The Electric Car Thread

Er I’d say £0.79 is more normal for the rapid chargers. Slight discounts available via electroverse or ovo cards. 

Oh good christ I was only checking same as mine.

(7kw)

Didn't even think of that. 

Oh yes, if you need regular public charging you can look forward to sub 20mpg figures

Wow I've been spoilt by running an EV on a home charger and not once in 7 years really taking notice of highway charging fees. (Mostly because it's our short run car.)

The private sector and marketing of all this stuff is total bullshit. 

This would have been an absolute cherry to get behind politically and subsidies. No brainer. But then Labour have no brains.

This is going to fail big time in terms of delivering for public purpose which is what I thought running an EV was all about (as well as being cheaper.)

I also see that expensive car supplement above 40,000 makes a dent too.

But could the CCP be so keen on market penetration with short term losses because they'll be able to capture and control all that data (and maybe the OSs...?) in the long term?

You've been watching too many films.

It's the difference between the state empowering it's currency and not.

Their loss of resources is our gain ultimately in terms of product.

I know that there may be cars coming soon that will reduce demand

Maybe not. If people are holding out for longer range cars, thst may increase uptake which could increase demand.

Also if the same longer range cars are also available cheaper with smaller batteries thst would also increase demand. Customer can have a choice, shell out for a long range car, realise they never need it but like electric motoring, then perhaps long range cars will end up not selling after all.

I strongly believe everyone will prefer electric motoring once they get their head around charging. People will buy them, their friends will ask about their journeys, and it'll become normalised through word of mouth.

In other news,  Swarco Evolt are shit. I went to Ruthin on Friday, stayed overnight and planned to use the slow chargers in town to fill up during my bike ride. Octopus app wouldn't work so I tried the Evolt app which also didnt work but charged me £35 every time I tried! I called the number and they told me to start the charge (via Octopus in my case) before plugging in the car and it worked, but that's the exact opposite of what it says on the unit!

However its the first time I'd properly used destination chargers for a full charge, that part worked well as I was there for 6hrs.

With the price of public charging there is no way I would of bought my EV if I was not able to home charge or was relying on public charging for anything more than topping up for my occasional long trips. Yes I can charge at home for 7c a unit but my rough maths meant it took my first year of home charging savings to offset the installation cost of the charger so it’s only now, 12 months later that I am quids in.

If you rely on public charging or you use it a lot, you can bring the cost down a fair bit by subscribing. Its still expensive,  but not as bad. Comparable to diesel perhaps.

Even at 50p per kWh most EVs will be returning around  40mpg equivalent. winter months will see that closer to 30. 

You say "even at 50p" but all the commercial chargers I've ever found south of the Scottish border have been 80p.

(which isn't many, admittedly, because we do almost all our our charging at home.)

I found that the ev charge price largely same or more when looking at the mpg / cost per mile. However I reason the fact the majority  of my charging is at home and only resent using a public charger slightly but still very annoying. LIDL do charge points priced at the lower end however the last few only had one point with 3 cables so pretty limited availability. Using their app makes it cheaper. Having recently bought a EV, Im still getting my head around %age charge left and feeling nervous seeing less that 30 miles available when heading home.

This has dramatically changed in the last few years. 

Like I said earlier I've only ever home charged so looking around currently - I just see a mess of a market doing what it does best and extract profit from people at the expense of everything else.

To make this work it needs government support - real robust investment and tax incentives (not disincentives such as the 40,000 levy.)  

Without this - this is now going to be a slow painful transition.

It was much more promising 4/5 year ago so we've regressed in my opinion even if the tech and proliferation has gotten better.

The only positive is that EVs are becoming cheaper options than ICE and that is happening on some leases currently.

Posted by: rone

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To make this work it needs government support - real robust investment and tax incentives (not disincentives such as the 40,000 levy.) 

While I’m not a fan of subsidies I agree that disincentives should be avoided when you are trying to change behavior. The hokey-cokey of the higher VED for ‘luxury’ cars is minor but unwelcome and gives the wrong signal to folks who might be considering an EV as an alternative to a similarly-sized non-‘luxury’ ICE car. 

the persistence of low taxation on fossil fuels with the stalling of the ‘fuel escalator’ is an ongoing anomaly. 

and the recent ‘blink’ in the long running game of chicken between government and motor manufacturers on the 2030 cutoff for new petrol and diesel cars, while anticipatable, is unwelcome. 

Things are better EV-wise than they were a few years ago, but again I agree with the idea that it’s not as exciting or enthusiastic from government as it could be. 

