autoevolution
 

Gustavo Henrique Ruffo

EV Expert
editor photo
Motoring writer since 1998, Gustavo wants to write relevant stories about cars and their shift to a sustainable future.

Got any tips? Feel free to contact him through his LinkedIn profile or Threema: R6F4J872.

Gustavo knew he would make a living with writing. The options were a career in law and journalism. After a quick research, he learned that law professions would help him earn ten times more than a reporter. Knowing how it feels to be broke, he took no effort in going to law school.

Having grown up reading anything about cars his father would put in his hands, he started driving late: Gustavo wanted to buy his first car before learning to drive. But life is funny, and his law internships demanded him to have a driver’s license so that he could go to courts driving company cars. That was the only fun he had in the world of legal affairs.

In the third year of college, dying of boredom, he took part in a journalism training course. Loving cars was what landed him his first job as a motoring writer. But he also fell in love with journalism and how powerful it can be when things are not right in the world.

The profession was as unstable and low-paying as predicted, which eventually became a problem. That made him try to go back to the legal world working as a trainee. Ironically, it was at Ford, where he missed his days as an automotive journalist. That drove him back to newsrooms and made journalism turn into a professional refuge: he could always count on it.

Accepting that the life of a reporter is full of ups and downs – aren’t them all? – Gustavo fully accepted he was a journalist. That helped him earn a few prizes, work in multiple places, visit almost every major auto show in the world, meet a bunch of nice people, and feed his family while working with what he loves. He thanks for that privilege every single day.

At autoevolution, he found the right environment for journalism at its best: it can be fun to have a purpose.
Ram Rampage Is Officially Stellantis' New Unibody Pickup Truck - The First Pictures
Ram Rampage Is Officially Stellantis' New Unibody Pickup Truck - The First Pictures

5 Jun 2023, 22:24 UTC · By: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo / When Autos Segredos said Stellantis would name its new unibody pickup truck Rampage, I had no doubt that would indeed be the case. Anyway, it is always good to have the official confirmation, and it arrived this June 5. Luckily, there are only a fe...

 
NHTSA Failing To Meet Investigation Deadlines Is Just One of Its Multiple Problems
NHTSA Failing To Meet Investigation Deadlines Is Just One of Its Multiple Problems

5 Jun 2023, 09:17 UTC · By: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo / The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) received a petition for a recall of all Tesla vehicles sold in the US in April. Costas Lakafossis came up with an explanation for sudden unintended acceleration (SUA) episodes and proposed ...

 
AEHRA Said Its BEVs Will Have a Repairable Battery Pack, But Will They Really?
AEHRA Said Its BEVs Will Have a Repairable Battery Pack, But Will They Really?

4 Jun 2023, 06:51 UTC · By: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo / I have just written about how BEV startups can be very different from each other, with only a few having any chance of survival. AEHRA is an Italian BEV startup that presented what seemed to be renderings of an SUV in November 2022. It also promise...

 
Rivian and Lucid Are Not Like Other BEV Startups – They Have a Backup Others Don't
Rivian and Lucid Are Not Like Other BEV Startups – They Have a Backup Others Don't

3 Jun 2023, 08:29 UTC · By: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo / It is increasingly clearer that most of the BEV startups we have seen in the last few years will not survive. They emerged in a moment of easy money when a bull market stimulated investors to look for the next Tesla. When war, inflation, and other ...

 
Tesla Roadsters Abandoned in Container Suggest That Battery Packs Also Die of Old Age
Tesla Roadsters Abandoned in Container Suggest That Battery Packs Also Die of Old Age

2 Jun 2023, 19:58 UTC · By: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo / I had been insisting on how expensive it is to replace battery packs for quite a while before the BMS_u029 error codes started popping up. They are affecting components not only due to their mileage but also due to their age. A new case reinforces ...

 
Cornell University Quantifies Need for New Mines for BEVs in a Way You'll Understand
Cornell University Quantifies Need for New Mines for BEVs in a Way You'll Understand

31 May 2023, 19:34 UTC · By: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo / Only a few people are truly familiar with how difficult it is to open and get a new mine started. Due to the environmental impacts that they have anywhere they are established, they have to comply with several requirements. That alone can demand ye...

 
What Do the Tesla Files and Arbitration Rules Have To Do With Each Other? A Lot!
What Do the Tesla Files and Arbitration Rules Have To Do With Each Other? A Lot!

31 May 2023, 12:34 UTC · By: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo / After I first wrote about the Tesla Files, it surprised me people were not giving them the attention they deserved – especially in the US. So I wrote about why these documents are crucial for American Tesla employees and customers. To a large...

 
Wirelessly-Charged Toyota RAV4 Prime Drives 1,206 Miles in 100 Hours, But There's a Catch
Wirelessly-Charged Toyota RAV4 Prime Drives 1,206 Miles in 100 Hours, But There's a Catch

30 May 2023, 23:39 UTC · By: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo / Although most BEV advocates are sure battery electric vehicles are the only way out of fossil fuels in personal transportation, others healthily look for other options. One of them is to have electric cars that charge on the go with wireless chargi...

 
What Everybody Missed About the Tesla Files Is That the U.S. Remains Carmaker's Main Stage
What Everybody Missed About the Tesla Files Is That the U.S. Remains Carmaker's Main Stage

30 May 2023, 13:19 UTC · By: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo / On May 25, the German newspaper Handelsblatt revealed a massive data leak from Tesla. What was supposed to make headlines in all serious media outlets ended up having a shy coverage so far. It seems most people failed to understand what Handelsblat...

