General Here it is, officially the new Panda

[PuntoHowTo]

Showed up during COVID and shortly after due to probably being the only manufacturer that had cars to sell

yeah same here, I did wonder if they are on long term loan, as you say no one is going to test a car to destruction better than the police. Over the years the police would get on random care pop up and appear for a year or two then disappear again. the cost of a Peugeot or two to the local police is likely to get a huge amount of data for them, for very little money, no need to pay test drivers to drive in circles all day, and they get to go much faster than the law would normally allow. They seem to be getting new ones now, as you never see the whole fleet at the same time Peugeot could be swapping cars out when they break or when they have reached a certain milage.... or they could just be buying them as they use a lot of cheap parts that are easy to swap out.

 

[The Panda Nut]

It’s just the way conversation flows.

When I interact with the motor trade it seems I have to exhaust the management structure before I can find someone who cares. Although Fiat were quite good / no arguing. Toyota being the most difficult but in the end up… getting there.

I wonder who wears the trousers at Stellantis… the former FCA execs or the former PSA execs

PS I hope Im have not been OTT Im do get excited so apologies to Andy Kett if so. I remember being taken over in the early 2000's n load of crap dished out by management including little boxes of smarties. Oh its a partnertrship both companies will be merging, its not a takeover etc etc. WIthin a few weeks we had been told to dump all our documentation and install the new companiys stuff even though so,me did not fit, some did not apply and some was just plain inapplicable to the work we did. Many of our peole were fired for just about any reason you care to name. As in all things some good came but some bad too. Its clear that PSA took Fiat over and have little or no intention of keeping anything from them. It seems pretty daft to throw the baby out with the bath water. Fiat were definitely better in some areas even if their incredibly long continuous development left their product line up looking old. Its inevitable progress economically but jusyt leads to bland product ranges. It will be another 10 years at lest before the dust settles. BEVs being pushed through and dying ICE product lines means there has to be a big wave of change. IF Stellantis cant get frimly into the black quickly they probably wont survive the upheaval. I see Fiat are offering £3K off electric purchases which probably isnt enough to make much difference to denand but will impact on profit. I think keeping the Panda we have and saving up to convert it to battery power may well be our best course of action if prices dont fall substantially. That wont do car makers much good if it becomes more widespread,

 

[SB1500]

PS I hope Im have not been OTT Im do get excited so apologies to Andy Kett if so. I remember being taken over in the early 2000's n load of crap dished out by management including little boxes of smarties. Oh its a partnertrship both companies will be merging, its not a takeover etc etc. WIthin a few weeks we had been told to dump all our documentation and install the new companiys stuff even though so,me did not fit, some did not apply and some was just plain inapplicable to the work we did. Many of our peole were fired for just about any reason you care to name. As in all things some good came but some bad too. Its clear that PSA took Fiat over and have little or no intention of keeping anything from them. It seems pretty daft to throw the baby out with the bath water. Fiat were definitely better in some areas even if their incredibly long continuous development left their product line up looking old. Its inevitable progress economically but jusyt leads to bland product ranges. It will be another 10 years at lest before the dust settles. BEVs being pushed through and dying ICE product lines means there has to be a big wave of change. IF Stellantis cant get frimly into the black quickly they probably wont survive the upheaval. I see Fiat are offering £3K off electric purchases which probably isnt enough to make much difference to denand but will impact on profit. I think keeping the Panda we have and saving up to convert it to battery power may well be our best course of action if prices dont fall substantially. That wont do car makers much good if it becomes more widespread,

I don’t think we need to worry. My prediction on EVs was that after the current push we’d see people rejecting them and companies reversing their strategies within the decade. We’re seeing that already! Fantastic.

The government has never really done anything to get old cars off the road that’s ever really impacted owners of current cars on the road. They could increase my tax from £160 to £1,000 annually. That’s still what… 22 years before it’d be ‘cheaper’ for me to trade it for a new EV Panda if it does come in at £22k… I’ll take the tax

 

[vexorg]

In other news stellantis issued their finances for the first half of the year and it’s not been good news.

