[Technology] The In no way official Electric Car thread

[Icy Gull]

With the Electric car revolution moving up through the gears smile quite quickly now, how about a thread to post interesting models and info?

Seems a few of you are looking to change to EVs so may be of interest to keep things on one thread?



The South Koreans are making stylish looking cars and although I am still in the “not for me” camp I have an interest and I thunk that this is a stunning looking vehicle when compared to most EVs and so much better than the offerings I’ve seen from European makers. I am suspicious of Teslas too, no logical reason

https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/new-cars/new-hyundai-ioniq-5-arrives-retro-design-292-mile-range

 

[Me and my Monkey]

Great idea. The desire for many to switch to these vehicles now must be huge. I would certainly like to, but like most I am being held back by the cost, the not quite good enough range, and difficulty in charging. My street has just one charging point, it's all on street parking, so ideally I'd like a car with a removable battery pack so I can charge it indoors. I have no idea if that's a feasible idea, although I think it's a great one. In the same way that I know nothing about football, I also know nothing about EVs, so look to the well informed on here to guide me.

 

[Goldstone1976]

Great idea. The desire for many to switch to these vehicles now must be huge. I would certainly like to, but like most I am being held back by the cost, the not quite good enough range, and difficulty in charging. My street has just one charging point, it's all on street parking, so ideally I'd like a car with a removable battery pack so I can charge it indoors. I have no idea if that's a feasible idea, although I think it's a great one. In the same way that I know nothing about football, I also know nothing about EVs, so look to the well informed on here to guide me.

The typical battery array weighs 400-500kg.

 

[Notters]

Live scenes from [MENTION=33633]Me and my Monkey[/MENTION]'s house.

 

[Me and my Monkey]

Live scenes from [MENTION=33633]Me and my Monkey[/MENTION]'s house.

Oh, stop it! I did say I know nothing about EVs. All the same, half a tonne for a battery sounds a lot, you’d think it would use half its energy dragging itself along!

 

[blue-shifted]

Oh, stop it! I did say I know nothing about EVs. All the same, half a tonne for a battery sounds a lot, you’d think it would use half its energy dragging itself along!

You would think right.

On the other hand, I don't think your idea is a total non starter. At least some of the battery packs in cars and actually lots and lots of small batteries, so I could see a solution at some stage where there are say, 50 batteries containing 2% of the cars charge each and you could keep replacing them as and when.

But we're not there yet, and I don't see there's any appetite from manufacturers for this.

 

[Madafwo]

Live scenes from [MENTION=33633]Me and my Monkey[/MENTION]'s house.

How big is the crane to remove that crane's battery pack?

I was thinking about this yesterday, Mrs Afwo is starting down the route to becoming a primary school teacher so all being well she'll start commuting in a few years time and even now an electric car would make sense. Luckily I've got enough space on the driveway for 2 cars and at a push I could empty the garage out and do something novel with it, like park a car in there.

The South Korean manufacturers seem to have done really well and the 2 that pique my interest are both Kia models, either the Soul or the e Niro but they're both logical choices, as such she'd probably want the Honda e.

 

[beorhthelm]

You would think right.

On the other hand, I don't think your idea is a total non starter. At least some of the battery packs in cars and actually lots and lots of small batteries, so I could see a solution at some stage where there are say, 50 batteries containing 2% of the cars charge each and you could keep replacing them as and when.

But we're not there yet, and I don't see there's any appetite from manufacturers for this.

nothing says convenience like spending 10 minutes unplugging and taking indoors a dozen or more small battery packs, plugging into their charger, then reverse the process.

 

[Driver8]

nothing says convenience like spending 10 minutes unplugging and taking indoors a dozen or more small battery packs, plugging into their charger, then reverse the process.

They are under the floor of the car too.

This is what is under the floor of a Tesla.

I have a Model 3 but fortunately have a drive and a home charger.

 

[mwrpoole]

I wasn’t really looking at electric cars until I got an email sent to me regarding company car tax and how it’s 0% this year, moving to 1% next year. That got my attention and I might start looking now.

 

[Motogull]

The prices are eye watering at the mo but hopefully by the end of the decade, they will have come down, capacities and ranges will have increased and there will be a grater number of charge points/options. £30K for an eVW up is too much - despite it being the ideal urban get about.

I am more interested in emotorbikes. 50mph with 60 miles range would do it and is in range financially.

 

[Seasidesage]

I wasn’t really looking at electric cars until I got an email sent to me regarding company car tax and how it’s 0% this year, moving to 1% next year. That got my attention and I might start looking now.

This is exactly why I changed to a Tesla. I save over £350 pm and I have a nice car which needs little or no maintenance. Charging is a pain in the sense that you always have to consider it but in reality I charge mine outside my house mostly and on the Tesla superchargers the few times I've been out. None of those in Brighton yet frustratingly, but charged my car from 7% battery to 80% coming home from a trip to Bath the other day in 30 mins at the services and cost under £20.

