The Electric Car Thread

This passage from the article you linked gives the reasons the paste stuff will never take off

That’s not what it says at all. “Huge logistical steps” doesn’t mean “difficult logistical steps” it means that there’s no infrastructure for making and handling vast quantities of this stuff. Which makes sense, because it’s only just been invented. Don’t you think the logistical steps required to get petrol into your car are just as huge?

Trouble with hydrogen is by the time you’ve electrolysed water to make the hydrogen, compressed it, transported it to the filling station then used the fuel cell in the FCEV to convert it back into electricity you’ve got he same efficiency as a decent diesel but maybe a bit cleaner depending on what’s powering your grid

Well, you can power your grid very cleanly if you want. An easy way to store and transport hydrogen allows places like Iceland or Morocco (or even the existing Gulf States) to become the next ‘Gulf States’ and get hugely rich exporting their energy, only in this case it’s free sunlight. Or we could use our own local wind and solar, because it doesn’t matter if it goes off overnight or you get good and bad days – you’re accumulating grey goop.

Much more efficient to generate the electricity push it down a cable with minimal losses straight into an EV battery.

Is it? How efficient is battery charging and discharging? And as above, solar and wind aren’t online all the time, so you’ve got less power available to charge your car at night – however if you have a stockpile of grey goop you can fill it up at any time.

It depends on your employer and the exact nature of the scheme. Generally speaking it’s some sort of salary sacrifice lease scheme where you can save quite of lot of tax depending on your tax bracket on the monthly cost, and for EVs the BIK is currently 0% so you’re not going to get a tax hit from that angle either (BIK gradually steps up to 1% for 2021/22 and 2% after that I think) because most (all?) are classed as company cars (even if you’re not entitled to a co car and you pay the monthly payments – that’s the case for me anyway).

Then, depending on the scheme you may not have to pay a deposit and the insurance, maintenance, etc. is often bundled into 1 monthly price. Add in some cheap/free fuel and it can be very attractive.

Ok, I’m a 20% tax payer, does that mean I effectively get to lease one for 20% off as it comes from gross pay? (Plus a currently zero, and then negligible BIK tax on top).

This doesn’t seem to cover how people (even 40%ers) are getting top e-trons for under £300 a month, unless they are being creative with their story telling.

Other thing to consider is that I do 6-7k business miles per year. And get to claim the statutory minimum 45p/mile expenses for that.
My understanding is that as a company car my work can choose how much if anything to give as a mileage allowance on top. (Girlfriend used to have a CC, the amount they paid was 12p which was nominally the fuel cost but in practise cost her money – my point being with an EV my tight fisted company would likely give a few pence per mile for the tyre wear.)

Is it? How efficient is battery charging and discharging? And as above, solar and wind aren’t online all the time, so you’ve got less power available to charge your car at night – however if you have a stockpile of grey goop you can fill it up at any time.

Battery charging and discharging are supposed to be a lot more efficient with li-ion than previous technologies, but I’ve got conflicting info. I read somewhere it should be high 90s % but my car data logging thing generally reckons c.90% on 16kW AC (it varies with charging speed – faster is better) of energy used goes into battery kWh charge, however I can’t verify what exactly this is measuring. It’s a Tesla so it spends power fannying about with its computers and whatnot. It’s probably watching Netflix or spying on the neighbours or something.

UK grid losses average about 8% I believe.

Night time gives us no less wind output, so only a small reduction in renewables output in the UK, but a large reduction in demand. Net result a reduction in grid carbon intensity compared with daytime.

Hopefully some good news for EV drivers. Gridserve are buying 25% of the Electric Highway from Ecotricity and all the Ecotricity chargers will be replaced with new chargers with Gridserve technology (so hopefully contactless payment) by the summer.

This doesn’t seem to cover how people (even 40%ers) are getting top e-trons for under £300 a month, unless they are being creative with their story telling.

NHS Fleet get huge discounts from some manufacturers such as VAG, then with salary sacrifice and 0% BIK you can get one for under £300 based on a other tax payer doing 6k a year.

The Gridserve/Ecotricity news is very welcome, reliable contactless payment units in motorway services ASAP and lots more high powered rapids down the line. Gridserve’s battery tech should also mean more charging in places without huge grid connections, they can buffer for the peak times and recharge off-peak.

Dale was never going to spend the money replacing the old stuff (all funded with generous grants back in the day) so this is about the least worst scenario. Someone else puts in decent chargers and looks after them, he still gets to claim some of the credit.

NHS Fleet get huge discounts from some manufacturers such as VAG, then with salary sacrifice and 0% BIK you can get one for under £300 based on a other tax payer doing 6k a year.

