The Car Thread

[leedswolf]

Renault sent me an £11,000 bill to repair my Zoe heater

The car is just five years old, and now the company seems to be washing its hands of the matter

www.theguardian.com

 

[EpsomWolf]

Renault sent me an £11,000 bill to repair my Zoe heater

The car is just five years old, and now the company seems to be washing its hands of the matter

www.theguardian.com

It’s a situation more and more people are going to find themselves in. The lifespan of a car is likely to get shorter as more complex vehicles with sky high repair costs hit their uneconomical repair ceiling more quickly.

Five years is a real shocker though, but spending 30 grand on a Renault Zoe does run it very close to be fair.

 

[Keef]

Some cars are very close to being scrapped for LED head and tail lights not working, some of those units are £1500-2000 to replace.

 

[Kenny]

First UK holiday in an EV. Staying in Widdrington Station in Northumberland.

Left the house with the car on 100% (wife had charged the car at work then topped back up from 91% before leaving, so a nice and cheap "full tank").
Charged up just outside Leeds and as not sure of the charging capability at the cottage, did a quick top up 20 miles away.
Money spent at that point - £20 at service stations and loose change at home.

Bonus we can charge at the cottage but via a 3 pin plug but means overnight charging will mean it is unlikely to require a public top up.

So will do a charge on the way home, meaning the whole week will cost less than £40 in fuel.

Love it.

 

[sycophantia]

First UK holiday in an EV. Staying in Widdrington Station in Northumberland.

Left the house with the car on 100% (wife had charged the car at work then topped back up from 91% before leaving, so a nice and cheap "full tank").
Charged up just outside Leeds and as not sure of the charging capability at the cottage, did a quick top up 20 miles away.
Money spent at that point - £20 at service stations and loose change at home.

Bonus we can charge at the cottage but via a 3 pin plug but means overnight charging will mean it is unlikely to require a public top up.

So will do a charge on the way home, meaning the whole week will cost less than £40 in fuel.

Love it.

This type of journey(s) is where EV makes sense.
An EV would suit our needs for a car very well currently but the initial outlay is just too much.

 

[The Bear]

As long as you can charge at your destination, even via the 3 pin granny charger then you're sorted really.

 

[MARKakaJIM]

As long as you can charge at your destination, even via the 3 pin granny charger then you're sorted really.

Depends how long you're in the accommodation and how far you're travelling day to say. Think you'd get about 50% charge of 12 hours on a 3 pin plug but then depending on terrain/weather where you're holidaying you could be looking well below peak efficiency so possibly down to 100 miles range a day?

It's those sort of occasions that still carry the most doubt form me switching to full EV, as it stands I know I can plot out a week away as I want with very minor disruption to make a few petrol stops along the way. When my partner next changes her car need to try and persuade her to go for something bigger and better suited to some long haul journeys so we can use that for holidays and that would make an EV company car far more practical for me. Then I'd just be fingers crossed that there's an EV on the car list in 4 years time that isn't massively reliant on touchscreens.

 

[Tredman]

Most places people would go to on a day trip have destination chargers. Very easy to use and sometimes a little too quick.

 

[MARKakaJIM]

Most places people would go to on a day trip have destination chargers. Very easy to use and sometimes a little too quick.

All depends on the sort of thing you're doing doesn't it, from my personal experience in recent years going to Cornwall, Scotland, Cumbria, North Yorkshire and Northumberland the only times I just happened across a charger without going out of my way tended to be supermarkets.

 

[Tredman]

All depends on the sort of thing you're doing doesn't it, from my personal experience in recent years going to Cornwall, Scotland, Cumbria, North Yorkshire and Northumberland the only times I just happened across a charger without going out of my way tended to be supermarkets.

I think it depends if you actually look / notice them. Having driven an EV for 3 years now I do look out for them. Slow chargers are very very common now, number of chargers in general have exploded in the last 6 months.

 

[Tredman]

Case in point - a random part of Cornwall. If were to zoom in there would be many more too.

 

[The Bear]

Yeah if you continually look out for them on your travels you see them popping up.

Hotels are the next place that needs more money and slow 7kw chargers installing.

With the price of public chargers being 60p-£1 nowadays I have found a local 7kw charger that is only 30p, so I park it there and make the short walk home for 7 hours then go back and collect it. Rather that which costs me about £18 than get charged £45 per charge at the fast ones.

That's just the annoyance of not being able to have a charger at home.

 

[Tredman]

Yeah if you continually look out for them on your travels you see them popping up.

