Battery Electric Vehicle News / Enjoying the Transportation Revolution

buglawton

1961Nick said:

buglawton said:

Ectophile said:

buglawton said:

Tesla is simply trying to sell at the top. Run a mile.

Are you one of the people who has lost money shorting Tesla shares recently?  There are a lot of people who keep predicting their imminent collapse.

Never touched Tesla stock. Sold my last shares in a US company and won't be buying more - too much paperwork and fiddly to trade.

If you used an online platform there's zero paperwork ... trading US stock is exactly the same process as trading a London stock.

Been using online for a long time. But my experience with (more than one) employer gifted US company stocks was, have to complete annual W-8BEN forms and there was a withholding of a proportion of the shares. All too complicated, put me off forever. FTSE in a trading ISA for me.

Not sure where EV hater comes from. By following good maintenance practices and not doing big miles, ICE is just so cheap to stay with. And the reality is, like me a large part of the British public has other things to spend money on than keeping up with the EV Joneses. Fascinating tech though.

1961Nick

buglawton said:

1961Nick said:

buglawton said:

Ectophile said:

buglawton said:

Tesla is simply trying to sell at the top. Run a mile.

Are you one of the people who has lost money shorting Tesla shares recently?  There are a lot of people who keep predicting their imminent collapse.

Never touched Tesla stock. Sold my last shares in a US company and won't be buying more - too much paperwork and fiddly to trade.

If you used an online platform there's zero paperwork ... trading US stock is exactly the same process as trading a London stock.

Been using online for a long time. But my experience with (more than one) employer gifted US company stocks was, have to complete annual W-8BEN forms and there was a withholding of a proportion of the shares. All too complicated, put me off forever. FTSE in a trading ISA for me.

Not sure where EV hater comes from. By following good maintenance practices and not doing big miles, ICE is just so cheap to stay with. And the reality is, like me a large part of the British public has other things to spend money on than keeping up with the EV Joneses. Fascinating tech though.

I completed my W8 Ben form online & it took a couple of minutes. From what I remember, it wasn’t much more than a declaration of residency outside of the USA. 

Martyn1981

buglawton said:

Not sure where EV hater comes from. By following good maintenance practices and not doing big miles, ICE is just so cheap to stay with. And the reality is, like me a large part of the British public has other things to spend money on than keeping up with the EV Joneses. Fascinating tech though.

Your ICE argument relies entirely on someone else buying new ICE cars. Since there is no factory turning out 'new' secondhand cars, or bangers, then any old ICE car argument applies equally to old BEV cars.

Most of the UK own cars, so your 'other things' argument is equally false, and your keeping up with the EV Joneses statement simply proves your bias - I (and I suspect most on here) have chosen to go down the BEV route as it is simply a better car, and better economics, with the environmental angle being a strong one, but not the main one*, it's simply an unavoidable bonus that nobody, even you will be able to avoid in the medium to long term - assuming no 'new' banger factory ever get built.

*That said, for those wishing to make an environmental change, the economic benefits of a BEV make the environmental beneficial switch an easy decision, so perhaps 'our' decisions be they environmental or economical, are more intertwined.

Martyn1981

Wifey told me about this story, it's seriously weird. A large tree fell during storm Dennis, and the Tesla Model X saw it and braked before the driver could, so the tree landed on the bonnet.

But, coming in the other direction, was another TMX which did exactly the same, so both cars got their front ends destroyed, but the occupants all survived. What are the odds!

Tesla Autopilot Saved 8 Lives In Storm Dennis

Storm Dennis was brutal in the southern part of UK, but it didn’t stop Tesla’s Autopilot from working, and seemingly saving 8 lives. There were two Tesla Model X vehicles involved in an accident caused by Storm Dennis blowing down a 400-year-old oak tree into the paths of these vehicles. The crazy thing is that when the tree fell, each Tesla was on the opposite side of the other. They were coming from opposite directions.

