EV Discussion thread

JKenH

Petriix said:

I've put in around 150kWh at public rapid chargers which mostly just used up some bone Instavolt credit I was given. I added £20 to my Podpoint account and that's all that's left my bank account for public charging. 

That reminds me, I must have a few quid lying around in accounts with charging providers. Inertia means I probably won see that again.

1961Nick

JKenH said:

1961Nick said:

JKenH said:

...... Yes I enjoyed charging for free but would sometimes put off a (spontaneous) discretionary trip because there wasn’t enough charge in the car. It just introduced a bit more hassle into life.... 

My experience has been the complete opposite. Because we can travel for virtually nothing, we've made many more spontaneous trips that we would have done in her diesel SUV. This week we went out for lunch, a trip that would have cost about £18 in the SUV but only cost 96p in the Tesla. 

Martyn1981 said:

1961Nick said:

JKenH said:

...... Yes I enjoyed charging for free but would sometimes put off a (spontaneous) discretionary trip because there wasn’t enough charge in the car. It just introduced a bit more hassle into life.... 

My experience has been the complete opposite. Because we can travel for virtually nothing, we've made many more spontaneous trips that we would have done in her diesel SUV. This week we went out for lunch, a trip that would have cost about £18 in the SUV but only cost 96p in the Tesla. 

Same with me. Lost interest in driving a few decades back, but now find it fun and pleasant again. Can't exactly say I like traffic jams, but they and slow queues are far more pleasant.

There’s the law of unintended consequences coming into play. EVs are causing us to drive further than we did before. I have to admit when I first got the Leaf I took every opportunity to go out for a drive. When I got the Golf it sat in the garage for 2-3 weeks and it’s first trip was a functional one to Wales. 

Given that electricity generated in most parts of the world comes in part from fossil fuels these extra spontaneous miles are undoing some of the good work that EVs are doing in reducing CO2.

I suppose with a 75 kWh battery even half full will get you a long way.

I only use green electrons from Octopus Ken.

EricMears

JKenH said:
You don’t need an ICE car to always have a full petrol tank if you have a sudden change of plan. I don’t fret about how much fuel is in the car as I can literally fill up in 5 minutes on my route with absolute certainty. 

The 'absolute certainty' must have taken a bit of a knock last year when fuel tanker drivers went on strike and ICE drivers were queuing up to buy a couple of gallons of fuel !

JKenH

EricMears said:

JKenH said:
You don’t need an ICE car to always have a full petrol tank if you have a sudden change of plan. I don’t fret about how much fuel is in the car as I can literally fill up in 5 minutes on my route with absolute certainty. 

The 'absolute certainty' must have taken a bit of a knock last year when fuel tanker drivers went on strike and ICE drivers were queuing up to buy a couple of gallons of fuel !

Well. as luck would have it I was driving an EV then. I do though find if interesting that something that happens once every 20 years or so is brought up so often. If there was a fuel drivers strike on now I would have a different view but there isn’t and I would be quite happy to jump in my car tomorrow and drive another 380 miles with just 70 miles range showing and fill up on the road when convenient without any advance planning. Could you say the same with your Leaf?

I don’t know if you are a member  of the Nissan Leaf Owners Facebook group but if you are you will have seen numerous posts today about charging problems and how much worse it has become to the point where some are saying enough is enough. 

It doesn’t affect you, I can accept that. I can also accept that the majority of EV drivers are happy with the charging network (or at least don’t complain even if they admit it could do with improvement).  But for a (perhaps small) percentage like me it isn’t good enough to keep us in an EV. 

I don’t recall 3 years ago anyone was saying they were going back to an ICE car or a Phev but it seems everyday now this seems to be raised on the EV Drivers and Leaf Facebook groups. 

silvercar

I must be bucking the trend. OH changed his diesel guzzling BMW for a Tesla in March and I love the Tesla so much that I’ve just sold my ICE and ordered a Leaf. So we will be a totally electric household in a few weeks time.

JKenH

silvercar said:

I must be bucking the trend. OH changed his diesel guzzling BMW for a Tesla in March and I love the Tesla so much that I’ve just sold my ICE and ordered a Leaf. So we will be a totally electric household in a few weeks time.

