Electric cars

I had a test drive of a Kia EV3 yesterday at Kia - Premier Auto in Dukenfield.

As I have never driven an electric car before I decided to sit in the front passenger seat.
I didn’t want to take the risk of crashing the car.

I’m not ready to buy yet, which I told the sales person. He didn’t mind and still offered the test drive,

I was really impressed with the Kia EV3. Spacious, loads leg and head room, very well built, solid cabin materials, comfortable seats, plenty of boot space, tons of tech, a really smooth and quiet drive, plenty of power, etc. A used car comes with the remainder of the 7 years car warranty and 5 years battery warranty.

A used Kia EV3 is definitely on my list of cars to buy.
 
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Centurions said:
The Inster, sadly, seems to have issues with both heat pump and the ICCU regarding charging which is making me hesitate on that. That and the fact that they put 45 profile tyres on a city car which seems an odd choice :( The Renaults are so popular that discounts seem to be lacking.

I'm thinking of plonking for the electric 208 at the moment as an Arnold Clark pre-reg GT can be had for £20,000, although I like the look of the EV2, it'll depend on costs.
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Weird considering Hyundai/Kia are pretty much at the forefront for EVs, presume they've changed some things to now have issues.

The Stelantis stuff suffered with efficiency, although the newer ones seem to have improved and if you're only doing local trips it's less of an issue. It was their motorway range that put me off, as I liked the look of the 208 - Peugeot seems to be in a good place design wise over the last few years. Might be worth also looking at Vauxhall, Jeep and Fiat offerings as just different bodies on the same architecture, so you can decide based on looks and offers.
 
We may be in a position to buy a car in the near future. Have leased for the past 18 years but now toying with the idea of buying outright to save the £300 p/m we’re currently paying. Definitely fancy an electric vehicle next, but don’t like the idea of buying outright due to concerns over battery life etc. So my question for any of u finance whizz kids (or whizz foc’s) on here, if we were to spend about £30k, would it be better to put the £30k into some sort of high interest account where we could pay just the lease for an elec car through?? Then after 3-4 yrs of leasing we’d still have a fairly fat lump sum to fall back on??
 
Centurions said:
The Inster, sadly, seems to have issues with both heat pump and the ICCU regarding charging which is making me hesitate on that. That and the fact that they put 45 profile tyres on a city car which seems an odd choice :( The Renaults are so popular that discounts seem to be lacking.

I'm thinking of plonking for the electric 208 at the moment as an Arnold Clark pre-reg GT can be had for £20,000, although I like the look of the EV2, it'll depend on costs.
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Have you sat in a 208, the steering wheel is weird it covers the dash when I sat in one you couldn’t see half of the instruments, it’s a weird shape definitely put me off.
 
tweety said:
On the lookout for some mugs to throw them some cash. The laws of chemistry and physics are set in stone.
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The weird bit is they stated it's ready now. Not "we are near" etc.
Any investor would just want to see/test it first before committing any money.

If it was real, why just put in in a motorbike? It would be the holy grail in battery terms.
We are talking about him being one of the richest men on earth kind of thing.
Be interesting to see how this turns out!
 
Blue Maverick said:
Have you sat in a 208, the steering wheel is weird it covers the dash when I sat in one you couldn’t see half of the instruments, it’s a weird shape definitely put me off.
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I've got the petrol 208 manual gearbox bud, definitely different inside :) I have the seat as high as possible as a rule in any car so the dash isn't an issue for me.

I've actually enjoyed my little pug, the biggest bugbear (or is that a pugbear?) I've had (and I've gotten used to it now really) is foot space for the driver. I'm 6' 1" with size 11 feet and you have to place your feet carefully, although obviously the electric won't have that problem, especially since I'd have it on B mode permanently. Can anyone tell me why Citroen decided their little city car with crap battery range would be better off with a C mode (cruise, for little or maybe no regen) and didn't bother with a B mode? It makes no sense to me.
 
