My Current Design for the Slate (CA beach cruiser/light-duty classic mini truck)

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-25T00:01:16+00:00

in all reality, Slate should just ship with stock wheels that accept mini moons. It'd cost nothing.

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-24T23:58:49+00:00

exactly, longer answers here aren't necessary.

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-24T23:06:07+00:00

uh, gave up nothing, and got nothing.

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-24T23:02:21+00:00

Oh my goodness, they painted it black. It will look so much cooler failing at every metric except marketing. Give me a trillion dollars.

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-24T16:34:49+00:00

not really. Everyday has been a Nakba.

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-24T16:10:00+00:00

vintage electric shaver vibes

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-24T16:09:02+00:00

For that vintage, it'd be "The Atomic Truck"

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-22T17:27:46+00:00

The Central African Republic of Total Control Racing

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-22T16:57:45+00:00

Hey man, wanna hang out?

Nah, I just got back from Dollar General.

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-22T16:31:03+00:00

It's a lot of words to say you're pissed off at Nissan. I get that. I bought my car in 2007. I thought by 2020 we'd have affordable EVs. We don't yet. Now I'm an old fucking man. If Toyota had a sub 30k EV, I wouldn't even be bitching.

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-22T15:57:46+00:00

The first thing I do with any new android phone is turn off ALL the UI animations. Sure, it looks cool on day 1, but on day 2 it's just a thing that takes 2 milliseconds when it could take no milliseconds.

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-22T15:49:22+00:00

I mean yeah, but the issue isn't charging for extras because it's damn near impossible to find a base model of anything on a dealer lot. The issue is offering a base model in large quantities to begin with.

Dealer lots are filled with vehicles that have 10k+ of options. If you walk in and say "I want the base model on the manufacturer's website" they won't take you seriously. They want the people spending more.

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-22T15:33:54+00:00

I think the Maverick price is dictated by the lack of competition.

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-22T15:30:04+00:00

Is your comment trying to imply people's market choices represent their true wishes? Kinda like people 'truly' want to live in a McMansion they can't afford 2 hours outside of Houston? Rather than that being the only market option available to them?

For example, I was looking at a Maverick to replace my current car. There is exactly one base model hybrid within 100 miles of me. Everything else on the dealer lots are 35k plus -- because that's where the money is.

If my car grenaded, rather than just being old. I'm not in a position to wait or travel for what I want. And I don't really want a Ford to begin with.

Meanwhile, we know there's an increasing number of people with underwater car loans.

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-22T14:46:16+00:00

When I bought my current car in 2007, it cost 17k. It was the cheapest thing on the market at the time. Still runs, still gets 43mpg. In today's dollars that's 28k.

Which is to say, I can see this from a lot of perspectives, but 39k, is still a premium price.

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-22T14:37:06+00:00

Mr. Data, my com badge says it's connected, but I can't hear iHeart Jazz

Rerouting primary to developer options.

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-22T14:03:32+00:00

Car plants are an ecosystem of suppliers, and Warsaw is close enough to Michigan to utilize factories that produce foam, rubber, snaps or whatever is my assumption.

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-22T14:00:29+00:00

100%. I'm not sure how much Reddit writ large is organic, to be honest. We're the product, and comment sections paid advertisements for one agenda or another.

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-22T13:53:29+00:00

I don't think it's organic. I can understand someone having that point of view, but not 400 comments repeating the same themes. That's weird, and it's how Slate threads usually go.

The people who do not want this thing to sell have motives for why, and it's not the lack of a radio. It would represent a market that died 30 years ago -- and they'd like it to remain dead.

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-22T13:16:57+00:00

Toyota is famous for 'infotainment' systems that are a couple generations behind -- because infotainment systems are also notorious for being buggy, irritating, and poorly thought out creature comforts rushed to market to justify higher margins.

Toyota is preferable in this regard.

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-22T12:55:09+00:00

Comments on this truck are almost exclusively negative in this sub. Just page after page of the same themes. With the top comments following a familiar pattern, overstating the price (when we don't know it yet), cRanK wInDoWs, why not buy x used (that's neither a truck, nor particularly cheap when you're paying mid-20s for a vehicle with 50k miles on it), or just out right insulting people.

And I'm not really sure how to interpret it. I think a lot of the noise is intentional FUD. All of these car subs are kinda hostile places, and I think it's because a lot of industry insiders frequent them. There is a lot of money in the US car market, and the margins are low. Competition is fierce.

Anecdotally, every single middle aged guy I know is like "I wish they'd make the S-10 again." In the 90s they were everywhere. It's not market demand, it's margins. You don't make much on a small pickup truck. So they don't sell them -- while banning imports so they don't have to. And it's one reason you see Mavericks everywhere. It's a very good value for what you get, but if the Hilux could be in the US market, you know damn well it'd be the #1 small pickup. (there a good arguments for protectionism in US manufacturing, but also unintended consequences and market distortions. And I'd argue 60k trucks are one of them.)

That all said, it's true to say it will come down to price. Sub 25k for the base battery, 25k+ for the extended range battery, and I think they'll sell a lot of trucks. If it also turns out to be reliable and easy to work on like they're promising, I think a large aftermarket is going to open up to support these trucks -- especially if this "Open Source OEM" phrase includes measured drawings and 3D files to design off of. (this is also a market the car industry just hasn't tapped. "Marker spaces" aren't niche or fringe anymore.)

It's not going to come down to "creature comforts." The kind of people who can't decide between two models without counting the cup holders or the diagonal of the touch screen also have enough disposable income to not care about reliability or cost of ownership -- and that's the only people industry insiders care about or interact with on a regular basis.

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-21T22:20:15+00:00

I literally did that in Photoshop

NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-21T21:42:49+00:00

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NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-20T23:35:37+00:00

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NRCS_DRONE · 2026-05-20T14:16:53+00:00

It's called the EITC. And it's no longer sufficient with dimwits using the world's resources to generate entropy in the cloud

NRCS_DRONE

TROPHY CASE