EV general discussion

no sign of the polestar yet ?
blairw said:
Ordered a Polestar 2 via company car scheme - hoping to it's not going to be too delayed but expecting october timeframe for delivery.
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but I've yet to see a golf id3 on the road either

so on the battery front (btw - the CATLs are apparently 10-20% lower in capacity and price but also 10-20% less volume with their new packing technique)
this is where the innovations on the bev market will arrive, to either provide lower car weight, longer range, or price reduction, so, multiple vectors.
There is always the it will be better tomorrow argument, but are the battery technology leaps going to be dramatic, so private purchase in 2-3 years will hit the value for money.

reading more on enyaq
https://www.motor1.com/news/441903/2021-skoda-enyaq-iv-reveal/
does seem strange that vw has given earlier access to id4 platform to skoda, rather than passing glory to either audi or itself.
there's not enough information on cd values published (article says it's good, but doesn't give frontal area), but, if this SUV is better than many saloons,
maybe I need to re-think, since that's my main aversion to suv's - the lower aero efficiency.
also, half the price of a tesla Y, as is commented, .... we have a problem
 
jpaul said:
no sign of the polestar yet ?

but I've yet to see a golf id3 on the road either

so on the battery front (btw - the CATLs are apparently 10-20% lower in capacity and price but also 10-20% less volume with their new packing technique)
this is where the innovations on the bev market will arrive, to either provide lower car weight, longer range, or price reduction, so, multiple vectors.
There is always the it will be better tomorrow argument, but are the battery technology leaps going to be dramatic, so private purchase in 2-3 years will hit the value for money.

reading more on enyaq
https://www.motor1.com/news/441903/2021-skoda-enyaq-iv-reveal/
does seem strange that vw has given earlier access to id4 platform to skoda, rather than passing glory to either audi or itself.
there's not enough information on cd values published (article says it's good, but doesn't give frontal area), but, if this SUV is better than many saloons,
maybe I need to re-think, since that's my main aversion to suv's - the lower aero efficiency.
also, half the price of a tesla Y, as is commented, .... we have a problem
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Think it was Autocar who published photos of ID3s on trucks being driven from the port at Grimsby to dealers earlier this week. Not seen one being driven on the road yet either.

Edit:

https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/new-cars/new-volkswagen-id-3-first-examples-ev-hit-british-shores
 
Fusion said:
Think it was Autocar who published photos of ID3s on trucks being driven from the port at Grimsby to dealers earlier this week. Not seen one being driven on the road yet either.
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That would be as they aren't being delivered to customers until the second week of September at the earliest, and they are First Movers Club only, so there are only a handful available. Don't expect to see then en masse until well into 2021 once they've fixed the software and released the non 1st edition models.
 
chorse said:
Trend is rising well is above forecasted. Wouldn’t be surprised to see 3 or 4 percent next year.
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BEVs represent 4.9% of new car registrations YTD 2020, according to the SMMT.

Here's an interesting statistic; more BEVs have been registered in the first 8 months of this year than were registered in the six years from 2012-2017, total. If registrations continue on the same trajectory for the rest of the year, more BEVs will have been registered in 2020 than in 2012-2018, total.

YoY registrations have, at the very least, doubled every year since 2012. If that trend continues, BEV registrations are likely to overtake Diesel in either 2021 or 2022 (depending on the trajectory of Diesel sales; if they keep declining, BEV will overtake next year).
 
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Silly question alert:

Next week will be the first time I have ever charged an EV. I'm with Octopus Go, and have entered both my tariffs into the Kaluza app for my ChargedEV home charger.

Tariff1 - 00:30 - 04:30 @ 5p
Tarrif2 - 04:30 - 00:30 @ 13.5p

It wanted to know a time I needed my car to be ready, so I told it 06:50 Monday-Friday and 09:00 on the weekends. Looking at the car itself, everything is still on all the defaults, and it looks like the car has a preference to charge to 80% to prolong the battery. How Kaluza know this I'm not sure, but I guess the car will simply stop accepting the charge. If Kaluza doesn't know the current state of the battery, how on earth will it know when to start charging. Maybe when I first plug it in, it will ask me?

Right, so I understand all that.....but here's where I'm struggling to understand exactly how it all works.

The car has a 71kw battery, and my home charger is 7kw. Let's use simple maths for now, so it will take 10hrs to fully charge the battery from 0% to 100% (ignoring energy loss and all that for now, let's just keep things simple).