I'm not in favour of subsidies from general taxation but I'm very much in favour of bonus-malus. Tax on the sale of ICEs to pay subsidies on EVs

I'm not in favour of subsidies from general taxation but I'm very much in favour of bonus-malus. Tax on the sale of ICEs to pay subsidies on EVs

Well we're not going to agree there because taxes don't pay for government spending at central government level -on that issue. (I seem to remember I sent you a peer-reviewed paper a while back detailing this.} Allow me for slightly being off topic there but it is a crucial difference.

But - I can assure you one of the reasons I got an EV 7 years ago was because of the grant incentive for the charger. (Now gone I believe.)

Tax can be used as an incentive or disincentive as you are pointing out. (Same as fags). 

What I'd be saying is the market alone is not good enough to make this happen at the level it needs to, without government investment it will just get too expensive for wide adoption. Markets alone are not good enough working for public purpose on which energy prices are based.

All that will happen is the well off will benefit like everything else in an economy not designed around public purpose.

Subsidies/grants should exist where we have a necessity to correct damage done by leaving things to the market, and it's the public interest.

Otherwise the oil companies will just gobble everything up.

The whole EU structure was built around subsidy! A system also exits in central government without membership to pull similar leavers. 

We just choose not to use it.

Posted by: prettygreenparrot

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the stalling of the ‘fuel escalator’ is an ongoing anomaly. 

It's not even an escalator -  the duty has been frozen since 2011-12, so has reduced in real terms, reduced further by the 'temporary 5p cut in 2022 which is still there. It's an open goal for a government that needs to raise taxes. Raising it by inflation wouldn't have lost significant votes so oil industry pressure is the logical reason.

I know so little about all of this compared to some on here, but now I'm starting to look at it ahead of delivery it does seem there's no government local charging strategy, and it's clearly not coming any time soon. 

I can live with 80p/kwh at motorway services, much like I can live with a 20% premium on fuel there - I plan not to use it and when I do, I use it as little as possible. When I'm home, then I'll charge at a cost that makes sense; I'll install solar if we think we're definitely not moving; and I'm going to look at installing a charger at work.

Those who can't charge at home or work need a fair solution to get supply at a fair price.  It's so typical of everything we seem to do in this country that those who can't afford to charge at a public station are going to have no option but to.  Government strategy appears to be pushing the burden to local authorities to come up with solutions, but there's no mention of price caps, only the ability to compare prices and I guess the hope that competition will keep the price down.   As such a critical part of infrastructure, would this not have been much, much better to make at least a significant part of it state owned?

I realise this has probably been covered several times in the massive thread, and I imagine everybody who looks at this over the next few years will keep asking the same question.  We don't seen to have a clue, do we?

I'd agree that leaving it all to the market is probably not going to produce a fair and equitable solution for all. That's what governments are for after all. But I do think the current high prices are driven by companies looking to fund expansion in order to get into a dominant position and once coverage reaches saturation point they will have to start competing on price. 

Also, correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't there more government involvement in Scotland (through Chargeplace Scotland). Has that led to better infrastructure up here?

Plenty ChargePlace Scotland chargers but prices vary quite considerably - 36p to just over 80p, most of the faster chargers are over 50p, but it not only varies by location but also by council...

Vauxhall Grandland GS 73Kwh is very cheap on lease currently.

Nice car.  Maybe 30 years since I've had a Vauxhall. 

Difficult to find the true range.  My partners Citroen E-C4 is terrible in the winter. Going from about 180 to 110.

Grandland has a heat pump. 

The indicated range in winter plummets if you do slow short trips i.e. town driving, because even a heat pump draws a lot of power to get the heating and cabin up to temperature, but you're not using much power for driving and not covering many miles.  So the power used as a portion of total consumption can be like 50%.  However on a long trip it should be only around 5% in the UK - and that's where range matters.  So when people quote drastic range drops in winter it's important to know on what sort of drive. I've had two heat pump equipped cars and the range drop on a long trip in winter was about 10-20%

Government strategy appears to be pushing the burden to local authorities to come up with solutions, but there's no mention of price caps

The most likely local govt solution seems to be removing planning restrictions on cables crossing pavements or installing gutters, so you can run the cable from your house. This is a great solution but only if you can park outside your house.

Councils don't want to roll out infrastructure because they don't have enough money to run the services they have.

