The Driven, an Australian car news site is reporting on a new EV offering from Chinese auto manufacturer BYD
From the article:
At $US15,000, BYD's new Qin EV is already being touted as a "Corolla killer" as the world's second largest EV maker continues to disrupt the global auto market.
Launched earlier this week in China, the all-electric Qin Plus has five models priced between 109,800 RMB to ($A23,300) to 139,800 RMB ($A29,700).
The Qin Plus comes with a 100 kW motor and the option of either a 48 kWh battery providing 420 km CLTC range or a 57.6 kW hour battery with 510 km range.
[...] Indeed, most legacy car makers, at least those that are bothering to make EVs at scale at all, are still focused on the top end of the market, selling premium and heavy and high cost EVs, largely to protect their ICE business. In the US, the major car makers are retreating rapidly on their EV plans.
BYD, which is challenging Tesla as the biggest EV maker in the world, says it's "officially opening a new era where electricity is lower than oil."
Additional reporting on the BYD Qin:
https://electrek.co/2024/02/19/byd-launches-15k-qin-plus-ev-kicking-off-price-war-gas-cars/
https://www.msn.com/en-us/autos/autos-hybrids/byd-launches-qin-plus-ev-honor-edition-electric-cars-now-cheaper-than-gasoline/ar-BB1izoNY
https://www.carscoops.com/2024/02/byd-launches-11000-qin-plus-dm-i-phev-in-china/
Related Stories
Automakers accelerating release of upgraded models, unlike typical 5-year cycle for gasoline cars; Hyundai introduces updated Ioniq 5, and BYD will soon unveil refreshed SEAL; how will this impact used car market?
In recent weeks, two refreshed car models have been launched: Hyundai's Ioniq 5 and BYD's SEAL. Both models, introduced in 2021 and 2022 respectively, are receiving significant updates ahead of the typical five-year facelift cycle. This global automotive industry standard generally involves cosmetic upgrades to keep cars relevant.
However, these updates are more than just aesthetic. The Hyundai Ioniq 5 now features a substantial battery upgrade, increasing from 72.6 kWh to 84 kWh. This enhancement boosts the top model's range from 480 km to over 550 km. Other upgrades include new wheel designs and interior materials, but the major improvements lie beneath the surface.
[...] These updates reflect a broader trend among electric vehicle (EV) manufacturers, who have announced major enhancements to existing models. Unlike mid-life upgrades in gasoline cars, which often focus on superficial enhancements like sound systems and wheel designs, EV upgrades are core technological improvements. This trend is driven by several factors.
[...] Recent trends in the used EV market show that the introduction of significantly upgraded models or superior competing models can deter buyers unless substantial discounts are offered. The new Ioniq 5's increased range and the SEAL's faster charging capabilities could negatively affect the resale value of older models.
Related:
- Auto Woes
- EU Battery Passport - Lifetime Record of BEV and Other Large Li Batteries
- "Corolla Killer:" BYD Launches $US15,000 EV in Direct Attack on Legacy Makers
- A Chinese EV Squeezed 650 Miles Of Range From Its 150 kWh Battery
- Why are All the EVs so Expensive?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Mojibake Tengu on Sunday February 25 2024, @07:56AM (7 children)
Surprisingly (to me), BYD is also building their own RORO ships, quite expensive tech in shipbuilding industry, to deliver their cars all over the world.
By sheer number of these ships now under construction, BYD cheap (and better) cars export to other continents will exceed all Western cars total production in just a couple of years.
So, after they watching Huawei adventures, BYD really know what they are doing. You call it disrupt global auto market? I call it takeover. Even shipping insurance companies will weep.
Rust programming language offends both my Intelligence and my Spirit.
(Score: 3, Informative) by redback on Sunday February 25 2024, @12:16PM (1 child)
they arent building them, they are just taking out a long term lease, rather than contracting with a car transport firm for services.
