EV general discussion

Shadowness said:
Christ.....having to buy car parts on cheap websites to fit parts that manufacturers should have fitted to begin with. What a wonderful state the car industry is in at the moment :rolleyes:
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haha yes indeed. waiting for my drivers display to arrive from china :cry:

b0rn2sk8 said:
You can but they are not the best and can be bricked by a software update on the Tesla side.
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true

b0rn2sk8 said:
It also doesn’t address the point that the steering wheels buttons are not the best in Europe and the lack of a stalk clearly impacted sales. It should never have been a thing.
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agree, it's silly...and an even worse design decision than having no buttons on the infotainment
 
b0rn2sk8 said:
It looks like Tesla have quietly added an indicator stalk to the model 3 in China and are now offering a $350 retrofit for existing cars without one.

Sense has prevailed at last.
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You have to pay for an indicator stalk ? I thought it was just BMW that had optional indicators…….lol
 
tamzzy said:
agree, it's silly...and an even worse design decision than having no buttons on the infotainment
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I don’t think the touched based infotainment is a material issue, on this particular car anyway.

What buttons do you think you need to play with when driving along.

For me the main issue is manual light controls and they require 2 actions to change. One dab of the stalk to flash up the light controls and then press the button on the screen which is next to where your left hand would be anyway.

Everything else is set and forget. Climate is automatic, heated seats are automatic, even de-most kicks on automatically.

You shouldn’t really be messing around with media or the nav when driving and there are audio controls on the steering wheel and voice commands which are decent.

The auto wipers are not the best but the irony is they have dedicated controls.
 
b0rn2sk8 said:
You shouldn’t really be messing around with media or the nav when driving and there are audio controls on the steering wheel and voice commands which are decent.
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Huh?! So I'm not allowed to skip tracks? Change source audio? Look up map details? See info about a traffic jam on route? Enter a waypoint? Change map zoom? etc etc etc

But that's easy to do with iDrive. Barely have to take my eye off the road to control anything (of course I do to see the result of that change), but I don't have to play operation to get my finger above the desired icon on screen.

Again, you can play with iPads on modern cars, but still can't use a phone handsfree (and I get it's a concentration thing too, but I'd argue you can concentrate more of trying to use one of those bloody thing than simply talking)
 
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There’s two crappy buttons on the wheel, it’s hardly flush with feature. Usual Purchase justification syndrome of a Tesla driver. A typical multifunction steering wheel is exactly that.

It’s good that people tolerate it, I’m afraid I just have higher standards…
 
b0rn2sk8 said:
It looks like Tesla have quietly added an indicator stalk to the model 3 in China and are now offering a $350 retrofit for existing cars without one.

Sense has prevailed at last.
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Is there any truth to the rumour that to indicate to the right is free but to the left isn't?

Put your hand up if you thought that was funny. No, not like that!
 
chanjy said:
I have an older SWB Life so not quite the same... but as close as anybody on here can get I think
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What are your thoughts on it out of interest? E.g. what's it like to drive on a daily basis, efficiency, what sort of range you get, anything which would put you off getting it if you had the choice again, etc.?

Thinking of picking one up (or a PV5) in ~18 months, as a daily "big family car" rather than under any illusions of it being a proper van. (The alternatives being one of the Stellantis offerings which - while cheap - are very much van-like and also have terrible range)
 
damn...that's nearly 5 miles/kwh :O

oWdcOlU.jpeg
 
Kenai said:
You're allowed to use (and touch) a phone that's in a mount, you're not allowed to hold it and use it.
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But you can eat a banana etc?! So I could be holding a banana, and talking hands free....how is that any different?! Anyway - silly car rule rant over.

I should add I do not condone any of the above! I'd ban all of it. It's just the silly contradictions that do not make sense.
 
Shadowness said:
So I could be holding a banana, and talking hands free....how is that any different?!
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Whilst the mobile related legislation is specific to try and minimise get outs and arguments, you could still get pinched under regular old 'without due care and attention' for doing this if your driving standards declined enough whilst doing so to draw attention to yourself.
 
Haggisman said:
What are your thoughts on it out of interest? E.g. what's it like to drive on a daily basis, efficiency, what sort of range you get, anything which would put you off getting it if you had the choice again, etc.?

Thinking of picking one up (or a PV5) in ~18 months, as a daily "big family car" rather than under any illusions of it being a proper van. (The alternatives being one of the Stellantis offerings which - while cheap - are very much van-like and also have terrible range)
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Love it really. It's not a luxury car but it's so practical and sliding rear doors make it really easy to park etc.

We also have a towbar and bike rack for it so it’s the perfect family car to go camping etc.

Range is bad - 200miles (2.6m/kWh annual average) would be normal with a bit more in summer but the long journeys we always take breaks anyway and it’s our 5th EV we have owned now so we are pretty comfortable with our charging routines

Would never buy one new though but if you see a cheap used one I’d snap it up!
 
chanjy said:
Love it really. It's not a luxury car but it's so practical and sliding rear doors make it really easy to park etc.

We also have a towbar and bike rack for it so it’s the perfect family car to go camping etc.

Range is bad - 200miles (2.6m/kWh annual average) would be normal with a bit more in summer but the long journeys we always take breaks anyway and it’s our 5th EV we have owned now so we are pretty comfortable with our charging routines

Would never buy one new though but if you see a cheap used one I’d snap it up!
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Thanks, so pretty much all positive then :)

200 miles is fine, that's about what I get in the Niro fully loaded with the roofbox on, and the kids need the loo/stretch their legs way before that point anyway :p
 
So, after two years of owning my Polestar 2 I’ve now passed 30,000 miles travelled and ticked over 48k total.

As a stats nerd, I used to keep details of my ICE fill ups and economy, and have the numbers back to my first car in 2001. Thus, I can tell you exactly how much I’ve spent on fuel over the years, and the number is frankly horrific. :D

The switch to EV (forced by writing off my 2017 E Class diesel estate) gave me a quandary as to how to record my usage, and in the end I went with taking readings every 1000 miles. I also assumed they were all done at the current 8.5p per kWh I get on Octopus - in reality, I’ve charged publicly occasionally and for a while I had free charging so I’m just going to let them cancel each other out:


https://flic.kr/p/2rotVs1


https://flic.kr/p/2rotbHm


The most interesting things are the £800 total it’s cost me to do the 30k miles, and the way the graph shows how the efficiency trends up and down over the course of the year as the temperature varies and I have the heater on or off.

I’ve easily saved over 4 grand in fuel costs, but due to the time I was forced to buy the car (after used prices started coming down, but before they stabilised) I’ve lost WAY more than that in value and thus would have been better staying with an older ICE Mercedes if it came down to it! Still, complete EV convert now!


https://flic.kr/p/2oUtEDa
 
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