Big mals fedora said:
We may be in a position to buy a car in the near future. Have leased for the past 18 years but now toying with the idea of buying outright to save the £300 p/m we’re currently paying. Definitely fancy an electric vehicle next, but don’t like the idea of buying outright due to concerns over battery life etc. So my question for any of u finance whizz kids (or whizz foc’s) on here, if we were to spend about £30k, would it be better to put the £30k into some sort of high interest account where we could pay just the lease for an elec car through?? Then after 3-4 yrs of leasing we’d still have a fairly fat lump sum to fall back on??
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Google AI.

The amount of interest you can earn on £30,000 in a year in the UK depends entirely on the interest rate you secure, which varies widely by account type and provider
. With current top rates, you could earn approximately £1,155 to over £1,300 in interest annually.

Me.

You also have to factor in petrol and diesel savings if you buy an electric car compared to your current diesel or petrol car. Running costs if you are no longer leasing. Insurance costs, with electric cars being more expensive to insurance. Electric car depreciation costs. Etc. You need to crunch all the numbers to find out which is more affordable over the year and over the lifetime of the car you are either leasing or buying. .
 
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Big mals fedora said:
We may be in a position to buy a car in the near future. Have leased for the past 18 years but now toying with the idea of buying outright to save the £300 p/m we’re currently paying. Definitely fancy an electric vehicle next, but don’t like the idea of buying outright due to concerns over battery life etc. So my question for any of u finance whizz kids (or whizz foc’s) on here, if we were to spend about £30k, would it be better to put the £30k into some sort of high interest account where we could pay just the lease for an elec car through?? Then after 3-4 yrs of leasing we’d still have a fairly fat lump sum to fall back on??
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You can get up to about 4.5% although you may need to put a bit of effort in to get that on the full £30k and may struggle over the full leasing period if interest rates continue to fall slowly. That would give you the equivalent of about £100pm in interest, although if you were drawing from the £30k to pay the rest of the lease amount, the interest would slowly reduce.

That doesn't take into account inflation, so your lump sum would buy less at the end of the lease, but the lease itself would be fixed for the period, so feeling cheaper at the end assuming other income goes up.

If you were buying, new or used, you need to consider the likely devaluation, so that side is a calculation between that loss and the cost of the lease. I would, however, say your battery concerns aren't valid and the risks are no greater, probably less, than buying an ICE vehicle. Modern EVs are showing that the normal car parts are likely to make the car uneconomical long before the battery dies and there's starting to be a few garages appear that can repair batteries through cell replacement - won't be cheap, but neither is a cam belt replacement etc.
 
Mal.

Not pushing Kia honest, as I’m also looking at the Volvo EX30, and ultimately my preferred choice, a Hyundai Ionic 5. I can get the 1st version from £16,000 upwards now. A couple of years ago when they first came out the base model was over £30,000. TBH I want a 2nd versions with the rear windscreen wiper and numerous improvements on the 1st version. Going back to the Kia. If you re buying new, Kia are offering a 7 year warranty, a 5 year battery warranty, but you have to service the car at Kia. Kia also offer a -15% charging offer across UK charges. TBH there are loads of electric cars across all the car manufacturers, so choosing one won’t be easy, unless you want a specific make and model. I’ve found the numerous Youtube electric car review videos a great help. Go to car dealers. They will fall over themselves to offer you a test drive as the driver or as a front seat passenger. You can also sit in the cars in the showrooms to get a genuine feel for the cars.
 
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Centurions said:
The Inster, sadly, seems to have issues with both heat pump and the ICCU regarding charging which is making me hesitate on that. That and the fact that they put 45 profile tyres on a city car which seems an odd choice :( The Renaults are so popular that discounts seem to be lacking.

