In Wheel Time Podcast: Your Go-To Automotive Talk Show Feb 21, 2024

Shifting Gears: The Drive Towards Electric, Auto Show Memories, and the Future of Cars with Jack Nerad

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Welcome to another In Wheel Time podcast, a 30 minute mini version of the In Wheel Time car show that airs live every Saturday morning 8 to 11am central From the world famous Sugar Shack Studios outside Houston, Texas.

This is the In Wheel Time car talk show.

Our favorite West Coast word Smith and automotive detective Jack Nierads just standing by and we're going to get to him in just a minute.

We'll get you caught up on the stories making automotive news headlines this week as well.

Howdy, along with Mike.

How do this world Mars and Jeff we need more Jeff Seaton, we do.

I'm, Don Armstrong, so glad you could join us on this Saturday for our live broadcast and just get right to it, because I want to talk to this guy.

It's Jack Nierad, ladies and gentlemen, a regular on our show, and we're very proud and happy that he joins us.

I don't know why.

I think he feels sorry for us.

That's why Quite the contrary, it's always a blast to talk to you.

Well, and it is.

It's a pleasure.

Thank you.

Thank you, jack, we appreciate that and we appreciate you.

And there's so many things I want to talk to you about, because this week it seems as though the American auto manufacturers, in particular, are going huh, evs, well, let's, let's.

Can we, can we rethink that for just a minute, just a bit?

And it seems and although Mary Barra is not really forthcoming, I think that she too is hinted to the fact that I think that we need to rethink the all in on the electric thing.

What do you think?

Yeah, I think they're looking at the handwriting on the wall.

They're looking at what consumers are doing.

We've seen the momentum If there was momentum for EVs slow down, it's.

It's a tough time and it's especially tough for general motives.

But all the car companies you know I was just talking to the folks at Stellantis this past week and they're about to launch a bunch of new electric vehicles.

I mean I'd be scratching my head right then and wondering is this the time I want to launch, you know, new electric vehicles?

It's just tough.

It's tough out there and when you look at what's going on in the marketplace, people are just realizing that a lot of times electric vehicle doesn't really match up with what they want.

So why pay more for something that doesn't have the utility that your tried and true vehicle has?

Well, yeah, you're exactly right.

And to add on to that, electric vehicles aren't cheap and and to saddle yourself with, you know, a $70,000 electric car and that's just right, on the kind of like the mid level, there you're going to go, huh, do I really want to saddle myself with this?

We don't have totally the infrastructure to support an electric car and I think that a lot of electric car owners are beginning to realize that it's not as easy as it sounds to try to find a charger when you need a charger and the carrot also was the tax incentives.

That's gone away or somewhat.

Well, to some extent it's gone away and it's changed certainly.

And a lot of people now have to lease.

You have to lease an import vehicle basically to get the benefit of the tax credit.

Not everybody wants to lease.

It's not necessarily the best financial decision over all to lease a vehicle.

So, Jack, a lot of things standing in the way.

Yeah, exactly as you mentioned well, the other thing is to and you mentioned Stalantis I heard a rumor, and it was just a rumor that they may be looking at selling and joining forces with Redo.

That is a hot rumor and we've reported that on the radio show, our radio show as well.

I mean it's and who knows?

I mean the French government owns pieces of both of those companies.

So it's not as simple as it would be to avoid something like that, and I think the Stalantis people are not necessarily enthusiastic about joining with Renau.

Maybe some are, maybe some aren't.

What would be the advantage of that merger, if you want to call it that or buy it.

Well, I think we need.

We've always had overproduction in the car industry.

We did I guess we didn't have it during COVID but largely there are too many car companies, too many brands, you know, chasing too few customers, and so if you could consolidate, you can get some economies of scale by doing that and eliminate some brands.

Where it's scary for Stalantis is what do you do with the Chrysler brand?

You know what's going to happen with the Dodge brand.

That is really in transition right now.

Would those just go away?

I mean Jeep and Ram.

You know very high volume, profitable entities, but the others I don't know.

I don't know if they could survive such a thing.

