Video interview: Miles Automotive on Javlon
We interviewed Miles Automotive about their Javlon electric car in April. They are planning to release a 4-door sedan, highway speed, electric plug-in in just two years. The price? Under $30,000! Below the fold is a video interview with fleet sales manager, I Zion Enos uploaded to Yahoo! videos in May. The interview is 12 minutes and he starts to talk about the Javlon 3 minutes into the interview.
Enos says it's a full-size, four-door sedan, about the size of a Jetta. He thinks it looks like a cross between a BMW and Mercedes with Italian designer Pininfarina behind it (the mock-up we saw in April was by Qingyuan Electric). You could pass this car off as gas until your friends noticed the plug or silent running. The battery will have a warranty like any other vehicle. 10 years or 75,000 miles... or a certain number of cycles. That's like any other vehicle? The engineers are working on a good number of cycles for you.
The battery will be in the back and the front. The model shown was not electric but the look of the car won't change. No bumps to make space for the battery. In a year, year and a half, they will set up their dealership network and start taking pre-orders. Go below the fold to watch the interview.
[Source: Yahoo! Videos]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Kardax 3:55PM (8/20/2007)
I wonder where Miles is getting the money to finance the development of the Javlon.
Somehow I doubt revenue from their golf-cart business is enough.
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Domenick 4:41PM (8/20/2007)
kardax: According to an article on Cnet, Miles Rubin has invested $15 to $20 million so far.
Also, they don't sell golf carts. They sell crash tested, fully enclosed NEVs.
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Kardax 5:27PM (8/20/2007)
Oh, ok. Having the backing of a multi-millionaire always seems to make things go much more smoothly :)
BTW, if it claims to be a "vehicle" but is too slow for the highway, it's a golf cart as far as I'm concerned. Miles certainly has the most luxurious golf carts I know about, but in terms of utility, they're not much different.
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Pete 8:34PM (8/20/2007)
A couple of points:
Miles has hit upon a great idea - warranty the battery for a fixed number of cycles vs. time or mileage. If the customer is presented with this up front at purchase, then the customer will be incented to treat it well and not drive it like a rental. Only question is: What defines a 'cycle'?
I am curious how 6 Kw/h will take the car 150 miles. By comparison, the EV1 - a car optimized for efficiency - with Nimh batteries held about 25 kw/h and could only go about 75 miles. I'd say a more realistic capacity (for 150 miles) for the Miles is 75 kw/h, which at 10 cents per kw/h would cost about $7.50 to "fill up", or 5 cents per mile to drive 150 miles. Not bad; a gas car would have to get 65 miles per gallon at today's prices to equal it. But people are going to have noticeably higher power bills when they start plugging these things in.
I love that this car may come to market, and I'm not trying to put it down. It's just that I think green cars and the EV world suffer from too much overhype followed by failure to deliver. Keeping them honest works in their favor in the long run, and subsequently works in our favor as well.
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Chris M 10:59PM (8/20/2007)
I agree that 6 Kwh is not sufficient for 150 mile range - must be a misquote. The EV1 averaged 0.2 Kwh per mile, the Tesla Roadster about 0.24, and the RAV4EV averaged about 0.3 Kwh per mile. From that, I'd estimate 40 to 45 Kwh battery storage for the Javlon.
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Pete 8:13PM (8/21/2007)
I was off, too. The 25 Kw/h was for the Nimh pack, which gave the EV1 a 150 mile range, roughly double that of the lead acid pack. If the Miles is a third less efficient, perhaps having a 33 Kw/h pack, then it will only cost $3.30 to charge up and run 150 miles, not the $7.50 figure from before. This more than halves the cost per mile of electricity to 2.2 cents/mile, or about 135 mpg cost equivalent.
I still stand by my assertion that Enos's statment was pretty optimistic, though I think he did a great job presenting the car otherwise.
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