Practical/affordable electric cars?

Herzlos

Bigwheels1111 said:

[Deleted User] said:

I'd try to go fully electric if you can, avoid hybrids. The problem with hybrids is you pay a premium to buy them, and then you have to maintain that petrol engine too. With an EV you greatly reduce your maintenance costs.

The charging infrastructure is much better than it used to be, and long journeys aren't a big problem now.

EV you greatly reduce your maintenance costs.

I have found that this is not so.

My friend MG ZS EV costs more than my Diesel to service for 5 years.

£805 Peugeot 5008 Diesel

MG £900.

I got him the quotes.

What's in the quotes? Because there's nothing in an MG ZS EV to service beyond an air filter and a software update.

Herzlos

jimbo6977 said:

Herzlos said:

Petriix said:

Alternatively, hire a car for those long trips and buy a short range EV. It's about £120 to hire a car for the weekend.

I think this is something a lot of people forget about, and it doesn't just apply to EV owners. If you only need something specific out of a car for a week a year (like a huge car to go on holiday, or a super long range or whatever), then it's going to be much cheaper in most cases to just run the smaller car all year and hire what you need for that week.

If I'm doing business travel, I just rent something because it's easier to expense and it's always gone fine.

Of course you may need to book in advance and there's a risk of peak pricing issues, but it's a model that works fairly well most of the time.

Hire cars are great in theory but there are too many horror stories of people being stiffed by unscrupulous hire desks for damage they didn't cause. 

The risk should be vastly reduced by using reputable companies and taking photos before/after the hire.

It's definitely more hassle than having the vehicle year now, but may be pretty cost effective.

Mutton_Geoff

[Deleted User] said:

I'd try to go fully electric if you can, avoid hybrids. The problem with hybrids is you pay a premium to buy them, and then you have to maintain that petrol engine too. With an EV you greatly reduce your maintenance costs.

The charging infrastructure is much better than it used to be, and long journeys aren't a big problem now.

There is also a misconception that the petrol engine in a hybrid will charge the battery.

A plug in fast charger has a rating of 22kw and takes around 3-4 hours to charge. 22 kilowatts is approx 32hp so would literally suck the life out of a PHEV engine even if it did have a generator powerful enough to charge the battery.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GoZN828qnp8

Jenni_D

Bigwheels1111 said:

[Deleted User] said:

I'd try to go fully electric if you can, avoid hybrids. The problem with hybrids is you pay a premium to buy them, and then you have to maintain that petrol engine too. With an EV you greatly reduce your maintenance costs.

The charging infrastructure is much better than it used to be, and long journeys aren't a big problem now.

EV you greatly reduce your maintenance costs.

I have found that this is not so.

My friend MG ZS EV costs more than my Diesel to service for 5 years.

£805 Peugeot 5008 Diesel

MG £900.

I got him the quotes.

The MG service plan also includes MG Assist (AA vehicle cover, with recovery, relay and home start) for each year after the service. Does the Peugeot 5008 Diesel service plan include an equivalent?

Bigwheels1111

Herzlos said:

Bigwheels1111 said:

[Deleted User] said:

I'd try to go fully electric if you can, avoid hybrids. The problem with hybrids is you pay a premium to buy them, and then you have to maintain that petrol engine too. With an EV you greatly reduce your maintenance costs.

The charging infrastructure is much better than it used to be, and long journeys aren't a big problem now.

EV you greatly reduce your maintenance costs.

I have found that this is not so.

My friend MG ZS EV costs more than my Diesel to service for 5 years.

£805 Peugeot 5008 Diesel

MG £900.

I got him the quotes.

What's in the quotes? Because there's nothing in an MG ZS EV to service beyond an air filter and a software update.

I know, The U is a tick

STANDARD MILEAGE SERVICE PLAN - 15,000 MILE/12 MONTH

	1st year or 15,000 miles	2nd year or 30,000 miles	3rd year or 45,000 miles	4th year or 60,000 miles	5th year or 75,000 miles
Pollen filter	-	ü	-	ü	-
Key batteries	-	ü	-	ü	-
Brake fluid	-	ü	-	ü	-
Coolant	-	-	-	-	ü

shinytop

Mutton_Geoff said:

[Deleted User] said:

I'd try to go fully electric if you can, avoid hybrids. The problem with hybrids is you pay a premium to buy them, and then you have to maintain that petrol engine too. With an EV you greatly reduce your maintenance costs.

