The all things EV chat thread

[bobmac]

240 miles is the real world range so he must be booting it with no regen on.
He spent 2 nights away and didn't charge overnight.
Just generally poor planning.
Yes, I know there are not enough chargers and not all of them work but if he's doing a lot of miles, he should stick with his Q7 until things improve. Or make sure he has a plan B

 

[Leftitshort]

I reckon you lose approx 25% range when it’s cold & long steady state runs combined. The Audi will be intuitive regen but grated it will have a max manual overrid. Based on experience you get about 50 miles overnight on a 240v.
If it was my own money I wouldn’t touch one yet unless it’s around town only. If it company car, sign me straight up. I’d make that work.

 

[cliveb]

Apart from not reading the manual, what mistakes?

The thing that irritated me was his continual erroneous use of the phrase "kw per hour".

 

[Fade and Die]

An interesting piece. No axes to grind, seemed pretty fair.

Ian is a decent chap (and a hammer) no way would be be unfair in his report.

It just confirms what I thought, an EV is a city car, excellent if you can charge it up at home every night then drive 150miles next day. Wholly unsuitable for long journeys where you need to rely on the public network and regen breaking.

 

[bobmac]

I reckon you lose approx 25% range when it’s cold & long steady state runs combined. The Audi will be intuitive regen but grated it will have a max manual overrid. Based on experience you get about 50 miles overnight on a 240v.
If it was my own money I wouldn’t touch one yet unless it’s around town only. If it company car, sign me straight up. I’d make that work.

He doesn't seem to have grasped the idea of charging while you do stuff like sleep, coffee with a mate, doing a radio show etc.
He does his stuff, then goes looking for a super fast charger because he doesn't want to wait hours.
He also forgot to mention his Q7 holds around 22 gallons with around 20-25 mpg. I wonder how much that would cost to fill at motorway service prices.

. Wholly unsuitable for long journeys where you need to rely on the public network and regen breaking.

No-one is disputing that, everyone knows that and everyday, things are improving but when someone complains about having to have nap because he couldn't open the charge flap, give me a break.

 

[Bunkermagnet]

He doesn't seem to have grasped the idea of charging while you do stuff like sleep, coffee with a mate, doing a radio show etc.
He does his stuff, then goes looking for a super fast charger because he doesn't want to wait hours.
He also forgot to mention his Q7 holds around 22 gallons with around 20-25 mpg. I wonder how much that would cost to fill at motorway service prices.


No-one is disputing that, everyone knows that and everyday, things are improving but when someone complains about having to have nap because he couldn't open the charge flap, give me a break.

I think you're exagerating a lilttle... the fuel capacity is 75-85 litres, so about 18 gallons. My VW Transporter fully loaded and with 80 litres of fuel will give 30-35 mpg around town, so I would suggest a Q7 would get more than the 20-25 you claim.
Just sayin

 

[bobmac]

I think you're exagerating a lilttle... the fuel capacity is 75-85 litres, so about 18 gallons. My VW Transporter fully loaded and with 80 litres of fuel will give 30-35 mpg around town, so I would suggest a Q7 would get more than the 20-25 you claim.
Just sayin

I've never had an Audi Q7 so I looked up Autotrader and all the Q7s I saw were 100 litre capacity.
So I wouldn't think you'd get much change from £200 if you were filling up with diesel at motorway services.
https://www.fuelly.com/car/audi/q7

 

[Deleted member 23270]

I was in my local Tesco superstore yesterday. They have 4 EV charging points, 2 of them had EV's parked in them but not plugged in to charge. You couldn't make up the stupidity of some people

 

[cliveb]

I was in my local Tesco superstore yesterday. They have 4 EV charging points, 2 of them had EV's parked in them but not plugged in to charge. You couldn't make up the stupidity of some people

Are the charging points close to the entrance?
If so, that's why some selfish people will park there (even some ICE cars).
Supermarkets really should place their EV charging points far from the entrance specifically to avoid this kind of antisocial behaviour.

 

[PJ87]

Are the charging points close to the entrance?
If so, that's why some selfish people will park there (even some ICE cars).
Supermarkets really should place their EV charging points far from the entrance specifically to avoid this kind of antisocial behaviour.

The problem with public charging is it is built on people not being self centred ..

I mean take our station. They put in a bike pump .. all the local kids used it ...right next to the bike rack. Perfect. Real good idea.

