Josh's Aptera Drive Video Transcript

[KarenRei]

Below is a transcript of the first test drive of the Aptera 2e by a forum member.

Steve: "... demo of the day."

Josh: "Ah, well it's fantastic, thank you."

Steve: "And I'll try to go through some of the features that... I know Marques has talked to you a lot about it"

Josh: "Drives really well."

(As Steve speeds up, the digital speedometer behind the steering wheel ticks up. On the center screen, we see 96% charge, miles/kWh (current and average), whether it's charging, and various other statistics. Another screen, shown later, shows entries for "Clean Charge", "Utility Load Balancing", "Vehicle to Grid", and "Vehicle to Home", as well as some that look like "Programmed", "Utility Programmed", and more.

Steve: "We'll go through some of this. This is part of bringing the internet to the vehicle.... the system that we're evaluating for Automaptics. It shows internet connectivity... it has internet connectivity right now. I can select the kind of charge that I want when I get home...

(Steve clicks on one of the program buttons; a series of clocks appear on the left for start and stop time, while on the right, entries show up for Charge Rate, Desired Level, and Threshold Level, as well as more entries that are harder to read)

Steve: "... if I want it completely charged, I can select the start time, stop time for it. If you go back to battery, you can... let's see... 'Smart Charge'... 'Recharge'... 'Here'... When we get back to the office, let's say, if you want to make a bunch of notes, what you want to do, with your Google Calendar, you can directly link to that with here because of the internet connection. And so when you make notes, shopping notes and that kind of thing..."

Josh: "And send it to the vehicle?"

Steve: "It's already connected. So it's not anything that you have to do extra."

Josh: "So from a web browser, you can get to..."

Steve: "That's correct."

Josh: "Sort of log in, that is your car..."

Steve: "That is correct."

Josh: "Wow."

Steve: "And this may not... Ah, here's my live schedule, on Google Calendar." (schedule shows up) "So if I wanted to go to lunch here..." (presses the lunch entry) "... it will give you directions."

Josh: "Oh my god..." (vehicle starts talking directions in the background)

Steve: "It'll bring up any notes that I may have, that I typed in."

Josh: "Are you going to have to have a lockout for in-car use, or motion use? Will they make you do that?"

Steve: "You know, the lawyers may end up doing something like that, for sure..."

Josh: "Yeah."

Steve: "I hope not. We'll see."

(Steve accelerates around a corner)

Josh: "Ah, it feels great!"

(Pause as Josh takes in the acceleration)

Steve: "Because this is a preproduction unit, this particular one doesn't have the air conditioner installed."

Josh: "Okay."

Steve: "So I do have a fan; if it gets warm... (inaudible)"

Josh: "It will later, yeah."

Steve: "The nice thing about the composite construction, though, is it has a very high insulating value, so it requires very little energy to heat or to cool."

Josh: "Yeah." (beat). "That feels very stable. I'm surprised, somehow, that it feels as stable as it does."

Steve: "Most people are unprepared for how well it rides. How aggressive it handles, how it turns, how it steers."

Josh: "Wow."

Steve: "Most people don't really realize that they're riding on three wheels."

Josh: (beat) "You can feel it -slightly- as you turn. It has a drift... er, not a drift, but a... just a slightly different feel as it changes lanes."

Steve: "That's probably just because this suspension, this whole vehicle is about six months behind what's in the computer now, you know, what's going to be built, even though this is closest to preproduction. The suspension geometry, a lot of those things are dramatically improved. Even though this is our fourth-generation vehicle, I think the leap from here to manufacturing is even much moreso." (beat; messes with computer while at a light) "There's a keyboard down here."

Josh: "Wow."

Steve: (clicks a button to bring up a map. The car shows up as a little "A", the route to the destination in a green line, and the destination address is
listed on the top) "You go to this location... so it shows you how to get from Point A to Point B, and it shows you charging routes along the way." (gestures at a series of icons directly along the route)

Josh: "Oh, that's fantastic! And you guys are going to keep a database updated? Of charging stations, that sends it to the car?"

(Steve clicks around; a "main screen" is shown briefly with "Search", "Navigation", "Organizer", and several other options to select)

Steve: "Yes. This is part of what this company, Automaptics, brings to the table. With navigation, for example, one of the nice features is the range feature which ties in directly -- all of these features tie in directly -- with Google Maps. And it draws a circle here on the map telling you how far you can go on your charge" (points to Google Maps, showing two large, concentric circles around the car) "And the inside circle is how far you can go on a round trip."

Josh: "This is really a neat idea."

Steve: "This is all live, based on the real-time battery information and the real-time Google Maps. If you want to drive somewhere, you can... let's see... " (presses "Navigation"; options for "Directions", "Charging Stations", and several more options appear; goes back to paying attention to the road.) "Let's make sure I don't hit anybody..."

(Josh laughs)

Steve: "If you want to drive somewhere and get directions, if you go to 'Recent'..." (presses button; a list of locations, such as "Long Beach Airport" and "California State University Long Beach" show up) "... let's say you want to pick up the museum..." (Steve picks "Rancho Los Alamitos Museum"; buttons show up for "Call" and "Directions") "... that's a recent search." (Steve presses "Directions"; buttons show up for "Shortest Route", "Greenest Route", "Scenic Route", and "Fastest Route". Each lists their estimated time, distance, mi/kWh, and traffic level. For example, "Shortest Route" is 25 minutes, 6.3 miles, 6mi/kWh, and heavy traffic, while "Greenest Route" is 23 minutes, 7.2 miles, 8mi/kWh, and moderate traffic, the "Scenic Route" is 31 minutes, 9 miles, 5mi/kWh, and low traffic, and the "Fastest Route" is 15 minutes, 7.5 miles, 4mi/kWh, and moderate traffic). "You can pick the fastest route or, unique to EVs, the greenest route."