Nice to see the usual candidates completely railroading the thread off topic for no reason.

Talk about gaslighting, you started the last diversion on employees and employment!!

 

[PuntoHowTo]

Talk about gaslighting, you started the last diversion on employees and employment!!

I was talking about stellantis, their poor half yearly performance and how this may affect the brands across the whole company.

A big part of the current problems includes a lot of legal issues that FCA carried into the merger and are still trying to deal with how.
So while it might not have been so very specifically on the topic of the fiat panda, it was the future of the company as a whole, but it was taken somewhat massively off topic into a rant about Uk employment law which definitely isn’t comparable or anything to do with the panda, fiat or Stellantis

Do go look up the meaning of gaslighting, before you try and use it in a sentence.
And you told me I talk

 

[SB1500]

Talk about gaslighting, you started the last diversion on employees and employment!!

As I had to add to my signature: Don't feed the trolls

I was going to use the word 'experts' but I think the T word fits better!

 

[vexorg]

I was talking about stellantis, their poor half yearly performance and how this may affect the brands across the whole company.

Nothing to do withthe current topic

Do go look up the meaning of gaslighting, before you try and use it in a sentence.
And you told me I talk

I would take this as the very definition of gaslighting, you subvert the topic and then put the blame on other for changing it. (google would agree, but you probably know better... if fact to make life easy for you: https://gprivate.com/6cju3 )

 

[portland_bill]

Horrible great lump. Just becasue it says Panda on the side deosnt mean its a Panda. I wonder how much the fancy colours add to the price too.

I seem to remember similar disdain when the 169 was introduced, it being so different to the original Panda.

That had extensive guidance about each and every material and how it could be recycled.. and yet, we have scrap yards of cars sitting out, rotting in big yards... and then eventually just crushed into a cube. Seems wasteful to me.

Legislation demands that every plastic part must be labelled, to enable easier recycling, and much of it is. Sadly, recyling plastic is often more expensive than making new, and the quality deteriorates each time. Your airbox and wing liners will most likely be recycled, as will similar black unimportant stuff, like fusebox covers and heater boxes.

EVs are surely worse... the batteries simply aren't recyclable or repairable and the lithium is a rare earth mineral. I'm not sure there's enough lithium on the planet to cater for every vehicle on the road in the UK to be replaced... let alone globally, for centuries to come...

There was a report by the mining industry a year or so ago, that suggesed that if we could mine every last gram of lithium, and use it only for passenger cars, we'd have enough for half the current world car population. But we also need it for our phones, power tolls, torches, hearing aids, etc.

As we currently don't have a method for recycling the lithium, it is all single use. EVs may be the car of the future, but it is only a short lifespan, then oops, nothing.
I've read that about 20,000 tonnes of earth needs to be shifted, for each EV battery. All mined and processed with diesel machinery. The CO2 footprint of a new EV is horrendous. Until they reach 70k miles, they are not green at all.
As said, the benefit is emissions at the tailpipe. Hybrids, used in EV mode in town centres, is a better way forward.

 

[PuntoHowTo]

I don’t know where this myth that we can’t recycle lithium batteries comes from? We’ve already been doing it for years !!

Just so you can see the process and actual proof these batteries can and are being recycled

 

[portland_bill]

I don’t know where this myth that we can’t recycle lithium batteries comes from? We’ve already been doing it for years !!

Just so you can see the process and actual proof these batteries can and are being recycled

That video is 11 months old, and at that time the reprocessing plant was still under construction, so at that point, not actually recycling the lithium. Just preparing to do so. I guess you did a search to find that, but didn't find anything about the next process, or it would be here too.
A Google search shows up a few 'recycling' companies in the UK, but none actually describe how the raw materials are extracted ready for making into new batteries. That part seems to be avoided. These websites have so much text in them, that I've lost the will to keep looking. I'm thinking that could be the plan, don't let on that currently, the stuff is just being stored ready for when technology finds an answer. If it was happening now, why is no-one proclaiming it loudly?
Contrary to the vid, where all types go into the same pot, I've found two UK websites declaring that due to differences, all batteries have to be dismantled for recycling. No concensus yet then.