I'm thinking of plonking for the electric 208 at the moment as an Arnold Clark pre-reg GT can be had for £20,000, although I like the look of the EV2, it'll depend on costs.
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I’ve had an Ionic 5 for 13months , done @ 14500 miles. It’s cost me £260 for the whole time we’ve had it, yes you read correctly- it’s £20 a month with Octopus, so I’m well and truly converted. It’s quick, quiet, more room than a limo and more spec than any Merc, BM or Audi I’ve ever had it cost pennies to run.
 
Quick question, does it matter which home charger you have, either in regards to the car itself or to the electric company (now or in the future)? I'm with EDF and they'll fit a Pod home charger for free as long as you take their EV tariff (I've not checked out the finer details of that bit yet).
 
Just had a look at and sat in the new Hyundai Ionic 5.(with the back window windscreen wiper)

Fantastic!

Even though I've looked at the Volvo EX30 and the Kia EV3, the Ionic 5 is the car I've wanted. More so the upgraded 2nd edition.
 
Centurions said:
Quick question, does it matter which home charger you have, either in regards to the car itself or to the electric company (now or in the future)? I'm with EDF and they'll fit a Pod home charger for free as long as you take their EV tariff (I've not checked out the finer details of that bit yet).
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Octopus has requirements if you want their intelligent tariff, which is cheaper than the Go tariff (up Vs 9p). They need to be able to either communicate with the car or the charger so they can decide when it charges. If you go on their site it should allow you to put in the car and it'll tell you if it's compatible, if not you need a compatible charger. We had to go with an Ohme Pro as they couldn't communicate with the car
 
Blue Since 76 said:
Octopus has requirements if you want their intelligent tariff, which is cheaper than the Go tariff (up Vs 9p). They need to be able to either communicate with the car or the charger so they can decide when it charges. If you go on their site it should allow you to put in the car and it'll tell you if it's compatible, if not you need a compatible charger. We had to go with an Ohme Pro as they couldn't communicate with the car
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Cheers. I've been looking at the Inster again and I've seen posts that suggest that the ICCU issue is because it's not communicating with some chargers. They can use the charger itself to set the charge time and it works, but using the Inster App it can fail.
 
Centurions said:
Cheers. I've been looking at the Inster again and I've seen posts that suggest that the ICCU issue is because it's not communicating with some chargers. They can use the charger itself to set the charge time and it works, but using the Inster App it can fail.
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We've got an older Hyundai which we got at the same time as the charger, as our first EV. When we first got it, the charger couldn't communicate with the car, so although we've set the car and battery details, we'd have to set it to add say 20%, rather than charge to 60%.

Out of the blue, it started communicating several months back and showed the battery percentage in the charger app. Then a month or so ago, it'd logged out and refuses to log back in, so we're back to adding a percent. It's not the end of the world, just a bit annoying. Seems to relate to the Hyundai account API and charger, but no idea where the problem is as both say in beta.

The mad thing is Hyundai say Ohme are their preferred supplier
 
Blue Maverick said:
Have you sat in a 208, the steering wheel is weird it covers the dash when I sat in one you couldn’t see half of the instruments, it’s a weird shape definitely put me off.
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I never get this with people and the small steering wheel problem in a peugeot, im 6 2" and the wife is about 5 6" and we dont have a problem, it doesnt cover the dash at all. Also 4 people at work that dont have this problem.
Me and the wife don't even move the steering wheel. I think the general consensus is you change the seat height if needed not the steering wheel.
I actually prefer a smaller wheel. Never got in any vehicle and thought I would prefer a bigger wheel.
 
hilts said:
I never get this with people and the small steering wheel problem in a peugeot, im 6 2" and the wife is about 5 6" and we dont have a problem, it doesnt cover the dash at all. Also 4 people at work that dont have this problem.
Me and the wife don't even move the steering wheel. I think the general consensus is you change the seat height if needed not the steering wheel.
I actually prefer a smaller wheel. Never got in any vehicle and thought I would prefer a bigger wheel.
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It’s not the size it’s the design it’s like a yolk, it wasn’t round so the vision through the wheel wasn’t as good as a normal round one
 
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