Then someone just cut it for a giggle.

Same with these parking there will be some who park there just because .. or oh I'll top up when almost full

Same with the petrol crisis how many just went for £10 when if they had kept to buying habits it would have been fine

 

[Deleted member 23270]

Are the charging points close to the entrance?
If so, that's why some selfish people will park there (even some ICE cars).
Supermarkets really should place their EV charging points far from the entrance specifically to avoid this kind of antisocial behaviour.

Yes close by the disabled and mother/child spots. It was Saturday morning and quite busy but the car park was probably only 2/3rds full. Hopefully the incosiderate ones will have to hang around and wait to charge next time.

 

[GreiginFife]

Well, it's been an eventful 10 days of EV "ownership" which has now ended with my car being returned and the Ioniq being taken away. So how did it fare? Here's my objective take having experienced it (disclaimer, this is in Fife, Scotland. In a village setting with a moderate sized town nearby. It is NOT a city with lots of amenities).

The car itself: It's ugly. Lets get that out of the way first. It's build quality is terrible and the inordinate use of plastics in an "environmentally friendly" car is shameful. The dashboard looked like one complete continuous plastic moulding with a screen in it. The seats, they were ok, I am used to shaped "sports seats" but these were just plain flat seats. Not major but not very secure feeling.
Driving: Quiet operation, but lots (and I mean LOTS) of road noise from a poorly insulated cabin, at one point while driving on a rough road surface I had to turn the music up to hear it. Braking was sharp however and the acceleration was good, smooth and quick enough. Sterile is a word I used a lot to describe the overall drive though. Fine if you are not really interested in drive quality. Suspension was ropey though, softer than a baby's nappy filler. Rolled like hell in corners - scarily sometimes.

Verdict: I wouldn't buy an Ioniq, some will and that's ok. But you are not getting a good car IMO, you are getting a passable EV. To balance that, I test drove the i4 M50 and it eliminated most of the above issues, so it's not an EV issue here, just this specific car.

Home Charging: I can't give full comment on it as I was only supplied a mains plug in charger than was slower than a week self isolating with the family. I used it overnight pretty much and had to use it every second night. I think a "proper" charger would have eliminated this so it's not something that I can fully venture opinion on. I also had one issue where the charge lead had been pulled slightly and was unseated slightly from the socket, so it didn't charge at all and I hadn't noticed. But as before this is specific to that charger type and can happen to any plugged in device I suppose, a "proper" charger would prevent that.

Out and about charging: Bit of a bust in my area. I visited Tesco 4 times and Aldi twice. In all but 1 case there was no charger free when I arrived. So unless I wanted to wait until they became free (however long that could take) I just had to park up normally and do my shop. On the onw occasion I did manage to get one (Aldi) I was in and out in 20 minutes and upon arriving had 128 miles and upon leaving had 151 miles. So not a lot but some and it was free. I scouted around town looking for charge locations and found that Dunfermline is actually quite barren in that department. Most places that did have them were restricted to customer use (which is fair enough - but I'm not going to buy things I don't need from somewhere I never shop just to use a charger for 5 minutes).

Charge usage: Variable and unpredictable would be the two words I would use to describe this. There's obviously a number of factors that affect this, but on a few occasions, the trip to Tesco (4.3 miles) whilst driving pretty much the same (30mph, same route, roughly same traffic conditions) yielded different usage figures. Not wildly different but enough that would make me question this effect on longer journeys. Stereo and heaters also had a noticeable effect (heaters mainly as we were hit with freezing mornings when the weather was good and then freezing days when the weather turned bad). Again, having access to reliable charging (home) would probably make me less nervous about it.

Overall: It was certainly an interesting experience, and it highlighted to me where we are and where we aren't for EV mass adoption. If you live in a city or somewhere with a reasonable populace, it's probably going to be a bit better for you and viable for the "out and about" piece. If you are not urban and can get a home charger, it would be more viable. If you are rural and have no access to charging then forget it. It's not for you at the moment until more charging points (or even charging stations akin to petrol stations) are available.
I will be keeping my name on the i4 wait list as I feel it's a good car and with the right home charger would work for me, I just wouldn't rely on the "when you are out it will all be easy" approach as it's just not the case here. Longer journey's especially those North of here that I regularly take will require MUCH more planning that I need to do now as what I consider rural here is practically urban sprawl compared to places up there (that's the REAL North to you folks in England )

I have to say that I am happy to have my own car back (and excited by the modifications and reconfig that's been done whilst it was away, dyno is reporting 525BHP from their test runs, although I will take it to my mate's place to verify), much of my trepidation is down to the poor quality of the car though, with some minor additional reticence caused by the "out and about" charging situation. I do believe that it will get better but it's now been almost 3 years since Tesco installed the two chargers and here we are in 2022 still with two chargers. A railways station with none and 4 "large" car parks in the town (all above 150 spaces) with none either. The revolution is turning very slowly for us in Fifeland.

