The Two Blokes Talking Electric Cars podcast – Episode # 146 – The Honda Episode

146 – The Honda Episode

Podcast: Two Blokes Talking Electric Cars
Date: 16 November 2026
Hosts: Trevor Long & Stephen Fenech
Guest: Jay Joseph (CEO, Honda Australia)

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[00:00:01] VOICE OVER: This is Two Blokes Talking Electric Cars with Stephen Fenech and Trevor Long. Thanks to NRMA Insurance and Uniden.

[00:00:09] Trevor Long: Great to have your company and great to have the company of NRMA Insurance once again, helping Australians protect what matters most for over 100 years. And they are one of Australia’s largest insurers of electric vehicles. And of course, Uniden smart dashcams keeping you with an extra set of eyes on the road so that if something happens around you, you’ve got a little bit of proof so that you can argue with the person on the other side of the road or confirm to your wife that you actually were in the right —put it on YouTube. Yeah. I mean, how good is that? It’s very Australian. Let’s be honest. One of the great channels. Yeah. I’m going to call this, Stephen, the Honda episode. Honda. We have a couple of calls. We’d love to hear from you at any point in time. 0477 657 657. Send us a text. Just save it in your phone as Stephen Fenech. Text him any time of night. Yes. He won’t see it. He doesn’t see the messages. 0477 657 657. We would love to hear from you wherever you’re at in your EV journey. You’re thinking about buying a car, you’ve had one for 15 years, or you’ve just picked up the keys to something special. And you brag about it, share it with us. We’d love to understand what that process was like for you. We’ve learned a lot from a lot of callers over the last couple of years.

[00:01:12] Stephen Fenech: Absolutely. As have our listeners. Every day’s a school day, we say.

[00:01:16] Trevor Long: Every day’s a school day. But a little later in the show, we are gonna go around the block in, I don’t know what we call it. Do we call it the Grimace monster car? Do you call it the clown car?

[00:01:26] Stephen Fenech: It’s a very small one.

[00:01:28] Trevor Long: It is.

[00:01:28] Stephen Fenech: It’ll fit in tight spaces.

Jay Joseph — Honda Australia CEO on the Super One and EV batteries

[00:01:30] Trevor Long: It was the funnest thing for me to watch Stephen get out of. It’s the Honda Super One. So we will show you the Honda Super One a little bit later in the show. That’ll be a fun Around the Block. And most importantly, we’ll take your calls shortly. All right, Stephen, our first guest, though, is on the line and is Honda Australia CEO Jay Joseph joins us right now. G’day, Jay.

[00:02:02] Jay Joseph: Hello, good day.

[00:02:03] Trevor Long: Mate, great to have you with us. We will be talking about the Super One a little later. We definitely want to talk to you about that in a moment. But before we do, I understand you’ve been at Honda for a very long time. Let’s not talk numbers. I don’t want to age me, you, or Stephen out of respect for each other. But you were in the US for a very long time. Can you give me a snapshot of how different the Australian market is to the US? Because I think we live a very insular life here thinking that we’ve got this, you know, automotive industry. We used to have manufacturing. Now we don’t. We’ve got this influx of new brands. It’s very different in America, isn’t it?

[00:02:38] Jay Joseph: It’s a touch different, there’s no question about that. So I’ve been here about a year and a half, and I don’t mind talking numbers. Look, we’re in auto sales, so numbers are what drive us. I’ve been with Honda just over 28 years. Wow. So I’ve had the good fortune of having a lot of different roles within Honda over that time. Um, until a year and a half ago, pretty much all in the United States.

[00:03:04] Trevor Long: Okay.

[00:03:05] Jay Joseph: Um, as far as the markets though, I had no idea that, uh, things were so different on the other side of the world. And coming here, of course, you know, the U.S. is a reliably 16 million, uh, new car per year market. There are 42 brands competing for that, so very large pie cut into quite a few less pieces. And Honda has near enough as makes no difference 10% of that market reliably. So 1.5 million plus new car sales per year. Wow. And

[00:03:38] Trevor Long: that’s— by the way, that’s the Australian market, right? A million cars a year. You’re selling those in America on your own at a 10% share.

[00:03:46] Jay Joseph: That’s right. Honda sells more cars in just in the US. That’s not even counting Canada and Mexico, where we also enjoy good share. Um, so we, yeah, we sell more cars in, in the United States alone than the entire Australian market. Of course, coming here, uh, we have a much smaller market share. We’re just shy of 1.5%. Um, so it’s 1/100th of what we sell in the United States. We sold about 15,327 cars in calendar 2025. Of course, we sold 30,000 motorcycles here as well. We have, we have a market leader in motorcycle and do very well with our power equipment business too. Um, the, we’ve got, uh, we’ve got in North America, we’ve got around 33,000 last time I was there, uh, associates. We have about 350 here. So one hundredth.

[00:04:40] Trevor Long: Yeah.

[00:04:40] Jay Joseph: Uh, it’s just a very different world. And of course we have manufacturing, full vehicle development in North America. Honda, Honda is one of the top 3 most capable companies in full vehicle development in North America, along with GM and Ford, more so than, than any of our other competitors. We just announced yesterday we’re making a couple of huge investments in a 9th factory in North America, in Ohio, and other investments in our other factories, mostly focused on expanding hybrids in the near term with the potential to provide more BEVs over time as the market adapts.

[00:05:21] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, I just wanted to know, you, the key moving forward, like, do you see here in the Australian market is EV? I know you said, you just said hybrid and plug-in hybrid is probably the next step for Honda, but it seems from the outside, it seems Honda’s sort of been a little bit slower in adopting to EV than other brands. Other brands have attacked it a bit more aggressively. Is there a reason reason for this sort of slow, planned progression to EV, or do you— does the company see this as the future right now?

[00:05:55] Jay Joseph: Well, look, we— a couple of years ago, we were much more bullish on, on the rapid adoption of BEV and, and thought that would take place. You know, we thought— we expected— if you’d asked us 3 years ago, we would have told you we expect 30% of the market globally to be battery electric by 2030. Right. Revised that last year. We made a change away from a couple of models that we were developing, the Zero Series, beautiful, very premium saloon or sedan and SUV. But we recognized that those were not aiming for the right position in the market, that the market is much more mainstream. And that top end of the market will not develop as quickly as we had hoped. So we pivoted back to what our customers love, which are our hybrids. And globally, we see huge demand for that. Obviously, North America is a big part of that, but that’s been a very successful formula for us here in Australia as well.

[00:06:57] Trevor Long: And I guess the global nature of Honda and your dominance in the North American region is a big part of that, right? There’s obviously strong electric vehicle sales there, but on a percentage basis, it’s not even scratching the surface like it is here in Australia, whereas in Europe and particularly China, where there’s there’s obviously pushes from different angles to actually push the adoption. So that’s obviously why we see that influx of Chinese vehicles here, because we— you don’t get them in the US. So there’s kind of a— we’ve got to, we’ve got to look outside of Australia to understand why a company like Honda does only have one electric vehicle in Australia. We need to have that global context, don’t we?

[00:07:35] Jay Joseph: I agree, Trevor. Yes, I think, I think that’s important. That said, the, the one EV that we have brought to Australia so far, the, the Super One, Honda Super One, has been very well received and I think you’ve had a chance to drive it yourselves.

[00:07:49] Trevor Long: Yeah, I mean, I would call it a cult hit classic. I can’t— I don’t know that it’s— It’s a head-turner. Yeah. I don’t know that it’s your mum’s and dad’s car. Many mums and dads would love it, but it’s not like— I don’t think it’s the option you choose if you were in the market for something that was a city car unless you just had this love for the Japanese style, that punchy little— it’s just, it’s a style, it’s a cult thing and it is a head-turner. We’ll talk about it later when we drive it, but there’s nothing about it that isn’t fun to look at and to drive and all those things. But that said, in a cult sense, how do you measure success? What was your goal for that car? And are you— have you already met that goal because of that hype?