 
Rivian R1T Repair Issue Leads Rich Rebuilds to Say It Will Be Worse in a Tesla Cybertruck
Rivian R1T Repair Issue Leads Rich Rebuilds to Say It Will Be Worse in a Tesla Cybertruck

29 May 2023, 11:18 UTC · By: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo / Rich Benoit disclosed he bought a Rivian R1T in November 2022. It was actually a little earlier than that because the electric pickup truck was rear-ended in October and fixed only in May. The insurance covered the repair, but it still cost $37,475...

 
Tesla Files: Huge Data Leak Shows Issues with Data Protection, SUA, Autopilot, and FSD
Tesla Files: Huge Data Leak Shows Issues with Data Protection, SUA, Autopilot, and FSD

26 May 2023, 08:26 UTC · By: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo / There are more than 2,400 reports of sudden unintended acceleration (SUA) episodes involving Teslas from 2015 until March 2022. Anyone with access to the company's Toolbox internal messaging system can access information from customers and emp...

 
Ford Will Have Access to Tesla's Supercharging Network, Will Add NACS Charger to Its BEVs
Ford Will Have Access to Tesla's Supercharging Network, Will Add NACS Charger to Its BEVs

25 May 2023, 23:40 UTC · By: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo / When Tesla decided to name its car for the masses Model E, Ford said no. The company had the trademark and was willing to use it in its battery electric car (BEV) division. Tesla's only option was to name the car Model 3. When Ford decided Ame...

 
Did the Aspark Owl Just Dethrone the Rimac Nevera? Here's the Answer
Did the Aspark Owl Just Dethrone the Rimac Nevera? Here's the Answer

25 May 2023, 22:02 UTC · By: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo / The Rimac Nevera broke several world records on May 17, including the lowest 1/8-mile and 1/4-mile times for a production car. Only eight days later, the Japanese carmaker Aspark seemed to have beaten the Croatian company with the Owl by setting tw...

 
BMS_u029 Error Reset Causes First Confirmed Blaze on a Tesla Model S
BMS_u029 Error Reset Causes First Confirmed Blaze on a Tesla Model S

25 May 2023, 13:50 UTC · By: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo / On April 25, I wrote about an appeal Jason Hughes made on Twitter. The Tesla Hacker urged people not to reset their Model S units with BMS_u029 or BMS_u018 error codes. That could lead to dangerous situations. Exactly one month later, Hughes confir...

 
High Battery Pack Prices? Wuling May Have Found a Solution With the Hongguang Mini EV
High Battery Pack Prices? Wuling May Have Found a Solution With the Hongguang Mini EV

24 May 2023, 22:36 UTC · By: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo / Wuling never had any problems with selling the Hongguang Mini EV, an electric quadricycle that costs only RMB32,800 ($4,650 at the current exchange rate)... until very recently. In January, it became the third BEV to reach 1 million units sold afte...

 
Jim Farley Is Worried About the Dumb Range Strategy for BEVs – So Should You
Jim Farley Is Worried About the Dumb Range Strategy for BEVs – So Should You

24 May 2023, 10:56 UTC · By: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo / Ford made a capital markets event on May 22 that wanted to prove the company no longer fits into the valuation box that comprises most other carmakers. The automotive industry is seen as a high-investment, low-margin business, and the Blue Oval bra...

 
Driver of Tesla Model Y Who Drove Off a Cliff Blames EV for Crash
Driver of Tesla Model Y Who Drove Off a Cliff Blames EV for Crash

22 May 2023, 18:51 UTC · By: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo / On January 2, a Tesla Model Y flew off "Devil's Slide" in California with four people on board. Dharmesh Arvind Patel was driving with his wife, Neha Bubna Patel, and their two children: a 7-year-old girl and a 4-year-old boy. They w...

 
BEVs Are Dying Earlier Than They Should – And You Already Know Why
BEVs Are Dying Earlier Than They Should – And You Already Know Why

22 May 2023, 12:56 UTC · By: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo / In its latest US passenger car fleet analysis, S&P Global Mobility discovered that the average age of cars in the country has risen to 12.5 years. That has two explanations: constrained new vehicle sales and the increase in SUV and light truck ...

 
YouTube Cancels Rendering Artist Channel While Letting Others Exploit His Work
YouTube Cancels Rendering Artist Channel While Letting Others Exploit His Work

20 May 2023, 14:45 UTC · By: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo / Even if you have never heard of Eduardo Oliveira, it is almost certain that you have already seen his work somewhere. Du, as he is more popularly known, started rendering classic Brazilian cars in 2006 with the Irmão do Décio (IDD) bl...

 
Tesla Agent Tells Owner of Model Y That Caught Fire To Tow It to Service Center
Tesla Agent Tells Owner of Model Y That Caught Fire To Tow It to Service Center

20 May 2023, 08:48 UTC · By: Gustavo Henrique Ruffo / It is not news that Tesla Customer Services are broken. I wrote on January 2022 about the issue, and nothing has changed so far. However, a recent example shows just how damaged the company's model for repairing its vehicles is. Bishal Malla&#...

 

Stories by Gustavo Henrique Ruffo