(Score: 2) by driverless on Tuesday February 27 2024, @01:19AM
This really illustrates why US car manufacturers have been slowly dying for the last 10-15 years, while newcomers like BYD are planning ahead on a massive scale, the US manufacturers response is to use their pet politicians to pass legislation favouring them and making it very hard for any competitors to emerge in their every-shrinking market. People can bring up all the usual bogeymen like the CCP secretly funding whatever, but the real killer of the US auto industry is the focus on short-term profit and maintaining existing markets even when those markets have moved on.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by mcgrew on Sunday February 25 2024, @06:23PM (4 children)
The global auto market is disrupted by the EV like the buggy market was disrupted by the automobile; the EV is to a piston car what a model-T was to a horse. But don't expect any current automakers to tell you of their many advantages. The piston drive train is an inefficient, unreliable Rube Goldberg device with thousands of moving parts to wear and break and need replacing, giving the manufacturer a dealer to junkyard gravy train. An EV's drive train is an electric motor with one moving part and needs no more maintenance than your ceiling fan. The existing automakers pray that nobody will find out how much better EVs are. One of the EV's advantages is that $15K car will be roomier than the Corolla.
The last existing buggy maker was Studebaker. They were smart enough to not try to swim against the tide.
Impeach Donald Palpatine and his sidekick Elon Vader
(Score: 4, Informative) by istartedi on Sunday February 25 2024, @06:50PM (3 children)
This is an exaggeration, at least for now. In order to make EVs perform well and be durable, you actually need quite a few moving parts. In particular you need a sophisticated climate control for the battery, barring yet another breakthrough in battery tech. Google "octovalve" for details on Tesla's battery temperature control system.
This might be the biggest problem with BYD's entry level cars going down the road. Getting an EV to perform well the day you drive off the lot is relatively easy. Maintaining range and performance as you drive and store the car in various conditions is a much bigger challenge. Telsas have racked up some impressive mileage [thedrive.com]
If you're considering one of these "cheap" EVs, definitely look in to battery warranty and/or how the temperature is controlled.
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 26 2024, @10:07PM (1 child)
For comparison, assuming the US$15000 price mentioned in TFA is accurate, you could buy around six of these cars for the price of one Tesla Model S. At this price it simply doesn't need to last as long as a Tesla.
(Score: 2) by istartedi on Monday February 26 2024, @10:45PM
That's not a comp. Tesla's Model 3 [tesla.com] is currently listed at $38,990 and has a 272 mi (437 km) range in base trim. IIRC, you need to up the price a bit from base to get that kind of range with a BYD. If the BYD's batteries don't hold range and/or need to be replaced early, the perceived advantage goes away.
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Wednesday February 28 2024, @01:17AM
In particular you need a sophisticated climate control for the battery
Your piston's radiator isn't any more a part of its drive train than the wheels and brakes.
Maintaining range and performance as you drive and store the car in various conditions is a much bigger challenge.
I have an EV. It's battery is covered under the car's ten year warranty.
Impeach Donald Palpatine and his sidekick Elon Vader
(Score: 3, Troll) by darkfeline on Sunday February 25 2024, @08:04AM (4 children)
BYD is known for faking its numbers (much like the CCP). There are tons of EVs dumped in places over China. Make a car (or a "car"), slap a license on it, that's one tick mark for the largest EV maker in the world.
Another thing BYD is known for is their heating functions (single use only).
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday February 25 2024, @05:21PM (2 children)
Hadn't heard of those issues (or BYD, for that matter) before this posting here. A cursory web search didn't show up any of the stuff you mention.
I'd very much like to learn more about this. So, in the absence of a newsletter to which I can subscribe, would you point me in the right direction WRT to the fraud and dangerous engineering to which you allude? Thanks!
(Score: 1, Troll) by quietus on Sunday February 25 2024, @07:52PM (1 child)
Maybe you haven't heard of a simple DuckDuckGo search [duckduckgo.com] either?
(Note that I'm not claiming anything about the quality of BYD's products).
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 26 2024, @12:52AM
I'd note that none of the links on the first page of the search you helpfully provided (thanks!) specifically call out BYD as the perpetrator of fraud or dangerous engineering.
That's not to say it's not true. Note that I didn't say it wasn't true -- just that I hadn't found such info with a cursory web search -- and asked for help in identifying the source of GP's assertions. Which you attempted to do and, again, thank you!
For the record, I searched -- also with DDG -- for "BYD ev" rather than "electrical vehicle dump china".
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Sunday February 25 2024, @06:25PM
Make a car (or a "car")
What do their "cars" lack? Besides a piston engine?