[00:08:28] Jay Joseph: Well, of course, you know, we always have a sales number in mind and we exceeded that before the car even got here. So it’s been incredibly successful from a sales point of view. We— I think we’re pretty well booked out for all of our production for this calendar year. But we are taking orders for cars that we can deliver in early 2027 and beyond. That beautiful, fun purple with the black roof, the two-tone, is booked out a bit beyond that. But we will continue making more. I think you’re always at risk of popping your own balloon if you refer to your own product as a cult. But look, it’s been sensationally successful, and it’s done exactly what we wanted. We wanted that car to inject some fun into EVs. Yeah. There is a sea of sameness among the EVs. They’re the same shape. They’re the same performance. They’re the same style. We wanted to inject something really fun. And that’s what Honda does best. We put these vehicles together that exceed their spec sheets. It’s true of the Prelude. It’s true of the Type R, the Civic Type R. It’s true of the Super One. The sum of the whole— the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. And if you’re anything like me, I just can’t wipe the smile off my face when I’m driving that car. It is pure joy. The audio system, the performance, the handling, everything about it. And unlike most things I’ve driven recently, it’s a head-turner. It gets people’s attention in a really good way.

[00:10:07] Trevor Long: It’s also not over-engineered, I would say. That’s my big takeaway is, you know what, you plug it in, there’s no fancy EV thing coming up on the screen to tell you where it’s charging at. You don’t need— it’s just, it’s charging, right? It’s on or off. It’s yes or no charging. The— can

[00:10:23] Jay Joseph: we talk about that for a moment? Yeah. Is that— that takes an incredible amount of discipline. And actually, you know, you would have pushed the boost button.

[00:10:30] Trevor Long: Oh, every time I get in it, I push that button just for the sound. Yeah, the fun button. The purple fun button.

[00:10:36] Jay Joseph: But The discipline of the engineers, and I talked with them about this a year ago when I was in Japan driving it in a preview. I said, how did you take the toys away from yourself and not overdevelop this? I said, there’s a kind of a 16-bit element of fun to that sound where you could have gone much further and really tried to make that sound like an internal combustion engine. You would have taken all the fun out of it by doing that. You stopped at just the right point. And there’s a brilliant discipline to that to say, nope, this is just right. We’re not refining it anymore. And it’s rare to see that. And it just makes it all the more fun.

[00:11:21] Stephen Fenech: So Jay, could we be safe in saying that the Super One, that your EV, could this potentially be like a bit of a test balloon for development of your other iconic cars like the Prelude? Yeah. I know CR-V has been very popular in America. Australia here as well. And those other vehicles you mentioned, is it potentially you’re sort of using the Super One as a little bit of a test run to see how EVs are received by Honda?

[00:11:50] Jay Joseph: Absolutely. We are thrilled with the response by the market. We’re thrilled with— look, part of the fun of that car is because it’s based on kei car styling, but amped up a little bit. It’s a bit of a blank canvas and we can’t wait to see It’s begging for some customization and we can’t wait to see what our customers do with it. But it is definitely a trial. You know, we took a different tack. Everybody else is building something that’s within a very familiar formula. And we wanted to do something different and see how it goes. And it’s going so well. That tells us something important about the appetite of the market.

[00:12:30] Trevor Long: Just before we talk about something that I think is very near to your knowledge is sustainability and batteries generally, because we get a lot of questions and people are very often using the, you know, battery life for 8 years and all this stuff was a myth in the EV world. The concept of the Super One and using the Super One as a balloon, as Stephen says, to kind of float the idea, you don’t feel like you’re too late to the party. I mean, especially in Australia where you’ve got this influx of Chinese brands and this, you know, 80 brands or something. It’s crazy. It’s a crazy market here. Is it going to be a challenge to grow Honda as an EV brand in the future through other models potentially? When you’re essentially, you know, yards behind Hyundai and Kia and other of your competitors?

[00:13:18] Jay Joseph: Look, I’ve always said if you’re going to be late for a party, you better show up best dressed. And I think we have done with the Honda Super One. I think there’s a challenge there, of course, because we’ve got some established players, but we’ve been able to set ourselves apart by by introducing a model that speaks to our customer very differently. And, and what we have that is of the greatest value with our customers is we’ve earned their trust. We make a quality product. It holds its value. We have the price promise. We have low-price service, fixed low-price service for the first 5 services, which is really the first 5 years of ownership. We have Honda Extend. We have all of these great products that contribute to the value of the vehicle. And what we see in our research and what we hear from our customers over and over again is that we are increasing the value of our product over time and they’re increasing their enjoyment of our product over time. We have this internal concept of, of the three joys. It’s as old as the company that we have to, we have to focus on the joy of buying, which draws our focus to our customers. The joy of selling. We have to take pride in the products that we deliver to our markets and to our customers and the joy of creating. We have to create things that have innovation and that generate value for our customers. And those three joys are fundamental to everything we do.

[00:14:44] Trevor Long: Add a fourth joy. What about the joy of driving?

[00:14:47] Jay Joseph: Well, that’s, that’s the joy of ownership. That’s the joy of ownership. Yeah, yeah. No question. The joy of— Yeah.

[00:14:53] Stephen Fenech: Sorry, Joe. One thing I’ve noticed in Australia that Honda drivers are very loyal to the brand. Yeah. You buy a Honda and typically they would buy the next 3 cars would be Hondas. Are you banking? Are you banking on that sort of, you sort of drawing that customer into the EV? Are they the ones waiting for you to make the move?

[00:15:16] Jay Joseph: Have you been reading our internal documents? That’s straight out of our playbook. Yeah, of course.

[00:15:20] Stephen Fenech: I’ve just noticed it. My wife had a Honda too and loved it. And I noticed others that have Hondas they pick and stick.

[00:15:27] Trevor Long: Loyalty is a good thing.

[00:15:28] Jay Joseph: Yeah. And that’s one of our core values is that we want to generate lifetime ownership loyalty, that we want to deliver such good value and earn the trust of our customers. Why would they look at anything else? And of course, that playbook applies to the Honda Super One as much as it does to the Prelude and the CR-V and everything else we offer our customers.

[00:15:50] Trevor Long: Just on sustainability, as I mentioned earlier, one of the myths is, you know, electric cars are bad for the environment because the batteries die after 8 years or some rubbish like that. But, you know, I believe you can talk to the insights of the afterlife of electric car batteries because we spoke to a guy, it feels like 18 months ago now, who was using car batteries from salvage cars. So, so wrecked cars to make trailers with battery power in them to be used as essentially portable generators at, you know, disaster areas and things like that instead of having to rock up a diesel genny. What’s your view on— and with respect, it’s a strange question to ask someone who leads a company that has just one EV in the market, but it also, I think, shows an insight into the long term of the market. So, where do you sit on the life cycle of electric vehicle batteries?