I think thats what I suspected was going on.
Is this some canny negotiation by the NHS fleet managers, or VAG punting some loss leaders out into the world to get their (EV) reputation up?

Is this some canny negotiation by the NHS fleet managers, or VAG punting some loss leaders out into the world to get their (EV) reputation up?

Probably a bit of both. My contract is with the NHS but it’s an Audi lease car, if that makes sense. If you’ve got the biggest employer wanting to lease cars off you makes sense to do a good deal. Also there is a bit of value loss over the years, some cars which are cheap to buy are surprisingly expensive on the less in part I suspect due to their value you at the end.

Also there is a bit of value loss over the years, some cars which are cheap to buy are surprisingly expensive on the less in part I suspect due to their value you at the end.

yes, lease cost is not proportional to purchase price (looking at private for both), I assume based on intended residual values at lease end.

Based on this, the shorter range EVs (mini, mazda etc) are anticipated to lose value more than the longer range ID3, cheaper teslas etc.

https://www.theguardian.com/money/2021/mar/14/first-there-was-netflix-now-you-can-subscribe-to-an-electric-car?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

the e-tron is available to the public for £430+vat a month (5k miles limit) – assuming the ‘£300 a month’ is cost to take home (so add an extra 40%) and you’re up to £500 a month (leaving £70 for tyres/insurance that’s normally rolled into a company car). it is cheap but the RRP is mostly fictional (£10k discounts available)

it is cheap but the RRP is mostly fictional (£10k discounts available)

Thats as bad as the pre-covid bike industry.
Something that is potentially a real game changer – the first proper range EV from the 3 german luxury brands – and its got a 15-20% discount almost at launch.

assuming the ‘£300 a month’ is cost to take home (so add an extra 40%) and you’re up to £500 a month (leaving £70 for tyres/insurance that’s normally rolled into a company car)

I’m not following you here, I’ve just come off nights so may be missing something.

Discounts is common on all new cars, even secondhand you never pay the price on the screen. £10k seems very ambitious though. .

Most salary sacrifice EV schemes seem to be bundled with insurance and servicing

Yup mine is everything I just need to charge it up everything else is covered.

Yeah you really have to look at total cost when weighing it up.

In our case the actual cost of leasing our Nissan Leaf worked out stupid cheap because of a number of factors:

– the lease supplier for our NHS Trust had them on a great deal
– we have pretty low mileage requirements so the deal got even better
– it’s paid through salary sacrifice from a 40% tax bracket
– there is no Benefit-In-Kind tax
– no vehicle tax
– no MOT
– all servicing, insurance and breakdown costs are included so you need to think what that would cost you.

Plus we charge it for free (local free-to-use council charger) – so consider that against the cost of petrol/diesel.

Completely agree that there are benefits of going for a company car – I was more just pointing out that if anyone was reading the thread thinking ‘I wish that was available to me’.. it might be. The £430/month (pre-tax) lease is publicly available, which would leave a reasonable budget to cover other costs.

My point around the overall price of the car (discounts of £8,300 to £12,300 are available without haggling on https://broadspeed.com/new_cars/Audi/e-tron/Choose_Number_Of_Doors/Choose_Bodystyle/petrol/Choose_Engine_Size/automatic ) – is that most of the german premium manufacturers are now artificially loading up the RRP to make lease deals look ‘better value’ – and its worth taking that into consideration when comparing (say) a tesla (who’s pricing is all over the place, but where the list price is what you pay)

Plus we charge it for free (local free-to-use council charger) – so consider that against the cost of petrol/diesel.

Thanks the 0% BIK and free electricity my E-Tron is costing me about £40 less per month than my Golf GTE which was ‘cheap’ to run too.

most of the german premium manufacturers are now artificially loading up the RRP to make lease deals look ‘better value’

they’re not loading it up, they are just charging a value that is somewhere nearly profitable for them. None of the majors make any money on EV’s at the moment, most were still making losses last year. All i’d say is look at your £10K MTB and try and figure out how 3 of those is anywhere near equal to what you get from a £30K car!

they’re not loading it up, they are just charging a value that is somewhere nearly profitable for them

They are loading them up if you can get 20% discounts without haggling. Its not just their electric cars either, you can get £30k (35%) off a 7 series..

https://www.hotukdeals.com/deals/volkswagen-abt-etransporter-lwb-83kw-373kwh-advance-auto-24-months-personal-leasing-24-months-10000-miles-ps6828-3688136

Could you get more stw than an electric transporter? £200/month seems good value..

@5lab 80 miles range….

I was wondering about that. Wouldn’t even do a round trip to the FoD for me. Effing useless.

