Electric cars

[ChicagoBlue]

I've had my e-vivaro about a month now and it's great for us. Hasn't got a massive range, 140mls, but for our everyday life it's great. We charge it 2-3 times a week. We contacted our electric company and they put us on a plan that gives us cheap electric between 2am and 6am so that's when we charge it, it's on a timer to charge at those times. In those 4 hours it puts 100mls on the charge and according to our smart meter it costs £2.
The big issue is obviously long trips, we're going to Devon end of march and we reckon that will encompass 3 stops for charging (we normally stop once when we go) at least, maybe 4.
The other issue with motorway driving we have noticed that when we cruise between 50-60mph the battery if fine but if you drive faster, ie 70+ it really drains the battery. So the Devon journey I reckon will take at least 2 hours longer than normal.
Next summer will be a test also with all the day trips we like to do with the kids, majority will require a charge at some point of the day. As of right now there aren't enough charge points but hopefully more and more are to be added

Never forget you can always rent a car for that 1-2 times a year it might be a pain in the arse. With a diesel cruiser, you’d still get excellent mileage and relatively low cost, and save the miles on your own car.

We are going EV (Model Y) and Plug-in Hybrid (RAV4 Prime) just for the flexibility. Recently bought my daughter the RAV4 Hybrid (no plug in location with apartments!) and the vehicle is outstanding, so the Prime seems like a no-brainer.

Wife currently has an ‘13 Ampera with 125,000 miles and rarely uses the gas on a daily basis. In fact, the engine often only comes on in very cold weather just to “condition” the car and warm things up that are large drainers.

Hopefully, infrastructure can keep pace?!

 

[1961_vintage]

No mate, not a rant. I am thinking about an ev so info like this is well worth knowing about.

A valuable lesson every EV driver learns quickly is that when planning your journey and charging, you have to have an A, a B and a C plan.

The network - particularly motorway service stations - is not reliable and becoming more and more saturated.

Use Zap Map and ABR for journey planning and from my experience, the InstaVolt network is excellent.

 

[Blue Mist]

If you cant choke kids to earn a living worlds gone mad:-(

I am all for being green, recycling the lot but if you are a sole trader, 2 years of lockdown and you have to fork out for a new van because you live in and work in Greater Manchester you are in the shit.

 

[Blue Mist]

When I come back from Australia (I may have mentioned I am going already, not sure) I will re read all 80+ pages as it is a minefield.

 

[hilts]

I am all for being green, recycling the lot but if you are a sole trader, 2 years of lockdown and you have to fork out for a new van because you live in and work in Greater Manchester you are in the shit.

True but this is what happens when the world drags it feet. We have stood back while shit happens so we all deserve to get a bit of stink on us.

 

[bluethrunthru]

I am all for being green, recycling the lot but if you are a sole trader, 2 years of lockdown and you have to fork out for a new van because you live in and work in Greater Manchester you are in the shit.

a lot of it is ill conceived bureaucratic and clunky. I have seen articles where people in Greater London are on the edge of the ULEZ so if the go left rather than right off their driveway they incur an instant charge so get get where they are going they go on a 5 mile detour. How does that keep pollution down?

I saw one about a school teacher who now has to park in a side street 1/4 mile away from the junior school she works at rather than the car park at the school because the expensive new diesel car she was encouraged to but 4 years ago is now barred from the street where she works.

In my opinion with what we have we need to look at car pooling car sharing and car clubs as maybe a short term fix. Share ownership and travel to work in an EV - maybe use a petrol or diesel car from a car club for your holidays.

Beyond that we need a more holistic answer taking into account vehicle type and movement - fuelling - parking or we strangle our economy and ourselves on the altar of arbitrary targets.

 

[Blue Mist]

a lot of it is ill conceived bureaucratic and clunky. I have seen articles where people in Greater London are on the edge of the ULEZ so if the go left rather than right off their driveway they incur an instant charge so get get where they are going they go on a 5 mile detour. How does that keep pollution down?

I saw one about a school teacher who now has to park in a side street 1/4 mile away from the junior school she works at rather than the car park at the school because the expensive new diesel car she was encouraged to but 4 years ago is now barred from the street where she works.