[00:16:42] Jay Joseph: So, Trevor, as I think you’ve already looked up, this is something that I was able to work on in a past role back in the States when I was leading sustainability and business development. My friends would tease me a little bit because sustainability and business development don’t seem to be a natural match. Actually, they belong together because we have to develop some of the businesses that will enable sustainability over the long haul. And what I loved about that role was I got to look way down the road. Trevor, you are spot on. So in general terms, and I’ll just, you know, I’ll take some simple examples, but In general, a, a battery for a battery electric vehicle. And Honda has been selling BEVs in the United States and other markets for a while. We have the most diverse powertrain portfolio of any company in the world, from ICEs, naturally aspirated, turbocharged, a range of hybrids. We’ve been, you know, we’ve been selling hybrids for 25 years, longer than anybody, and with multiple generations of hybrids, fuel cell electric vehicles, natural gas powered vehicles. Battery electrics, plug-in hybrids, really a more— and diesels— a more diverse powertrain portfolio than any other automaker, which has given us a lot of knowledge and a lot of experience working with different propulsion types. With batteries specifically, our vision for that is that a battery is good for mobility for about 80% of its functional life. Now, after it’s reduced to about 80% of its range, potential range, it would probably be warrantied out of the vehicle and replaced with a fresh battery. But that doesn’t mean that battery isn’t good for anything else. The first stage after that would be— could be some other mobility use. You know, let’s think of a use case where you don’t care about weight. Actually, weight is an advantage, not a disadvantage. And the energy density doesn’t need to be nearly as much as it does for, you know, hundreds of Ks of range for a passenger car. And maybe it goes into a forklift, and it’s very easy to apply because you don’t care about weight, and the energy density is much, much less demanding. So that’s one potential application that’s still a mobility use and still valuable. So if, uh, let’s say, uh, Let’s say 100 kilowatt-hour battery costs $20,000 when it’s new. Well, at 80% of its useful life, it’s still worth $16,000 to somebody. So how many different uses can we extract from that battery before it goes to recycling? And that really, that’s the key, is the end of life. So there are lots of things we can do. You mentioned a use case of mobile energy storage. Stationary energy storage is incredibly valuable.

[00:19:39] Trevor Long: Ion batteries, yeah. Business batteries.

[00:19:42] Jay Joseph: Renewable energy, whether it’s wind or solar or anything else, they’re lovely because there’s no natural resource expended in the generation of that electricity. But the problem is you generate electricity when the wind blows or when the sun shines, which might not have anything to do with consumption. So having stationary energy, and we’re working with a company in California that has huge solar fields And they’re offsetting the gap between production and consumption of electricity by packaging up vehicle batteries, warrantied vehicle batteries— Yeah. —in stationary, in big shipping containers in the middle of the desert, and then storing that energy from when it’s generated and deploying it into the grid when it’s needed.

[00:20:27] Trevor Long: So, in your view, who’s responsible for that conversation? Is it governments? Is it some form of regulator? Or is it the car industry that needs to lead that conversation? Because I think that’s the biggest challenge we have now is there’s a conversation in the wider market, call it conspiracy, about this. We need to both educate them and educate owners so that we’re all empowered with that knowledge and know that there is a plan. That’s really the main thing. So who’s responsible?

[00:20:52] Jay Joseph: That’s right. Yeah, in a perfect world, it should be a combination of regulators and industry, a government-industry coalition. That’s the best way to get things done. There should be a little bit of accommodation. You know, there’s some little, little things that make these— that can make a system like that complicated. The transport of those batteries, they can become hazardous material if they’re damaged or if they’re not— they’re not cared for properly. Well, it’s some dispensation so we can move those batteries to a place where they can be managed. And then, yeah, just kind of carrying that thought. So, so I think a consortium of government and industry working together is the best way to get that done. And you’re right, there’s a lot of education required. People think it’s, it’s every, in every way, it’s just like an internal combustion engine in a car where at the end of vehicle life, yeah, it gets, it ends up in a scrap heap. That doesn’t need to be the case. That battery, everything in that battery, whether it’s the lithium or the nickel or any of the, any of the materials, can and should be recycled and made into new batteries. So once we reach a critical mass of battery electric vehicles in the market with similar chemistry, the economies of scale come into play where it’s actually hard to market, to recycle those batteries and make new batteries out of old batteries.

[00:22:17] Trevor Long: Yeah.

[00:22:17] Jay Joseph: At that point, you’re no longer digging holes in the ground to get the raw materials to make the battery. So, that argument goes away. And you’re no longer digging holes in the ground to bury the spent carcasses of those batteries at the end of life because you’re recycling the majority of the materials.

[00:22:32] Trevor Long: Yep.

[00:22:33] Jay Joseph: We’re years away from that, but that’s the vision that we have and that’s what we’d like to enable.

[00:22:38] Trevor Long: Well, I’ll tell you what, I think— I don’t know about you, Steve, but I think— I don’t— I didn’t think we would have this much to talk about in the electric world from the CEO of a company that has one electric car in Australia, you’ve opened our eyes to not just the market globally and the scale of Honda’s operations globally in terms of different powertrains and different new energy powertrains as well. But it’s great to hear that you’ve got that thought process around how the industry works for the longer term. And most importantly, Jay, geez, I hope Australia is treating you well, mate. Are you enjoying it?

[00:23:09] Jay Joseph: Oh my gosh, I cannot believe my good fortune that this is where I’ve landed. I absolutely love it here. From the colleagues that have been incredibly warm and welcoming to just an unbelievable country. I’ve loved every minute of it. I’ve had some experiences here that I couldn’t have had anywhere else on the planet and cherish every minute of it.

[00:23:30] Stephen Fenech: And how long did it take you to get used to driving on the left, mate? Is that, did that take some adjusting or?

[00:23:37] Jay Joseph: Not too bad, not too bad. I’ve done it several times before. I’ve got dozens of trips to Japan over the years. Course. Yes. To the terror of my wife. But that wasn’t too bad of an adjustment.

[00:23:50] Trevor Long: Just look out for the kangaroos. All right. Just keep safe out there, Jay.

[00:23:53] Jay Joseph: Yeah, no question.

[00:23:54] Trevor Long: Lovely to meet you and great to chat. And I’m sure we’ll do it again when you’ve got more to talk about and more to announce, mate. We appreciate your time.

[00:24:01] Jay Joseph: Thank you both. Likewise.

Steve — BMW iX ownership and road trips in California

[00:24:02] Trevor Long: Thanks very much. There you go. Jay Joseph, CEO of Honda Australia, here on Two Blokes Talking Electric Cars. There he is, Stephen Fenech, folks. Come to the YouTube just for him. Two Blokes Talking Electric Cars, thanks to NRMA Insurance and You Need N Dash Cams. We’d love to hear from you, 0477 657 657. Let’s go back to the phone, Stephen, and your namesake is here, Steve. From the USA is with us. G’day, mate.

[00:24:40] Steve: How’s it going?

[00:24:41] Trevor Long: Yeah, really, really good. We spoke to you, it’d be over, well over a year ago, wouldn’t it? Um, the, the BMW iX, I believe, is your weapon of choice. That stunning, uh, one of their OG electric cars, the iX SUV, mate. That’s what you drive?

[00:24:57] Steve: That is correct.

[00:24:58] Trevor Long: Tell us, how’s it been?

[00:24:59] Steve: My wife and I have it. It’s awesome. We love the car. It’s— we’ve had to— there’s been some adjustments with changing from a petrol vehicle. We used to have a plug-in hybrid to a fully electric vehicle.

[00:25:13] Stephen Fenech: So this is your first—

[00:25:14] Steve: several road trips with it.

[00:25:16] Stephen Fenech: So this is your first full EV. And so tell us, how has the adjustment been? You’ve had it for a while now. How has the adjustment been for you?

[00:25:26] Steve: So it’s— been well. It’s just that when we take it on a road trip, and like we took it to Yosemite recently, and that’s, you know, several hundred miles away, and I mapped out where the charging was, and it was going to be relatively easy until we got about 30 minutes down the road and we realized we’d left some of our important equipment behind and we had to come back. So I ended up leaving with, uh, less charge than I planned on. Yeah, because I charged it to 100% the night before. But because I had done the planning in advance, I knew where the charging stops were, and we just stopped. And as we were getting close to the first one I had my wife pull it up on the app and yep, there was a charger available. We got there and it was occupied, but I knew there was another one 30 minutes down the road. So we just went to that one and it was 7 bays free. So worked out well.

[00:26:12] Trevor Long: It’s a solid name drop to take a road trip to Yosemite, really. That’s big. What’s the best you could do here is we’ll take it to Kosciuszko and it doesn’t even— it doesn’t have a global ring to it. Was there— just remind us, was there a reason you chose the iX? Is it the BMW brand? Is it— was it something about the car itself?