Performance is off the charts 0-60 is 4.4 secs on my long range model 3 another second quicker on the performance version. Having a front boot is handy too. Best piece of advice I had was treat the car more like your phone ie charge it whenever you get the chance rather than a standard car where you tend to let the petrol get low before refueling. Done that and its worked so far also pleasantly surprised to find the council on street chargers are free too if a bit slow.

Not using my car as much during COVID for obvious reasons but it seems a perfectly valid option for a CC user and a significant saving to you which is nice.

 

[dazzer6666]

As others have said I’d like to change but the combination of cost, range and charging (in)convenience doesn’t make it viable at the moment. Mrs D does about 1500 miles a year in her car, replacing that with an EV would make some sense but spending 30k or so on a little-used runaround doesn’t...........although I guess if we had it we’d make more use of it and use mine less perhaps. We could easily have a charging point installed at home.

I do 8-10k a year in my car normally but until the range improves I wouldn’t want the inconvenience of, say, having to stop on the way back from a long football awayday, with no guarantee of a charger being available when I needed one.

Definitely going to keep an eye on developments though as tech will continue to improve and I suspect prices will fall.

 

[Stumpy Tim]

I have a BMW i3, and absolutely love it. I wouldn't go back to petrol now, and when my wife ditches her car we'll get another electric car with a longer range. Having said that, my i3 gets me to Gatwick and back from Hove twice. In addition it has a small petrol engine that allows you to add another 70 or so miles... though I've only used it twice in three years. I don't know why other EV's don´t do the same - it seems to be all EV or hybrid, which in some cases means 15 miles electric range.

I like the look of the VW ID.3 at the moment, but in a year things will have moved on quite a bit.

 

[studio150]

In the same way that I know nothing about football, I also know nothing about EVs, so look to the well informed on here to guide me.

All you need to know, is that EVs are like watching the Albion, you will have an enjoyable journey when you leave home, and see some stunning scenery as you travel towards your destination. However when you are getting close to the end of your journey, the EV will always take you to the next street to the left or right, or really infuriating will grind to a halt in sight of a free parking space.

On a more serious note, I would seem to be a step ahead in that I have a garage and an additional off road parking space where I could have my own charging point, or use the power socket in the garage, but there is so much detail to read and understand on different types, charging times, cost as well as the issues on driving range, on street charging points when you get to another town, that I'm still some way from taking the plunge to go fully EV.

 

[happypig]

As posted elsewhere, I have a Toyota hybrid, I don't like it and I want to change. My (financially limited to about £12k) options are a full electric or a petrol.
As I have solar panels I could charge an electric on the driveway but I would need to hire a car for the 2 or 3 times we go long distance to see family.
I'm also concerned by battery degradation over time (it costs about £4k to get a new battery for a Nissan Leaf).

 

[Notters]

If we are going all electric, I would think induction chargers are the way forward?

https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/new-cars/road-charges-your-electric-car

 

[beorhthelm]

...I'm also concerned by battery degradation over time (it costs about £4k to get a new battery for a Nissan Leaf).

one day we'll all realise this is why the car manufactures are quite happy to move to battery, rather than other options. shorten the life cycle of vehicles, or increase the onward cost of maintenance to keep on the road

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

Great idea. The desire for many to switch to these vehicles now must be huge. I would certainly like to, but like most I am being held back by the cost, the not quite good enough range, and difficulty in charging. My street has just one charging point, it's all on street parking, so ideally I'd like a car with a removable battery pack so I can charge it indoors. I have no idea if that's a feasible idea, although I think it's a great one. In the same way that I know nothing about football, I also know nothing about EVs, so look to the well informed on here to guide me.

I suspect you may have a very long weight (gedditt? )

"The large 90kWh battery of the Tesla S Model (2015) provides an unparalleled driving range of 424km (265 miles), but the battery weighs 540kg (1,200 lb), and this increases the energy consumption to 238Wh/km (380Wh/mile), one of the highest among EVs."

 

[Audax]

I like the look of the VW ID.3 at the moment, but in a year things will have moved on quite a bit.

Yeah, it's all moving very rapidly at the moment. All the manufacturer's are going through either a model refresh (eg the Renault and Nissan with recent Zoe and Leaf refreshes) or launching entirely new ranges (eg VW with the ID range).

We are, right now, in the first phases of what should turn into a big EV R&D / marketing / sales war between all the major (and some upstart) manufacturers that should both drive the technology forward rapidly, as well as drive prices down. I would hazard a guess that we're within a few years of reaching the tipping point where the tech and prices will be such that EV sales will skyrocket and non-EV sales will go into permanent (and accelerating yearly) decline.

We've currently got the traditional big manufacturers pushing out new models that they hope will compete with the likes of Tesla (who've had a head start). But Tesla themselves are preparing new models that should push the goalposts further away again, so you're going to see probably fairly short model lifespans for the EVs launched last year and this year. I'd be expecting to see the current models receiving motor and battery updates within a couple of years while retaining the same chassis and body layout, before another big refresh phase by the middle of the decade.