Agreed its not much use as a bike van. Pretty good for most trades thou

Leases about to go up in price as £3k grant being removed for cars over £35k and cut to £2500 for those under.

I’ll start taking an interest in vans when they put 100kWh or bigger batteries in them. The Opel/PSA is the best to date with 75kWh but the Renault and VW offerings with less than 40 are indeed “effing useless”.

Re electric vans, surely they are aimed at local users and deliveries, not MTBers driving to trail centres? I’ve seen a few of these vans about so they clearly have a use.

If you’re a plumber carrying kit about Cardiff to a couple of jobs and then back, 80 miles would be fine I’m sure.

Lots of Amazon branded electric Mercedes Sprinters around here. They have a published range of 96 miles, so they’re clearly able to make it work. It charges to 80% in half an hour apparently so you could top it up in a lunch break if the drivers ever got one.

Re electric vans, surely they are aimed at local users and deliveries, not MTBers driving to trail centres? I’ve seen a few of these vans about so they clearly have a use.

in particular, places like the london ULEZ where these will get in and out for free, plus your daily milage is likely to be measured in single digits.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-56441639https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-56441639

The Department for Transport will reduce the grant from £3,000 to £2,500 and restrict it to cars under £35,000

Thats pushed a load of the desirable cars out. I take it that is based on RRP, not the actual price, based on the discounts being discussed upthread

I suspect the manufacturers have inflated their selling prices by the amount of the subsidy and are currently just trousering it. Prepare for some £3000 price cuts.

I know this is going to attract a lot of derision but I wonder what the upcoming ban on ICE cars is going to do to the concept of caravanning? I can imagine people with horses etc will get exemptions but I doubt they’d do them for caravans. And possibly not boats and the like either.

I wonder whether it will be a problem that will have gone away by then. Ten years ago the very first Nissan Leaf had just come out; now there are quite a lot of different EVs with specifications far in advance of that. The Tesla model X can tow a caravan already. I have no idea what the EV market might look like in 2030 but I think I’d be surprised if battery technology and, more importantly, cost hadn’t improved to make towing entirely practical.

Lots of PHEVs today can tow, and they’ve got till 2035. Plus all the towing capable ICE cars sold till 2030 will stay on the road for decades after.

Beyond that there are certainly capable BEVs but efficiency is terrible with a caravan and few rapid chargers today are set up for a towing outfit.

I suspect some commercial exemption will exist and people really keen to tow their box around behind them will have to pay through the nose to run one. Or just get someone else to move it for them.

The Tesla model X can tow a caravan already.

Yeah but it’s the only one, and it remains to be seen how well it’ll do. It’s already two and a half tons and costs over seventy grand because of all the batteries in it. If the range is halved when towing, then that’s probably still usable, but there’s no way on earth I’m going to be able to find that kind of money.

Batteries would have to be a hell of a lot cheaper before they can make an affordable EV that can tow, I think.

A model X is a long way over budget for the vast majority, but they’ve still got nine years. The speed of EV adoption is still growing exponentially so I wouldn’t bet against the technology and the price being there by 2030.

Yeah but it’s the only one, and it remains to be seen how well it’ll do.

Not quite but I’ve no idea how they perform as I’ve no interest

https://elbil.no/the-very-first-test-of-three-electric-cars-with-caravans/

Hmmm…  Just been pushed this on my Google feed:

https://news.mgmotor.eu/press/mg-unveils-new-mg5-electric-worlds-first-all-electric-station-wagon/

So it looks like the EU version of the mg5 is getting a different nose and, more importantly, towbar and roof bar ratings!

75kg on the roof, 50kg on the towbar with max trailer weight of 500kg.

Hope they update the UK spec to that rating, it could be the new STW Estate du jour!

Perhaps the extra batteries needed could live in the caravan so you don’t need to lug the extra weight around the other 99% of the time.

I doubt you’ll be towing a caravan with a 500kg limit. Trailer or small trailer tent is all I imagine you’ll manage.  I was more pointing out the potential for bike rack on, you know, a bike forum?  Given most EVs can’t have towbars and limit roof bar options. And that the current UK version doesn’t have these features (roof bars are stated as cosmetic only)

Ha!  Hadn’t realised this thread had moved onto towing when I posted above about the EU version of the MG5!  How randomly well timed.

On the subject of

first proper range EV from the 3 german luxury brands

BMW i4 – supposed direct competition for the Model 3 and so perhaps a lot less expensive than the Audi for a 360 mile range car, even if it’ll be far from “cheap”. And nice to see a non SUV. It doesn’t look like a hatch though, annoyingly.