[00:26:30] Steve: I was, when I was researching cars, when I still lived in Italy, if you remember, before coming back to the United States, I wanted 3 things. I wanted about a 300-mile range, and it has that at 80% charge. Apple supports Apple CarPlay, which knocks out a number of— Really? —quality electric vehicles. And then the other one was I wanted access to the Tesla Supercharging networks, and it’s there, hands down the best one.

[00:26:57] Stephen Fenech: Yeah.

[00:26:58] Steve: And that those 3 requirements limited what was available. And then the other thing is, since this was the only car my wife and I were buying, we wanted a luxury vehicle. So that’s how we ended up settling on the BMW.

[00:27:12] Stephen Fenech: Steve, I’ve got a question. If Tesla had have had CarPlay, would you have been driving a Tesla today?

[00:27:21] Steve: No, and that’s— I’m not going to go into that as a former government employee.

[00:27:29] Stephen Fenech: Right. Okay. So

[00:27:30] Steve: that was— I wanted to stay married.

[00:27:35] Trevor Long: You know what? Happy wife, happy life. It’s the motto of the show, mate. It’s the motto of the show. But you’re not just in on the EV journey. You’re doing some solid, what we call new energy work there. You’ve got the charger at home, solar panels. How’s that working out for you? And what’s that like in America? We obviously, you know, ’cause we have a similar situation here. We have far more rooftop solar in Australia than anywhere in America. But is it that uncommon there, or is it enough that there’s a community that you can kinda get the support to understand which is the right one to get and all those kinda things?

[00:28:07] Steve: Well, it was going along pretty well. And I’m here in California, which of course we get a lot of sun, especially in coastal California like I am. So most of my neighbors have solar panels have— or I shouldn’t say most— a significant portion of my neighbors have solar panels on the roof. In fact, my next-door neighbor, he was a manufacturing engineer for solar panels. And so when I was getting my system, I spent a lot of time talking to him about pros and cons and different things like that.

[00:28:33] Trevor Long: Yeah.

[00:28:34] Steve: But what we do though is, uh, because we’re both retired and the car is in the garage a significant period of the day, I just did an analysis on my solar production. And hey, I’ve always got electrical production at 9 o’clock in the morning. So we start charging at 9, and then I cut it off at 4 o’clock when the rates go up significantly here in, uh, California. And that’s worked out well. Uh, if we come back from a trip, it may take a couple days to get the car back up to 80% as we’re running errands around town, but not really an issue. It did cause an issue once when we came back from a trip and we only had about a 40% charge, and my wife was driving some friends down to a concert the next day and it didn’t charge enough, so we had to run out to the local DC fast charger to top it up before she took the friends down to the concert in LA. It’s about 100 kilometers away.

[00:29:23] Trevor Long: Does that— has that put the wife off at all? You’ve had a couple of instances there where it’s like, oh, we’re gonna have to go to the next one or whatever. Is that just part of life now, or is it still a bit frustrating when those things happen?

[00:29:33] Steve: Right now it’s just a part of life. She’s gotten used to it. She’s gotten into the habit of every time we come home, we just plug the car in, and it’s always plugged in when we’re at home. So,

[00:29:44] Stephen Fenech: yep. One thing I’ve noticed, and whenever I’ve been to California, we go to the US quite often, whether it’s LA or San Francisco, there is a high number of EVs on the road. How so? Is it— I’d assume it’s easier driving an EV in those areas because I’m assuming the infrastructure’s there. It’s not a hard sell, is it, to have an EV in where you live?

[00:30:11] Steve: Most of the time that is a true statement. Um, when you get into some of the more remote areas, particularly out in the deserts out in Eastern California, it can become a little more problematic. Um, so for instance, when I was looking at taking it to Death Valley when we first had it, it ended up being that our car, even though it’s a good-sized SUV, was not big enough for the 5 people and all the luggage we were having because we had some people visiting from Italy. So we rented a petrol vehicle for that just because it took that out of the equation on making sure we found EV charging, although I’d probably be willing to do it again if it was just the wife and I. Yeah, it wouldn’t be much of an issue. So yeah, but like in Yosemite, we had destination charging, which was free.

[00:30:54] Trevor Long: So that’s handy. In Yosemite. Have you ever been to Yosemite? No.

[00:30:57] Stephen Fenech: I’d love to go to Yosemite.

[00:30:59] Trevor Long: Let’s do a road trip. Let’s go. Let’s go. In Steve’s iX. Come on along. Gorgeous. One thing you mentioned in your message to us on WhatsApp, which I was fascinated by. I want you to explain to me for people. You talked about recording a maneuver. I have no idea what you’re talking about here. Run me through this feature, which I’m assuming is a BMW exclusive. I’ve never heard of it before. Talk me through it.

[00:31:22] Steve: Okay. So what happens is, is our wall charger is on the back of the garage. Our house sits at a— it’s not a 90-degree intersection. I would call it a scissor intersection. So it’s a more obtuse angle. And, uh, cars go through it too fast. There’s a stop sign at it, but they tend to blow through it a little bit. So we prefer to pull out of the garage rather than back out of the garage. That’s why we put the wall charger on the back of the wall. And so I’m an engineer, so I read the owner’s manual and they talked about recording this maneuver. So when I get in front of the garage, I hit them and it pops up on the dash Start parking garage. I hit a button and then the car automatically backs up so that the hood clears the garage door, but there’s still enough room in the back to open the hatch up while it’s in the garage.

[00:32:11] Trevor Long: So, so is it based on your specific garage and you just put it close to the garage and then go, you do the rest, you understand my garage and off you go?

[00:32:22] Steve: Yep.

[00:32:23] Stephen Fenech: It’s cool.

[00:32:24] Steve: And you can, you can record multiples of these. I only need one. One, but you could, as far as I know, have as many as you want.

[00:32:31] Trevor Long: Can you think of another example of where you would use a maneuver? Is it like, um,

[00:32:35] Stephen Fenech: is it like Autopark?

[00:32:37] Trevor Long: Yeah, so is it like— that’s exactly what I was thinking. Is it like Autopark, but it’s— so let’s say you’re, you work in an office park and you’ve got the same spot every day. You get to, I don’t know, close enough and you just go, yep, just take me to my spot now. Like, is that what we’re talking about, or is it only for that last 10 meters?

[00:32:52] Steve: It knows to do that, um, depending on where you wanted to start the recording, the maneuver, I just started it in front of the garage so that it would park it in the same spot. Could you have started on the street? I do start on the street

[00:33:04] Trevor Long: and then I

[00:33:05] Steve: have a very short drive

[00:33:06] Trevor Long: and then it backs in from the street up into the garage.

[00:33:10] Stephen Fenech: So it sounds to me like a preset. You say, okay, here’s what I want to— I’m going to start recording what I’m doing right now. And then you repeat it. Is that my understanding?

[00:33:18] Trevor Long: It’s like an Excel macro. Do this every time.

[00:33:20] Stephen Fenech: Yeah.

[00:33:21] Steve: Exactly. That’s exactly—

[00:33:23] Trevor Long: is that an undersold, underrated feature of the BMW, by the way?

[00:33:28] Steve: I didn’t know about it until I read the owner’s manual.

[00:33:30] Trevor Long: You know,

[00:33:32] Stephen Fenech: who reads the

[00:33:32] Trevor Long: owner’s manual? You are an engineer. That’s right. Wow, mate. Obviously you while away some time listening to us idiots. What are you— what are your observations of the things that you hear from Aussies talking about EVs?

[00:33:49] Steve: Uh, no, it seems to be a growing market segment there. You know, here in California has more EVs than I think the rest— well, I know it has more than the rest of the country combined, but that could be wrong. It’s certainly on a per capita basis, it’s the highest number of EVs. Multiples of my name— in fact, my neighbor has 2 EVs. Um, you know, so it’s not uncommon to see EVs in the, in the neighborhood.