Our work has just introduced the Octopus Energy Salary Sacrifice scheme. Given that all of the tax, insurance, servicing, breakdown cover etc. is included, it is quite a tempting scheme

I am doing this exact same thing. Comparing sums. We have a 2015 astra diesel with 123k on the clock. I think it'll need a clutch and DMF soon. its the unknown of what else can go wrong and when to consider another car. Also taking into accout depreciation. Octupus offering 6p/kwh at night + insurance, servicing etc + charger install. we do 12k a year

Trouble is i'd want a tow bar fitted to use my bike rack and if we can tweak things in terms of insurance - my wife is a garden designer. I'm going ot enquire if we could get business insurance for her

I'd agree that leaving it all to the market is probably not going to produce a fair and equitable solution for all. That's what governments are for after all. But I do think the current high prices are driven by companies looking to fund expansion in order to get into a dominant position and once coverage reaches saturation point they will have to start competing on price. 

I guess it could end up like diesel prices at motorway services.  You pay a huge premium for convenience, except that because the cheaper option is to charge at home that premium ends up being payable at any garage.

The most likely local govt solution seems to be removing planning restrictions on cables crossing pavements or installing gutters, so you can run the cable from your house. This is a great solution but only if you can park outside your house.

Part of me really thinks we should just get on with the process of ripping off the band-aid that it on-street parking.

If the house doesn't have parking, then it was probably built within walking distance of local employers. If it's not walking distance of your employer then you're just displacing someone else who could walk to work 🤷

Someone will inevitably argue that this disadvantages poor people who can't afford a house with off-street parking.  No it doesn't. On street parking disadvantages poor people who can't afford a car by removing a significant amount of the price premium that should be attached to having parking so they're forced into paying for an asset they don't even use or own.

Trouble is i'd want a tow bar fitted to use my bike rack

I have a salary sacrifice lease car through work and i specced it with a towbar, it's usually in the standard options assuming it's something the manufacturer offers.

If the house doesn't have parking, then it was probably built within walking distance of local employers. If it's not walking distance of your employer then you're just displacing someone else who could walk to work

Ok, I think large scale relocation of people, restructuring of cities and transport modes is probably a lot harder than installing on-street chargers.  Also off-topic 🙂

The indicated range in winter plummets if you do slow short trips i.e. town driving, because even a heat pump draws a lot of power to get the heating and cabin up to temperature, but you're not using much power for driving and not covering many miles.  So the power used as a portion of total consumption can be like 50%.  However on a long trip it should be only around 5% in the UK - and that's where range matters.  So when people quote drastic range drops in winter it's important to know on what sort of drive. I've had two heat pump equipped cars and the range drop on a long trip in winter was about 10-20%

Useful info. Trouble is for us that's what we use an EV - lots of small trips.

Ok, I think large scale relocation of people, restructuring of cities and transport modes is probably a lot harder than installing on-street chargers.

But therein lies the key benefit of not installing those chargers (or allowing trailing cables).  It allows those streets to empty out of cars and be gentrified / pedestrianized / LTN'd gradually over time.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Eza9e7iWUAAAI2Z?format=jpg&name=small

It's already happening in a more top-down way in Reading, there are lots of new developments with little or no parking at all including no on-road parking nearby. 

Posted by: rone

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Trouble is for us that's what we use an EV - lots of small trips.

So (assuming home charging) unless you're doing something like 15 10 mile trips a day range doesn't really matter.

Trouble is for us that's what we use an EV - lots of small trips.

It's not trouble though (with home charging) - you are unlikely to be doing 150 miles of short slow trips in a day.  The only problem is that the estimated range on the dashboard might say 150 based on your previous usage, but it will work out much more when you take that long trip.  And you would need to know what to expect if you were to do that.

Trouble is for us that's what we use an EV - lots of small trips.

But most of my trips across a week for the last 7 years (even charging at home) in the winter are not showing good efficiency.

I'm a bit unsure what you're saying about the range. Isn't the range based on current driving?

It's based on the recent history of the car - I'm not exactly sure how it's calculated or over what time or mileage, but my Hyundai seems pretty consistent whereas my Nissan wasn't.

I'm saying that the range indicated on the dashboard isn't necessarily relevant to a long trip you might be doing - just as it would be in an ICE car.  So if you do these slow short trips in cold weather your efficiency for those trips might be 3 miles per kWh. Then, with a 50kWh battery, it'll say your range is 150 miles.  But if you go on a long trip you might actually be getting 4.5 m/kWh, which would give you a range of 225 miles. But when you set off, your dash will still be saying your range is 150 miles.

