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Another review...

2005 Views 9 Replies 5 Participants Last post by  Dutch, 
SoCalGuy
[video=youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SO_G5J73JZ8[/video]

The last minute or so is in English and Fisker tech says "we can start the engine using Bluetooth" etc.

Interesting.
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F
He tells nothing new. In the beginning just how the car works, range extender etc.
In the Netherlands the fisker is mostly bought by young business men who have good taste and who want to do something for the environment. The Netherlands is 2nd or 3rd country in terms of sales for the Fisker. More than 100 have been sold. The Nissan Leaf sold just 160 and has been on on the market much longer. Fuel consumption is about 1 liter per 50 kms. He explains that this is a strange number because in fact you could drive the car without any fuel consumption by planning your trips carefully. He finds the car very impressive and there is no other car in this class. The Fisker is more computer than car he says. 10" flatscreen and remote diagnostics. The English part you can follow I am sure.
All in all a positive review.
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SoCalGuy
Thanks for the translation - seems like the Netherlands has a lot of eco-chic people with highly disposable incomes =)
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Fabulist
SoCalGuy said:
Thanks for the translation - seems like the Netherlands has a lot of eco-chic people with highly disposable incomes =)
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Our Dutch members can verify or correct this: my understanding is that the car tax structure highly favors cars like the Karma and makes them price competitive with much less advanced cars. During one of the company calls, Henrik estimated that once you add in the taxes, a Karma costs the same as a Toyota Camry in certain European countries, and there is very little doubt which car would win that face-off.
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D
Yes Fab, our tax system is structured in such a way that it's very attractive for a business owner to buy a green car like the Karma or for an executive to lease one.

- As a business owner you cannot only get back the VAT-tax (19%), but you can write off the car for 175% (!) in just two years time. With an effective tax rate of 40% that means I am effectively paying for my Karma what a private person pays for a Ford Focus. I also don't have to pay road taxes for the next two years.

- As an executive leasing a Karma you have to add 14% of the value of the car to your income every year (and pay taxes on that, usually at a rate of 52%). For a Porsche Panamera or even BMW5 or Audi A6 you yearly have to add 25% to your income. So that make the Karma a very interesting car to lease. For a car like the Opel Ampera or Tesla Model S it will actually be 0%. That's because they emit less than 50 grams of CO2 per kilometer. The Karma scored 51 grams in the European test, so it missed the mark by just 2 grams. If it would have made it, they would easily sell hundreds more (150 have already een ordered). Fisker of The Netherlands are rumoured to be looking at the possibilty of selling a Karma with smaller wheels (the 21 inch winter rims might already do the trick) to shave those 2 grams off.
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M
Dutch dont you think fisker will tweak the software to get 49g of co2, we have the same level in sweden
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Fabulist
Michael said:
Dutch dont you think fisker will tweak the software to get 49g of co2, we have the same level in sweden
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Given the amount of time it took to actually get through the certification process in Europe, I doubt that Fisker would be able to make a sufficiently effective engineering change and get it re-certified in time to make a big difference in sales this year.
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M
a dealer i talked to said they was working on it. If i buy now i can claim the tax rebate until 2014
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Fabulist
Michael said:
a dealer i talked to said they was working on it. If i buy now i can claim the tax rebate until 2014
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I am usually skeptical about what a dealer tells me in order to close a deal and even more skeptical when I hear that Fisker is "working on" anything other than bug fixes at this point, but if you can do it without getting busted and fined by the Dutch equivalent of our IRS, then that's excellent news indeed.

In fact, if Fisker can do that, it may also be possible to reduce the emissions so that the Karma can qualify for an HOV sticker in California, or least give owners that option.
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D
The car that was being tested by TÜV in Germany was probably already optimized (all cars that get tested are optimized). So software changes are probably not going to push the emissions below 50 grams CO2. Unless they do something drastic like allowing the battery to drain to 90% or lowering the performance. But I don't expect them to do that.

Using smaller or more closed tires (which the winter rims are) is quite easy and might do the trick. I don't expect Fisker corporate to be involved too much in these efforts because Sweden and The Netherlands are not big countries, but the local importers/distributors might try to arrange for a new test, if it's not too expensive.
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