[00:34:13] Trevor Long: Yeah, it’s far more common in— let’s be honest, and you mentioned this, Steve, you see them everywhere in California.

[00:34:17] Stephen Fenech: Yeah.

[00:34:17] Trevor Long: They’re everywhere.

[00:34:18] Stephen Fenech: High percentage.

[00:34:18] Trevor Long: But you go to Dallas and Florida, there’s Teslas a lot. But yeah, it’s California is the EV state without really any big question, mate. So the iX is obviously treating you well. No plans to look at a replacement anytime soon. It’s got a bit of long life for you guys.

[00:34:36] Steve: No. Yeah. So I tend to keep my cars for a fair number of years on the order of 10 before I replace them. And I see no reason why that would change. We’re a year almost a year and a half in. So the other thing I’ve noticed is, is that it has assisted driving, which I forget which one of you doesn’t like that. You want to be in charge. That’s my wife. She never uses it.

[00:34:54] Trevor Long: Yeah, I like to be in charge.

[00:34:57] Steve: I use it frequently on the, what we call freeways, the divided highways, limited access. And, you know, the wheels moving and speeding up and slowing down, it doesn’t bother me at all. And I was thinking about it, and I think that’s because I was a pilot for 26 years. Oh, we always had an automatic flight control system or an autopilot. Yeah, that’s— and so the controls would move, the computer would move the controls, and you just had to monitor it all. And so yeah,

[00:35:20] Trevor Long: which goes back to the disgrace of Elon calling his thing Autopilot when, when it— back in the day when it was first called that, it was— whoever was not happy with anything but autopilot. It may resemble that now in Full Self-Driving mode, but anyway, that’s a, that’s a false advertising claim if I’ve ever heard one in my life. Um, lovely to hear from you again, Steve. I’m glad that you’re enjoying the car. Um, we’ll, uh, we’ll hit you up for some Yosemite road trip advice soon, I

[00:35:43] Stephen Fenech: think. Or when you come down to Australia, we’ll do a road trip down here, mate. Have you ever been to Australia before?

[00:35:48] Steve: I have been in 1998. I was in Fremantle and then in Woolloomooloo. Woolloomooloo. I’m still in Sydney then.

[00:35:57] Trevor Long: Oh,

[00:35:57] Stephen Fenech: both sides of the country.

[00:35:58] Trevor Long: Great. What are you, a sailor? That feels like too—

[00:36:01] Steve: I was.

[00:36:02] Trevor Long: Yeah.

[00:36:03] Steve: I was a Navy pilot.

[00:36:04] Trevor Long: I was going to say, they’re like, that’s Navy. This guy’s— Yeah, yeah. It’s all coming together now.

[00:36:09] Stephen Fenech: That’s what they say.

[00:36:10] Trevor Long: Yeah, yeah. Okay. Well, mate, love to hear from you again, that’s for sure. Go on.

[00:36:15] Steve: Yeah, we look forward to going back. We were supposed to go for our honeymoon and then we never took one, but that was 21 years ago.

[00:36:20] Trevor Long: Never a better time to take a honeymoon than when disposable income is far more available than when it was when you got married, mate.

[00:36:25] Stephen Fenech: Come on down.

[00:36:27] Steve: We’re looking forward to it.

[00:36:29] Trevor Long: Good on you, mate. Great to hear from you.

[00:36:31] Stephen Fenech: Thanks, Dave.

[00:36:32] Steve: All right. Thanks a lot.

[00:36:33] Trevor Long: Cheers. And no matter where you’re listening, no matter where you’re watching, we’d love to hear from you as well. More here on Two Bikes, Talking Electric Cars. Two hands! What is that, some sort of gym machine?

[00:36:48] Stephen Fenech: Double fister. I feel like that’s something like I’m on a boat, you know. Isn’t there a machine— the winch?

[00:36:54] Trevor Long: I’ve never been to the gym, but isn’t there a machine that—

[00:36:56] Stephen Fenech: yeah, there is, there is, but it’s like on a winch on a yacht.

[00:36:59] Trevor Long: Oh, okay. You’ve not been on a yacht lately? No, I’ve not been on— not a Sydney to Hobart style, not one with sails. That’s for sure.

[00:37:05] Stephen Fenech: There you go.

Paul — Snapping up an F-150 Lightning from the administrators

[00:37:06] Trevor Long: 0477 657 657. We’d love to hear from you if you want to have a chat about electric vehicles. Paul’s on the line today.

[00:37:13] Paul: Paul, good morning.

[00:37:15] Trevor Long: Paul, great to be with you, mate. We’ve spoken before, and yeah, you— I remember you telling us about the F-150 Lightning. I’m a massive fan of that big American all-electric truck, but you’ve been doing some— you’ve been looking into this because obviously the company that brought them in. They brought a bunch into the country and they were going to convert them to— what are we, right-hand drive, left-hand drive? Right-hand drive. We’re right-hand drive.

[00:37:38] Stephen Fenech: We drive with the left.

[00:37:40] Trevor Long: I know, we were just talking to Honda CEO about switching to left-hand drive. Anyway, but I think they went bust, didn’t they? So

[00:37:46] Paul: they did.

[00:37:47] Trevor Long: Have they had any luck selling them, or do you reckon there’s a bit of a deal out there to be had?

[00:37:53] Paul: All of the above. They went into receivership back around February. Mm-hmm. Yeah. The administrators had something like 500 to get rid of.

[00:38:03] Trevor Long: 500? Wow.

[00:38:06] Paul: They’re down to 80. There were some that went through Slattery’s Auctions about 3 weeks ago. 21 of them. I think there’s another 10 up now.

[00:38:17] Stephen Fenech: Wow.

[00:38:19] Paul: The one that was originally, it was an XLT, so it was 215. It had $30,000 worth of accessories on it. So you’d say it was worth about $250,000. It brought, I think, $127,000 at the auction. Wow.

[00:38:36] Trevor Long: Wow.

[00:38:37] Paul: And so the administrators have realised where the market is really at. And I got better than half price.

[00:38:48] Stephen Fenech: Wow.

[00:38:48] Trevor Long: So you snapped one up. Incredible.

[00:38:50] Paul: I have.

[00:38:51] Trevor Long: So just to be clear, So the ones they’re selling, are they converted or before conversion?

[00:38:57] Paul: Yes. No, no, everything’s fully converted for Australia.

[00:39:00] Trevor Long: So they completed the conversion of all these vehicles? Yes.

[00:39:03] Paul: Yes.

[00:39:03] Trevor Long: And then went bust. How does that happen?

[00:39:05] Paul: Yes. Well, if you go online, it’s a long story. And I think there are about 12 companies in the group that all went bust together.

[00:39:15] Trevor Long: Wow.

[00:39:16] Paul: And it, as I say, it’s a full story and you could spend a whole show talking about it. But it’s probably better handled by a finance group or, you know, one of the people that do the finance podcasts.

[00:39:29] Stephen Fenech: So you now have though a fully electric F-150.

[00:39:33] Paul: Yes.

[00:39:34] Stephen Fenech: So, and so tell us what’s it like range-wise? Like what, what it drives like an EV now, doesn’t it?

[00:39:41] Paul: It does. I picked it up, I flew to Brisbane from Melbourne on the 6 AM flight on Melbourne Cup Day. I was at their site before half past 7, which was half past 8 our time. Yeah. But yeah, so about 9 o’clock I drove out. The guy that handed it over to me, I said, can you help me with it? He says, don’t know anything about it, mate. Just good luck.

[00:40:10] Trevor Long: Good luck. But to be clear for our newer audience, you’ve owned owned a couple of Tesla Model S’s. So you’re across charging, you’re across the concept. This was not totally new to you, but mate, a converted car, there’s potential for issues there. You know, is it all done properly? Is it rattling and all that kind of stuff? You would have shaken all that out coming down, coming down the Pacific Highway and then the Hume Highway, I’m guessing. So how did it end up in Melbourne?

[00:40:36] Paul: Fantastic. Yeah, I drove to Melbourne after I got it registered on the Friday. Everything was fantastic. Got in it Saturday morning, it was totally dead. Pulled the covers off, found the 12-volt battery was dead. And so now I put a new battery in it. It’s going terrific. And I’ve heard this is a common problem with them when they’ve been sitting around for a couple of years and not used. They just need a new 12-volt battery. But apart from that, the ride is phenomenal. Everything about it is what you’d expect. It’s just the best drive ever. I remember I was driving one 12 months ago up the Hume Highway. And if you know Pretty Sally, which is a big, big hill heading up to Kilmore, I was sitting on 110 and put my foot down and it shook my head back against the pillow. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That’s the amount of power they got. But, you know, when you pull into a parking spot, it takes up one and a half parks.

[00:41:36] Trevor Long: It’s a big unit.

[00:41:37] Paul: Your bum’s always going to be hanging out. You go to a Tesla Supercharger you have to go in sideways because the leads are not long enough.

[00:41:46] Trevor Long: Yeah,

[00:41:46] Stephen Fenech: I was going to ask about that. So when this converter— so I’m assuming where the petrol cap is.

[00:41:53] Trevor Long: No, no, no. They’re electric F-150s. They’re converting them to right-hand drive. I’m sorry. Yeah, sorry. Yeah. The F-150 Lightning is an electric car in America. It’s just that it’s converted. It was never built for Australia.

[00:42:03] Stephen Fenech: Oh, it was an EV conversion. We’re talking about a full EV conversion.

[00:42:06] Trevor Long: No, no. This is even easier than that. I mean, that’s the great thing. That was the beauty of this concept. This business was made. This is— I thought it was a desirable car. It didn’t do well in America because Americans love the gas. You know, that’s, that’s how they are. And that’s, that’s essentially why it didn’t work there. Not because it’s not a good car. And I guess as someone that knows this type of vehicle, Paul, would you say that, you know, for those people that are driving the big Ram trucks and, you know, they are looking for a big work ute, Does it fall short in any way, do you think? Like towing capacity, anything?

[00:42:41] Paul: No, no. And as it is currently, they’re $30,000 cheaper than what you can get a petrol version for and half the price of what I’ve seen some people pay for the big diesel Rams. If you go to the administrators and you get yourself a deal now, you’d never look back.

[00:43:01] Trevor Long: You think you’re sitting on a gold mine yourself? Do you think, you know, in a couple of years you might be able to sell it for more or are you loving this car that you see it for you for a long time?

[00:43:12] Paul: I see it as my last car. Well, that’s a bit harsh.

[00:43:15] Trevor Long: Come on, Paul.

[00:43:17] Paul: Jesus. I’m 74. How long is it gonna last?

[00:43:20] Trevor Long: How long is it gonna last?

[00:43:23] Paul: You know.

[00:43:24] Trevor Long: Come on, you got a few years in you yet. Jesus.

[00:43:26] Paul: I know. I hope I’ve got 20+ years in me. Yeah.

[00:43:29] Trevor Long: So the car’s gonna last 20 years. Very good. Okay. We hear you.

[00:43:32] Paul: It’s gonna last. Last more than 20 in every way possible. Driving down, I was getting around about 30 to 34 kilowatts per 100 km. So that’s around about 3 kilometers per kilowatt hour. When I look at the Tesla, I was always averaging 5. I found when I did drive it at 90 km/h, I was getting closer to 4 kilometers per kilowatt hour. And if you go back to Electric Trucker on YouTube, he He’s found that the most economic speed for him to drive the electric trucks in Europe is actually 82 kilometers per hour.

[00:44:13] Trevor Long: Wow, that’s very specific.

[00:44:13] Paul: And when I got down to there, I was getting closer to 5 kilometers per kilowatt hour, which would put the range up closer to 500. Wow. A 98 kilowatt-hour battery.

[00:44:25] Trevor Long: Big battery, yeah.

[00:44:26] Stephen Fenech: Does it amaze you, Paul, that there’s no other ute, like electric utes that can match this? Like, well, why is it taking so long? Long do you think? Well, like, surely, like, I know, can you get an electric Hilux now? There

[00:44:38] Trevor Long: is an electric Hilux pretty much just for the mines. There is the, there’s the, what’s it called? KGM, KBM or something. Yeah. The Musso that we talked about. But they’re all, they’re not as big as the F-150. I think for the, for what people would want from a truck in Australia, a big ute in Australia, the F-150 is the perfect vehicle.

[00:44:59] Paul: It is. VW U9, VW, the

[00:45:04] Trevor Long: MG,

[00:45:06] Paul: MG U9. We’ve got that in the next couple of weeks. Yeah, it sells for 80 grand. And when you look at the comparison videos on YouTube, I’d

[00:45:16] Trevor Long: take

[00:45:16] Paul: an F-150

[00:45:17] Trevor Long: every day.

[00:45:18] Paul: Yeah. No, they say it’s got more software features, but yeah, the MG does. Yeah, they say it’s got more software features, but is it built for tough Paul? Without doubt. We’ve also just picked up a Sea Lion 7.

[00:45:35] Trevor Long: Hey, so you’re fully past the Tesla world now. You’re out.

[00:45:39] Stephen Fenech: You know,

[00:45:40] Paul: we’ve still got one.

[00:45:41] Trevor Long: Okay. Okay. Mate, when you say it’s my last car, you’re collecting cars, mate.

[00:45:45] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, you got a few.

[00:45:47] Paul: We’ve got a few. But how do you like the BYD? Disappointed.

[00:45:53] Stephen Fenech: Oh, tell us why.

[00:45:55] Paul: In the case of the S, you can put your personal settings in and save it. So when you get in the car and just go back to yourself, it’s there. Yeah, it’s very difficult to do that in the C-Line 7. A lot of the other software is just daggy and hard to get your head around. It’s thirstier than the S. My wife loves it because it’s smaller than the S but higher, so she, she can get in and out of it quite easily.

[00:46:27] Trevor Long: Yeah.

[00:46:28] Paul: But I don’t

[00:46:30] Trevor Long: know why

[00:46:30] Paul: you’re saying the word

[00:46:31] Trevor Long: but, mate. Your wife likes it. That’s all that matters. That’s it, mate. Well, have you not been listening? Happy wife, happy life.

[00:46:37] Paul: 100%. Yes, dear. Those two wonderful words.

[00:46:41] Trevor Long: Hey, what did she say when you bought an enormous ute home?

[00:46:46] Paul: Oh, well, when I was going to get it, she said, oh, I’m getting mine. Okay, so we got hers and I took her to see the Zica and 7X, and she loved it. But she said, let’s go have a look at a BYD. Well, we actually went to Essendon BYD, and contrary to all the other experiences I’ve ever had at BYD, we walked in the door and we were greeted by a young lady who said, would you like a coffee or water?

[00:47:17] Trevor Long: Wow, there you go.

[00:47:18] Paul: And while we’re sorting that out, a salesperson came over and introduced herself, took us over, showed us the vehicles. Then took us out and let us have a test drive. We could drive it.

[00:47:30] Trevor Long: Customer service, folks. Not rocket science. You end up buying the car.

[00:47:34] Paul: See, and it was— the deal was done almost there. And then

[00:47:39] Trevor Long: did you even go to the Zica dealership after that?

[00:47:42] Paul: No. Yeah, they kept calling, but I had to say, I’m sorry, you’re a little bit over the top. And a girl and a coffee got me over the line.

[00:47:50] Trevor Long: That’s a way.

[00:47:50] Paul: No, it was the lady that knew everything about it and the way she, she didn’t push. It was just there. If you want it, it’s here. This is what it does. And she explained everything so fully. It was— I’ve never found an EV salesperson that knew as much about the vehicle as I did.

[00:48:10] Trevor Long: Shout out to BYD Essendon then. Wow.