Your car is actually more efficient in driving terms at low speed, but your heating and electronics are using the same as if you were driving fast. So there are fewer miles against which to offset their energy usage. So you are using less energy per hour, but not less energy per mile.   Your heating uses maybe 3kW for the first 5 mins on a cold day, but if you live on a busy road you might only have driven 100 yards in that time and used 500Wh of battery.  Those numbers would give you an efficiency of 0.2 m/kWh during that 5 minute period.

Useful. Comprehensive, thanks.

Need to assimilate that - always thought range was battery capacity/ current power draw.

I have noticed on the Citroen the range drops massively for about 80 miles then slows down.

Huh, weird.  Manufacturers do seem to vary hugely, I have no idea what they do. I've heard that Tesla always starts (or used to) with the WTLP range and then changed according to that particular drive, which seems inadvisable - but maybe not due to the above scenario.  My car seems to take a pretty long view since it never changes except with the seasons. I also suspect it takes the ambient temps into account since you can finish a trip in the afternoon with a certain charge level, then if you don't charge it might be down a few miles by the following morning if it got cold overnight.

Okay many thanks for this.

It's given me food for thought.

The Zoé adapts quite quickly, do a few motorway miles and it's soon adapted and giving a realisitic range.

As for cold starts, I've got into the habit of putting the car in the well- insulated garage, and putting a ski jacket on. I just use the heater if the screen starts misting on long runs. The heater is crap when it's really cold anyhow.

If you have heated seats and steering wheel, that’s much more efficient to use than space heating. Slightly different feel as far as comfort goes. 

The heater is crap when it's really cold anyhow.

Is this the difference between having a heat pump and not?

I'm convinced our first gen Kia Soul didn't have one - took forever to warm up. E-C4  has one, rapid heating system.

I've really not followed the tech of Evs despite leasing them for years.

Got to say I'm still pleased with EDFs electric cheap off-peak rates because of the amount of hours they provide. Even if it's not the cheapest. (22:00 - 08:00 week day and all weekend.) 14p. Means i can do all the washing and enjoy the weekend etc guilt free.

Possibly a niche question for this thread & might have been covered in the preceding 00’s of pages, but looking at a tusker salary sacrifice Skoda enyak (or sealion 7 if I can get past the daft name) and wondered if anyone here had opted to purchase the ev after the 3 year lease and  could offer some insight into what tusker refer to as “fair market price”.

ive spoken to them and its a value derived from autotrader and something else (caps maybe ?)

im not even sure its worth thinking about, but i am curious, as ill probably be stopping work in a few years after this term, so would rather not be without a car then.

still struggling with the man maths on leasing and not buying secondhand outright. But that’s really off topic.

The problem with any heat pump is the COP when it's really cold. Getting in the car at -20 in a ski resort a heat pump is barely more efficient than a resistance. Thecaptain has a good point, in those conditions a heated screen/seats/steering wheel are better than a heater. The Zoé shares its heat pump for cabin and battery. When it's really hot the A/C is useless and when it's really cold th eheater is useless.

@walowiz not sure if this helps but...

CAP is a well known industry set of value tables (like the old Parkers books that used to come out monthly and Glass's, which was more trade oriented).  CAP has various condition values that range from basically the auction house to pristine retail.  I'd guess it'll be a number between auction and dealer screen price they want.  

I'd expect they'll value against CAP/Autotrader at the point where you express interest/they are able to offer it to you.  You won't get a value now as the market may still have some volatility as things settle down further amd changes in volumes over the intervening 3-4 years.  

@walowiz

PCP might give you more certainty on the final value but more expensive overall.  

Kia explains well

https://www.kia.com/uk/about/news/pcp-vs-lease/

Posted by: rone

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Is this the difference between having a heat pump and not?

Can only speak for the Musk ****panzer but the heat pump has never struggled in my 4 years of ownership with one. Toasty air from the vents within seconds of getting in the car. There is a degree of resistive heating from the various computers and motors that share the coolant loop, though, and you can sometimes feel the motors shivering to generate additional heat.

I was always conservative with the heat, but one morning when it was -4 and I had the Leaf I decided to treat it as a normal person would and whack it on 22.  It warmed up in about 15 seconds.  Not sure if it was the resistive heater or heat pump doing that, but it worked nicely.  That's the same trip I realised the slow short trip thing because the efficiency went through the floor.

