EV general discussion

we are currently looking to replace our 2nd car after someone wrote it off

I want to get a plug in hybrid (the wife does not want us to have 2 pure electrics and it's mostly her car so it's out of my hands).

it's a real shame there is only really one small plug in hybrid with a decent range... the i3.

we discussed the likes of a plug in ionic or capture but with only a 30 mile range on electric it would need plugging in every night

normally not a problem but our house battery combined with intelligent octopus actually makes that a pita.

either we only plug it in after 11:30pm every night which would be a pain or i risk having my house battery flattened every time I plug the car in.
I may have to get an electricirian to see if they can change my charge point so it is unable to use the battery. I think this can be done with a CT clamp but not sure.

I can't believe if the boss does not like the i3 we may be looking at a Toyota "self charging" hybrid.....

I truly hate their crappy marketing but love the look of the C-hr

(if only it had a 60mile plug in range)
I'm probably missing something obvious but as its such a small battery couldn't you charge it off a standard 3-pin smart socket and just setup a schedule to switch the socket on in the window you want the car to charge?
 
I mean I could technically but not interested in running a granny cable through the window every day. it's inconvenient esp in winter. and we have a proper charge point.
Fair enough. As you were talking about getting an electrician involved anyway I was thinking along the lines of an external smart socket but I guess it's another box (all be it quite compact) stuck on the side of your house or garage.
 
I mean I could technically but not interested in running a granny cable through the window every day. it's inconvenient esp in winter. and we have a proper charge point.
I have a smart BG socket in an outdoor enclosure. Never had an issue.
 
What home battery have you got?

You could automate it via home assistant so the battery doesn't discharge while the car is charging. You should be able to export for >7.5p these days so I think most folks on IO with batteries just charge them overnight to 100% come summer or winter and just export any excess solar they generate.
 
I mean I could technically but not interested in running a granny cable through the window every day. it's inconvenient esp in winter. and we have a proper charge point.
doesnt your wall charger have scheduling capabilities? We used our hypervolt to schedule charge for our id.3 for nearly two years to fit in with Octopus GO..

I was thinking of getting a second charger installed myself as was contemplating keeping the ID.3 when the Model y pitches up just as I currently don’t have a car so would be convenient.. but will need scheduling capability to have the second car on intelligent octopus as I think they only allow one per account due to technical reasons.
 
I have considered home assistant but I don't have the smarts to set it up. as for scheduling ... you can't .intelligent octopus works on giving octopus control so they can charge your car when grid is cleanest. I could override for a 2nd car and is what I will do if we get an i3.... but doing it every day to charge a 30mile electric range would be a pain esp if we had to dig out the granny cable.
For the house battery if I could fathom HA I would do that but failing that if I can install a CT clamp so the battery will never discharge to the car that would be ideal I am just not sure if it would work
 
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The battery should have a CT clamp already? You might not even need if if you are using IO.

You don’t need to be an expert to set something like home assistant up, you should be able to do everything you need within the GUI, no fancy programming required.

IO can be set up in home assistant, your battery may be able to be and your charger may be able to be.

You’d just need a fairly basic ‘if this than that’ type of automation between IO and your battery.

Essentially ‘if IO is active, charge battery (or don’t discharge battery)’.
 
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I'd say anything from as little as 220 miles (3 miles/kwh) on the worst of the worst winter days miles up to 290 miles (3.9 miles/kwh) on a nice summers day when driven up to posted speed limits. It really depends on your actual speed and how cold/windy it actually is. Last January, temperatures varied between 15C on a very mild day in London and -15C at the top of a mountain in Cumbria.

You'll be fine either way with cheap overnight home charging, where it gets tricky us if you end up using public chargers. Tesla can is typically 35-45p depending on the time of day, AC chargers vary from 35p right up to 60p and rapids are usually least 65p and some are 80p+. It's the non-tesla units that will hurt and you will not need to go much charging on a public charger on a trip to get above 10p/mile.

Thanks. Looks like Tesla is the best EV option if you need to charge on the Road. I can stomach 45p/unit charging rates, question can I stomach a Tesla! Looks like the ID7 has been released this week. Will have to keep an eye on the pricing for that.
 
