My wife’s car is reaching it’s end of life and going electric makes a certain degree of sense.

I know the range is not great but ignoring that it gets good reviews.

Her commute is only 15 miles, twice a week. The other trips are all short and we have a second car for the longer child taxiing journeys.

We’d be looking at a 2020ish 20k car with about 10-20k miles .

What are peoples thoughts please?

My dad has one and really likes it. One of his criteria was to be able to get his wheelbarrow in the boot – don’t ask – so an MTB or two shouldn’t be a problem.

It always was a a bit of a stop-gap to the ID3 but it’s a Golf so you can’t go far wrong.

Thx.

Not sure I like the ID3, I definitely prefer the idea of a traditional looking car. That puts the 208 in to the mix as well. Range aside though, which I do not believe is an issue for us, I do like the idea of the golf

Thought this was a post about playing golf in Yorkshire…

We have a 2020 one. It is a company lease car delivered just before lockdown. We love it. Range in the summer is about 170 and goes down to 120-130 over the winter. Most of the time it is used for the wife’s commute and school run although we do use it for some longer journeys as well. Isn’t quite big enough for a family car for holidays but use it to travel from Derby to Kent visiting family. Need to stop for one charge on the way for about 30 mins which by the time everyone has gone to the loo and brought a coffee it is charged up enough.

Inside it looks just like a normal golf with a few extra digital screens. Wife finds it super easy to drive, it’s comfortable and quiet. You notice how unsociable non electric cars are when you are sitting in traffic as it is so silent!

In hindsight we like it so much if we had known that my role would change to more home based we would have got something slightly bigger and got rid of my diesel but there are 18 months left before we change so can do that then having dipped our toes and enjoyed electric vehicles. It gets used for everything now apart from when we need two cars or for the family holidays (haven’t tried but suspect putting the bikes on top would kill the range!)

We have a home charger and plug it in overnight. We are on octopus go and I think an overnight charge is between £3-£4 which is very cheap compared to petrol.

Bit disconcerting to hit the ball at the screen initially but you soon get used to it. Plus you can have a few beers while playing.

Sat on the drive here I have a diesel golf and an electric Renault Zoe.

Yes, definitely buy an electric car.
They’re so easy and pleasant to drive, both mine and my wifes opinion.

With that out the way, is the e-golf the right car to go electric? Well, if you like golfs (I do) it can’t be wrong, and it doesn’t seem to be a bad electric car by all accounts. I haven’t driven one.
I love our Zoe, for how it drives and it’s practical space for a small car, and it only cost us half your budget (serveral years ago before the market picked up perhaps). But the e-golf is certainly not the best electric car. Especially if you’ve a £20k budget for a recent model. The e-golf really was a stop gap model before the ground-up electric design of the Id.3 arrived.

Having had an electric car for a few years myself, if I was spending your budget today I’d be looking for ways to spend it on one of the newest crop of models, perhaps an ID.3 (or is that out of reach?). Either way, given what you’ve said in your OP, I think you and your wife will be very happy with the e-Golf.

Comes on to thread expecting to see comments from people saying they work just as hard playing golf when they use an electric cart compared to carrying their own clubs.

Is disappointed.

We like our egolf.
Only downside is the mileage swing from summer to winter driving. Summer shows 160-180 miles and winter can go as low as 90 miles unless the car has a heat pump installed

Apart from that everything else is great. Nice to drive, has a bit of acceleration.

Boot is smaller than a regular golf. Lots of free charging about as well.

Go for it, sounds perfect for the amount of driving you do.

Summer shows 160-180 miles and winter can go as low as 90 miles

Our “old” 22 kWh Zoe does 90 miles on a good day. Even with this in mind it’s a great car that gets used daily for ferrying the kids or taking me to the shops. I used to use it to commute the ten miles to work and ten miles back… in the before times.

Comes on to thread expecting to see comments from people saying they work just as hard playing golf when they use an electric cart compared to carrying their own clubs.

Is disappointed.

Pretty much all I came to contribute. If cycling really is ‘the new golf’ then I guess e-golf will be the next big thing after ebikes.

Thanks all.

It certainly makes sense to look at other newer models. Interesting how the range changes with the seasons. Is that just down to the heater?

So much to learn if (‘when’ I think) we take the plunge.

All EVs see a reduction in range due to cold weather.

Any additional loss will be down to how the car heats the cabin, sone take energy from the battery and some use a heat pump which can heat or cool the car more efficiently. They are usually an optional extra at cost.

We have the 2021 e golf, similar experience to that detailed above. It’s ostensibly a golf GT with a few different screens. Usually build quality and ride. Like all EVs it is surprisingly fast up to 60 and can be rather fun.

Thought this was a post about playing golf in Yorkshire…

I was thinking electric golf carts.

Getting towards the end of our lease on one. It’s very “normal” – twist a key to start (unless specced with keyless), normal dials, normal gear selector. Rides well, comfy seats, decent boot, a bit boring. Adaptive cruise works as well as every other mk7 Golf. Unlike many EVs though it can take roofbars (75kg load). Rapid charging is the modern CCS standard but 40kW speed max. I’d drive it anywhere in the country (and have done some 300+ mile trips) but you do need to allow plenty of extra time. Infrastructure is getting better but also busier now.

Freezing/wet motorway (worst case) and it’ll be well under 100 miles. Now in summer it’s closer to the claimed 140.

The biggest thing against it IMO is that used prices are really strong for such a limited capability car. Base ID.3 can be had for £23.3k via a broker and that gets you 40% more usable battery, much quicker charging and niceties like heated seats and wheel. New Zoe, e208, Corsa etc also offer a lot more capability either new or lightly used. But if you want a Golf, are comfortable with the price and ability then it’s a decent car.

Interesting how the range changes with the seasons. Is that just down to the heater?

The heater is a minor detractor (takes a couple of kW to heat the cabin at most, takes 20-30 kW to drive at 60mph). The range loss is due to the battery being cold and less willing to give out energy.

As others have said the range on the car is affected by the cold. But put on the heater in winter and the range will drop again.

Range will also change on how you drive it. If you floor it then the range will drop.

But it can also recuperate miles on trips out. Wife uses the car to get to work from Chorley to Blackburn which is around 11 miles to get there. On the way back the car only uses around 4 miles.

Hope I haven’t put you off as it’s still a cracking drive. our lease ends in two years and will probably purchase it. Think final payment is 10k.

If you’re going on long trips then it needs a little planning, but if you use zapmap it will work out when you need to stop and charge.

As for charging, we have a charger at work and also a local Tesco has a few charge points so most of the time it’s costing nothing to charge.

I go into Manchester a lot and can park and charge for 4 hours free.

I always liked PGA on the PC and Links.

Always got in a round at lunchtime at work 🙂

IGMC

Base ID.3 can be had for £23.3k via a broker

sauce? broadspeed have them at £29k, there might be a grant on top of that but it’d still be £5k off your figure

Drivethedeal although others (carwow, autoebid, etc) aren’t far off.

There’s the £2500 gov grant (basic list price under £35k), VW £1750 finance deposit contribution then about £2k more from their participating dealers.

2019 egolf here, have now done about 24k in it. Really happy with it. We only ever charge it from home and most of our journeys are within it’s range including a regular 52 mile round trip to the South coast and occasionally 82 into central London. It can be programmed to charge overnight if you have access to cheap off-peak electricity (we have E7) and we use the app to pre-heat it in the winter.