The Car Thread

[Wolf Hunting]

Had to order my company car today.
Has to be an EV.

So I had the following to choose from

ID.3
Polestar 2
Megane E-Tech
Kia Nero
Citreon C4
BMW i4 Sport


What would you pick from that list?

Normally have Tesla's on the list but they withdrew their support. Must something coming back as I am at their place in Solihull on Tuesday though.

If it's any help, I can only speak for the VW system. The electronics is absolutely the dogs bollocks.
It's so comprehensive, you can see how it's only gonna be a relatively short step to driverless cars.
That, said, mine isn't driverless, and I'm not that keen.
Couple of basic issues, once you get it set up ready to go, (Saying hello to it, letting it configure itself, connecting it to your phone, turning off certain things especially the fucking automated lane departure warning) you're ready to go.
When you finish your journey, you touch the 'brake' button and get out. You don't turn anything off, as soon as your arse leaves the seat, it turns everything off for you. EVERYTHING! Heating, radio, dashboard, lights... everything.
But!! It might be you've left your sunglasses in the house or something is in the boot that you need or even on the back seat, as soon as your arse leaves the seat.... then you have to set it all up again when you get back in. and if you're doing several short trips, as soon as ...

Another issue is, unless when you got into the car for the 1st time and set up the hundreds of voice commands, you'll find yourself doing 70mph down the motorway and you want to set the cruise control, you have the buttons on your steering wheel, but I got a message like, 'You have not enabled Cruise Control in the main settings'. Now, on start up, you have 8 set screens, and you need to touch 'Settings' then scroll down till you find it and 'enable'. Not that I'd ever turned the fucking thing off.
But the problem here is it's amazingly difficult to reach out and touch the screen ACCURATELY! Don't for get you're doing 70mph which is about 102 feet per second and by the time you've inaccurately hit 2 wrong buttons, gone back, then hit the right one, you've gone an awful long way without looking at the road.
Another thing we have failed to master, is, that whilst it recognised my voice sat in the drive one quiet Sunday afternoon, it only partly recognised it on the move. So my wife might be driving, she starts talking and as I answered, it paused the music or sat nav to ask, "What is it you'd like to do?", so then we have to cancel that.
The touch screen is highly intuitive too. At night it changes to dark mode but the volume slider (no buttons) is not lit, so you have to feel around for where you think it is, then if you get it right, then you can slide your finger along the bar.

Behind each of the 8 screen there are frequently many more. It's very comprehensive but it really does require a degree in technology to get the best out of it. It really is is clever. But I think, it's a bit too clever. And can be very annoying.
The final thing, is every single thing you turn on, heating, radio, air con, windows, satnav, blah blah, eats a tiny chunk out of the battery. We found it better to turn off the heating altogether and turn on the heated seats. kept you warm but kept it nice and cool.
I have no idea what any of the other systems are like.
My wife drives this every day and loves it.
I drive it occasionally and don't.

 

[MARKakaJIM]

Okay.
We just drove from home to Belfast then Cairnryan to Northumberland.
1st fatal error in the planning was not considering the charging time required.
When we got to Dumfries, I'd allowed an hour to charge whilst we went shopping (M&S Meal deals x 4 etc) and had lunch.
Got my 7kwatt cable out, plugged it in and it said, "Charging from 27% to 100% will take 4.5 hrs."
What?? Fucking hell! So we moved up a few places and used the 53KWatt charger which did it in 1.25 hrs.
There was actually a charging point (7KW) at the holiday cottage so that was good.
Apart from the time 2 diesel cars were parked at the slot outside the gym so I had to get some fucker out of the swimming pool to shift his car. Not happy. (Ironic that a man visiting the gym doesn't want to park and walk and extra 30 feet. Mutter, mutter, no one's ever used it before mutter)
So now we knew this, your 7Kw chargers are virtually useless unless you have at least a half day to spare and the return trip was perfect.
I think the 7KW was £0.44 per Kw and the fast one was around £0.53 Kw

More expensive than petrol at those prices!

 

[Wolf Hunting]

With 7kwh you should be aware that is a slower charge, surely? Plugging in your own cable will always deliver 7kwh which will amazingly deliver...7kw per hour. As you say, great if you are at home or know you are on the car park for 3 or 4 hours. Which how it was when I was in York a couple of weeks ago. Always hunt out the fast chargers on long trips where you want to stop for 25-30 mins

Also beware of your timings - You leave you car plugged in and its done you will start to get charged for hogging the space and that will be more than the kw charge will be

Yes, but as @Alan pointed out in the next post, I understand Miles per gallon. but Miles per Kw is more confusing and much more dependant on what you're consuming on your journey. Speed is another thing too! Anything over 100kms per hour really chews it up. (Speed limit over here is 120km/hr)
Fucking thing absolutely takes off if you're overtaking, and will happily do 85mph down the motorway with no effort, but wow!

 

[Tredman]

More expensive than petrol at those prices!

Only if you ignore the fact you can set off from home with a 'full tank' which costs 7.5 p/KWh

 

[MARKakaJIM]

Only if you ignore the fact you can set off from home with a 'full tank' which costs 7.5 p/KWh

Your home rate isn't really useful, or relevant, when you're 100+ miles away is it? Not really an issue as a company car driver as the tax saving would offset a fair chunk of those adhoc charges but if I was running an electric car privately then I'd be rather perturbed having to charge away from home as I'd be reliant on the cheaper running costs to make it stack up.