Martyn1981

I recently posted that France had surprised me with PEV sales, well now it's Germany's turn with 7% in January. Admittedly over half are PHEV's, but still great and introducing people to EV's and reducing vehicle emissions:

7% Plug-In Vehicle Share In Germany!

The German plug-in electric vehicle (PEV) market started the year on fire, jumping 128% year over year (YoY), to a record 16,131 registrations. That smashed the previous record (12,026 units) set last October, so it seems the German locomotive has (finally) been set in motion.
While fully electric vehicles (BEVs) jumped significantly (+61% YoY), the bulk of growth came from plug-in hybrids (PHEVs), with their sales jumping through the roof (+308%!!!). That allowed plug-in hybrids to recover the lead from full electrics (46% BEV vs. 54% PHEV).
This brilliant performance, added to the fall of the overall market (-7% YoY), allowed the PEV share to jump from 2.6% a year ago to its current 6.6% in 2020. BEVs alone hit 3.1%, which is already originating significant changes in the fuels mix, with diesel dropping 12% YoY, to 33% share, while gasoline fell 17%, to 52% share.

EVandPV

Martyn1981 said:

buglawton said:

Not sure where EV hater comes from. By following good maintenance practices and not doing big miles, ICE is just so cheap to stay with. And the reality is, like me a large part of the British public has other things to spend money on than keeping up with the EV Joneses. Fascinating tech though.

Your ICE argument relies entirely on someone else buying new ICE cars. Since there is no factory turning out 'new' secondhand cars, or bangers, then any old ICE car argument applies equally to old BEV cars.

Most of the UK own cars, so your 'other things' argument is equally false, and your keeping up with the EV Joneses statement simply proves your bias - I (and I suspect most on here) have chosen to go down the BEV route as it is simply a better car, and better economics, with the environmental angle being a strong one, but not the main one*, it's simply an unavoidable bonus that nobody, even you will be able to avoid in the medium to long term - assuming no 'new' banger factory ever get built.

*That said, for those wishing to make an environmental change, the economic benefits of a BEV make the environmental beneficial switch an easy decision, so perhaps 'our' decisions be they environmental or economical, are more intertwined.

Also, surely if economy is your only concern, a second hand BEV makes far more sense than an 'old banger' that's only going to become more of a money pit as it starts to need continual repairs.
If your a low mileage driver, a second hand Zoe 22kwh can be bought for as little as £6k and charged for 1p a mile or less on Octopus Go/Agile.

almillar

buglawton said:

ill EVs seem to be twice as expensive to insure in the UK, due no doubt to higher repair costs.

My current ICE car is old enough to be in bangernomics territory. I follow EV threads and YouTube on EV out of technical interest, the tech really is more interesting than the ICE. Were I to switch to a 'bangernomics' EV it would have to be a well used Leaf or similar. Which regrettably would only get me to work and back. My bangernomics car with its 50mpg is too cheap to run for me to seriously look at an EV at the moment. I suspect a lot of the British public do a similar calculation.

Where's this information from? A person who made a YouTube video?! Based on my experience of insuring 2 EVs over 5 years, and anything I've ever heard from EV owners, this is absolute rubbish.

Care to share any link?

What's your bangernomics car got to do with EV insurance? What age is your car? What age of EV are you comparing it to? Is that a fair comparison? I guess - No. You don't want to spend money on cars, fine. Don't complain about new ones being expensive though!

JKenH

My own experience is that my Leaf costs a similar amount to insure as my Golf tdi but I was with LV= anyway. Saga were about twice as much when I got a quote for the Leaf. The moral is shop around but we don’t all do that and it might not be an option if one is changing car mid term.

Since I bought my first Leaf I have become an EV convert and my friends are getting fed up of me banging on about how great they are and everyone should have one. I am always emailing links to great leasing deals on the Leaf. There is nothing like the zeal of the converted. 