Impeach Donald Palpatine and his sidekick Elon Vader
(Score: 2) by RamiK on Sunday February 25 2024, @10:16AM (5 children)
and contrast:
2022 Toyota Corolla Hybrid: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-nn844Ellw [youtube.com]
2023 BYD Qin Plus DM-i: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=260m_RYPdUA [youtube.com]
( SPAM caveat: it's marketing material. )
compiling...
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Sunday February 25 2024, @06:28PM (3 children)
Of the many advantages EVs have over piston cars, hybrids share only one, the cost of fuel, and that to a lesser extent.
Impeach Donald Palpatine and his sidekick Elon Vader
(Score: 2) by number11 on Sunday February 25 2024, @11:24PM (2 children)
EV hybrid vs. ICE car? HEV (and preferably Plugin HEV) has the "cost of fuel" advantage because it uses less, consequently makes less pollution. Fewer recharge issues for people who either can't recharge at home, or live in the wilderness where there aren't any working chargers. HEV eliminates the "range anxiety" of pure EVs for Americans, who fantasize that they will hop in and drive hundreds of miles at a moment's notice (rather than just renting an ICE for that rare occasion). But there's no reason why a hybrid can't have the low-end torque (and potentially neck-snapping acceleration) of a pure EV, since some of the time it is purely EV (at low speed/acceleration for a parallel HEV, always for a series since there the ICE just recharges the battery). True, hybrids do have the complexity of an ICE, though depending on the design might have no mechanical transmission. And towing your yacht will play hell with the operating range.
(Score: 2) by mcgrew on Wednesday February 28 2024, @01:31AM (1 child)
HEV (and preferably Plugin HEV) has the "cost of fuel" advantage because it uses less, consequently makes less pollution.
Incorrect, I have an EV. My friend in Columbia has a hybrid. It costs him six dollars to drive here and back, it costs me four to drive to his house and back. It was twenty with gasoline.
Fewer recharge issues for people who either can't recharge at home
Those are the people who need hybrids. But I've been driving since 1968 and have never driven anything that handled or braked better, thanks to the weight on the bottom and two sets of brakes acting in tandem. No routine maintenance, and in fact almost no maintenance at all. No worries about it starting in the cold, you have heat before you're out of the driveway instead of when you get to where you're going, and you don't have to stand in the snow babysitting it while it fuels. It's roomier than a much larger piston car, those thousands of moving parts in that drive train take up a lot of room. I don't have 220, but if I did my car could power my house in an outage. No noise or vibration, no gear changes. That's off the top of my head, I'll never buy another piston car.
Impeach Donald Palpatine and his sidekick Elon Vader
(Score: 2) by number11 on Wednesday February 28 2024, @05:15PM
I was comparing hybrids to ICE, and certainly didn't say that hybrids got better mileage than EVs (whether $/mile or mpge), so I don't doubt your experience. But if you're using commercial chargers, the cost of recharging is uncertain since most will charge what the market will bear. You get the range anxiety issues, though in real life, range shouldn't often be an issue for city dwellers.
Yes, you get instant heat, but probably at the cost of a significant amount of range. Worse with the cheaper EVs with resistance heaters than with the more expensive ones with a heat pump, though I wonder about even those if it's 0F (-18C). And even if you had 220V available, most EVs aren't capable of powering your house (sure, they should be).
I've got a 2015 ICE, and don't plan on replacing it for another 10 years (I don't rack up a lot of miles), at which point I may be too old to drive anyhow. I probably couldn't afford a new EV with price-gouging manufacturers. I just want cheap reliable transport from Point A to Point B that's easy to get in & out of (crossover territory), not "entertainment centers" or "allegedly self driving" or mood lighting or heated seats (I wear pants when I drive in cold weather, thank you), and certainly not with touch screens that you have to look at while driving. Eventually EV prices will drop (Hello BYD!), the fad of touch screens will pass (though they'll still remain cheaper than real buttons), batteries will become modular and standardized enough for ordinary mechanics to deal with, and insurance costs will drop (since insurance companies won't play it safe by ruling a minor fender-bender a total loss).
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 26 2024, @03:29AM
Toyota Hilux: https://youtu.be/Yl1FNX08HFc?t=680 [youtu.be]
( SPAM caveat: it's marketing + entertainment material. )
(Score: 5, Insightful) by redback on Sunday February 25 2024, @12:18PM (3 children)
News sources need to stop just converting the chinese price to dollars and say thats what its gonna cost. They cost a lot more in other countries. Between higher spec export models and different safety requirements, not to mention shipping and tarrifs, they cost WAY more than they do in china.