 

[Kenny]

Yes, but as @Alan pointed out in the next post, I understand Miles per gallon. but Miles per Kw is more confusing and much more dependant on what you're consuming on your journey. Speed is another thing too! Anything over 100kms per hour really chews it up. (Speed limit over here is 120km/hr)
Fucking thing absolutely takes off if you're overtaking, and will happily do 85mph down the motorway with no effort, but wow!

It really is just simple maths at the end of the day. No different to MPG. If you need 30kw to get back up to 80% battery life then how many times does 7 go into 30 and you get your charging times. Obviously find a 100kwh charger and you are out of there a lot quicker

As for the speed draining the battery, well yes it will as it does on petrol or diesel car, You need to find the optimum speed for the battery. In the wife's Q4 if I do 65 on the motorway I will get the best range. I thought that would feel like a snails pace on the motorway but turns out a lot of people go slower than that and I don't fancy having to do another speed awareness course, so I am happy to stick just below the limit

 

[Wolf Hunting]

More expensive than petrol at those prices!

No Mark.
At home we have a charger (7Kw) and that costs us around €8 per top up to 80% which we do about 6 times a month. say around €48-50.
A full tank of diesel was costing us around €200 per month. Bit of a no brainer.
On holiday the fast charge (to full/100%) was costing around £20 and the slow (7Kw) was around £13.

 

[Tredman]

Your home rate isn't really useful, or relevant, when you're 100+ miles away is it? Not really an issue as a company car driver as the tax saving would offset a fair chunk of those adhoc charges but if I was running an electric car privately then I'd be rather perturbed having to charge away from home as I'd be reliant on the cheaper running costs to make it stack up.

Well it is if your range is 250 miles.

Average cost is what’s important.

 

[Carrotdude]

I’ve only had to fast charge my car once, but it seemed to really slow down after about half an hour - is that normal or is it when the battery is nearer full charge? We were trying to get it to 90% but once it hit 80 it really slowed down

 

[Kenny]

I’ve only had to fast charge my car once, but it seemed to really slow down after about half an hour - is that normal or is it when the battery is nearer full charge? We were trying to get it to 90% but once it hit 80 it really slowed down

Up to 80% will be the quickest. The final 20% will take longer than going from whatever % to 80%.

This covers the reason why

For the last 10-20%, the battery chemistry starts limiting the current it can accept and as you get closer to the maximum battery voltage (batteries gain voltage as they charge) charging slows down dramatically. You can't force it to try and maintain the pace, because over-voltage will destroy the battery.

 

[Carrotdude]

Up to 80% will be the quickest. The final 20% will take longer than going from whatever % to 80%.

This covers the reason why

For the last 10-20%, the battery chemistry starts limiting the current it can accept and as you get closer to the maximum battery voltage (batteries gain voltage as they charge) charging slows down dramatically. You can't force it to try and maintain the pace, because over-voltage will destroy the battery.

Thanks Kenny, I assumed it was something like that but I’ve never got round to checking and this conversation just reminded me!

 

[Tredman]

Yeah, never worth charging past 80. Better to shift off and start again. Plus you’ll get daggers from everyone else

 

[Kenny]

Also keep an eye on the charges if you over stay at a charge point. They can be fun and sometimes well hidden

 

[Alan]

Well it is if your range is 250 miles.

Average cost is what’s important.

There's also the whole environment thing.

 

[The Bear]

You actually save more time only charging to 80% because of the amount of slowdown past that point. Even if you have to make an extra stop on a really long journey.

 

[Kenny]

Pop this in here...a Brexit benefit incoming (or not).

New tariff set to come into play in January. If an item arriving in the UK has less than 90% of it from the EU a 10% tariff will be added to the cost.
Most EV's whilst built in the EU they will have its parts from outside.
Apparently we have shown no desire to sort it, most of the EU don't care bar Germany.
No chance this tariff will be absorbed into the pricing so a price bump incoming.

I have got the details that explain it better but that's the jist of it

 

[MARKakaJIM]

Pop this in here...a Brexit benefit incoming (or not).

New tariff set to come into play in January. If an item arriving in the UK has less than 90% of it from the EU a 10% tariff will be added to the cost.
Most EV's whilst built in the EU they will have its parts from outside.
Apparently we have shown no desire to sort it, most of the EU don't care bar Germany.
No chance this tariff will be absorbed into the pricing so a price bump incoming.

I have got the details that explain it better but that's the jist of it

That new car scheme needs to sort it's act out then!

 

[PuntsWolf]

@Wolf Hunting if you use your type 2
Cable you’ll be able to get up to 22kW AC in your VW (obviously if the charger is rated that high). Tesco always have a 22 and a 7.

Time is money though. So if you’re not intending to stay long then just wack the DC in. I worked out that paying £0.70p for the pricey chargers was the equivalent of the price per mile in my old diesel. So you haven’t really lost out still, you just haven’t won.

 

[MARKakaJIM]

@Wolf Hunting if you use your type 2
Cable you’ll be able to get up to 22kW AC in your VW (obviously if the charger is rated that high). Tesco always have a 22 and a 7.

Time is money though. So if you’re not intending to stay long then just wack the DC in. I worked out that paying £0.70p for the pricey chargers was the equivalent of the price per mile in my old diesel. So you haven’t really lost out still, you just haven’t won.

Sub 40mpg?! Surely a petrol would've been a better choice.

 

[PuntsWolf]

Sub 40mpg?! Surely a petrol would've been a better choice.

32mpg…

4.0L, 0-60 in 5.5s. Probably why it got nicked. Making up for my planet destruction now though…