditions (you are backing into an empty space, and forwarding into a space with other moving cars that are out of your control).
it's one forward lap and one backward lap, same difference, in addition to which I find steerability/maneuverability is much better with the "steering" wheels in the back, because after you get the forward aligned to enter the slot, you can simply steer away after that.
You're ignoring differences in the size of the space and the ability of most drivers to back-up vs going-forward into a small space.
>90% of the people who back in take much longer to back-in than they'd take to back-out because it takes them more time to back up with any accuracy.
Head-in to the spot is just as fast as head-out into the lane because most people don't have any trouble going forward.
The result is that back-in is a net time loss.
You can get into a smaller space by reversing in. In the UK there are parking lots where I would never attempt driving in forwards because it would take multiple back-forward movements to achieve it due to the width of the space.
> Still, can't think of a reason I'd back into a space in a parking lot.
Safety. Several organizations that have automotive fleets recommend it for that. Pulling in backwards is safer because everybody can see everybody while that is occurring. Pulling out forwards is safer because you have much wider field of view and you have to do less maneuvering.
Liability. If you are pulling out forward and someone doing 50 in the parking lot hits you, you have a much better chance of them being at fault. If you get hit backing up, it is almost always considered your fault irrespective of how stupid the other driver is being.
The majority of pickups I see in Denver and NoCo parking spots are backed in. This behavior seemed to come on very suddenly, maybe 3 years ago. I rarely saw it, and then suddenly, 3 out of 4 pickups are backed in. Puzzled me until I realized that a rearview camera with the green/yellow/red markings on the image made all the difference.
Build it, please. The lack of affordable EVs in the US is depressing.
Have you seen the used Tesla market lately?
Yeah, but have you seen the Tesla repair parts prices?
Buying a used car presupposes the ability to service it.
how much of the original range do they retain? you have to consider the price a new tesla battery (between $12,000 and $15,000)
https://www.nimblefins.co.uk/study-real-life-tesla-battery-d...
I bet they have more than half the original range, so I don't have to consider a new battery at all.
I kind of like it, but re-use is the way to go, Problem is you get Tax credits for buying new EV but just a shit tonne of regulations and no money to convert your old truck; that was New Zealand five years ago. I really hope other countries have it easier as most older gas trucks are easy to convert to EV's at the end of their lives by a decent amateur.
I have a 1990 Hilux pickup working just fine as my daily driver, but it cost about US$20K to convert and with only 100KM range it is only effective as a second vehicle. Good news though is with a couple of future battery swaps it will only get better and should outlive me.