 

[PuntoHowTo]

That video is 11 months old, and at that time the reprocessing plant was still under construction, so at that point, not actually recycling the lithium. Just preparing to do so. I guess you did a search to find that, but didn't find anything about the next process, or it would be here too.
A Google search shows up a few 'recycling' companies in the UK, but none actually describe how the raw materials are extracted ready for making into new batteries. That part seems to be avoided. These websites have so much text in them, that I've lost the will to keep looking. I'm thinking that could be the plan, don't let on that currently, the stuff is just being stored ready for when technology finds an answer. If it was happening now, why is no-one proclaiming it loudly?
Contrary to the vid, where all types go into the same pot, I've found two UK websites declaring that due to differences, all batteries have to be dismantled for recycling. No concensus yet then.

That is the plant that breaks down the batteries into recyclable materials.
The lithum as stated in the video is the most valuable part, the other metals and plastics are a by product of the process.

When you consider that raw lithium does not exist in the natural world because of its high reactivity to water. all of the worlds lithium has to be extracted from either rock or salt water by chemical processes. The salt water process is highly inefficent, takes 18 months from extracting the brine to being able to harvest any lithium. and still requires chemical processes to extract anything even resembling pure lithium, Rock lithium extraction again requires massive amounts of material to be processed and then chemical reactions and processes to extract the lithium.

In those big bags of black material, they have mostly lithium with very little other contaminants, the process from that point is just adding in chemicals to remove the contaminants or other metals separate them out and then use the remaining lithium to make new batteries, there are probably not may videos on this process because its not something that is easy to show on video. Its just chemistry in a lab, but it is much cheaper and more simple to extract the lithium from those big bags of waste battery material than it is to extract it from rock, as they do in Australia, or many millions of gallons of salt water as they do in Chile.

This video is a bit heavy going but talks about the processes used to turn old batteries into Black Mass, and talks about the complex processes needed to turn it back into battery material

you get the idea it is quite complex and specialist but while this company is building its technology, the Black mass is often sent to asia for reprocessing.

 

[SB1500]

Stellantis in many ways is making a much more sensible decision than most of the other big car companies.

Whilst the irony in comment sections across the internet, of BEV fanatics commenting that Toyota is the next Nokia for taking a sensible approach to BEVs and alternatives, it seems like the real big hits are being taken by the companies who threw too much out, too soon (Ford, VAG, Mercedes) - these are the companies risking themselves going extinct.

At least when the BEV bubble pops, this next generation Panda (and wider use across Stellantis in other models) will be good-to-go with a modern, engine capable platform and they can pick up where they left off. Whereas Ford will need to invest massively to get it's next Fiesta.. next Focus... next Ka(?!) should the world get back on track in terms of realising that smaller is better for the planet.

I wouldn't take onboard the opinions of those buying high end Tesla's or Porsche BEVs - at the end of the day, these people have always had the money to spend on exciting, prestige cars that never worked too good or weren't engineered to last very long anyway - what do they care that their 300 mile BEV only does 80 now - that's a third / fourth owner problem.

Enough 'normal' and 'middle class' people are adopting BEVs now and options that are affordable like the upcoming Panda have emerged. Once they spend their very much hard earned cash on them, expect to go up to 10 years, and get burned very badly, I think that's when the car companies will lose customers for life. At least with Stellantis brands... they can curse their BEV Panda and trade it in for an ICE Citroen C3 and Stellantis still wins. The companies not taking ICE seriously are the ones that could very quickly sink.

We haven't even gotten into the ethics of sourcing them, the child labour, the mining, the total write off in minor accidents, the re-igniting on the recovery truck multiple times, the extra spaces allocated behind dealerships for damaged BEVs in case they go on fire, the less modular and therefore less consumer friendly repair-ability versus an engine car, the fact it's just a deferring of emissions from street to power station... Oh the list goes on.