I can't believe if the boss does not like the i3 we may be looking at a Toyota "self charging" hybrid.....

I truly hate their crappy marketing but love the look of the C-hr

(if only it had a 60mile plug in range)

The Honda and Toyota Hybrids do a good 50-80mpg, not terrible at all really if plugging in is a problem, charging a smalll EV off the special rate ~30p/unit would essentially cost you more or less the same to run as one of these self chargers, can you not upgrade your charging equipment to something that splits 50/50 in the charging window.

I'm probably missing something obvious but as its such a small battery couldn't you charge it off a standard 3-pin smart socket and just setup a schedule to switch the socket on in the window you want the car to charge?

Yup you could do that with a fixed outdoor socket but anything with a reasonable battery needs a good 8-9 hours to fully charge as typically those cables don't give much more than 2.3kw well that's certainly the case whith my Volvo which is ~5.5hrs on 16A zappi (onboard charger limit) and almost 9 on the 10A granny.

30 miles tends to work OK for us, quite a few days we'll do double that and just use petrol but 8500 miles since Jan, done 5 fill up, tank lasts months when not touring :D
 
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Its an xc60 PHEV that mostly runs as an EV rarely touches the fuel :D it uses lots of Kw instead though.

Current tank has been in since early Oct, might not go for fill till next year, maybe Feb before touring season starts, I am waiting for the warning symbol to show up to tell me I must use the petrol :D
 
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going to look at an i3 tomorrow...... will be a nice partner on the drive along side the ipace :)
I like the i3, its the first EV I drive and got me buying an EV for the Mrs… very quirky though, and those skinny tyres!

Inbetween cars, I also went to look at one to just tide me over, the idea of two EVs didn’t put me off, a good clean second hand cheap i3 isn’t crazy money and would be cheap to run just for me commuting.

FYI, there is a way to get the battery health using just the in car controls, you need the last 4 numbers of the VIN as a password, just Google it, a great way to see if the battery is in a good state.
 
going to look at an i3 tomorrow...... will be a nice partner on the drive along side the ipace :)

We went fully electric in April after my wife got rid of her Audi Q2. We looked at hybrids just to utilise the home charger as the petrol costs were nuts. But I finally convinced her they were a solution looking for a problem (sorry I can’t be nice about them).

In the end we leased a Volvo C40 single motor BEV. A very nice car and a decent EV that is a more relaxed drive around towns than our I-Pace.
 
I have considered home assistant but I don't have the smarts to set it up. as for scheduling ... you can't .intelligent octopus works on giving octopus control so they can charge your car when grid is cleanest. I could override for a 2nd car and is what I will do if we get an i3.... but doing it every day to charge a 30mile electric range would be a pain esp if we had to dig out the granny cable.
For the house battery if I could fathom HA I would do that but failing that if I can install a CT clamp so the battery will never discharge to the car that would be ideal I am just not sure if it would work
Intelligent octopus gives you 6 hours overnight at 7.5p.. If you use a charger or EV that can schedule the charge, you just schedule i]that EV to charge in your 6 Hour overnight slot.

When we visit friend with intelligent octopus, we just plug in to their charger and schedule it overnight, and it just works. The app knows we are away from home so doesn’t schedule a charge, it assumes you are public charging away from home, . and friends visiting us with EVs just works overnight as expected, octopus don’t even know about the visiting car so don’t do anything..

Surely if your batteries and an EV are charging during your off peak slot, then all will work as you want?
 
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We went fully electric in April after my wife got rid of her Audi Q2. We looked at hybrids just to utilise the home charger as the petrol costs were nuts. But I finally convinced her they were a solution looking for a problem (sorry I can’t be nice about them).

In the end we leased a Volvo C40 single motor BEV. A very nice car and a decent EV that is a more relaxed drive around towns than our I-Pace.
Aah I disagree. I want to keep miles off my big car but the pug just doesn't have the distance. I'm going to replace it with a PHEV I think, best of both worlds. I hate cold starting petrols and only using them for a tiny distance.
 
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