@wOOdster

That’s the adaptive cruise

Some adaptive cruise doesn’t work at low speeds in queues – I think Mercedes call it Distronic Plus where it does work in queues and normal Distronic where it doesn’t.  And sometimes different ones behave differently resulting in varying degress of usefulness. It’s also not an EV-specific thing as ICEs have it too.

You’re probably all aware (and think I saw it mentioned in passing in this thread), but there’s only 3 days left to apply the ‘hack’ to VED to delay having to pay from 1st April 2025.

https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/utilities/electric-vehicles/#need-10

I just went in and ‘paid’ for another year of VED at a cost of £0 to take me through to 1st March 2025. I’ll then be able to ‘pay’ for another year while it’s still £0 to take me through to 1st March 2026.

Re the Pro pack on the i4 – it comes with adaptive suspension, so can switch between “firm” and “comfort” modes so should be able to make the car more comfortable than the standard car which is somewhere in the middle. (I’ve not driven one with the pro pack, but maybe someone who has could comment).

Wheel size would definitely make a difference though – mine is on 18s and the ride is generally pretty good – slightly on the firm side but still a good cruiser.

My van has it , but you have to press the accelerator to pull away when you come to complete stop. Car has it and it will pull away itself.

The iX3 I had before would even do the steering for you at low speeds. Makes sitting in traffic that tiny bit nicer 😎
Still had foot hovering over brake though

It’s also not an EV-specific thing as ICEs have it too.

My petrol Mazda will do it too (more or less) – if the car has been stationary for more than 5 sec then you need to press the ‘resume’ button on the steering wheel to make it pull away again.  But that’s not too onerous. I suspect this is restricted to automatic ICE cars only tho!

First commute this morning. 30 miles cruising on dual carriageway and motorway, then a couple of miles of slower town traffic…..it’s an incredibly pleasant experience. I did leave a tad earlier than normal and traffic was fairly light.
The only negative so far is the heater makes a whining noise when it’s on high power.

Was 6 degrees, 30 miles used 11% of my battery. I didn’t check the final miles pkw, but it was just above 3 over half way into the commute. I’m still a little heavy footed, not intentionally, just need to get used to very gentle acceleration. My Q4 is 300hp (or equivalent), I’ve found that even the slightest press on the accelerator pushes the battery use to a high %. Missus has it down to a tee, I’m still adapting after coming from a Cupra that felt like it wanted you to drive it fast.

Weirdly I charged yesterday at a motorway service station (M56 Gridserve), only added about 25%, maybe a bit more, probably just over half an hour. Cost me £1. I’ve been checking my bank and nothing is pending.
Oh last thing….setting up the Audi app is an absolute nightmare!! Going to the dealers today to get it sorted. You’d think Audi would have this sorted by now, but apparently there’s loads of people who get stuck in the same loop as me.

Cost me £1

That’s just the pre charge, the real amount will show up in a day or two

Weirdly I charged yesterday at a motorway service station (M56 Gridserve), only added about 25%, maybe a bit more, probably just over half an hour.

You know that different rapid chargers give different amounts of power right? Older Gridserve units only do 50kW but are cheaper. Most modern chargers are 150kW or so, some are 350kW. You may have been on a 50kW Gridserve.

the Pro pack on the i4 – it comes with adaptive suspension

My 320’s Pro pack has adaptive suspension. It can switch between ‘uncomfortable’ and ‘really uncomfortable’

Don’t get me wrong, it turns in like very few cars and can be hustled with confidence on the back roads. But on poorly maintained roads it’s jarring.

Not a fan.

The Skoda app seems to be simple enough to get sorted, but I now also have 3 other apps for charging – ZapMap for overall mapping, but also Chargeplace Scotland (which is just along the road from the house) and Chargepoint (which is what is used in the office – but doesn’t show on the actual app).

The charging thing for the first time is ‘interesting’ – I was hoping to get 1 hour of charge at the office but I couldn’t get the system to work – after 10 minutes I’d realised I was reading the company name as Chargeplace but it was Chargepoint – got that app downloaded and registered, but it wouldn’t recognise the charger…so I moved to a Chargeplace Scotland charger and that seemed to be much easier.

Picked the Enyaq 60 up on Tuesday morning and by last night it was down to 31% – with the car telling me it had done 112 miles – I couldn’t afford the larger battery 80 model, but I’m a bit surprised how quickly the battery drops as I don’t think I’ve done a huge amount of driving over those 2 days.