Josh: "Green route."

Steve: "That takes in a bunch of information, like real-time traffic, the grades of the roads, things that all really enable you to use the least amount of energy which, of course with an electric vehicle, is really what most people are always worried about how much energy they have (inaudible)"

Josh: "And what's the D1, D2, D3?" (knob)

Steve: "Oh, these are the different power settings. Now we're in D2. It's a good all around..."

Josh: "Mix of economy and performance?"

Steve: "It's kinda, this is normal."

Josh: "Can you switch on the fly?" (Steve switches to "D1" while they're talking)

Steve: "D1 is economy, and D3 is power."

Josh: "And what's the 0 to 60 on..."

Steve: "It's about ten seconds, yes."

(beat)

Josh: "What kind of reactions do you get driving this thing around?"

Steve: "It's pretty varied. But always usually positive."

Josh: "I bet!" (laughs)

Steve: "Most people give a thumbs up. They wave, they give something, some sense of approval. They don't necessarily know it's an electric car, you know, but they think it. They probably also think that it's efficient and that it's good for the environment, and they sort of get that when they see it, and it just sort of brings a smile to their face. They give a thumbs up, or..." (turns back into the lot at TED)

Josh: (beat) "What a treat, Steve. Thank you!"

Steve: "Thank you very much."

Josh: "... was just a real pleasure and an honor."

Steve: "Thanks for your preorder and your support!"

Josh: "I'm excited!"

Steve: "Every one matters to us, so it's really a pleasure to finally give a first official ride to someone who has a preorder."

Josh: (laughing) "I can't wait. I'm number 315, so I'm not as low as I'd like, but I'm pretty low." (gets ready to exit the vehicle). "That's fantastic. Wow! What an experience."

[Apt3448]

Thanks Karen, as always. Just a slow connection. Hmmm, I was wondering if you were perhaps taking time in adding a laugh track, applause, and special effects.
Wow, we're getting so much new info today, great stuff. I guess one could get the directions not only via google calender, but also via iPhone entries. ANd I guess one has to somehow indicate that the lunch with so-and-so is not at HIS?HERE place, but at the local darts club. But a cool idea, my wife is suddenly also totally for it.

[KarenRei]

I should get the full thing by some time tomorrow morning. When I do, I'll make sure we've got a copy on YouTube, Vimeo, the original accessible by bittorrent, and a significantly smaller, minimally lower quality version of the original accessible by direct download (I may delay that one a bit to encourage torrent use).

[Matthijs]

I would like to ask if I can take care of the youtube version of the video and post it onto the Aptera Group and Aptera youtube playlist.

Great work on the transcript, we are getting tons of info.

[KarenRei]

Video is two-thirds of the way in, and still crawling along. I guess it'll be a few more hours. I updated the transcript accordingly.

[JimmyDreams]

Ok..

NICE job, thanks Josh and Karen. I'm starting to get more exicted than I was yesterday after hearing about the (ahem) wide stance (ahem) of the Aptera.

[KarenRei]

If we assume that it's taken 12 hours to get to where it is now, then one could estimate it'll take another 4 to complete, and then perhaps half an hour on my end to get it ready to be shared (I have other things I have to be doing today, and can only take care of that during intermittent downtime periods).

New transcript update in, by the way.

[randyd]

I found Automaptics. Here is a quote from their web site:

Am-Inflight

Am-InFlight family of products is designed to maximize positive travel experience for Passengers while providing a strong platform for Incremental Revenue and Passenger Retention for the Airlines. Am-InFlight is available only to passengers In-Flight and upon request, for the duration of their travel. The feature rich Am-InFlight User Interface is simple and intuitive to use in a touch screen environment without the need for a mouse or a keyboard. A Wi-Fi version will be available as well.

And what do you know!!! Their area code puts them a few miles north of Vista, California, home of our favorite vehicle manufacturer.

Even though the Automaptics web site talks about in-flight systems, I'll bet they are expanding into Automotive, in-drive (?) applications through Aptera.

Edit: More content from the Autompatics web site Partners tab:

AutoMaptics sees the opportunity in providing a suite of services to vertical markets becoming a dominant vehicle for delivering real-time local content to consumers via applications and presentations that are tailored to each vertical market. We truly believe that our success is measured based on the revenue which our solutions generate and as such our Business model is based on true partnership of sharing revenue with our partners across the board.

We leverage the evolution of new broadband technologies and the demand for always-on connection. This will allow AutoMaptics to gather and present local content to anyone, anywhere, anytime using a broad array of client platforms including PC’s, laptops, PDA’s, Cell Phones and other mobile and embedded devices in automobiles, planes, conference rooms, hotel lobbies, etc.

We are delighted when we find and forge relationships with business partners who are kindred spirits. We are committed to building and retaining strong strategic alliances who are best-in-breed in their own industries and who share with us the passion of enabling local merchants and points of interest to showcase themselves online. For more information regarding how to become a partner with Automaptics please contact us.

This must be the optional, extra-cost Navigation system. It will likely include a monthly internet access charge too.

[KarenRei]

Great catch!

[KarenRei]

Full transcript in. Videos soon.