There's not much surprising they survived until now.

But let me ask you this so why would a major car company called Dodge dump all that they have worked on for over a decade with this performance thing and be very successful with the SRT, and not only the charger but the Challenger as well, both of those cars you know thousand horsepower.

They sell every one that they make.

Why would you completely get away from all of that dump all of that, say no, we're not going to do that anymore and put all of your money in going into electrics or hybrids and stuff like that?

You just say, waving goodbye to all of that audience.

Yeah, well, I mean, look at what the landscape looked like two or three years ago.

A lot of people were absolutely and made.

And longer ago than that, five years ago, there was this gung-ho belief that we had to go and we were going to go all electric.

It's not happening, I mean it's not happening out in the wild there, it just doesn't happen.

But you're not going to happen when you're looking at $2.70

And I said gas in Texas, gas is even down under $5 here in California.

There's just too many obstacles, I think, to a lot of people adopting electric vehicles.

If you don't have a single family home, if you don't have your own home and probably your own garage, if you live anywhere where it gets cold, having electric cars is probably a disastrous idea.

It's not just a bad idea or kind of here or there, maybe it'll work, maybe it won't.

It's just a bad idea at that point If you can't charge at home.

The public charging infrastructure is so bad that and it's not getting better we're adding more electric vehicles but we're not adding operating fast chargers, which is what everybody wants at the same rate.

I mean, a guy was telling me that his municipality, his local town, added a bunch of level two chargers and threw a bunch of level two chargers into the mix, which doesn't do very many people a lot of good these days when if you're going to charge a full electric on a level two charger, it's going to be sitting there for hours.

Yeah.

Well, yeah, that would be more like I'm going to go to work and I'm going to plug my car in and try to regain the loss of electricity from the battery that I got going from home to work that day.

That's all it would do.

Yeah.

And it's happened that you know, during this time, during this five-year period, right, a lot of people are not going to work, not commuting to work like they used to.

They're working from home.

Where do you go?

Where you sit somewhere or you're there for hours on end, you know, and people aren't going to the movies at the rate they used to.

Maybe that's two or three hours.

Maybe you go to the shopping mall occasionally for two or three hours, but even two or three hours isn't going to get you a whole lot of gain if you're sitting on a level two charger, exactly.

I guess the point that I guess I'm trying to make is the fact that I think that going in I think that most manufacturers knew going in that the best that they could do is 20% of all of their total sales on EVs.

Why do?

Why would you throw away cars that you know are attractive, that they sell, and your gasoline motors?

They get 30, 40 miles to the gallon on a hybrid and you're going to throw all of that away and go all electric?

Why would you do something like I've never heard?

of this.

Well, my sense is that, say, general Motors decided okay, we're going to be the domestic EV leader, this is our plan going forward, and so we're going all in on that, which, if it had worked, it would have been a great plan.

Right, and you'd maybe be ahead of your competitors Others Toyota maybe specifically, but even Ford Motor Company and, to some extent, you know, stellantis, two years ago or a year ago, was being pummeled because it didn't have electric vehicles.

And what are you guys thinking about?

You're going too slow into this.

So then they kind of ramped that up and it turns out to not be the best idea, certainly in the short term and maybe in the long term, because I'm not sure how you guys feel I don't necessarily see a long term future where we're all electric.

I just it doesn't make sense to me, given what electrics are versus what conventional vehicles.

Well, I think that the perfect example of that would be the Ford Lightning that's sitting on lots everywhere.

They keep lowering the price of them.

Ford Motor Company has already said they're going to lose five to five and a half billion dollars in this changeover to electric.

Why would you not put the brakes on that?

And I guess that they have, because now they've said that they're going to develop a couple of hybrids in the meantime.

Well, in the meantime, it takes two or three years to make a car.

You know you talk at least at the very least.

I mean, if you're developing an all new platform, you're probably looking at more like five years or something like that.

So you really have to guess, anticipate what the market is going to want.

And for you know, since 1920, it's been conventional gasoline powered vehicles up until a decade ago.