 

[drdel]

'Public' chargers should use a traffic light system. Steady Green indicting free, flashing green for charging, Orange for virtually charge complete in 15 minutes and Red for charge complete and car now illegally parked with potential fine of £50 !!!

 

[Bunkermagnet]

Is the EV world shooting itself in the foot?
The supermarkets dont supply milk and bread for free, so why should they supply free electric to charge those EV's?
If charging your EV was fully chargeable, it would a) encourage people to stay on the charger for as little as possible, and more importantly b) encourage more chargers to be installed because there would then be a return on them.
Currently where is the incentive for a retailler to install a charger, all they do is cost them a lot of money. I don't expect everyone to pay for my electric to wash my clothes or cook my food, so why should EV owners expect everyone else to pay for their charging, because the retaillers put that cost onto everyone else...they aren't charities.

 

[bobmac]

Is the EV world shooting itself in the foot?
The supermarkets dont supply milk and bread for free, so why should they supply free electric to charge those EV's?
If charging your EV was fully chargeable, it would a) encourage people to stay on the charger for as little as possible, and more importantly b) encourage more chargers to be installed because there would then be a return on them.
Currently where is the incentive for a retailler to install a charger, all they do is cost them a lot of money. I don't expect everyone to pay for my electric to wash my clothes or cook my food, so why should EV owners expect everyone else to pay for their charging, because the retaillers put that cost onto everyone else...they aren't charities.

I can only speak for my town which has Aldi, Lidl, Tesco and Sainsburys and
Tesco is the only one that has EV charging. That gives it a unique selling point, I'll do my shopping at Tesco and charge at the same time.
And not all the chargers are free, you have to pay 28p per kwh for the faster 50kwh charger and even at that price, you could charge your EV from 20%-80% in 30 mins at the cost of about £7 (less than the cost of a gallon of diesel 100 yds away) which would add 80-100 miles. Just sayin

 

[Deleted member 23270]

Do public charge points charge only for the electricity you use or the entire time the car is plugged in?

 

[pool888]

Free charging will stop if energy prices keep going the way they are, the free supermarket ones are usually 7kw ones (in our town anyway) which add around 30 miles per hour, if you're just popping in for 10 minutes it's not worth getting the cable out of the boot, if your doing full shop for over half an hour then maybe as you'll add roughly 15-20 miles, but if you're on an EV tariff at home like most EV drivers you'll save less than 50p of off peak electric, hardly anything to get too excited about considering the cost of a full shop. I can see them in the future offering X amount of kw free charging if you spend X amount in the shop, a bit like the money off per litre of petrol/diesel offers they sometimes have.

You only get charged for the amount of energy drawn from the charger, which will be slightly more than the amount going into your car due to losses. This is why chargers need overstay fees so that you pay for hogging up the charger once your charge is complete.

 

[bobmac]

the free supermarket ones are usually 7kw ones (in our town anyway)

We must be lucky as we have 7 and 22kwh which are free and a 50kwh which is 28p per kwh

 

[Deleted member 15344]

I can only speak for my town which has Aldi, Lidl, Tesco and Sainsburys and
Tesco is the only one that has EV charging. That gives it a unique selling point, I'll do my shopping at Tesco and charge at the same time.
And not all the chargers are free, you have to pay 28p per kwh for the faster 50kwh charger and even at that price, you could charge your EV from 20%-80% in 30 mins at the cost of about £7 (less than the cost of a gallon of diesel 100 yds away) which would add 80-100 miles. Just sayin

Which leccy car did you get in the end ?

 

[bobmac]

Which leccy car did you get in the end ?

I wasn't quoting myself, I was just typing what some people might say.
When I do get my EV, I'll do a full report, it's probably going to be a Nissan Leaf 2019 or an eGolf