[00:48:12] Paul: Yes.

[00:48:13] Trevor Long: Shout out Essendon Fields at the, at the airport there. Nice. Very good. Good work. Well, Paul, I’m, I’m stoked to hear about the F-150, mate. What a cracking car. I wish I had the money to just go and get something like that because it’s a— I love it. I thought it was a great car. And by the way, we should say that in the last 2 weeks Elon’s announced they’re no longer gonna make the Cybertruck. Cybertruck, so that’s gone. Massive fail. They sold 70,000 of the things when they said they had a million pre-orders. How’d that work? So it just shows that there is a straight— it’s a struggle to sell a different type of vehicle. America struggled with the F-150. You’ve been able to snap one up and mate, that is really good advice for people, especially if you’re in the, I don’t know, you’re towing a lot, horse floats, whatever it might be. If you’re towing a lot, the F-150 is a viable option as now science sealed and delivered by Paul, mate. Thank you very much for getting in touch, mate.

[00:49:02] Paul: I’ll just say one thing. Jim Farley admitted they were losing $40 grand on every F-150 Lightning they sold.

[00:49:11] Trevor Long: That’s insane.

[00:49:12] Paul: It is. That’s why they stopped making them. There was nothing wrong with the product. But wow, like you were saying, there are electric Hummers and everything else in America now. There is the electric Silverado. It’s available now. There’s a guy in Pakenham that’ll pick you pick up either a new or used, whatever you want, electric in America. He will take it to Sri Lanka and he will convert it and bring it to Australia fully specced up, 100% everything compliant.

[00:49:42] Trevor Long: Wow.

[00:49:43] Paul: But it’s $230,000. Whoa.

[00:49:46] Stephen Fenech: Okay.

[00:49:47] Trevor Long: Now that’s insane.

[00:49:48] Paul: Get out of my budget.

[00:49:49] Trevor Long: Yeah, bit out of everyone’s budget.

[00:49:51] Paul: But, but this, if you are quick enough. Yeah. As I say, there is still a number available and I’ve sent you the guy’s number to contact before. Just give him a ring. There’s some available sitting in Sydney that you could pick up tomorrow or take, even do a test drive in.

[00:50:08] Trevor Long: All right, we’ll, we’ll check it out. Maybe that’s a good endorsement of the vehicle. Lovely to hear from you again, Paul.

[00:50:12] Paul: I look forward to hearing you guys every Monday morning. Thank you.

[00:50:15] Trevor Long: Very good, mate. Thank you so much. Thanks for getting in touch. Lovely to hear from you again. And there you go. The F-150 F-150 Lightning.

[00:50:21] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, well, when you said conversion, I’m thinking that it was a— they’ve electrified the car.

[00:50:25] Trevor Long: Sorry, sorry, I don’t think I said the word Lightning. Uh, F-150 Lightning, standard F-150. Yeah, it’s all my fault. Of course, of course, my fault. I’m aware of where I sit in the world. Uh, we’d love to hear from you, um, 0477 657 657. After the break, we go around the block in the complete opposite to the F-150, the Honda Super one. Two Lokes Talking Electric Cars, and today in our special Honda episode, not only did we speak to the CEO of Honda Australia, but we are now inside the purple people eater, the Honda Super One. Stephen, yeah, we’ve to have been in something like that.

[00:51:13] Stephen Fenech: Definitely no buffer zone in this car, mate.

[00:51:15] Trevor Long: No, not at all. This wouldn’t have worked in COVID. No, definitely not. But, uh, I, I mean, we said it earlier briefly, but this is a fun little car. And I just want to talk about the interior quickly first, because, you know, these modern cars, they, they spend so much time on a big infotainment system with all these bells and whistles. But what they’ve done here is they’ve gone— and I know you love this—

[00:51:36] Stephen Fenech: that is really cool.

[00:51:38] Trevor Long: Gear shifters are good. So easy. Park.

[00:51:39] Trevor Long: Just pop them Yeah, reverse is like a pull down, so it has a reverse feeling to it. And the drive lights up green when you’re in it, right?

[00:51:46] Stephen Fenech: Yep.

[00:51:46] Trevor Long: Simple drive mode selector between like Eco, Normal, um, uh, City, and Economy. Now this is at 96% charge right now. Yeah, 163 km in Economy mode, right? Wow. 157 in Sport mode.

[00:52:02] Stephen Fenech: So you’re not driving this too young, are

[00:52:04] Trevor Long: you? No, no, you’re not.

[00:52:05] Stephen Fenech: A city runner.

[00:52:07] Trevor Long: This is probably the lowest range car you can buy today. The Atto 1 Essential has 200km range. This is probably rated below that.

[00:52:14] Stephen Fenech: Yeah, I think I, I’ve— I charged this to 100% and it was like 175.

[00:52:18] Trevor Long: I charged it 100% one morning, it was at 140km, but I think that was because I’d done freeway driving for the last 2 days and it was very early in the morning. So, but you know, this is traditional, like it’s, it’s standard controls on the, on the steering wheel. Wheel. It’s, you know, standard stalks for, um, indicators and wipers. Great gear shift, great little, um, air conditioning controls.

[00:52:39] Stephen Fenech: So still old simple buttons, everything air conditioning.

[00:52:41] Trevor Long: So you want the vents on—

[00:52:43] Stephen Fenech: what’s that, an 8-inch screen there?

[00:52:44] Trevor Long: Wouldn’t be more than 7 or 8, no. But what I hear— can I tell you something simple about this? When you get in it, it says, like all cars, you agree to the terms and conditions of this car. If you ignore it, screen just goes black. I love that. I, I’m happy with it just disappearing on me. If I want it on, I just press home and I press the button. It’s no drama. Yeah, yeah. Um, like, they, they literally haven’t overthought it. They’ve just gone, we’ve got to put a big, you know, display that shows them how fast they’re going. We’re going to put some fake dials on here for revs per minute and stuff for the people that want to be sporty.

[00:53:14] Stephen Fenech: It’s fun. Jay, who we spoke to earlier, was saying that this was— the idea of this car was to have it really simple. Yeah, stripped down to the basics.

[00:53:23] Trevor Long: And K-car is what they call it, you know. Yes, this little tiny car, mate. There’s a lot of headroom.

[00:53:28] Stephen Fenech: There is, there’s a lot of headroom. So it’s a tall car, short, small car.

[00:53:33] Trevor Long: First day I took it home, uh, I didn’t know Amanda was out putting the bins out or something at home, and I, um, I was in this mode, boost mode, which you won’t be able to hear cuz it’s not that loud. Yeah, but actually when you’re, um, when you’re using the car, it—

[00:53:48] Stephen Fenech: hey, whoa!

[00:53:50] Trevor Long: Like it will, it will deliver the power to the wheels and you’ll get some wheel spin. She goes, what are you driving like that for? I went, honestly, cuz I can. But honestly, it was, it was a nothing corner and it just— because it’s so light.

[00:54:04] Stephen Fenech: Yeah.

[00:54:05] Trevor Long: And there’s so much power going to the front that it, that it will spin the wheels. Like just a bit of silly fun.

[00:54:09] Stephen Fenech: If you like doing burnouts, it’s a good car.

[00:54:11] Trevor Long: I mean, it’s not burnouts, it’s just silly wheel screeching fun. But mate, the wheels, I have loved driving this car.

[00:54:18] Stephen Fenech: I like the color of it. It’s available in more than just one color, or is this the only color?

[00:54:22] Trevor Long: So it’s available in multiple colors, but it’s— there’s only two options to this car. Both of them have the same range, everything. It’s either mono-colored paint, so one color all over, or it’s this dual tone, so black roof, purple body. Um, so that’s like the difference between $36,500 and $37,500, basically. So this is a $37,000 car with less than 200 km range. It’s insane. It’s, it’s a ludicrous purchase. Yeah, but I would absolutely buy it.