(Score: 2) by Username on Sunday February 25 2024, @03:05PM
I was thinking the same. Even if it's just shipping, that's like 2K usd, right? 17k final buying direct.
Add on taxes, 40k. Sales fee by auto dealer cartel, 50k about total normal route.
I still wouldn't buy an electric car at that price. I think I would require a car company to pay me to beta test thier electric vehicles.
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Sunday February 25 2024, @06:31PM (1 child)
An excellent point!
I wonder how much the shipping/tariff costs would be, compared to the costs of potential additional safety requirements. How much, in the absence of the former, would a BYD Qin cost in the US? Although, as Username [soylentnews.org] pointed out, there's also dealer mark up, sales tax and other costs as well.
I'd expect that with economies of scale, the cost of locally manufactured EVs could drop quite a bit -- whether that would affect the price is a different discussion.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 3, Interesting) by number11 on Wednesday February 28 2024, @05:27PM
The US has been importing cars from overseas for many years. Japan, Korea, Turkey, Germany, etc. Including some models of "domestic" brands (my last car was a "Ford" made in Korea). Shipping costs from China shouldn't be significantly different. What will be different is added costs due to politics (whether the "chicken tax" we currently have, or additional tariffs for Chinese companies because we don't like China). So the same car may be far cheaper in the rest of the world than American politicians will allow here.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by DadaDoofy on Sunday February 25 2024, @01:26PM (5 children)
"Trembling"? I doubt it. Not surprisingly, TFA and the other FAs cited, make no mention of it ever going on sale in the US. Most likely because it lacks many of the features mandated by US regulators. Nice puff piece though.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by istartedi on Sunday February 25 2024, @06:37PM (4 children)
Parent modded Troll, but that's a bit harsh. Better to rebut with actual stories [electrek.co] about them getting a foothold in North America. Building a plant in Mexico definitely gets rid of the shipping issues, and of course they'll have to make sure they meet US safety standards but they may already do that. It's not that hard. They also wouldn't be above dumping product on the market. This is a Chinese company after all. I don't care to be seen tooling around in one; but you know a lot of people won't care and it most definitely *will* put pressure on other makers. Tesla might have the least to fear, since they're a bit of a luxury brand; but the other makers are going to have to step up.
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Sunday February 25 2024, @07:06PM (3 children)
It has received 3 moderations - 2 positive and 1 negative. Unfortunately it is the latest one that gets displayed. There is still plenty of time for it to be countered if anyone feels that it should be. There is no indication that it is moderation abuse - the person making the negative moderation obviously feels that it deserves it.
[nostyle RIP 06 May 2025]
(Score: 5, Informative) by sgleysti on Sunday February 25 2024, @07:52PM (2 children)
Personally, I consider a comment with a score of 3 or higher and a rating of Troll to be somewhat of an honor.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Monday February 26 2024, @03:08PM (1 child)
Hmm..., pretty sure +5 Troll is possible. +5 Troll just means "controversial opinion" and is actually legitimately hard to achieve.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Monday February 26 2024, @03:53PM
But it has been done on this site - I will try and dig out a link later...
[nostyle RIP 06 May 2025]
(Score: 2) by VLM on Monday February 26 2024, @06:45PM
Technically, the option is to "pay for" a 48 KHh or 57.6 KWh battery. This is a Chinese battery so it'll be marked 48 KWh but it'll only store like 10 KWh and it'll bulge and catch fire within the year.
Buying a battery that's large multiple of the size of an after market power tool or cell phone battery will result in the same problems as buying a large quantity of smaller power tool or cell phone batteries.
People squawk about EV range anxiety but the real problem is the energy storage is a long-term relationship with shady as F people. My relationship with Citgo gasoline is about two weeks long and only costs a couple dozen bucks and its personal because its my local station and the worst thing that can realistically happen is a dozen bucks at Autozone for a new fuel filter. The relationship with Chinese car batteries will involve bankruptcies, repos, fire depts, maybe some ER visits or even life insurance claims, its just more involved than a gas car's relationship with the local gas station.