A BEV works for me because I have access to other cars. I needed to go to Oulton Park on Saturday, a 252 mile round trip, mainly motorway. There are no chargers there and even if there had been with Storm Dennis doing its worst I doubt I would have made it on either leg of the journey without an intermediate top up. So I was relieved to jump in my Merc and see I had a remaining range of 495 miles (I had already done 200 miles since last fill up), enough to go there and back as fast as the roads would allow with no range anxiety. 

The reality is that for a lot of people without access to a second ICE, a BEV demands compromises. It is necessary to plan long journeys in advance and accept that even then the journey may not go quite according to plan. If one is an EV enthusiast one is prepared to make sacrifices and accept that a bit of unexpected inconvenience is par for the course just as one might when running a classic car. It is best to think of long EV trips as an adventure. (I read today on one of the EV Facebook threads of someone who had done Glasgow to Barnsley in a Leaf 24 kwh necessitating 6 charges en route - ‘chapeau!’ I say. 

If however one has a long day ahead and time is important, or you have a couple of young kids in the car, an ICEV is still a more logical choice for most people. 

We are looking at changing my wife’s Kia Picanto which we have owned for more than 8 years. It does about 6000 miles a year and has cost us less than £1k a year in depreciation, came with 7 years warranty and has needed nothing other than routine servicing and 6 tyres. I was looking at a 69 plate mid range (like for like) replacement at £10.5k and could expect another 8 years at similar cost (i.e. about £2k per year for everything). 

Because I am an EV convert I would spend the extra and get a Skoda Citigo EV but my wife has said she would like another Picanto. She has said that while she much prefers driving an EV, if she needs to jump in the car at a moments notice to pick up the grand kids she doesn’t want to find the car has insufficient charge or has to charge to get back home. 

I respect her point of view and that of others who say an EV won’t work for them. EVs are still too much of a compromise for many people and we must accept that this is, and may continue to be, the case for some time yet. Labelling someone as being out to disrupt the thread because they say an EV won’t work for them is not helpful and won’t win them round. I think it is healthy that occasionally we get a reality check from someone who is not an EV convert and we try and see things from their point of view.

Solarchaser

EVandPV said:

EricMears said:

EVandPV said:

Some good news for Chargemap users ......

http://blog.chargemap.com/chargemap-cutting-charging-rates/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=cmnews_en_29

If you thought it was worth paying an extra 15% just to save loading a few apps,  you're not going to be all that excited by only having to pay 10% in future !  And now that contactless cards are being more widely accepted at chargers,  there's even less advantage to the chargemap scheme.

Must admit, I've never used Chargemap so had no idea how it all worked.
We have the Charge Place Scotland network up here which has been free until recently with most regions now introducing fees. I'm pretty much charging overnight at home all the time now as a result.

Where have you seen charges?
Ive never seen charges in Scotland, except for the odd rapid charger (and all motorway ones).
I regularly use them in the central belt , ayrshire and perth with no issues.

EVandPV

Solarchaser said:

EVandPV said:

EricMears said:

EVandPV said:

Some good news for Chargemap users ......

http://blog.chargemap.com/chargemap-cutting-charging-rates/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=cmnews_en_29

If you thought it was worth paying an extra 15% just to save loading a few apps,  you're not going to be all that excited by only having to pay 10% in future !  And now that contactless cards are being more widely accepted at chargers,  there's even less advantage to the chargemap scheme.

Must admit, I've never used Chargemap so had no idea how it all worked.
We have the Charge Place Scotland network up here which has been free until recently with most regions now introducing fees. I'm pretty much charging overnight at home all the time now as a result.

Where have you seen charges?
Ive never seen charges in Scotland, except for the odd rapid charger (and all motorway ones).
I regularly use them in the central belt , ayrshire and perth with no issues.

Orkney have had tariffs for a while, Dundee introduced charges in October, East Lothian started last year too and Fife start in April.
There's still plenty of free charging but I think it's just a matter of time before the rest follow suit although I guess they can't stay free forever.