If my car is empty, and I plug it in, I assume Kaluza will attempt to fully charge the car using 6hrs @ 13.5p and 4hrs @ 5p. Thing is, I only want to use the cheap tariff and don't mind charging over two nights. Do you think I'm best off putting the car on charge when it gets to 40% (40% + 4hrs charging on cheap tariff brings me to the 80%)

also, will the car itself stop charging when it hits 80%, and what if I want to charge to 100% if I'm going on a long journey? (Maybe I need to change the setting in the car from 80% to 100%).

Sorry for all the questions, I just want to understand how it all works.

Thanks!!
 
TheOracle said:
Do you think I'm best off putting the car on charge when it gets to 40% (40% + 4hrs charging on cheap tariff brings me to the 80%)
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Can't you just tell the app only to charge during the cheap hours?

How many miles are you doing daily, and what does that do to the battery percentage?

I use Agile so my Ohme is told to only charge using a price I set in the app, which I change weekly if needed. Presently is is told to use any electricity after 22:00 as long as it is less than 6ppkWh. This way I set the car to 80% and plug it in whenever I am home and it chargers only when the criteria are met, this can be overridden with two presses in the app and charge to maximum regardless of the preset prices and times.
 
Journey said:
Can't you just tell the app only to charge during the cheap hours?

How many miles are you doing daily, and what does that do to the battery percentage?

I use Agile so my Ohme is told to only charge using a price I set in the app, which I change weekly if needed. Presently is is told to use any electricity after 22:00 as long as it is less than 6ppkWh. This way I set the car to 80% and plug it in whenever I am home and it chargers only when the criteria are met, this can be overridden with two presses in the app and charge to maximum regardless of the preset prices and times.
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I'm not sure, I'll have to test it next week to see what can and can't be done. The ready time is what's confusing me. It's asking me for a time for the car to be charged, which is utterly meaningless. What does 'charged' mean? 80%, 100%, current status of battery vs start time.

If it does indeed only charge during the cheap time, and I set a ready time of 5am, and the battery is down to 1%, what then.

I'll just have to see, but reading around on speakev, it seeems I'm not the only one. There is another user of Kaluza who says he's found it just charges as soon as you plug the cable in.

Last resort, I'll set the car to only charge during 00:30-04:30.

I guess people have a different definition on the word 'smart'. The app doesn't even have any API calls to third party apps, else I'd hook my audi account in so at least Kaluza knows the battery status. Bloody amatures :p
 
TheOracle said:
What does 'charged' mean? 80%, 100%, current status of battery vs start time.
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The charge limit you set in the car normally or can be in the app as well if they communicate, like mine does.

TheOracle said:
If it does indeed only charge during the cheap time, and I set a ready time of 5am, and the battery is down to 1%, what then.
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Then I suggest you just mess around with it using non-cheap charging one night to see the behaviour. I don't have the exact same charger, but unless I set the Ohme to only charge with the conditions met, it would start as soon as I plugged it in.

With the GO tariff you are guaranteed those 4 hours from 00:30 to 04:30, which at 7kW is 28kWh less heat loss or thereabouts, which is my car is 154 miles, not sure in the etron but unless you are doing a lot of miles even at 3mpkWh that will get you 84 miles, so you should never end up on 1% unless you've told the charger to do some weird stuff, and getting your car down to 1% is an achievement in itself! :)

TL;DR Set the charge rate to 80% in the car, plug in every night but set the charger to only use cheap rate, test on a weekend when it isn't important.
 
Journey said:
set the charger to only use cheap rate
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This is the thing, the app doesn't have that option. It just has a table where you input your tariff rates, and a time you want the car to be 'ready' whatever that means.

:edit: Ignore me, I missed one of the faqs which explains it. When you set two tariffs in the app, the charger will ONLY use the cheaper one.
 
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TheOracle said:
This is the thing, the app doesn't have that option. It just has a table where you input your tariff rates, and a time you want the car to be 'ready' whatever that means.
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Can you set the charge % in the app or only the car? If only the car the charger will stop charging at this point, meaning the charger would see the car as 'Ready' at this point an cease the charge.

Is there a support number for the charger to help you explain the specifics of the charger? I was lucky to be able to chose a charger that I wanted, hence going with the Ohme, it is just a shame that not all the chargers are smart enough, or easy enough to use, maybe some of that is the app support though rather than the hardware.
 
TheOracle said:
Silly question alert:

Next week will be the first time I have ever charged an EV. I'm with Octopus Go, and have entered both my tariffs into the Kaluza app for my ChargedEV home charger.

Tariff1 - 00:30 - 04:30 @ 5p
Tarrif2 - 04:30 - 00:30 @ 13.5p

It wanted to know a time I needed my car to be ready, so I told it 06:50 Monday-Friday and 09:00 on the weekends. Looking at the car itself, everything is still on all the defaults, and it looks like the car has a preference to charge to 80% to prolong the battery. How Kaluza know this I'm not sure, but I guess the car will simply stop accepting the charge. If Kaluza doesn't know the current state of the battery, how on earth will it know when to start charging. Maybe when I first plug it in, it will ask me?