Hotels are the next place that needs more money and slow 7kw chargers installing.

With the price of public chargers being 60p-£1 nowadays I have found a local 7kw charger that is only 30p, so I park it there and make the short walk home for 7 hours then go back and collect it. Rather that which costs me about £18 than get charged £45 per charge at the fast ones.

That's just the annoyance of not being able to have a charger at home.

I paid 22p at Tesla in Bristol the other day! Must admit having now shifted to Tesla the charging tech and ecosystem are next level. Shame it’s not a great car in itself.

I tend to use Hilton hotels these days and they are pretty good for chargers. IHG too.

 

[MARKakaJIM]

Case in point - a random part of Cornwall. If were to zoom in there would be many more too.

View attachment 10187

I definitely keep an eye out for them, when I first got a PHEV I was slightly obsessed with trying to find out any free electricity but usually to no avail. I'm not saying the facility doesn't exist outright, it just rarely seems to be in a place that's convenient for me. Showing me a map of a 100 mile spread doesn't really do anything to define chargers that might be suitable for any given location. There could be countless within the area I'd cover in a week's holiday but if they're all 5 miles or so from the place I'm actually spending the day then what use is it to me?

I knows it's not likes it's always the case with petrol stations either but a few miles diversion for a 5 minute exercise isn't a massive deal compared to having to stop for best part of an hour somewhere you don't really want to be, particularly on holiday when you want to be making the most of your time.

90%+ of the time I would be fine in an EV, I could possibly even upgrade my 6kw charger at home to a fast charger if I went full EV, there are free issue chargers at the office too and I'm unlikely to ever cover a distance in a single day that would need me to stop en route, unless temperatures plummeted. However the times when it would inconvenience me are the times I would least like to be inconvenienced and that's why I wouldn't yet make the change, unless as mentioned before the 2nd car in our household was able to step in on those occasions and take the EV out of the long distance/intense usage debate.

 

[The Bear]

Just be aware that you need a three phase electricity supply on your consumer unit in order to charge faster than 11kw (I think off the top of my head. Could be 22kw).Plus cars like the Tesla have on board charging units which will only do a max of 11kw.

 

[Tredman]

I definitely keep an eye out for them, when I first got a PHEV I was slightly obsessed with trying to find out any free electricity but usually to no avail. I'm not saying the facility doesn't exist outright, it just rarely seems to be in a place that's convenient for me. Showing me a map of a 100 mile spread doesn't really do anything to define chargers that might be suitable for any given location. There could be countless within the area I'd cover in a week's holiday but if they're all 5 miles or so from the place I'm actually spending the day then what use is it to me?

I knows it's not likes it's always the case with petrol stations either but a few miles diversion for a 5 minute exercise isn't a massive deal compared to having to stop for best part of an hour somewhere you don't really want to be, particularly on holiday when you want to be making the most of your time.

90%+ of the time I would be fine in an EV, I could possibly even upgrade my 6kw charger at home to a fast charger if I went full EV, there are free issue chargers at the office too and I'm unlikely to ever cover a distance in a single day that would need me to stop en route, unless temperatures plummeted. However the times when it would inconvenience me are the times I would least like to be inconvenienced and that's why I wouldn't yet make the change, unless as mentioned before the 2nd car in our household was able to step in on those occasions and take the EV out of the long distance/intense usage debate.

You’ve probably got a 7kw charger, 6 are very rare.

 

[MARKakaJIM]

Just be aware that you need a three phase electricity supply on your consumer unit in order to charge faster than 11kw (I think off the top of my head. Could be 22kw).Plus cars like the Tesla have on board charging units which will only do a max of 11kw.

There's a 3 phase supply into my house, hence the potential to upgrade, would just need to check with the DNO whether all 3 phases are still live and if so could upgrade to a 3 phase meter and swap the charger. If its been cut off further back from my property then it's properly more expensive that worth bothering with to upgrade back to 3 phase.

 

[pagey]

Took the kids to skegness Butlins over Easter (yeah I know), charged at home before I left, they offer 7kw charge for a £5 charity donation so charged once to 100%, spent a few days out and about, and drove home. In total over 400 mile and cost me about £15. Was delighted.

 

[The Bear]

Are you all on Octopus Go? They give you cheaper charging during the night.

 

[pagey]

I'm still on British Gas standard at the minute, we use quite a bit of electricity during the day and shopping around for the best value, did an estimate on octopus website, last 12 months use and found it would have cost us more. (Without the ev and charging).