Electric vehicles

[sploo]

Probably because computers have more and more influence. If information and requirements are fed into a computer the result will be the same no matter whose computer it is.

Agreed. Physics (and economics) works the same for everyone, so any manufacturer that puts a vehicle through a wind tunnel (to try to improve economy), or shapes panels to meet safety requirements (in a way that's economically feasible) is likely to end up with a similar outcome.

It's a shame (e.g. thinking back to some of the wonderful artistic 1950s and 1960s car body styles), but I guess progress means we get safer, more efficient, motors; at the expense of aesthetics.

 

[sploo]

With my diesel I tend to only half fill the tank generally. As I do mostly short trips it doesn't make a lot of sense to me to carry 25-30kg of extra fuel with me everywhere i go, when half a tank will get me well over 250miles.

I only brim the tank when I've got a very long journey to make, and even then It would probably make more sense to re-fuel on the way.

I guess if i had an EV i would have to change my habits and try and keep the battery topped up, as it makes no difference in weight and is seemingly better for the battery.

Ironically I brim the diesel up because it's a faff to get to a petrol station (accepting the extra weight isn't good for economy), but with a driveway I could just frequently top up an EV; so for me, my ICE car is more of an inconvenience in terms of refuelling.

 

[jetsetwilly]

So which car are you talking about?

I've just pulled the stats off the MG website for the MG5 EV Estate that you highlighted and it's much longer than 6 hours to charge from 10 to 100%. In fact 10 hours at 7kw and of note is that is at a temperature of 25c

https://www.mg.co.uk/new-cars/mg5-ev

7kW charging will be largely unaffected by environmental or SOC factors, and it'll give a theoretical 42kWh in 6h. Let's kill 10% for transformer and heat losses and round down to say 35kWh, just for kicks. At say 3miles per kWh (conservative estimate based on review figures) that's about 100 miles range added to your MG5 per cheap rate window. If you do more than that, you will need to add some peak-rate electrons. If you don't, you're golden. Simples.

Unless, like me, you have a 3ph supply, in which case you can get 22kW (my car can take 11kW), which is great, but you might struggle to get a smart meter (I have) in which case you'll pay top whack for all of it...grr...

 

[jetsetwilly]

I guess if i had an EV i would have to change my habits and try and keep the battery topped up, as it makes no difference in weight and is seemingly better for the battery.

AFAIK, 'most' (sorry!) lithium batteries are best maintained at 20-80% state-of-charge. Battery management systems however, need to calibrate against the real battery sitting still at different states of charge. I run my EV a bit like an ICE car - most of my use is short-journey, so I charge it to 'full' (=80-90%) and then just drive it until it gets low. Usually charge twice a fortnight, not that I keep track.

 

[woodieallen]

Not really, midnight to 06:00, 5p kWh every night which equates nicely to 1p per mile fuel cost. I'll take that thank you.

That is from a sample size of one. You! Back in the real world, there are external factors....from MoneySupermarket

"Some of the most popular options on the market come with smart charging, allowing you to take advantage of cheaper electricity rates overnight. By taking advantage of this, and the best tariff available to you through our comparison tool you can save significantly on the cost of EV ownership."

 

[woodieallen]

• .....an EV with 250 miles total range has an effective range of 200 miles. In winter ~zero UK temperatures could reduce range by ~30% giving an effective 125 miles.

..

Is that with the heater and demister on or not ?

 

[woodieallen]

......

This is simply not the case, most EV's get to 80% in a maximum of 40 minutes and thats where you stop charge and journey continues.
.....

I think "most" is very over-used in this thread. It implies veracity and fact when neither is necessarily present.

 

[AJB Temple]

Must depend on the make then. In winter I precondition the car so battery starts warm, fully demisted, car at desired internal temp and heated seats and steering wheel on if desired. Can all be set from phone app. Still plugged in and trivial cost. At below zero temps I find range is reduced by about 10% at most if pre-conditioned. Internal service use seems to make very little difference to the range at any time.

 

[Spectric]

This is a list of some of the existing vehicles available here in Australia

Yes I would think that unless you lived in a major suburb that both the distances involved and those corrugated roads might not be so good for an EV. I remember a freind had an imported Toyota landcruiser from Aus and it was really solid with proper bumpers unlike the euro version which was plastic.

 

[Dabop]

Yes I would think that unless you lived in a major suburb that both the distances involved and those corrugated roads might not be so good for an EV. I remember a freind had an imported Toyota landcruiser from Aus and it was really solid with proper bumpers unlike the euro version which was plastic.

Funnily enough- I am indeed actually looking at an EV (specifically the Atto3, because of its towing ability - up to 1200kg on a braked trailer) and being completely offgrid to boot!!!

I live literally in the middle of the bush in rural Australia, and even with the approximate 400-450km range limit of the Atto, it would still cover all my daily driving needs- plus I could reach my sisters place in the big smoke and return (just) on a single charge, or even get to my mothers place interstate on a single charge (just)- but would have to drive past literally DOZENS of chargers on the way to do so- so why would I do that???

My sleepy little town (all 1500 of us) still has a charge point (its only 30kw though, so a 'full charge' would take a couple of hours, but we all have driveways to park in here lol- there are another 7 fast chargers in three different directions within an hours drive (lol- there is literally 4 roads out of town, and all three towns are an hours drive away, the fourth is closer to two hours)

It isn't as if I would even be the first to own an EV here- in fact mine wouldn't even be the second- or third- or even fourth!!!!