Anyway, first charging experience was a 7kW and after 25 minutes gave me a 2% increase in the battery. I then used the charger near me and ran that for about 90 minutes and got to about 78% (from 31%) – that cost me £9, the 25 minutes cost me £2 (as a minimum charge). I then stuck it in the rapid charger this morning and it charged to 100% and that cost me £11.

I’ll use the rapid charger next time as all the charging points from Chargeplace Scotland were 45p/kW, so the rapid one is likely to be ‘better’ as I’ll get more charge in the same time.

So apart from the rapid usage of the battery (I’m going from a diesel with 700 miles range to an EV that claims a range of 214 miles – I’m hoping that does improve as things get warmer – so for now, I’m liking the car but not impressed with the EV experience yet. I suspect it will improve as I get more used to it.

I’m missing the auto full beam on the car this replaced…and I had a shot in a car with adaptive cruise control and thought it was fantastic, but this model ‘only’ has cruise control and adaptive cruise control would be a fantastic addition – I seem to have all the controls for ACC but it tells me it isn’t enabled (and I’m not going to go looking to see if I can subscribe to having it!).

However, so many apps needed for the various charging stuff!!!

I’m a bit surprised how quickly the battery drops as I don’t think I’ve done a huge amount of driving over those 2 days.

What kind of driving? Short slow trips with the heating on high does ruin range; but having the heating on high on longer faster trips much less so.  Still, I generally have mine set to 17 or 18.

Your car may take some time to calibrate its battery estimates to your driving.

first charging experience was a 7kW and after 25 minutes gave me a 2% increase in the battery

That does seem slow. Assuming that 25 mins gave you 2.6kWh given charging efficiency of 90%, if that were 2% your car would have a 131kWh battery.

so many apps.  Like parking.   Worse in Englandshire.

I have CPS, Zapmap and also Octopus.   Plus BP pulse. Luckily we were able to get a larger battery than standard, sole household vehicle, came in handy yesterday as Elgin – Perth – Glasgow – Perth – Elgin.   Making use of the Broaden Hub (where even there at least 2 points were out of order or needed manual reset from CPS HQ – who are absolutely brilliant.    We had a nightmare first long journey when the claimed range wasn’t close – but that’s about the same as yours has.

so many apps. Like parking. Worse in Englandshire.

I honestly don’t think most people need most of them.

What would be deemed short trips…reckon the shortest is 7 miles…certainly not big distances but most were 10-12 miles. Suspect this is all due to a new method of powering the car, in a few weeks I reckon I’ll be fine and sorted, just the new experience and clearly not doing the research beforehand.

Heating is set to 17c…there are no obvious controls to control the speed of the blower (and I haven’t worked out how to direct the blower – there is a button to do maximum ‘something’ on the windscreen, but that seems to be it) – I can set the temperature, but can’t see what to do with speed – assume it is automatic. I appear to have dual climate stuff (or 2 sets of temperature controls on the dash) – ideally, I’d like to set it so the temperature isn’t dual – never used it in the past and reckon it’ll mess with my faux OCD!

New car and needing to learn it all…I’m very pleased to have it and there will no doubt be improvements over the next few weeks.

The range figure is, at best, a guess-o-meter.

The number you want to concentrate on is the efficiency which should be displayed somewhere as miles per kWhr

If it doesn’t start with at least a 3 then you need to wear either a warm coat or a lighter right shoe.

That seems to be sitting at 3.1…I’m trying not to be heavy footed as already aware that without the engine noise (and very little road noise), it is very easy to be going faster than expected, so I’m trying to be cautious so I don’t unintentionally speed.

This is all very new hence all my daft questions and comments, but thanks for the confirmations and answers as I suspect I won’t be quite so thick in a couple of weeks once it is all settled down and going.

3.1 is about what you would expect to see at this time of year if it’s cold and you are doing short-ish trips with the heating on.
Over a year my car averaged 3.4.  Low 3s in the winter, mid 3s in the spring and autumn   and high 3s in the summer.

I have heard it said that to get the equivalent of miles per gallon you multiply the m/kwh figure by 40 so the car is doing the equivalent of 124 mpg. Dunno if that’s just internet bullshit though.

DaffyFull Member
It’s £525 from my net pay.

that sounds a great deal,  I have an i4 40 though Tusker salary sacrifice, it has a few upgrades – towbar, leather, comfort pack and I pay just over £700 net a month, and am a high rate tax payer also.