Right, so I understand all that.....but here's where I'm struggling to understand exactly how it all works.

The car has a 71kw battery, and my home charger is 7kw. Let's use simple maths for now, so it will take 10hrs to fully charge the battery from 0% to 100% (ignoring energy loss and all that for now, let's just keep things simple).

If my car is empty, and I plug it in, I assume Kaluza will attempt to fully charge the car using 6hrs @ 13.5p and 4hrs @ 5p. Thing is, I only want to use the cheap tariff and don't mind charging over two nights. Do you think I'm best off putting the car on charge when it gets to 40% (40% + 4hrs charging on cheap tariff brings me to the 80%)

also, will the car itself stop charging when it hits 80%, and what if I want to charge to 100% if I'm going on a long journey? (Maybe I need to change the setting in the car from 80% to 100%).

Sorry for all the questions, I just want to understand how it all works.

Thanks!!
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honestly - my 2p's worth....

Just charge the car when you need to....Trying to say a £1/£2 here and there when charging is more hassle than it's worth. Will drive you nuts messing around with apps/car settings etc etc.

I've had my M3 for 12 months - I charge when I need to/ don't when I don't need to....Not charge my car for 8 days now - it's down at 35% - I'll just charge it Monday/Tuesday when I need to top it up, play golf on Friday and I'll put it on the free charger at the golf course. My home charging is less than 40% of my total charging over the last year. I've thought about changing tariffs etc - but really not worth it unless you literally want to count the pennies
 
I used to have access to a mix of cheap and free charging, which was suddenly taken away from me. Honestly, losing that access best thing to ever happen. Charging at home whenever I feel like it is well worth the extra cost, and part of the point of having an EV
 
McPhee said:
YoY registrations have, at the very least, doubled every year since 2012. If that trend continues, BEV registrations are likely to overtake Diesel in either 2021 or 2022 (depending on the trajectory of Diesel sales; if they keep declining, BEV will overtake next year).
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paradoxically the usa and china are doing less well - had read this last week ... so maybe some good deals for the EU .
https://www.mckinsey.com/industries...x-europe-cushions-a-global-plunge-in-ev-sales

The federal government’s recent moves to loosen regulations could further decelerate the EV market in the United States. In March 2020, for instance, the government revised fuel-economy standards, to a 2026 target of 40 miles per gallon (mpg), from 54 mpg. Today’s low oil prices are also contributing to the EV slowdown, since they significantly lower the total cost of ownership for vehicles powered by internal-combustion engines (as compared with EVs). These changes are creating great uncertainty, and the US EV market’s development could depend largely on the number of states adopting California’s Zero-Emission Vehicle Program and on the vicissitudes of oil prices.

etc
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yes - some of it is covid related.
 
I imagine the US will be a hard sell for EVs for a fair few reasons.

- Fuel is dirt cheap compared to here so that isn’t such an advantage.

- They love driving cars the size of a house there’s not really any proper sized SUV EVs out there bar the model x for mega bucks.

- You’re going to need the non Tesla public charging network nailed before people will buy them en mass. 300 miles range here would cover the majority of the country in 1 or 2 charges, 300 miles over there won’t even get you from one state to another in some areas!

- There will be far too many US politicians getting their palms greased by Oil companies to make much of an effort to incentivise the move to EVs.

Think HEV and PHEV will be the bigger sellers over there for a good while before BEV.
 
Psycho Ned said:
I imagine the US will be a hard sell for EVs for a fair few reasons.

- Fuel is dirt cheap compared to here so that isn’t such an advantage.

- They love driving cars the size of a house there’s not really any proper sized SUV EVs out there bar the model x for mega bucks.

- You’re going to need the non Tesla public charging network nailed before people will buy them en mass. 300 miles range here would cover the majority of the country in 1 or 2 charges, 300 miles over there won’t even get you from one state to another in some areas!

- There will be far too many US politicians getting their palms greased by Oil companies to make much of an effort to incentivise the move to EVs.

Think HEV and PHEV will be the bigger sellers over there for a good while before BEV.
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Presume you've never been the California?? Every 2nd car is a Tesla Model 3.....literally everywhere.....
 
Yes, and the USA is 50 states all with their own ways of doing things. California, Texas, Alabama, New England, Alaska and Hawaii are all about as different as you could possibly imagine and in between those are loads of other states with different legislation and ways of doing things. So while every other car in Northern California might well be a Tesla, you might never see one in Michigan.
 
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