S06.E27: Zero Pollution Motors, The Paleo Diet Foods, World Record Striper Company, Frameri

[needschocolate]

I was thinking Hawaii because there are no interstate highways where everyone is driving 90 mph like madmen. However, I've never been there, so correct me if I'm wrong. I just picture it having two-lane roads that are pretty curvy so the mph is pretty slow. So the tiny air car would work well there, small vehicle for a small place.

 

Plus there's the living there thing ... Heh.

 

I took a picture of an official minimum speed limit sign on Maui - apparently you can be ticketed if you don't go fast enough.  It was a two lane highway and the main thoroughfare.  Ran right along the coast.  We figured the locals were tired of the tourists slowing down traffic.

 

The problem with Hawaii is not so much that there's a problem with pollution, it's that getting resources to Hawaii is incredibly expensive.  If you build a car in Hawaii, you don't need to put it on a boat or a plane to get it to Hawaii to be sold.  If it doesn't run on gasoline, they don't have to ship that either.

 

I thought the presenters cited  concerns about pollution as a reason why Hawaii was a good location.  

 

I would think that manufacturing anything in Hawaii would be more expensive, because you have to ship the materials there. How the cost of manufacturing compares to the cost of shipping finished goods, I don't have any numbers on that.  However, I don't think there is a lot of manufacturing done in Hawaii and most goods, including cars, are shipped in already made.  There is probably a financial reason for that.  

 

Although I don't think the world needs anymore granola/protein bars, I do think they were hard on her for teaching an exercise class once a week, as someone mentioned up-thread.  I would have shot back, "Dudes!  I'm getting paid for something that I love doing and would be doing anyway!"

 

Plus, as long as her employer is okay with it, I would think that teaching an exercise class would be a good way to promote your nutrition bars.

Edited May 4, 2015 by needschocolate

[starri]

When the Zero Pollution car came out with the Hawaii idea, it reminded me of Catalina Island... which has no cars but is golf-carts only. And then I thought... what does this do that golf carts don't? It's just barely more roadworthy. At double the price. Didn't make sense to me.

A)  A non-gasoline engine.

B) Greater range.

[saber5055]

Aren't golf carts electric? I've never put one at its top speed, but I'm guessing they don't do 50mph which, if I remember correctly, is what the air car could do. Plus the air car is enclosed, so unless you get a tractor heat houser for your golf cart, there's that!

 

I would think Europe would be the place for the air car. Small, narrow roads, very expensive petrol plus countries are so close together, it doesn't take long to drive from one to the other. Plus, it's already a haven for tiny vehicles that are not sold in the U.S.

Edited May 4, 2015 by saber5055

[Charlesman]

We have electric carts here at work, so that's what I was thinking. The real downside of the Zero car was that it appeared to be a single-seater, which minimizes its usefulness. There's only so many errands you can run with this thing: a trip to the grocery store with no more than three bags, perhaps, seemed like the max. No picking up the kids from school, no trip to Ikea. Building a two-seater probably kills the range with the extra weight. Carrying any kind of load and you might not hit 20mph.

 

So, in reality, the only use is as the commuter car for the office worker type, while you leave a perfectly good car capable of doing all the other things you need a car for sitting in the garage. So the $10K cost is in addition to the cost of the other car you'll need to do everything else. The market of people who live without a car, but would buy the Zero car, is small. I can't imagine there are many more people who have a car, but would find the Zero a suitable replacement for everything they need to use a car for.

[basiltherat]

Where would  you PARK all these extra cars, when there are no spaces in many cities and garages are very, very expensive?

[theatremouse]

Air car - Hey, Pat Boone looks good for 80.  I hadn't heard of air cars before, so I thought it was intriguing.  I thought they said it takes 4 hours to fill the tank with enough compressed air to go 100 miles.  If that is correct, then that is 4 hours to fill for 1.5 - 2 hours of driving - definitely not the car to take on vacation.   I didn't understand why, if they are already being manufactured in India and Europe, why they had to make protypes in the US.  

 

I got the feeling that the real reason they want to produce these cars in Hawaii is because they want to live in Hawaii.  The rationale they gave seemed week.  It is a set of islands that have ocean breezes, it is not like pollution just hovers over Hawaii all the time.  It would make more sense to me to focus on an area that has a bigger pollution problem, but I guess they couldn't get that deal from the main company.

It's not intended to be the car you take on vacation, and that's also one of the reason's they'd choose Hawaii. These types of things are always marketed a commuter cars. Most trips most people take in their cars are short enough that the range wouldn't be a concern. Add in the factor of in Hawaii, you literally can't drive far enough to be concerned about range. So it seems like they figured Hawaii would either be a good market to test in because it has factors that make that sort of vehicle more desirable, or if you want to be pessimistic, which I do, it also artificially inflates the satisfaction level. No one has range concerns. Of course they don't. They run out of road before they would.

