Electric Vehicles

[Droverunner]

>>>It will get better, just like mobile phone batteries, however it’s not there yet, so I won’t invest until it’s better.

That's been our view. I've been lucky to take an early retirement package years ago but Mrs D who is the same age kept on longer and finishes next month. Five years ago we started chatting through some retirement thoughts and one was that she'd change her CLK for a new/nearly new elec car at retirement with part of her lump sum. We still had that thought three years ago. But things haven't moved on fast enough re range and charging access en-route for us to commit to swapping her lovely CLK worth perhaps £2500 for something elec at £30000+. Laying out £30k for something she'd not like as much is just not a good retirement option.

At 65 how many driving years have we left I wonder... 20 a reasonable average forecast? In truth I think we may leave it to the next generation to enjoy (?) the benefits of research and investment that solves the massive elec car issues currently existing.

I do wonder if it will turn out our generation has enjoyed the best years of motoring never to be seen again?

 

[A.J.]

I do wonder if it will turn out our generation has enjoyed the best years of motoring never to be seen again?

From where we are at the moment I am sure that we have enjoyed the best years of motoring. Who knows what the future holds though, will our Grandchildren be thinking in the same terms when they are our age ?

 

[curious]

I recently had the pleasure of driving a Jaguar I-pace as a loaner for the day. Very impressive, until the range limitations/battery charging thing completely soured my view of it.

Anyway, the base price of these is approx £64k and sit between an E-pace at £32K and an F-pace at £40k with regards to size. That's some £24-32 of electrickery within the car over the two ICE models either side of it.

I calculated I've spent approx £8k in fuel in my F-type at 25mpg to do approx 38,000 miles in 4 years.
In very simple economics using my expenditure (I'm sure an E-pace and F-pace are far more economical than my F-type) it would be approx 12-14 years cost of petrol to overcome the battery cost alone. Oh, and during that period the electricity for the batteries isn't free either.

Aside from all the infrastucture issues/battery limitations which will have to improve, the economics simply don't work for me at the moment.

 

[sonic]

>>>It will get better, just like mobile phone batteries, however it’s not there yet, so I won’t invest until it’s better.

That's been our view. I've been lucky to take an early retirement package years ago but Mrs D who is the same age kept on longer and finishes next month. Five years ago we started chatting through some retirement thoughts and one was that she'd change her CLK for a new/nearly new elec car at retirement with part of her lump sum. We still had that thought three years ago. But things haven't moved on fast enough re range and charging access en-route for us to commit to swapping her lovely CLK worth perhaps £2500 for something elec at £30000+. Laying out £30k for something she'd not like as much is just not a good retirement option.

At 65 how many driving years have we left I wonder... 20 a reasonable average forecast? In truth I think we may leave it to the next generation to enjoy (?) the benefits of research and investment that solves the massive elec car issues currently existing.

I do wonder if it will turn out our generation has enjoyed the best years of motoring never to be seen again?

In a similar situation as you except we are both almost 10 years older than you. We have a 10 year old E class & a 4 year old SLC, only did 4,000 miles in both of the them over the last 12 months, & the same the year before.
So no great saving on fuel if we move to EV, & a massive cost to purchase. Just not worth it for us.

 

[Blobcat]

>>>It will get better, just like mobile phone batteries, however it’s not there yet, so I won’t invest until it’s better.

That's been our view. I've been lucky to take an early retirement package years ago but Mrs D who is the same age kept on longer and finishes next month. Five years ago we started chatting through some retirement thoughts and one was that she'd change her CLK for a new/nearly new elec car at retirement with part of her lump sum. We still had that thought three years ago. But things haven't moved on fast enough re range and charging access en-route for us to commit to swapping her lovely CLK worth perhaps £2500 for something elec at £30000+. Laying out £30k for something she'd not like as much is just not a good retirement option.

At 65 how many driving years have we left I wonder... 20 a reasonable average forecast? In truth I think we may leave it to the next generation to enjoy (?) the benefits of research and investment that solves the massive elec car issues currently existing.

I do wonder if it will turn out our generation has enjoyed the best years of motoring never to be seen again?

In your scenario I'd get the nicest V8 available for the management and see out your driving days with it

 

[A.J.]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1475411353385025545

 

[DSK]

Not sure if this has been shared but, a Tesla owner decides its better to blow up the car rather than fix it in order to permanently rectify the issue

IIRC the car developed water/electrical issues, followed by, Tesla wanting £16K to replace a battery and prevented measures for any third party to repair it for less.

 

[Blobcat]

 

[JBell]

Tesla Model X can tow 2250kg (same as an R class). That's about the best so far. As demand becomes apparent I'm sure others will follow with 3500kg towing limits (I'd expect Land Rover to fill this gap).

Travelling across Europe is an interesting one.
It depends entirely on your cars charging rate.
As an exercise I tried calculating the time difference between our petrol E class and a Tesla P85D to get from Northamptonshire to Bordeaux. The difference was 1 hour with 4 x 30 minute top-up charges en route.

That said we could save 25 minutes by charging at Folkestone before getting on Eurotunnel 8nstead of charging at Calais.

Top up charges would therefore be Folkestone, Rouen, Le Mans and Poitiers. This normally takes us 12 hours in the E class with a fuel stop at Rouen.
However for us we 5ake 3 dogs and stop 4 times en route to walk them so coinciding these with top ups would mean there would be little if any difference in reality.

SHMEE did UK to Munich in his Taycan, quite an interesting video on the ups and downs of EV ownership

 

[JBell]

There's Hydrogen buses driving around Aberdeen and I see a Hydrogen car driving around my estate at work (there is a Hydrogen refueling point in one of the units on the park)

James May drives a Hydrogen Toyota Mirai

 

[JBell]

That’s the problem… charging too much…

EV’s batteries can also suffer if constantly fast charged

Apparently you should never charge over 80% or let them go below 20%

 

[LostKiwi]

SHMEE did UK to Munich in his Taycan, quite an interesting video on the ups and downs of EV ownership

Very typical the chargers in the UK didn't work!

 

[flying haggis]

All very well to say that charging only takes X minutes but what happens if you turn up at a charging station and the person in front has just plugged in and you have to wait till they have charged then wait till you charge. At least at a proper filling station you know that the person in front will be done in 5 minutes max and so will you.

 

[Blobcat]

At least at a proper filling station you know that the person in front will be done in 5 minutes max and so will you.

Unless they could go in and do a shop as well…

 

[Gazwould]

 

[DSK]

Unless they could go in and do a shop as well…

That’s the whole point, force people to spend whilst they sit bored waiting for a car to charge to charge and kids get restless. Service stations will become mini entertainment stations.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[star]

I’m sure I put on half a stone, whilst waiting for my eqc to charge away from home. Mmmm another Costa and cake #bored.