[00:54:50] Stephen Fenech: It’s a fun car, isn’t it? You know how many people— you get looks driving this car. People are fascinated by it.

[00:54:56] Trevor Long: Yeah, head turner. Parked out the front of the studio, people love looking at it. Yeah, man, it’s fun. And I, I respect that about what they’ve done. I don’t agree entirely with, with Jay Joseph talking about this setting a time own for Honda in terms of going EV, because it doesn’t— the CR-V can’t be like this if it goes EV at some point, you know.

[00:55:15] Stephen Fenech: This just needs more range for a start.

[00:55:16] Trevor Long: Yeah, well, no, but just in terms of, you know, the simplicity of this and stuff like that, it has to have some history.

[00:55:21] Stephen Fenech: But I think what he was getting at was that this, it still had to have the character of a Honda, still had to have it. Yeah, that’s why people keep coming back to them, because they, they like the look of the, the look and fit and feel of the car. So I think if you go too far away from that for the EV version, then you might lose those customers.

[00:55:40] Trevor Long: Just for a second, just stay quiet for a second because I’ve got paddle shifters here and it feels good because it actually, it actually makes the motion when you, okay, when you engage the gear, you can feel it happening, which is fun, right?

[00:55:55] Stephen Fenech: Don’t forget I’ve got to drive this home, mate, so you’ve got to leave some range for me.

[00:55:57] Trevor Long: Yeah, it’s 154 km, you’ll be fine.

[00:55:59] Stephen Fenech: I should be fine.

[00:56:00] Trevor Long: Um, look, a couple of, couple of criticisms. Yeah, there’s nowhere to put your— well, nowhere to put your

[00:56:04] Stephen Fenech: iPhone Duo slide because it slides around, slides around, and the cup holder is too small for it.

[00:56:09] Trevor Long: Um, I love it up here, but there’s a couple—

[00:56:12] Stephen Fenech: yeah, that’s where it goes. There, it’s there, mate. What? That’s the shelf for your phone.

[00:56:17] Trevor Long: It’s gonna, it’s gonna fly around when we go around.

[00:56:19] Stephen Fenech: That’s where you can put it though.

[00:56:21] Trevor Long: Nah, that’s going to go around corners, mate.

[00:56:23] Stephen Fenech: You think so?

[00:56:23] Trevor Long: I don’t like that at all.

[00:56:24] Stephen Fenech: This cup holder over here There’s a ridge here and a ridge here.

[00:56:27] Trevor Long: No, I don’t like it.

[00:56:28] Stephen Fenech: Okay, don’t worry, I’ll keep an eye on it.

[00:56:29] Trevor Long: Yeah, you’ll keep an eye. I’ll go around the corner real fast later on. There’s a cup holder over here on the driver’s side door.

[00:56:35] Stephen Fenech: I like that one.

[00:56:35] Trevor Long: You know what I like it for? My keys. That’s where I put my keys.

[00:56:37] Stephen Fenech: Oh, I put my can of Diet Coke in.

[00:56:38] Trevor Long: Well, that’s where I put my little— my office keys and stuff.

[00:56:41] Stephen Fenech: My can of Diet Coke.

[00:56:42] Trevor Long: There’s no door pockets. Like, there’s a—

[00:56:44] Stephen Fenech: there’s another— there’s a large cup holder. There’s a cup holder here, cup holder up there. And I do like this. Like, I’m a fan of this. This. I do like the fact that all your AC and all your controls in one spot are right there as well.

[00:56:57] Trevor Long: Let’s be clear, it has sport mode, has this boost button, this purple boost button. It’s fun to drive, but it’s actually not a sports car. Like, it doesn’t have great acceleration, doesn’t have any of that, but it’s, it’s more about the vibe. Yeah, if we can draw from the Castle here, this is a vibe.

[00:57:10] Stephen Fenech: You know what, it’s also got Bose speakers.

[00:57:13] Trevor Long: Yeah, I mean, sounds great. The sound is good, sound is good, and it is hard hard basic plastic. Yep. But I don’t begrudge it that. It’s a weird thing to say that I don’t begrudge it because it’s $37,000. This car is not worth $37,000. Yeah, but it’s worth $37,000 because of the appeal of the car, and that’s why they will sell. Maybe they will sell. You would buy this, you know? So I wouldn’t buy it as our second car. This is a car I’d own if I had the luxury of having a weekend car that I wanted to have some fun with.

[00:57:41] Stephen Fenech: What about like, this has been the sort of car car like a younger person would buy, maybe an older person would buy, where it’s a runaround car. Yeah, but at that price, it doesn’t—

[00:57:50] Trevor Long: like, it’s at the same range and it’s, it’s got— it’s slightly bigger inside. Yeah, like, it’s just— it’s, it doesn’t make logical financial—

[00:57:58] Stephen Fenech: real Honda fan, though.

[00:57:59] Trevor Long: You’re going to be a fan of the Japanese cars. No, I can’t take your calls, sorry, whoever you are. Um, you’re going to be a fan of Japanese cars, you’re going to be a fan of the K-car style, you’re going to be a fan of the look, the round lights. You’re a fan of this. You’re not, you’re not actually needing this.

[00:58:13] Stephen Fenech: You’re going to get looks. We, we know. We’ve had people looking at it and asking us about it.

[00:58:17] Trevor Long: You think people are looking at it because we’re—

[00:58:19] Stephen Fenech: they’re probably thinking, look at these two idiots, look at these two

[00:58:21] Trevor Long: big

[00:58:21] Stephen Fenech: blokes, these two big dudes in this small car.

[00:58:24] Trevor Long: We do look— what we should be doing is—

[00:58:26] Stephen Fenech: I do remember you enjoy— not so squeezy. Do you remember when, when I first arrived in your office with it and you said you were— you enjoyed watching me? Watching you get in and get out of this car. But this is—

[00:58:38] Trevor Long: what was that, Isuzu or Hino?

[00:58:40] Stephen Fenech: That ad back in the day, not so squeezy. Toyota?

[00:58:42] Trevor Long: No, it was, it was— I’m pretty sure it was for trucks, Hino trucks or something. It was not so squeezy, like sumo, sumo wrestlers in it.

[00:58:50] Stephen Fenech: Okay, wasn’t that the ad?

[00:58:51] Trevor Long: I’ll take your word for it. I’m not going to find that clip.

[00:58:54] Audio Clip: At the end of the day, which not so squeezy truck keeps on earning a reputation for delivering the goods. Mitsubishi Canter, it commands respect.

[00:59:08] Trevor Long: Anyway, I’m a fan, Honda. Well done. But they are a long way behind. They’re a long way behind.

[00:59:13] Stephen Fenech: Oh, they are. We did mention that in our interview earlier, that, uh, this— they’ve still got a way to go to catch up with other brands in terms of EV range. But they’ve got so many iconic cars. You’d have I reckon an electric Prelude would sell. Electric CR-V,

[00:59:29] Trevor Long: beautiful

[00:59:29] Stephen Fenech: looking car.

[00:59:30] Trevor Long: Amazing, um, mate, bring back the Honda NSX with fully electric.

[00:59:34] Stephen Fenech: Imagine, that’s a supercar.

[00:59:36] Trevor Long: Holy heck, they could blind people with that. Nice. Anyway, uh, we’d love to hear from you if you’ve got your money down for one of these. We need to hear from you.

[00:59:44] Stephen Fenech: I need to speak to you.

[00:59:45] Trevor Long: I need to understand why, what, what is your— what, what was in your garage beforehand? What, what is your love for cars about, because that’s— it’s a passion for cars. Definitely. In the meantime, let’s go! Woo! I love it, it’s just good fun. Two blokes talking electric cars, we’d love to hear from you. 0477 657 657. Stephen, see you next week. We’ll, we’ll, we’ll drive the GWM Ora 5 next week.

[01:00:08] Stephen Fenech: Watch out, bring it on!