It’s amazing how much the options add – it’s like they have no resale potential, so they’re all just lumped onto your costs.  £3000 of option (leather, towbar and comfort) is pretty much £100 a month and then there’s the £100(ish) to the 40, which is probably the difference.

I still cant bring myself to do it.  I’ve obsessively worked out the math and it sort of makes sense, but the Scot in me seems to have won.

that makes sense.  I went onto the Tusker scheme from a PCP Audi Q5, the monthly payments on that were under £400 but adding in servicing, insurance, fuel etc added up.  I reckon I am around £150 a month better off with the i4, incl cheap electricity, with almost all my charging at home on IO.

@DB — our trips around local county seem to yield 3.1-3.3 consumption, if the heating has been on. For longer journeys it does seem to rise to 3.4.3.5 at the moment, as I guess the heating evens out over the journey.

** if you have heated wheel and seats — ** use that as seems to be a much better use of energy. I didn’t even know how to turn on heated wheel for months (never having had that, did have a Saab with heated seats though).

I read on the LEAF FB chat group that the blower volume does have an effect, mine is kind of hidden as a +/- switch on dash.

So, question on rapid charging rates. I normally charge at home on an Easee charger and only occasionally use public ones. Car is a BMW i4 40, and we left home in Glasgow at lunchtime today at 90%

We arrived for a week at a holiday cottage near Bamburgh early afternoon and once we’d unpacked, gone and done a food shop etc, and racked up 180 miles, I popped 3 miles up the road to the open Tesla chargers, which I have used for top ups before, at Purdy Lodge. These are 250kw and when I plugged in, at 38% charge it was going in at about 140kw, quickly slowing down once it got past 50% and by the time the battery was at about 70% the charge rate was at about 60kw. I stopped at 80%, which had taken about 20 minutes and rate was at 50kw.

I realise it drops as the battery fills up, and there were 3 others cars on the bank of around 8 chargers, but I thought it would have been faster for longer ?

Took out a 2024 Tesla 3 dual motor and Tesla Y RWD today for a test drive. The 3 was ludicrous, …. the Y seemed a bit pedestrian in comparison but is a more ‘sensible’ option for a family of 4. My current car is from 2007, they’ve come on a bit…

Compared to the alternatives, I like the simplicity of the single screen and supercharger network – anyone moved from Tesla to another EV brand? Be interested in thoughts.,

I have driven a Tesla 3, albeit a more basic, I think a 2022 one. I ordered an i4 as it felt a much more refined place to be, albeit a little slower off the mark, in a straight line.

BMW have been making cars for a long long time in comparison to Tesla and IMO it is reflected in the driving ‘experience’ !

Older Gridserve units only do 50kW but are cheaper.

Since November all the DC chargers have been 79p/kWh. With charging losses that’s close to £1/kWh, or 33p/mile on non-Teslas.

AC charging is marginally cheaper.

However, when you can charge at 34p on the Supercharger network it’s not good value. Arguably Tesla owners are maybe paying the difference in the up-front cost of the car, but ultimately we have Tesla and then a pseudo-cartel of Ionity/Gridserve/Instavolt/Applegreen, none of whom are going to be particularly interested in reducing prices when there’s already a shortage of chargers.

Thanks, currently smoking about in an E92 330i, its a lovely car, but its a bit of squeeze for two adults and full sized teens + holiday paraphernalia and it spends most of its time scraping bits of MSport bodywork on London speed bumps..

I liked the Model 3’s ability to squirt an overtake in the blink of an eye and the ‘cooking’ Y is no slouch but having been through motorbikes and trackdays, road driving ‘experience’ is not the foremost priority for me.

I guess I’m more interested to know if the alleged simplicity and comprehensive availability of the supercharger network is worth turning a blind eye to the exploits of the company owner and the slight vehicle purchase premium over other options?

So, question on rapid charging rates

It’s all about the charging curve for your car

The i4 hits a peak early and the speed declines as the battery gets more charge

anyone moved from Tesla to another EV brand? Be interested in thoughts.

Somewhere earlier in the thread I posted my thoughts on coming out of a Model 3 after three years and choosing between the BMW i4 and Polestar 2, rather than another Model 3. I bought the Polestar in the end.

I think some of it is on this page…

https://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/the-electric-car-thread/page/133/

Thanks will take a look ^

The Hyundai/Kia e-GMP platform cars hold a high charge rate much longer than that.