No, you are bang on trend. I have said before I am a contrarian. I bought fitted carpets when the trend was for laminate flooring. I am happy to go with what works for me.

You have the right combination of EVs to make it work if the Tesla is the main car. Charging a Tesla (I imagine) is a completely different experience to a Leaf. The car does a lot of the planning and I believe even updates the status of planned charging stops. And I believe the Tesla network is more reliable. Personally I think opening up the Tesla network to non Teslas is a bad move for the brand and Tesla drivers. Owning a Tesla is a bit like buying private medical insurance and personally  I think it is a good thing - it takes pressure off public provision. Maybe that’s also why some people hate Teslas. I don’t, in fact I still haven’t grown out of saying to my wife “there’s a Tesla”. I saw a BMW i7 the other day and didn’t even comment. 

My problem was once I got the Leaf I wanted to move to an all EV household  ( I sold both my ICE cars) but my wife wants to stay with a small ICE car even though she did most of her driving in the Leaf. 

I did seriously consider a Tesla but it would have had to be a LR and tbh I can’t bring myself to spend £50k plus on a car just as a means of transport when my £16k Golf does the job (and at the time I had every intention of keeping the Leaf as well). At the time I got the Golf, most used Teslas were costing as much as new ones and that didn’t make much sense to me. That’s all changed in the last couple of months of course. 

Grumpy_chap

JKenH said:

I did seriously consider a Tesla but it would have had to be a LR and tbh I can’t bring myself to spend £50k plus on a car just as a means of transport when my £16k Golf does the job (and at the time I had every intention of keeping the Leaf as well). At the time I got the Golf, most used Teslas were costing as much as new ones and that didn’t make much sense to me. That’s all changed in the last couple of months of course. 

The price of used Tesla's has certainly softened in the past few weeks.  
As have iPace - especially via the Jaguar network with the large finance incentive and home charger

I wonder whether the price of new Tesla's will reduce?
The lead times are now much shorter than they were and there was an attractive lease offer for new TMY's from stock recently (not sure if it is still available).
The Tesla approach of "the price is the price, no offers" makes it difficult for prices to reduce without offending existing customers, unlike the majority of manufacturers who set the list price and then always have varying offers / incentives available.

I did just see a £36k 2019 TM3LR 25k miles which is certainly better than was available a fortnight ago.  Current new price is £57k, but I could not find past price history to assess the level of "discount" that this used TM3 would be.
It is still a significant cost-uplift against a comparative ICE.

EDIT:
Here is a TM3LR, 2019, 18k miles, £36k:
https://www.autotrader.co.uk/car-details/202212142521259

To compare with a Jaguar XE, 2020, 21k miles, £30k:
https://www.autotrader.co.uk/car-details/202211051401320

ICE options would be cheaper still if relaxing the AWD from the specification, which is not a major consideration for the majority, but included to make the comparison as close as possible.

1961Nick

Tesla appear to have an oversupply problem due to the Chinese market stalling because of Covid lockdowns. The situation isn't helped due to Tesla still ramping production at Texas & Berlin. Whether this becomes a long term thing or a temporary blip only time will tell.

Now might be a good time for Tesla to work on the Model 2 - or whatever they decide to call it - because there's a vast untapped market for a premium $25,000 EV with a 200+ mile range. There can be little doubt that Tesla could make that vehicle for a lot less than anyone else (other than maybe BYD) & price is crucial in that segment.

ABrass

Tesla are going to have to drop prices if they want to keep growing sales outside the US. At a lower price more people will be interested.

The US is effectively on pause due to the Inflation Reduction Act, which means if you wait to the new year you'll save thousands.

Or perhaps ditch Musk, he's !!!!!! off a lot of the traditional EV buyers and the Tesla brand is suffering because of it.

Martyn1981

ABrass said:

Tesla are going to have to drop prices if they want to keep growing sales outside the US. At a lower price more people will be interested.

The US is effectively on pause due to the Inflation Reduction Act, which means if you wait to the new year you'll save thousands.

Or perhaps ditch Musk, he's !!!!!! off a lot of the traditional EV buyers and the Tesla brand is suffering because of it.

Thinking of getting one of the large tansfers for the back of TiMmY that says "I bought this car before Elon went nuts!"