In my opinion with what we have we need to look at car pooling car sharing and car clubs as maybe a short term fix. Share ownership and travel to work in an EV - maybe use a petrol or diesel car from a car club for your holidays.

Beyond that we need a more holistic answer taking into account vehicle type and movement - fuelling - parking or we strangle our economy and ourselves on the altar of arbitrary targets.

Fully agree with all that.
Electric cars are the way forward unless you live on a terraced street.
Diesel was pushed by govt. but now its bad.
When we all go electric how does the govt. Make up the tax shortfall ? (billions of pounds in petrol/diesel tax)

 

[shemnel]

Fully agree with all that.
Electric cars are the way forward unless you live on a terraced street.
Diesel was pushed by govt. but now its bad.
When we all go electric how does the govt. Make up the tax shortfall ? (billions of pounds in petrol/diesel tax)

I may have missed something (highly likely) but this appears not to have been publicly strategised by the govt? you'll see the fall away of a vast majority of £40bn in the next 25 years if targets are met, while many new vehicles will continue to attract zero VED up to 2025 at least i reckon. While vehicle tax is a minor part of traffic based taxes (fuel being by far the largest), i can see the reintroduction of a flat vehicle ownership tax at some point in the future.

As a further prediction, might the old concept of road tax - that Winston Churchill doomed in the 1920/30s (and that weirdly many people think still exists) - make a comeback? with a much more technologically interconnected society, road usage is now very easy to monitor and a pay as you use service is feasible (i.e. tax the mileage done). I personally dont agree with it but i can see it being put forward in coming years.

 

[Blue Mist]

I may have missed something (highly likely) but this appears not to have been publicly strategised by the govt? you'll see the fall away of a vast majority of £40bn in the next 25 years if targets are met, while many new vehicles will continue to attract zero VED up to 2025 at least i reckon. While vehicle tax is a minor part of traffic based taxes (fuel being by far the largest), i can see the reintroduction of a flat vehicle ownership tax at some point in the future.

As a further prediction, might the old concept of road tax - that Winston Churchill doomed in the 1920/30s (and that weirdly many people think still exists) - make a comeback? with a much more technologically interconnected society, road usage is now very easy to monitor and a pay as you use service is feasible (i.e. tax the mileage done). I personally dont agree with it but i can see it being put forward in coming years.

As with most govts. they don't plan further ahead than the 5 years they are in office.
The change to ev's will get pretty dramatic in terms of them making up the shortfall from petrol tax.
I can only think they will have a national charge using smart cameras on A roads and motorways.

 

[Bluemanc100]

Never forget you can always rent a car for that 1-2 times a year it might be a pain in the arse. With a diesel cruiser, you’d still get excellent mileage and relatively low cost, and save the miles on your own car.

We are going EV (Model Y) and Plug-in Hybrid (RAV4 Prime) just for the flexibility. Recently bought my daughter the RAV4 Hybrid (no plug in location with apartments!) and the vehicle is outstanding, so the Prime seems like a no-brainer.

Wife currently has an ‘13 Ampera with 125,000 miles and rarely uses the gas on a daily basis. In fact, the engine often only comes on in very cold weather just to “condition” the car and warm things up that are large drainers.

Hopefully, infrastructure can keep pace?!

I worked as a Tesla account manager (For Bosch) and we handled all the service centre installations for EMEA so I've been close to Tesla since 2013 (until I retired at the start of lockdown). I'm still devastated that I didn't buy some shares when I started working with them as some of the Tesla staff I worked with did very well indeed!!

Tesla always saw the Model Y as the game changer but there is possibly another version coming that is a budget offering and if they go through with that for around the £25k mark they'll clean up as long as their charging network can cope...

I drove a BMW i3s for 18 months and loved it though you have to plan journeys because of the range... I'd buy a Model 3/Y tomorrow to replace the Diesel ePace we have but SWMBO can't get her head around the fact that having £50k tied up in a car isn't dead money... You only lose what it depreciates... Does my nut in when the money is there and doing nothing in terms of generating interest