EV general discussion

Keep thinking about electric but numbers just don't add up.

We both WFH.
We probably use car once or Twice a week.
Only one of those drives is usually 10miles +

For UK holidays distance can be high. 300-500 miles is common.


To me this feels like nearly the complete opposite.
Electric cars depreciate fast
They are not great for long/short drives and are more Commute cars

Feels like an electric car is a long way off for me.
And mediocre used car is much cheaper and probably better than a new electric

Have to say I've lost interest in cars since WFH is a thing and needing to transport kayaks etc

I used to love my s2k
 
Journey said:
You are right it could be even bigger, as the government (whoever that is at the time) will be needing to ensure we are going to hit the proposed climate targets. So I'd imagine company vehicles will be highly disincentivised (sp/new word?) from taking anything other than a fully electric car, will also be in the wrong side of the decade to be going backwards.
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Which is all well and good if A) an electric is an option and B) they suit your needs. For me it isn't and they don't and I can't really see either of those changing in the short to medium term.

My personal circumstances are in the minority though (small company, last company car budget was £15k with the car bought outright, must be an estate, lots of overnight stays away from home etc.) so I can see my personal finances being pretty heavily hit in the pursuit of "net zero".
 
welshboy said:
This is now my third month on the e-tron, loving it.
Still using the public network at the minute to charge, the last two times I’ve had rude people waiting for me on the chargers, I only charge 45mins on a ecotricity site.
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Do people genuinely give you stick for charging your car on a public charger?! What is their issue, that you've been on there for too long or something?
 
lordrobs said:
Which is all well and good if A) an electric is an option and B) they suit your needs. For me it isn't and they don't and I can't really see either of those changing in the short to medium term.

My personal circumstances are in the minority though (small company, last company car budget was £15k with the car bought outright, must be an estate, lots of overnight stays away from home etc.) so I can see my personal finances being pretty heavily hit in the pursuit of "net zero".
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I guess the business might have to start shelling out for a more expensive vehicle then, assuming there are not options in 5 years time that fir your needs.

Also a lot will change in 5 years, in 2016 there were ~37k BEV's registered for the whole year, and 5 models to choose from. There were more BEVs registered in September above this year, then the whole of 2016, and there is ~80 models to choose from.
 
Journey said:
I guess the business might have to start shelling out for a more expensive vehicle then, assuming there are not options in 5 years time that fir your needs.

Also a lot will change in 5 years, in 2016 there were ~37k BEV's registered for the whole year, and 5 models to choose from. There were more BEVs registered in September above this year, then the whole of 2016, and there is ~80 models to choose from.
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True. I guess even if I was looking at an ICE replacement right now there would be a disparity between what they think is a suitable budget and what it actually costs to get a car suitable for the job.

That just leaves the issue of destination charging and I'd be surprised if one of the hotel chains doesn't soon latch on to the idea of a "room and charge" type package where they guarantee you a 7kW charge point for the duration of your stay.
 
Journey said:
You are right it could be even bigger, as the government (whoever that is at the time) will be needing to ensure we are going to hit the proposed climate targets. So I'd imagine company vehicles will be highly disincentivised (sp/new word?) from taking anything other than a fully electric car, will also be in the wrong side of the decade to be going backwards.
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No doubt ICE cars BIK will continue to rise but doubt the gap will get bigger, BEV will go up a lot, esp the closer we get to 2030. By 2026 I doubt there will be hardly any ICE cars you can buy except specialist ones. It will be hybrids or BEVs anyway so no need to continue to ramp up ICE BIK rates but now you have captive buyers than can only buy BEVs/hybrids then time to start getting some money back.

If you look at how much the BIK incentive is worth to employees and businesses in lost tax revenue for the Govt, if they were serious about getting us all to move over to BEVs then they could have given £15k grants on BEVS for private buyers.
 
lordrobs said:
True. I guess even if I was looking at an ICE replacement right now there would be a disparity between what they think is a suitable budget and what it actually costs to get a car suitable for the job.

That just leaves the issue of destination charging and I'd be surprised if one of the hotel chains doesn't soon latch on to the idea of a "room and charge" type package where they guarantee you a 7kW charge point for the duration of your stay.
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The likes of TravelLodge or Premier Inn, or both, will probably do deals with a company like PodPoint or similar to provide a set of load balanced 7-22kW posts in their car parks. I also imagine there'll be loyalty scheme where you get the charging thrown in, or pay £5-10 extra if you aren't a regular user etc.

If it seems unfeasible or unlikely to add 20-30 chargers in a car park, then there's a great example in Norway where they've added over 700 charge points to a single car park at one of the airports.
 
lordrobs said:
Do people genuinely give you stick for charging your car on a public charger?! What is their issue, that you've been on there for too long or something?
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If it's anything like the EV Facebook groups, they go crazy if people charge more than 80% at a public charger.
 