But, jack, like you said, we had a disruption and you know people are disrupted by the disruption.

There's no doubt about that, right.

But, like you said, though, the whole idea of moving to EVs has never been consumer driven.

I mean, we've talked about this here a lot of times it's not consumers driving that.

So all these companies for GM, whoever they're going to it, but like they're not looking at what the consumers are wanting or what the consumers are buying per se.

They're something else driving it, and I'm not even going to get into that, but it's not consumers driving.

Well, we know what that is it's the yeah.

And it goes back to just like we were talking about Dodge All this branding they did with the Dodge brothers.

Even if you don't particularly care for a thousand horsepower car, they had great commercials.

People talked about the great commercials and how much fun they were, even if they'd never buy the car.

So there's just it's not consumer driven is the problem.

And the other thing we talked about the infrastructure so far as the charging stations.

In my day job I occasionally go to a construction site for new, new builds of buildings, hospitals and things and they are installing areas and segments of the parking lot in the building with chargers, which is that one recently here in the Sugarland area that the building opened up and they've got five EV chargers segregated on the side of the building.

So that is more of a individual company putting it in rather than the government.

Yeah, and hopefully they're putting in the right type of charger.

Right that I don't know.

That has the right capacity and is is going to match up with it the technological requirements of vehicles, not just now but going forward.

And you know a lot of people, a lot of various entities are installing again level two chargers which are in a lot of ways kind of a thing of the past, not as as a public charger, not very useful.

It's maybe in a hotel or something like that where you're staying overnight.

So we I just had a new charger installed at the Hyundai dealership, so now I got one less than 20 miles away and I went over there three times and sat in line to get to that particular charger.

Finally went over there at six o'clock one morning when it was drizzling rain and the gent it was a Genesis and it was at 10% and I sat there and go all the way to a hundred percent took me an hour and 38 minutes.

I took my truck down to the gas station and put 26 gallons of gas in it in less than five minutes to go 500 miles.

So I got twice the range out of my gasoline vehicle versus the hour and a half I spent there charging reading a book in the rain.

Yeah, I mean, who has time to do that on a regular basis?

I mean, I sure don't, and but I see it all the time.

I live in Southern California.

I see these people sitting in their expensive Tesla vehicles at chargers.

These are obviously professional people, probably making a lot of money per hour.

Right, when you think about it.

They're sitting there playing video games in their car or, you know, making phone calls, or stuff like that.

I mean, I just don't see that as being very productive.

It's up to others, though, to decide.

Well, Mike, if you're reading a book where you're reading one of Jack's books, unfortunately now Okay.

Oh, you've already read that.

Yeah, yeah, I already read both of them.

We're waiting for the next one, jack.

Yeah, well, I'm working on it, are you?

I'm close to having another crime novel.

Oh good, yeah, it hurts, exactly yeah.

We're the crime.

So you mentioned gas out there at below $5.

Wow, I'm bowled over.

Yeah, well, I was excited I was in Austin actually.

I just flew back from Austin yesterday on a car event or truck event actually, and noticed how low the prices of fuel were there in Texas.

But it's come down a bit.

I think probably with election coming up, kind of swelling the rhetoric a little bit about fossil fuels.

We haven't heard that kind of rhetoric that we heard two or three years ago that really sent the prices through the roof.

Yes, of course we've got problems in the Middle East too.

I mean, who knows what could happen with fuel prices there.

So it's always volatile.

But there's little doubt that fuel prices are a big factor in whether EVs are going to be adopted.

So, jack, on a different note, let's talk about something that you got excited about, that you've driven or got some sort of a reveal that you went to see or did.

What's going on?

in your life.

You know, I just went to the Chicago Auto Show a couple of weeks ago.

How was that without Stellantis there?

Well, it was a little lonely, yeah, A little lonely.

I think it's so short-sighted of all these brands to pull out of auto shows.

I think we all love the magic of cars, we love the magic of auto shows.

We love the magic of seeing the new stuff and getting to sit in it.

I remember going to a Chicago Auto Show at the Chicago Amphitheater now a building long gone, I think, way, way back and just falling in love with everything about it the concept cars, the new production cars that were on the floor there.

It was just magic right.

The chrome, the lights, the noise.

And that's what car companies are really selling.

They're selling romance.

They're not selling transportation.

If they were selling transportation, we'd all be driving Honda Civics, right?

Well?

I was thinking more along the lines of checker cabs, but that's another story.

Yeah, something like that.

Yeah, exactly.

So they have to have this romance and they kind of understand it.

I think in the commercials they do, but not putting these vehicles in front of people where they can see them in a no-pressure situation.

I think you guys probably love auto shows as much as I do, absolutely.

And I just think they're great.

And sadly this Chicago auto show still would have been exciting for a consumer, Didn't have a whole lot for the media.

I think next year will probably be more, because what I did see too is the media still turns out.

People in the news business go to auto shows.

So if you have something newsworthy, or even a mildly newsworthy, it's a good place to get it reported.

I think that's going to turn around a bit.

And you talk about the romance.

Growing up as a kid Detroit Auto Show, cobalt Hall you'd go there.

You'd get all the paper brochures in the magazines.

You take those homes and you read and study them, about all those cars and the pretty colors and that's how you get involved.

That's the romance of it.

Couldn't agree more.

Yeah, absolutely true.

Have you driven anything fun and exciting lately?

Well, you know, I just did a report on the Volvo V90 cross country.

That's a station wagon, isn't it?

It is a station wagon exactly, and I think a lot of auto journalists maybe not you guys so much, but I think many of us there's something strange in the automotive journalist genome that we love station wagons and we love hatchback.

I mean we love a lot of vehicles that maybe the typical consumer doesn't love so much, certainly station wagons.

Well, to that end, jack, if I may just interrupt it and say to you, I drove just recently the Subaru Impressor.

It's a wagon now and it drove great.

I fell in love with that thing.

Will anybody else I don't know, but I've pumped it up as much as I could because I'm excited about it and I'm not a station wagon guy.

I love driving this V90.

It's got plenty of cargo space.

I think it's got like 34 cubic feet of cargo space behind the second row seats.

It's nice five passenger vehicle, easy to get in and out of and low enough.

You're not climbing up into it and then you're driving essentially a luxury sedan from the driver's seat.

You're driving essentially an S90, a pretty competent luxury sedan with plenty of room.

So I just really like that.

There's nothing startlingly new about it.

Quite the contrary, but it's just, you know, pointed out to me.

This is a pretty good configuration for a vehicle, and why not?

Why don't we see more of these?

Let me tell you something.

So I look at the collector car market all the time.

Man, I'm telling you, the Buick estate wagon, the Chevrolet wagons from the 80s, pontiacs, the Bonneville, they're back with the great big.

You know, wooden side, the applique's on it and they're hot and they look as like man.

I remember that I'll bet you that thing rides like a dream boat and they're selling them and they get more and more and more money for them.

Yeah, well, it makes sense.

I mean, we all have nostalgia for the cars that we want to buy.

Right, there's collector cars.

A lot of it has to do with boy.

I remember that as a kid, or I really wanted to have that thing when I was 15.

And now I've got some money and I'll buy one, so it makes all the sense in the world there.

They're pretty cool.

It may not fit in the garage, but boy, it sure is cool going down the street and when you, when you see one going down there, you honk, you wave, you thumbs up all of that sort of stuff.

Who doesn't like that?

Yeah, absolutely, and they're pretty useful actually.

I mean, they're not necessarily fuel efficient, but otherwise haul a lot of people, as you mentioned, certainly very comfortable.

They got three rows.

Now the third row may be facing the opposite direction.

That's the beauty of it.

Those are great when you came from.

Yeah, exactly, all right.

So anything to look forward to on your end in the next month or so.

Well, I'm going to do some traveling.

I'm going to be driving the new Ford Ranger fairly soon.

I have to tell you I liked that Ford Ranger last time I drove it.

Yeah, yeah, I think there's a lot to like.

You know, all of these new mid-sized trucks.