The charging infrastructure is much better than it used to be, and long journeys aren't a big problem now.

There is also a misconception that the petrol engine in a hybrid will charge the battery.

A plug in fast charger has a rating of 22kw and takes around 3-4 hours to charge. 22 kilowatts is approx 32hp so would literally suck the life out of a PHEV engine even if it did have a generator powerful enough to charge the battery.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GoZN828qnp8

That's a little misleading.  I don't think anyone thinks a PHEV engine will charge as quick as a fast charger.  But my Golf GTE would charge the battery quicker than my home charger (a proper one not a 3 pin plug in one).  

So a PHEV will charge the battery.  Also, a GTE has a 148 bhp petrol engine and under normal driving can easily spare a few HPs to charge the battery, even 32 of them if it had to.  The only difference I noticed was a drop in mpg.  

Jenni_D

A PHEV uses the ICE to charge the EV battery? Really? Maybe to a very small extent, and regen braking does (to some extent), but what does the P stand for in PHEV?  

shinytop

Jenni_D said:

A PHEV uses the ICE to charge the EV battery? Really? Maybe a self-charging hybrid does, and regen braking does (to some extent), but what does the P stand for in PHEV?  

Well the one I had definitely did. I even plugged it in sometimes too. 

DrEskimo

Bigwheels1111 said:

Herzlos said:

Bigwheels1111 said:

[Deleted User] said:

I'd try to go fully electric if you can, avoid hybrids. The problem with hybrids is you pay a premium to buy them, and then you have to maintain that petrol engine too. With an EV you greatly reduce your maintenance costs.

The charging infrastructure is much better than it used to be, and long journeys aren't a big problem now.

EV you greatly reduce your maintenance costs.

I have found that this is not so.

My friend MG ZS EV costs more than my Diesel to service for 5 years.

£805 Peugeot 5008 Diesel

MG £900.

I got him the quotes.

What's in the quotes? Because there's nothing in an MG ZS EV to service beyond an air filter and a software update.

I know, The U is a tick

STANDARD MILEAGE SERVICE PLAN - 15,000 MILE/12 MONTH

	1st year or 15,000 miles	2nd year or 30,000 miles	3rd year or 45,000 miles	4th year or 60,000 miles	5th year or 75,000 miles
Pollen filter	-	ü	-	ü	-
Key batteries	-	ü	-	ü	-
Brake fluid	-	ü	-	ü	-
Coolant	-	-	-	-	ü

Is there any need to do the brake fluid of coolant service though? For my Renault, it has extortionate prices for12v battery replacement, brake fluid changes and coolant changes. These are just recommended though and I imagine 9/10 are not even needed, as the fluids are fine. I just change the 12v battery myself.

In the 4yrs I've had my Zoe I've just done the A/B service that has ranged from £90-£120 a year to keep the warranty going. 

CarolWHerts

mysteryUser said:

I recently bought a 2016 VW Golf GTE and love it, there's also the Passat. 

Doesn't quite do the 40 miles you are looking for though, not the 2016 one anyway. Newer ones do more than mine. In summer mine does about 22 miles. In this colder weather it's more like 16. 

Another vote here for the VW plug in hybrids. We have had a 2016 Golf GTE for four years and it now gets about 20 miles of electric driving before the 1.4 petrol engine kicks in. We did have a (free) new HV battery under the recall in 2019. Then when circumstances changed and we needed two cars we bought a new Golf e-hybrid because we loved the other one so much - it's a great driving car. The new one, with a bigger battery, will do a 30 mile round trip on electric only, driven carefully. After that, petrol consumption appears to be in the region of 40-50mpg. 

The PHEVs provide either the best of both systems or the worst, depending on how you frame it. It all depends on your personal circumstances and preferences. We do mainly short distances with the occasional long trip so no range anxiety. We can charge on our driveway and have some solar panels that can sometimes help charge the cars and we have a decent electricity tariff. I also love the pre-heating/cooling features that the electric gives you. It's not the absolutely cheapest way to drive, taking all costs into account, but suits our particular circumstances. 

I have also found that there are some very helpful FB and SpeakEV forums where EV fans have the answers to all your questions to get the most out of these cars (as the car manuals appear to be written by German engineers for German engineers).