Em3bbs said:
If it's anything like the EV Facebook groups, they go crazy if people charge more than 80% at a public charger.
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Yep, the EV FB here in N. Ireland had to basically stop people posting images of someone else's car "daring" to charge at the free public charging stations. It was always some freeloader complaining that some other freeloader was freeloading. I would ask if their need to charge more important than that other person's and never once got a reply.

A few times when I was charging people have driven up to me and declared they had some emergency and if I could let them charge. I fell for it once before realising I was being too nice. One guy in a Tesla Model 3 tried it once and I asked him what his charge was and he said "just under 30%" and I said, "so you have the range to get to another charger then?"
 
Well the new car arrived today and got to say its a joy so far. Took a little getting used to using the regen and not the brakes but that only took a couple of minutes. Got a manual the size of the encyclopedia brittania to get through, but im glad I made the switch to an EV. Lots of bells and whistles for the price which Im pleased with and on the first couple of short journeys getting 5miles/kwh.
 
Bar said:
Well the new car arrived today and got to say its a joy so far. Took a little getting used to using the regen and not the brakes but that only took a couple of minutes. Got a manual the size of the encyclopedia brittania to get through, but im glad I made the switch to an EV. Lots of bells and whistles for the price which Im pleased with and on the first couple of short journeys getting 5miles/kwh.
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Ha, when I got the Ioniq I was surprised just how big the manual was, spent a good couple of hours reading it which was actually worthwhile given all of the features. The efficeincy is amazing, even in the winter when other cars can drop into the low 2's, you'll still be in the 4's.
 
Journey said:
You are right it could be even bigger, as the government (whoever that is at the time) will be needing to ensure we are going to hit the proposed climate targets. So I'd imagine company vehicles will be highly disincentivised (sp/new word?) from taking anything other than a fully electric car, will also be in the wrong side of the decade to be going backwards.
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Wouldn't it be nice if people were taking these options because they were genuinely better not because the alternatives are being made artificially awful.
 
[TW]Fox said:
Wouldn't it be nice if people were taking these options because they were genuinely better not because the alternatives are being made artificially awful.
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Isn't that like the 18th time you said this in this very thread. We get it you don't like any of the current electric cars.
 
Journey said:
Isn't that like the 18th time you said this in this very thread. We get it you don't like any of the current electric cars.
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You clearly don't get it, because I like lots of them.

Which I've said many times in this thread.

This entire thread is the same people saying the same things so don't single me out for it :D
 
[TW]Fox said:
You clearly don't get it, because I like lots of them.
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I think you've said you like the Mini-E, which ironically is one of the worst examples of a BEV avialble vs a standard version of the car. Or maybe you said you like the Taycan or the Audi e-Tron GT, but hey who doesn't like £100k sports cars, right?
 
They're still electric cars though, right? It's taken time for us to get a range of electric cars that are actually decent all round cars, more and more are coming onto the market now. Were it not for the horrendous front end the new i4 would be a strong contender for me, as it is I'm thinking of waiting for the i5 which could end up being absolutely ideal.

But unlike most in this thread I don't think electric cars are the perfect alternative to ICE cars because they are not. The massive sales figures are distorted by extremely favourable tax treatment. There are clear downsides which it looks unlikely will ever be solved (just as there are different clear downsides to ICE vehicles).

Remember the last time we drove massive take up of one type of fuel through the use of taxation policies? It ended up with every other driveway containing a diesel powered Fiesta which would have been far better for everyone had it been petrol.

EV tech and infrastructure should improve to the point that nobody wants an ICE car. If it can't then it shouldn't be the future. If nothing else just how are we paying for all these incentives?
 
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[TW]Fox said:
EV tech and infrastructure should improve to the point that nobody wants an ICE car. If it can't then it shouldn't be the future.
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That is your opinion though, I find my Ioniq a perfectly good all-round car, that suits my lifestyle better that any ICE car ever has before. Now before BEV's were available I was being inconvenienced, much like you state would be if you changed now. So should i have to suffer and go backwards because of others?
 
Journey said:
I think you've said you like the Mini-E, which ironically is one of the worst examples of a BEV avialble vs a standard version of the car. Or maybe you said you like the Taycan or the Audi e-Tron GT, but hey who doesn't like £100k sports cars, right?
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The Mini has appeal. not sure what the problem really is. The other bookend is the i3 so BMW have both based covered frankly.

Its like EVs have not only turned everyone into lifecyle analysis engineers but also vehicle architecture engineers.
 
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