I mean they're kind of the size of a full size truck of two decades ago.

That's exactly right.

Yes, they're a very handy size.

They are more capable than ever they fit in the garage?

Absolutely, and that's something that they're adamant about, the designers are adamant about, because the consumers are adamant about that, and you can't do that with a full size pickup truck.

These days, they're just too big.

I'm waiting for the compact truck to come back and I don't know why they don't build them anymore.

I still see those Ford Rangers from the 1980s on the streets today.

They're usually, you know, the pool guy or the pest control guy, that kind of stuff, and they're well maintained and they're still driving them.

Yeah, Very, very cool vehicles.

I remember the rotary trucks that Mazda used to make in the 70s.

I mean those were really cool too.

Well, Jack, it's always great to talk to you, my friend, get caught up.

Thank you so much for joining us today and thank you so much for getting up extra early for us today.

I was up a little early.

We have an old dog.

I was trying to teach him some new tricks and it just doesn't work.

That's what we do to the dawn every Saturday morning, every Saturday morning.

Jack Nehrad, noted author and auto journalist and got a great show.

What's the radio show, jack?

It is called America on the Road, yep.

And where can we find that?

Can we find it online?

Yes, absolutely.

You look for America on the Road.

I mean, there is, it's on all the major podcast outlets, so look for it.

So listen to our show and then follow it up with America on the Road, and you'll get everything you've ever wanted to know in the automobile industry.

Seems like a plan.

I think that's a great plan.

We love your brother.

Take care of yourself, thanks.

Thank you you too.

All right, jack Nehrad, I got some stuff I got to get in.

Get it Get it, get it, get it, get it, get it.

So we can either do Hemings Sold Cars Roundup or we can do some headlines.

What would you like?

Well, this, the Hemings takes longer, so let's do the headlines.

Okay, well, there and we don't have a scorecard ready.

Some of these aren't real headlines.

They're more lengthy Dissertations.

Yeah, they are.

That's too long.

I don't want to do that just yet.

We'll do that.

I'll do it every one.

I'm doing, I'm doing, I'm doing.

You're a man On the fly editing here, so we're going to put those two down there.

Jack was talking about charging electric vehicles.

Public electric vehicle chargers are becoming more reliable, but charger availability is worsening.

According to JD power data the story from automotive news 18% of public charging attempts failed in the fourth quarter.

That's a three point improvement From the previous nine months.

According to JD Power's latest charging satisfaction surveys, are you satisfied with your charge satisfaction guaranteed?

Lack of charger availability or long wait times made up a growing percentage of problems.

That represent 20% of failed charging attempts, up from 10% in the fourth quarter of 21.

Lack of availability is really alarming as EV adoption outpaces charging installation growth.

According to Brett Gruber, executive director of JD Power's EV practice, much of JD Power's feedback on limited availability came specifically from failures with level two chargers, which is a total waste of time.

Anyway, shell Oil Company subsidiary shuttered almost all of its hydrogen fueling station network for light duty vehicles in California, dealing a setback to an energy source that could reduce carbon emissions.

Shell Hydrogen Vice President, andrew Beard, cited supply complications and other external market factors as reasons for the closures of seven stations in a letter to hydrogen customers.

Yet Shell's decision runs counter to burgeoning momentum for hydrogen, which includes $8 billion in federal spending designed to promote its use and ensure consistent demand.

Well, we taught, we did a segment on hydrogen and recently there's been an ounce.

There's going to be a hydrogen plant in Katie, Texas, which isn't far from here.

Don't know the development of it or when it's going to go online, but it's being considered and it's being worked on.

The closed shell stations accounted for seven of the 59 public hydrogen fueling stations in the United States, about 12% according to department of energy data.

Their closures may hinder broader efforts to make hydrogen fuel cells an alternative and complement to battery electric vehicles.

Who, who would?

Hey, let me, let me show you my new Cadillac.

It's hydrogen powered.

I'd say awesome.

Yeah, you drive out to Katie to get it refueled.

That's true too, that's awesome yeah, yeah no.

I got.

I got other things to do with this no different than the EV, some of the EVs now.

You just, sometimes you just got to drive way out of your way no, he said 20 miles for his.

There's a.

I could walk to the shell station right down the street.

I could walk there.

With a five gallon gas.

Can Yep, I just, I agree.

And I could get that five gallons of gas in about 60 seconds Probably.

If you're paying with a credit card, just saying yeah, I understand.

It's probably about $32 with a gas.

Uh, roughly yeah 280, something like that.

Yeah, uh.

Last story, mercedes Benz made a bold bet on luxury.

In the wake of the pandemic, german luxury automaker vowed to maximize profit, focusing on its highest margin combustion engine and electric name plates.

But now not so much.

Auto industry is dogged in 2024 with high interest rates that are stinging even Mercedes, deep pocketed customers and retailers.

As a result, mercedes will adjust its US sales strategy this year, pivoting from what it calls its top end vehicle segment to its lower priced models.

At a dealer meeting in Las Vegas last month, mercedes said more affordable bread and butter models will drive sales in 2024.

Surprise, surprise.

Automaker will deliver 25 new and updated models to showrooms this year, including entry and mid segment models such as the redesigned E-class, a new CLE coupe and convertible and a GLC plug in hybrid crossover.

Mercedes will also veer from its con con con controversial EV push in the US and turn up its supply of internal combustion engine and hybrid vehicles as demand for electric vehicles slows industry wide.

Ow, which one are we going to?

Three or four Um?

I don't know it's going to be it's going to be that one right there.

Oh, we did, didn't we miss, we missed.

Well, let's guess what.

Yeah, we did so.

Let's, let's, let's do that, let's do talk them a jazz one.

Let's do the first one first the three Okay, yeah, so we're going to try to make things up here.

Just stay with us on the end.

Wheel time car talk.

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About this episode

Jack Nerad joins the In Wheel Time Podcast to discuss the current state of electric vehicles (EVs) and the challenges facing American automakers. The conversation highlights a potential shift in strategy as manufacturers reassess their commitment to EVs amid consumer hesitance and infrastructure issues. The episode also touches on the nostalgia of auto shows, the romance of cars, and the resurgence of station wagons. Jack shares insights from the Chicago Auto Show and his recent experiences with vehicles, emphasizing the need for a balanced approach in the automotive market.

Dodge Challenger Dodge Charger Ford F-150 Lightning Ford Ranger Honda Civic Hyundai Genesis Mercedes-Benz E-Class Volvo S90

Original notes

Strap in and get ready to explore the American auto industry's electrifying journey with Jack Nierad, our guide through the twists and turns of electric vehicle (EV) adoption. We're peeling back the hood on manufacturers like General Motors and Stellantis, who are reevaluating their EV commitments amidst concerns over costs and consumer hesitance. The conversation sparks with the potential of a Stellantis-Renault merger, stirring the pot on the future of Chrysler and Dodge. And if you're curious about Dodge's pivot from muscle to electric, we weigh in on this high-voltage strategy shift.

Ever found yourself watching the clock at an EV charging station? Join us as we navigate the real-world time crunch of juicing up your electric ride. From the integration of chargers in new construction to the politics of pumping gas, we're breaking down the barriers to a smooth EV transition. With Jack Nerad about to launch his new crime novel, we connect the dots between our energy conundrum and the transportation tales of today.

Lastly, buckle up for a drive down memory lane as we reminisce about the golden days of the auto show circuit—those heady moments of chrome and charisma that have shaped our love for cars. We'll look at the Volvo V90 Cross Country and debate the resurgence of the station wagon while keeping our eyes on the road ahead for Mercedes Benz's game plan and the fresh car models merging luxury with practicality. Don't just listen to us—ride shotgun as we cruise through the latest automotive insights and tales for gearheads everywhere.

Be sure to subscribe for more In Wheel Time Car Talk!

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In Wheel Time Podcast: Your Go-To Automotive Talk Show

In Wheel Time Podcast | Automotive talk with Don Armstrong, Michael Marrs, and Jeff Dziekan

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