The market for this type of vehicle is probably someone who would bike to work but can't because it's either too physically demanding or just a little too far. Or one of a couple who might (currently) have only one car, and one person takes public transit to work. So the consideration of a second car that's cheaper than a normal vehicle and has substantially cheaper fuel and/or maintenance costs might be appealing. As in, they wouldn't buy a full second car anyway, so they're not "losing" anything with that vehicle. I don't think it's really aiming for single-people-who-already-have-a-car. Except maybe for rich people who always want the latest whatever. Then the question becomes: are there enough of those types of people for this to be a sustainable business model? I don't think this type of commuter car (actually was it 3-wheel? So it's a motorcycle for insurance reasons?) is ever really going to take the US by storm. We've developed our cities and roads and country to be car-centric. But I do think there may be a solid-enough market for it in certain specific areas, and Hawaii might be one of them. But they either didn't seem to be admitting that or didn't seem to realize it. If Hawaii's a proof of concept, it's that for other areas with similar needs. They sort of implied they thought they could be a totally mainstream thing in all parts of the US and that's probably not viable.

ALL of that being totally irrelevant until the crash tests pass.

[NikSac]

I keep going back to this car topic because my husband's a mechanic and life-long car fanatic, and I enjoy cars but also like the environment, so I really want this thing to work and be practical. I just don't see how it can be, at least not as they showed it. It looks very unsafe (crash tests could prove otherwise, if they ever bother to do them), and just seems so impractical. I have a family member who lives in a metropolitan area where a lot of people don't own cars because there is really good public transportation and parking spaces are expensive. I think the best solution I've seen for that situation is Zipcar, where you basically sign up for an "anytime" car rental and they have cars parked all over the city that you can rent by the hour or day in the event you need one when the public transit won't work for some reason. I suppose that could be a workable solution as a "back-up" for the air powered car, but then you still have the problem of the expensive parking spaces. I have a hard time picturing the right market for this thing. I do hope they keep working on it, I just don't see it being practical anytime soon for about 99.9% of people who want to own a car.

 

ETA: theatremouse we posted at the same time. I agree the "would bike to work but can't" could be a good (if small) market, and of course this comment is related to my own experience, but the two places I've lived where people did bike to work/school or wanted to, one huge advantage of a bike (including those with power assist) was being able to use the bike lanes or trails. I'm assuming this car wouldn't be allowed on bike routes, so you'd still be subject to getting stuck in bad traffic.

Edited May 5, 2015 by NikSac

[Lola16]

The aircar would be ideal for train commuters.  The train station is about 2 miles from my house so it's not really walkable (I don't want to get up extra early).  There's no bus that goes in that direction.  A cab costs $10 and it's a pain.  So drive it is.  At my train station, about 1/2 the commuters get dropped off by a spouse or parent; there are few bicyclists but quite a few scooters.  In a 2 car household, an aircar would be perfect for the commuter.  I agreed with the sharks that this local building franchise concept wasn't the best.  They should build in Puerto Rico - lots of old military bases.  Makes just as much sense as starting in Hawaii.

 

Kind bars just got dinged by the FDA for calling the bars healthy when they are loaded with sugars.  Don't doubt Paleo bars will face the same scrutiny.  The caveman diet is a nice schtick. But that's all it is.  As another poster pointed out, cavemen didn't live that long so not sure why we'd emulate them.  The woman looked like she was on HGH or something. 

 

The glasses - yea, the lens pop out but the overall frame has to be the same shape or they wouldn't fit in.  That is limiting.   I buy cheap OTC readers as I only need them occasionally so I'm not the market for this.  I think the most I spent was $15 for some Vera Bradley readers that had a cute soft case

 

Fishing guy - don't like the grandstanding of TAKE MY OFFER NOW.  They need to disallow that in future seasons.

[Kiss my mutt]

The paleo bar lady seemed like she was about to become unglued. She kept bringing Loren Corbain like she was in a cult and she wanted to make this guy happy that she got a deal. If these bars were the end all, be all, or even lucrative you'd think he would have been there.

Pay him for an endorsement to try to get into his secret circle. It was so unsettling to watch.

[saber5055]

The air car caught my attention right away because, when I worked in the city, I drove 80 miles round trip every day. I owned a large cargo van I used for my own business on weekends, but my daily drive car was a tiny one that got almost 50 mpg. Yeah, I had to pay two licenses, two insurances, but not having to fill up a van that got 15 mpg tops four times a week made it worth it. So, the van stayed in my farm-based garage, the little car went on all trips to work/town. The air car perked my ears up since it would have been perfect for my daily commute. I've always been interested in how to buy one of those tiny economy cars sold by U.S. manufacturers to European customers.

 

The glasses ... I would want to change the frame shapes if I were swapping lenses, so it didn't appeal to me. Nor did the price!

[Amarsir]

From the Zero Pollution Motors Facebook yesterday:

the original production model of the AirPod will not be a highway vehicle. later models will have higher tops speeds capable of highway travel.

So they're already scaling back to golf-cart-esque models, and have yet to go throguh crash testing.

[theatremouse]

The one they showed I thought they said maxed at 50mph, so isn't that not really highway to begin with?

[Jamoche]

Where would  you PARK all these extra cars, when there are no spaces in many cities and garages are very, very expensive?