The Model Y RWD seems pretty efficient. Over my first 200 miles I’m averaging 248 wh/mile or around 4mpkwh. That’s a mixture of town driving and motorway/dual carriageway. (about 50/50)

Something to consider @davy90.

Had a go on the supercharger network on Monday night. Dead simple.

Edit: as a caveat to that, I’ve been driving a PHEV for the last three years so am well practiced at ringing as many miles out of a kWh as possible. 😆

@davy90

https://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/the-electric-car-thread/page/78/#post-12722623
https://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/the-electric-car-thread/page/80/#post-12725467
https://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/the-electric-car-thread/page/80/#post-12725676
https://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/the-electric-car-thread/page/80/#post-12725838
https://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/the-electric-car-thread/page/90/#post-12850566

https://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/the-electric-car-thread/page/131/#post-13088094

https://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/the-electric-car-thread/page/133/#post-13104384

Don’t get me wrong though, Teslas are exceptionally good EVs, but the current ones without stalks and a reliance on vision for everything ADAS systems just aren’t for me. Don’t get too hung up on the Supercharger network either… Tesla are rapidly opening them up to all vehicles, and other offerings are now just as good and in some cases (such as MFG) more widespread.

Yeah I don’t really get why they’ve taken the stalks out of the model 3 update and soon to be Model Y. Seems crazy to me for the sake of saving a bit of cash. Glad I don’t have to put up with that nonsense.

I’m finding the auto lights to be ok. Tesla Vision seems ok for parking but I’ve yet to experience the horror show that is auto wipers.

I was actually after an EV6 but they took it off our company car list about a month before I was due to order, annoyingly.

First road trip with the EV this week. Over in Anglesey. Have to say it is a faff with having to use public charging.

The phone signal over here is rubbish. Managed to install an app called Pod Point, first charger had two points but only one working. Then tried using the chargers in Morrisons but wouldn’t take card payment. No signal to install the app this machine was saying to use. Off to Tesco, connected and used the Pod Point app. Connected to it fine, put the money on the app account and managed to get less than 1kw in just over an hour.

This is probably partly because this is new to me. But thought I’d use this trip as an opportunity to see how the car works for longer trips. (Getting about 3.5kwh as an average)

“The i4 hits a peak early and the speed declines as the battery gets more charge”

Yep – for a quick hit to “just get you home” you can charge at a shockingly (sorry) high rate if you time it so you’re starting in the bottom quarter of the batteries capacity – my shortest stop so far has been just over 3 mins plugged in.

For larger top ups the upper half and especially top quarter of the battery slows down a lot which is a little frustrating but I’ve found that in the real world I need to use fast chargers in this way maybe two or three times a year, vs the more common “splash and dash” approach so in reality is not a problem.

^^^ yes, very much my experience yesterday, it went from 38% to 55% in probably under 5 mins, then took another 20 mins to get to 80%. I think given the proximity of the fast Tesla chargers to where we are staying in holiday cottage (a 5 min drive) I’ll just do a few regular top-ups during the week, rather than sit there for half an hour as it slows down. I know that if it’s a bit over 50% Saturday morning it will get us home with probs 15% left ‘incase’.

@bensales thanks.

Re the no stalks thing, didn’t mind that on the new 3, its a non issue, the Y we’re looking at still has stalks.

On the driver assist stuff, I’m used to having nothing more than cruise and reversing sensors, so not something I’ve any real experience of.

Our use case is mostly pootling around London with the odd weekend foray into the SE which should be doable on a single charge, and then infrequent road trips on motorways with some to hols in fairly remote places, so I’m expecting to home charge for most use but don’t want to rely on phone signal in the sticks for charging apps.

This is what I absolutely want to avoid..

The phone signal over here is rubbish. Managed to install an app called Pod Point, first charger had two points but only one working. Then tried using the chargers in Morrisons but wouldn’t take card payment. No signal to install the app this machine was saying to use.

We’re also not on a company car scheme so looking at Personal Contract Hire which is also a factor.

@iainc

Sometimes , when on holiday with the wife and kids, i like to escape the madness and pootle on down to charge the car, take a coffee just relish the peace and quiet for an hour ( with a bonus full battery afterwards 😁)

“First road trip with the EV this week. Over in Anglesey. Have to say it is a faff with having to use public charging.”

Yep, that looks like a pretty challenging location. Holyhead Clock Tower gridserve is your best bet I’d say.