I forget... what government programme / incentive scheme was there in 2007 when the first modern smartphones came out? They're EVERYWHERE today - I suppose people must have been forced to give up their ole' reliable Nokia brick phones just the same right... and cameras, remember the government schemes back in the day forcing everyone away from their film cameras to digital cameras? How ever would we have moved forward without a forced hand.......... (sarcasm of course that bit) People aren't stupid. If going all in made sense there'd not need to be any incentive programmes. Superior solutions always win organically. Not by force. Look at diesel, that lost and many people made the same sort of arguments back then too. Whilst for many years, fans could point the finger at petrol cars, look where we are today... the bubble burst. Pop!

 

[Bundes]

I've just found some images from the factory in Serbia.
Here is one of the actual Bambox upper storage in one of the first Big Pandas of the production line. Already looking better.

 

[Bundes]

1# Black roof & tailgate. Some colours will really suit this.

2# The actual production wheels. A wee bit different from the 11th July ones.

3# And a mean looking all black Big Panda just rolled off the production line.

I heard today that the battery in the PandaE will not have any form of cooling. Surely not.

 

[portland_bill]

I heard today that the battery in the PandaE will not have any form of cooling. Surely not.

That does not seem like a good idea. Early Leaf was like this, seriously reduces battery life, although not necessarily creates a greater fire risk.

 

[StevenRB45]

I believe the plot is it's an LFP battery.

Among the advantages of using these other than them being cheaper and requiring significantly less Lithium, cobalt and the other rare metals they are significantly hardier than the standard lithium batteries used in other cars and can take far more fast charge cycles.

They also apparently do not require active cooling...

Why aren't all batteries like this you may ask...but they aren't as energy dense as lithium ion batteries, are heavier and charge more slowly in winter.

Lack of heat pump, and active battery cooling would be why the list price is likely to be low 20s when a similar car from Stellantis with both is low 30s. Time will tell re. Battery life but comparison to the leaf is not valid as it's a different type of battery that can reach much higher temperatures without taking damage.

 

[SB1500]

I've just found some images from the factory in Serbia.
Here is one of the actual Bambox upper storage in one of the first Big Pandas of the production line. Already looking better.View attachment 449683

I think we'll be getting plenty of special editions and interior options given it's a simple cloth choice. That will change the feel of the interior big-time.

Anyone else thing these patterns / colour combinations seem reminiscent of the cars of the 90s with their crazy upholstery options?

 

[StevenRB45]

As discussed earlier in the thread the whole car is very reminiscent in colour palette and material choice of the MK1 Punto of about 1994 onwards. Also the dash design is similar...exterior seems to be more 1980s vibe but that is likely down to starting with the C3 which is a box and 90s shapes tended to be soft as opposed to 80s hard edges.

So 80s exterior style with a 90s interior and colours would be about where it is in my opinion.

 

[The Pretender]

1# Black roof & tailgate. Some colours will really suit this.
2# The actual production wheels. A wee bit different from the 11th July ones.View attachment 449694
3# And a mean looking all black Big Panda just rolled off the production line.View attachment 449695

I heard today that the battery in the PandaE will not have any form of cooling. Surely not.

I like these 2 pictures, black Grande Panda, and different Black wheels, hopefully the Black version has also better interior colors.
I expect more wheel options, not just a single wheel option, there are also 16" steel wheels, as standaard.
And i hope voor more interior options, the 2 seen so far are terrible colors.
Black is the best colour for the Granda Panda, it camouflage al the nasty black plastic parts on the car, like those hideous big black plastic wheel arches.

 

[SB1500]

I like these 2 pictures, black Grande Panda, and different Black wheels, hopefully the Black version has also better interior colors.
I expect more wheel options, not just a single wheel option, there are also 16" steel wheels, as standaard.
And i hope voor more interior options, the 2 seen so far are terrible colors.
Black is the best colour for the Granda Panda, it camouflage al the nasty black plastic parts on the car, like those hideous big black plastic wheel arches.

Well, the DS3 and 208 have historically had 'hot hatch' performance variants. Maybe in the near future, we'll get a hot Grande Panda with Abarth level specs? An Abarth Panda?

Like you've always hoped for?