They should make a deal with a short-term rental company like Zip Car in places like San Francisco or New York.

[cooksdelight]

If Joe Schmoe was pitching the air car -- and not Pat Boone -- would anyone have given it the time of day?

[BusyOctober]

I looked into the Paleo thing b/c a cousin of mine (who owns a Cross-fit Gym) is a total believer.  The only thing I got out of this "lifestyle" is that these Paleo people really want to play up the "hunt & gather" aspect of feeding themselves.  The list of ingredients to make Paleo Pancakes or Paleo Frittata is ridiculous!  I'd have to go to several different stores to hunt and gather 3 different kinds of unprocessed flours, alternative soy-based fat substitutes, virgin coconut meat grown at free range grove on soil composed of volcanic ash..  Please!  I'd waste so much time and gas getting super expensive ingredients to make crappy food that no one would eat.  I'll stick to low fat, lots of fresh greens and proteins, limit the processed stuff where possible and eat reasonable portion sizes.

[Guest]

Although I don't think the world needs anymore granola/protein bars, I do think they were hard on her for teaching an exercise class once a week, as someone mentioned up-thread.  I would have shot back, "Dudes!  I'm getting paid for something that I love doing and would be doing anyway!"

I wanted her to reply to Robert with, "You too are a parent, a husband (well, were) and spend an hour in the gym daily, and have multiple balls in the air at work.  Why is it you can do it but I can't?"  

 

I think they had other problems with her company and just used her being busy as an excuse, though.  

 

I'm surprised no one poked fun at cavemen eating bars.  If you're paleo, it's really not that hard to have a snack that's not a bar.  Nuts, meats, jerky, fruit...  She even said in her opening spiel part of the paleo diet is avoiding processed foods.  I guess it's ok if it has PALEO on the label.    

[Kel Varnsen]

I quite liked the notion of it, but I would fear for my life in that tiny thing in my traffic-choked city.

I am really curious if the air car had the option to provide air conditioning. Of course air conditioning in a car is not a necessity. But in a lot of places it gets crazy hot in the summer (it does where I live) and driving a car without AC would not be fun. At the same time I recognize that running an AC system is a huge power drain.

 

 

I'm surprised no one poked fun at cavemen eating bars.  If you're paleo, it's really not that hard to have a snack that's not a bar.  Nuts, meats, jerky, fruit...  She even said in her opening spiel part of the paleo diet is avoiding processed foods.  I guess it's ok if it has PALEO on the label.    

The thing that bugged me about her presentation is the whole "avoid foods with ingredients you can't pronounce thing". I am not saying that these type of ingredients are good or bad, but the whole assumption that something is bad because it has a big name just seems so ignorant to me.

[Guest]

I hate that assumption, too.  If a long name scares you, take 10 seconds and research what it is and see if it's anything to fear.  Most of the ingredients people treat like they're poison are just simple, harmless preservatives.  If you don't want preservatives, don't eat packaged goods.  Preservatives aren't some evil.  They're responsible for a whole lot of the diversity in foods we have, and a general lack of hunger in the world.  Some of them are quite natural, too.  Like citric acid sounds so scary but it's what preserves citrus fruit in its natural state and what we use to preserve home canned foods, and is quite harmless.  

[NikSac]

I am really curious if the air car had the option to provide air conditioning. Of course air conditioning in a car is not a necessity. But in a lot of places it gets crazy hot in the summer (it does where I live) and driving a car without AC would not be fun. At the same time I recognize that running an AC system is a huge power drain.

 

Same here. The concern I had about getting stuck in a traffic jam also kind of assumed that the thing did have air conditioning. It gets well over 100 degrees numerous days during the summer where I live, sometimes starting as early as May and lasting through September. There is no way in heck I'd want to risk being trapped in a car with no A/C when it's that hot. I don't remember them asking about that. Might've been part of the discussion that we didn't see.

[NikSac]

I hate that assumption, too.  If a long name scares you, take 10 seconds and research what it is and see if it's anything to fear.  Most of the ingredients people treat like they're poison are just simple, harmless preservatives.  If you don't want preservatives, don't eat packaged goods.  Preservatives aren't some evil.  They're responsible for a whole lot of the diversity in foods we have, and a general lack of hunger in the world.  Some of them are quite natural, too.  Like citric acid sounds so scary but it's what preserves citrus fruit in its natural state and what we use to preserve home canned foods, and is quite harmless.  

 

Me too!  I actually use Xanthan Gum in cooking as a thickener, and that's one I hear people flip out about. It works kind of like corn starch. Is the Xanthan Gum somehow more "evil" because it's harder to pronounce? (just an example).  Citric acid's another good example. There are dozens if not hundreds more. Not to mention all the perfectly natural foods with long or funky names - would some of the Paleo people who say things like "don't eat foods you can't pronounce" shy away from difficult to pronounce but totally natural foods?

[Amarsir]

Something tells me that the health food movement to avoid stuff you can't pronounce and the health food movement pushing us to eat more quinoa probably never met.