Regardling leasing:  Someone buys a car, and plans to sell it after 3 years.  They then let you drive it, and pay them for the privilege. Your payments cover the depreciation, risk, and their admin costs.  The differences between you borrowing the money to do it yourself is that you don't have to pay their admin cost; and they might get a better deal on the new car to begin with because they are buying in volume. They might also self-finance or get better interest rates.  But the mechanics are the same.

The only benefit to you is that you aren't exposed to huge depreciation shocks and you don't have to stump up for a large loan or put loads of capital in. Getting an unsecured loan of more than £25k isn't particularly easy or comfortable (you're on the hook for the money regardless) and that doesn't go far when it comes to cars.

But the massive benefit to buying is that you can buy used. New car deprecation is huge, and if you buy used someone else has paid that. If you buy at 3 or more years old the depreciation is likely to have slowed to the point where it broadly keeps up with your loan payments so you if you need to you can sell the car and cancel most of the loan (or make some money back towards the end of the term).

So I think leasing is not a bad idea if you want a new car every 3/5 years, but regardless of how you finance it this is a very expensive habit.

Posted by: garage-dweller

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@walowiz not sure if this helps but...

CAP is a well known industry set of value tables (like the old Parkers books that used to come out monthly and Glass's, which was more trade oriented).  CAP has various condition values that range from basically the auction house to pristine retail.  I'd guess it'll be a number between auction and dealer screen price they want.  

I'd expect they'll value against CAP/Autotrader at the point where you express interest/they are able to offer it to you.  You won't get a value now as the market may still have some volatility as things settle down further amd changes in volumes over the intervening 3-4 years.  

yep, not expecting a value now, just wondered if anyone has done this and has an example of whether it was a good deal or not at the end of the 3 years lease on salary sacrifice.
I'm not expecting a good deal tbh as it’s their car and their business is leasing.

Arval's offer to me at the end of the lease was not too bad.  But how good or bad it is depends on the market situation in 3 years' time.

I'm not exactly sure how it's calculated or over what time or mileage, but my Hyundai seems pretty consistent whereas my Nissan wasn't.

They are fairly complicated models in the cars i've worked on. Averaging over the last 1000-2000 km of driving with different weightings depending on how long ago it was, and how much of that type of driving you were doing etc etc.

Using instantaneous, or even near instantaneous consumption would see your range fluctuating from infinity when you coast or regenerate to sub 50km when you start up and leave the house. (My last full ICE had a consumption of about 6-8mpg getting from the front door to the main road.)

Your heating uses maybe 3kW for the first 5 mins on a cold day

More like 5-7kW in anything bigger than a small hatch.

FWIW when i hit motorway speeds, rolling at 100kph uses between 25-30kW. Maybe 80 to accelerate to that speed. The slow steady roll to the kids school (mostly 50 or 70 limits) is using about 13-15kW to maintain speed. Heater is still using the same 5-7kW.

(I've had several fully instrumented EVs to play around with. Sorry, to do detailed analysis and test of...)

VW (via BCA) offered me my lease cars to buy at the end of the term. The prices were what you'd expect for that car on a VW dealer's forecourt - so maybe worth buying if you wanted that exact car but no bargains to be had.

More like 5-7kW in anything bigger than a small hatch.

Maybe in Sweden.  Do you have uprated gear? I've never seen the consumption go over 3kW in either of the two cars I've had but they are downmarket cars and I've only got the energy breakdown on the dash to look at.

FWIW when i hit motorway speeds, rolling at 100kph uses between 25-30kW. Maybe 80 to accelerate to that speed

That seems huge, to me.  Even with a 90kWh usable battery that's only 3hrs of driving which would be 300km.  When I look, mine's about 12kW at motorway speeds which ties in with my range numbers.  Are you in an E-XC90 or something?

Maybe in Sweden.  Do you have uprated gear?

Nope, standard ish fitment for most C-D-E class cars across maybe a dozen manufacturers that i'm aware of. Not many companies fit different sized/powered systems for different markets these days. Sometimes they may have deleted the auxiliary PTC elements in warm markets. I know Ford and GM used to do that BITD. I'm not even sure if anyone still fits them now that 400V systems are available.

That seems huge, to me.  Even with a 90kWh usable battery that's only 3hrs of driving which would be 300km.  When I look, mine's about 12kW at motorway speeds which ties in with my range numbers.  Are you in an E-XC90 or something?

Nope, that's from test data. I'd have to double check to find out which car.

And FWIW most of the test cycles used to work out your rated range average out at about 45-50kph. So massively less than rated range at about twice the speed used in the test cycle wouldn't be hugely surprising.