EV general discussion

Car play isn’t the be all and end all at the moment because it can’t trigger things like battery preheating.

The new car play should but hardly anything supports it and I doubt anyone will bring it to cars sold previously.

Edit: it’s also a great benefit when your car’s underlying infotainment is sub par but when the infotainment in your car is fit for purpose, it’s less of a benefit.
 
Last edited:
b0rn2sk8 said:
Car play isn’t the be all and end all at the moment because it can’t trigger things like battery preheating.

The new car play should but hardly anything supports it and I doubt anyone will bring it to cars sold previously.

Edit: it’s also a great benefit when your car’s underlying infotainment is sub par but when the infotainment in your car is fit for purpose, it’s less of a benefit.
Click to expand...
It’s free though and most people never need battery conditioning. For routes etc I prefer a decent CarPlay screen than the Tesla nav anyway.

Can you heat the battery without the nav ?
 
Last edited:
b0rn2sk8 said:
That’s only for ‘premium connectivity’ which is focused around media streaming.

The data connection to the car for navigation, charging etc is included for 10 years.

It’s not clear what will happen after those 10 years yet as all the early cars include it for lifetime. There is still another 5 years to go yet before anyone will hit this trigger.

You can also connect your car to your phones hotspot and do most (but not all) of the stuff included in premium connectivity.
Click to expand...

Ah OK that makes more sense!

I've just done it for convenience, really. I also like having the ability to see the cameras whenever I fancy it but it's certainly not a necessity.
 
Last edited:
Yeah i'm not so sure car play/android auto is a decent replacement for built in stuff, while the mapping is going to be better the lack of integration of route planning as it doesn't know your battery state so can't plan your whole route.

The cars with native google maps baked right in are so much nicer to use as its all integrated
 
I quite like the built in on mine, augmented reality on HUD is nice with roundabouts, lane changes, exits etc projected in front of you, makes it much more advanced than a screen thats out of peripheral view. ROute planning is rather guesswork, as the car doesnt know if you plan to sit at 60 or 75mph on the motorway?
 
Last edited:
Junglist said:
Ah OK that makes more sense!

I've just done it for convenience, really. I also like having the ability to see the cameras whenever I fancy it but it's certainly not a necessity.
Click to expand...
That feature is locked behind the paywall as it goes via Tesla’s servers either way.

It’s mainly the media streaming stuff that isn’t.


Simon said:
It’s free though and most people never need battery conditioning. For routes etc I prefer a decent CarPlay screen than the Tesla nav anyway.

Can you heat the battery without the nav ?
Click to expand...

The UI is just google maps anyway, the underlying navigation isn’t (mapbox I think) but anything you can see is.

You can’t trigger preconditioning manually, you need to navigate to a charger for preconditioning to kick in (aka the Apple approach to UX). In reality, that’s the only time you actually need to trigger it so it’s not so much of an issue.

That can be rapid charger, not just Tesla superchargers.
 
Last edited:
Simon said:
I quite like the built in on mine, augmented reality on HUD is nice with roundabouts, lane changes, exits etc projected in front of you, makes it much more advanced than a screen thats out of peripheral view. ROute planning is rather guesswork, as the car doesnt know if you plan to sit at 60 or 75mph on the motorway?
Click to expand...

So far the charge planning has been pretty good on mine, certainly for new trips it’s been good to learn, esp when I did/do my trips to France or Germany.

It’s just annoying as we change the company cars every 3 year. Might have to start looking for 2 years options next time round :p
 
Can do it manually in battery management to condition the battery on VW MEB at least and there a battery temp indicator, time to optimum and current max charge rate. Horses for courses I guess
 
Simon said:
Can do it manually in battery management to condition the battery on VW MEB at least and there a battery temp indicator, time to optimum and current max charge rate. Horses for courses I guess
Click to expand...
Does your car set out what the current bottleneck is when charging?

Tesla added this a some time ago for cold batteries but have been iterating more recently and it will say in the UI if it’s a car bottleneck (e.g. temperature, state of charge etc) or if it’s the charging station itself.

It’s quite handy to identify chargers which aren’t performing as expected (e.g. cable cooling not working) and you can move.
 
Last edited:
Don’t know. I don’t think I need to use public charging on route anymore and haven’t tested it. Car play integration is more appealing for me for making calls using Google maps etc.

I’m sure the system won’t talk to chargers etc like Tesla but it does show if they occupied or not if a partner provider.

In the past my stop was longer than the charge so heating battery just feels a waste of energy. Bigger battery and high rates even without heating (old car didn’t even have any controllable battery heating - just came on at 0C
 
Mine doesn't tell me what the bottlenecks would be, just the max, initial and live charging rates. Using the Connected Nav it will route on certain criteria, you can set to preferred charging networks first (I have it set to Ionity as am on a 1 year deal for cheaper charging) and it will start the battery conditioning without input, you can also start it manually if you want on one of the menus.
 
I've often mentioned that due to my job an EV would add extra hassle and time to my working week. Well for balance, this week the opposite is true.

I've had back to back trips of about 210 - 240 miles, ending up back home in between. Within the realms of possibility in an EV without having to charge. The Astra has a crappy range in PHEV form (400 miles from a full tank and battery) so I'm having to fill up daily as well as chucking it on charge every night.

While BEV wasn't an option this time round it has to be a strong contender for it's replacement. I could do with dropping the BIK as well as that is pushing me up a tax bracket.

In theory that is 2 to 3 years away but we've got one of the lads joining the sales team and he'll need a car at some point. Maybe I can palm the Astra off on him and expedite the process!
 
lordrobs said:
I've often mentioned that due to my job an EV would add extra hassle and time to my working week. Well for balance, this week the opposite is true.

I've had back to back trips of about 210 - 240 miles, ending up back home in between. Within the realms of possibility in an EV without having to charge. The Astra has a crappy range in PHEV form (400 miles from a full tank and battery) so I'm having to fill up daily as well as chucking it on charge every night.

While BEV wasn't an option this time round it has to be a strong contender for it's replacement. I could do with dropping the BIK as well as that is pushing me up a tax bracket.

In theory that is 2 to 3 years away but we've got one of the lads joining the sales team and he'll need a car at some point. Maybe I can palm the Astra off on him and expedite the process!
Click to expand...
BIK on ev's is 3% this tax year, rising to 4% 26/27 and 5% 27/28.
 
I don't remember if he had said he would get sweetener of reimbursed petrol mileage -
but, for older generation of EV's he might have needed some destination charging to complete 240miles in the cold season.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom