16 months living with an EV - my honest experience

[b0rn2sk8]

Yeh its not every week. Just most holiday periods so maybe 5 or 6 times a year at the most.

Normally I just do it all in one trip without stopping but I probably wouldn't mind a 45 minute stop to get a coffee or something.

I truly hope there is a breakthrough that makes over 300 miles a charge (even in the winter) realistic for the average EV car. Would be amazing.

I have a private drive running right next to the wall of my house so charging and getting an ev point installed would be no issue. Its literally only the range that I'm worried about, and I think that would only ever bother me infrequently .

Most recommend staying away from the leaf unless it’s really cheap or you’ll not be stuck with it for a long period of time (including gen1 leaf owners).

It’s a really old car, that has been tarted up a bit and a large battery pack added.

The main issue with the leaf are the fundamentals are still the same as when it launched in 2012 (chademo, air cooled batteries etc.) and they are not up to standard in 2021.

It really doesn’t go very far given the size of the pack and it was considered to be pretty expensive for what it offered.

That said, if you can get a good deal over a short pcp/lease it might be worth looking at.

 

[chaparral]

This is a really difficult question. I'd really like to say yes -- I could charge locally as there's chargers in supermarkets, on street parking spots etc..
In reality - that would take away one of the best features which is always leaving home every day with a full (or 80%) battery, as well as the ultra-low running costs.

I think I'd have probably waited a bit to let things develop a bit further if I couldn't charge at home.

Thanks

Having no home charger or charger at my work place scares me a bit about owning an EV and can see it going to hold me back from buying one for a very long time

I don't know anyone yet that owns an EV that doesn't have there own driveway or garage where they can charge it..

 

[VincentHanna]

Technically I don't have a designated drive way but my cul-de-sac is rather unique.

4 homes share this space:

 

[theone8181]

Forgive if this has been covered, but as a large proportion if the country don't have a drive, how do they charge up? I'm thinking a cable to a lamppost is asking for trouble (but could see ****** trying it).

 

[Haggisman]

Forgive if this has been covered, but as a large proportion if the country don't have a drive, how do they charge up? I'm thinking a cable to a lamppost is asking for trouble (but could see ****** trying it).

This is actually being done in some streets. Failing that, charging at work, park & ride etc, or as charging speed and battery tech improves, popping to your local rapid charger will hopefully become no more inconvenient than having to go to the petrol station

 

[b0rn2sk8]

‘Only’ about 40% of households don’t have access to suitable off street parking. You do have to consider that people without off street parking are also less likely to have a car (think inner city and flats), even less likely to have multiple cars per household.

Still a lot though and very much a post code lottery where you’ll get pockets of streets where there isn’t really a great solution because they also have narrow pavements so putting in charge posts is difficult.

For flats there really isn’t anything stopping leaseholders and the free holder sorting something out but it all comes down to money and no one will want to pay for it and those who don’t own cars will not want to subsidise others who own cars to get it.

 

[Bradmax57]

I'm almost just about to order a EQC and running it as a company car on a 3 year lease, I do have a single driveway at the back of house which is fortunately very close to my fuse box (presume a wall charging pod has to be wired into that directly?) however as its a town house don't have much space and currently have a cycle shed and a garden storage unit on the drive so may have to do a little rearranging of that, how long are the tethered cables? There are a couple of 50kw chargers around the corner which would only be a few minutes walk home, not ideal but could work I guess

 

[blun]

I read yesterday that althoguh

‘Only’ about 40% of households don’t have access to suitable off street parking. You do have to consider that people without off street parking are also less likely to have a car (think inner city and flats), even less likely to have multiple cars per household.

I believe it's something like 40% of houses don't have off road parking, but 20% of drivers don't have off-road parking (which supports your point there). That's still 20% of people that need a different solution though. Charging at work / train station will be an option for some, and fast charging whilst shopping or at the gym could be another. It's not as convenient as charging at home though.

.. may have to do a little rearranging of that, how long are the tethered cables? There are a couple of 50kw chargers around the corner which would only be a few minutes walk home, not ideal but could work I guess

Most home charge points come with a 5m cable but you can get 10m ones (possibly longer - not sure!)

 

[HangTime]

Also remember "off-road parking" doesn't necessarily mean you can easily charge your car there. We have both a garage and an off-road parking space in front of it, but neither of those can easily have power run to them. So looking at stats for off-road parking will be quite misleading I think, I mean loads of flats have off-road parking for example but it's not attached to their property...

 

[MissChief]

So the local authorities get the money from taxes, so the tax payer is paying for people to drive vehicles that would cost 2p per mile for free?

As a Scottish taxpayer, I'm actually really, completely and totally OK with this! As I am paying a little bit more tax for free further education and free prescriptions.

 

[theone8181]

Also remember "off-road parking" doesn't necessarily mean you can easily charge your car there. We have both a garage and an off-road parking space in front of it, but neither of those can easily have power run to them. So looking at stats for off-road parking will be quite misleading I think, I mean loads of flats have off-road parking for example but it's not attached to their property...

I can't believe it's that high, I'd have thought it would be closer to 50/50 (going on how many cars park on the road). I suppose if a family have 1 space off road but 2 cars it still counts as having off road patking.

 

[DarrenM343]

Also remember "off-road parking" doesn't necessarily mean you can easily charge your car there. We have both a garage and an off-road parking space in front of it, but neither of those can easily have power run to them. So looking at stats for off-road parking will be quite misleading I think, I mean loads of flats have off-road parking for example but it's not attached to their property...

Is the garage in a block or something?

I wouldn't have bought an EV at this time without being able to charge it at home. Inconvenience of trying to keep one charged, possibly having to queue, the higher cost too potentially. The savings can be just 50% of fuel, maybe worse. Imagine rocking up at a 1 charger station and the bay is already populated. 2 hours later you finally leave having only saved 50% of the cost of a tank of fuel. Also it's often recommended to be always connected to a charger when not in use. I leave mine plugged in all the time, even if not using for 5 days. This allows the cell balancing to take place and pre-heating of the battery/cabin if required, although cabin pre-heating can be done if not connected but will of course drain the battery.

In next 5 or so years a 300 mile range from a 10 min charge should be doable so will make EV's available to more people I think and the infrastructure improvements will help before then too.

 

[booyaka]

Was quickly checking last night and I last charged at home 9 weeks ago. Done the last 450 miles in that time for a cost of nothing in terms of charging.

Public chargers at the golf course, top battery up once a week at the moment. Can't beat it.

 

[Haggisman]

I think driveway/garage parking is going to have a much bigger impact on house desirability/value in the near future because of this. It's certainly on the "100% must have" list for us when we look to move in the next few years.

 

[b0rn2sk8]

I think driveway/garage parking is going to have a much bigger impact on house desirability/value in the near future because of this. It's certainly on the "100% must have" list for us when we look to move in the next few years.

Agreed and I won’t deny this wasn’t a factor in our move last year.

 

[Randomface74]

Forgive if this has been covered, but as a large proportion if the country don't have a drive, how do they charge up?

Public charging, which is a pita and negates all the fuel savings, so I wouldn't advise those ppl to get an EV yet. Charging will have to get faster so you can refill at a 'petrol station' in a couple of minute like you do now otherwise there'll be massive queues in 2030. If that can't be done with electric it'll be hydrogen instead.

 

[b0rn2sk8]

If it can’t be done with BEVs then hydrogen will have no chance.

The costs of installing infrastructure and producing the fuel in a clean way exceed that BEVs by an order of magnitude. It all comes down to the economics of the fuel and hydrogen is just an inefficient way of storing energy. Unlike fossil fuels, you get way less out than you put in so you might as well just stick it all in BEVs from the off.

Hydrogen will have its place, just not in mass market cars.

 

[VincentHanna]

Already we are seeing cars like the Porshe Taycan supporting 350kw charging and having a good charging curve

Bjorn Nyland charged one from 5-80% in 23 minutes. That's pretty speedy!

 

[jpaul]

The costs of installing infrastructure and producing the fuel in a clean way exceed that BEVs by an order of magnitude. It all comes down to the economics of the fuel and hydrogen is just an inefficient way of storing energy. Unlike fossil fuels, you get way less out than you put in so you might as well just stick it all in BEVs from the off.

Hydrogen will have its place, just not in mass market cars.

I've not seen an analysis on whether hydrogen could actually be distributed in sufficient volume by an equivalent number of lorrys replacing fuel tankers. ?
The bmw prototypes 6-8kg of gas for ice type range so maybe it is even lighter(!)
but, as soon as you have spare off-peak wind energy , or a nuclear station, you can afford the inefficiency hydrogen production introduces,
also is the co2 impact of fuel cell creation less than batteries

 

[Randomface74]

Bjorn Nyland charged one from 5-80% in 23 minutes. That's pretty speedy!

It is progress, but it's still garbage compared to the 2 mins it takes to fill up with petrol. You'd need 10x more chargers than petrol pumps.