Two Atto3's, an MG4 and a BYD T3 van all running around locally (with a local business looking at buying another two T3's!!!)- so I suspect that many people are over-exaggerating their 'lack of range'- leave my town and it is literally almost exactly an hour's drive to the next closest town- and one of the Atto3's does that daily (my Hilux uses close to $25 per round trip to do that exact same drive- so would be using $125 a week in fuel doing that...)- the Atto owner charges it almost entirely off solar...

I live in the middle of this....

(thats my place taken from a mates drone when I first bought it, from the road out the front- the arrow is where I am sitting ATM (waves hi- can you see me lol)- my driveway is over half a kilometre long!!!)

I can literally go from a standing start at the gate in my 8 tonne Merc tilttray- and hit the state speed limit on my driveway!!!

Oh, and the EV owners here in town LOVE their cars for 'long distance cruising' required here- with diesel being over $2.00 a litre, and most places here either offgrid solar or gridtied solar if you are 'in town', you can effectively be 'driving for free'- or near enough to it...

You can even drive right across Australia in an EV (and many have)- as long as you have 200km range per charge- you can drive down most of the east coast- and then across to Perth in an EV!!!

https://thedriven.io/2021/11/08/the...on-nissan-leaf-with-a-just-in-case-generator/

 

[MikeJhn]

Not really


Hmmm, not really safe, 400 miles and no stops.


Aye it does, just killing everyone around


Without exception, since 2016 when I changed to EV's I have never waited for my car to charge, not once and my driving was not all short journeys I travelled around presenting training course throughout the UK - 14,000 miles per year.

What a load of tosh, must be new technology that your EV charges instantly.

 

[Dabop]

What a load of tosh, must be new technology that your EV charges instantly.

Most current EVs charge at around 10km per minute if the charger permits, some faster...

The Atto 3 I am looking at for example will on a DC charger of 150kw or more (most here newer than a couple of years old are 350kw) will put in that 10km per minute rate (and the Atto is a fairly old design mind you, having been on sale in Australia since 2022 and overseas for several years before that) with a '100km topup' taking less than ten minutes, and a full charge less than 35 mins to take you back to another 400km

So basically every 4 hours stop for half an hour to recharge...
(dunno about you, but thats about the time between most meals for me, so it could charge up, while I 'charge up' as well lol)

3 charges and thats at the legal limit for driving for a 'heavy goods driver' like myself, so thats leave home say at 8am with a 'full tank' and having had breakfast, 4 hours later, time for a recharge and lunch at 12, leaving at 12.30, another 4 hours and another recharge and a 'early dinner' at 4.30, leaving at 5pm, another 4 hours and thats basically 1200km down the road, I'm beat and ready to crash for the night before I really do crash, its 9pm and the car can slow charge overnight ready with a 'full tank' again in the morning
A 1200km drive is a very full day for a professional driver- most 'car drivers' couldn't do it (safely)- some 'believe' they can- but the crash statics show otherwise... with fatigue related crashes being about 1/3 of all crashes in Australia- driving for more than 17 hours straight puts your reaction times at the same time as if you were legally drunk!!!

 

[johnb80]

What a load of tosh, must be new technology that your EV charges instantly.

Well youre entitled to your experienced opinion, I should take heed of my dads advice, never argue with idiots, they drag you down to their level.

Exactly what Dabop says above, I have never waited for my EV to charge, just had a coffee or toilet break to get me my next few hours of driving. Unlike ICE where you have to stand there pouring poison into the tank. EV's are way more civilised refuelling.

 

[Dabop]

Well youre entitled to your experienced opinion, I should take heed of my dads advice, never argue with idiots, they drag you down to their level.

Exactly what Dabop says above, I have never waited for my EV to charge, just had a coffee or toilet break to get me my next few hours of driving. Unlike ICE where you have to stand there pouring poison into the tank. EV's are way more civilised refuelling.

Plus they are so much more than many expect in performance- I got to 'test drive' one off the locals Atto 3's, just to see what it felt like in person- sure it isn't in the Tesla levels of performance (but then they can beat pretty much anything that isn't a performance 'supercar' - perfect for your 'grocery getter' lol) but I was actually pretty impressed by its acceleration- a sub 8 second 0-100 time might 'sound slow' on paper, but it has the same acceleration as a V8 Commodore!!! (sold in the UK as a Vauxhall)

And thats from one of the 'cheapest' EV's on sale in Australia...
(plus it has a 1200kg towing capacity- handy as I hire out trailers... the heaviest is my car trailer at 600kg- so technically I could even put a 600kg load of rubbish on it or whatever)- that was the major strike against the MG4- no towbar...

 

[RonnieI]

not sure I'd agree with that. Whilst they have improved the aerodynamics for the specific design, there are better similar size designs. I think they have mostly just stuck with designs from the 80's that sold well.

This is an old-ish list but shows some interesting things

https://ecomodder.com/wiki/Vehicle_Coefficient_of_Drag_List

For instance the similarly sized 2001 Nissan Almera has a 0.3 Coefficient of Drag (6.13 CdA) whilst a similar age Golf has a 0.32 Coefficient of Drag (6.89 CdA). So it would make more sense in terms of aerodynamics if more cars ended up the shape of a Nissan Almera. The VW Jetta is also much more similar score to the Nissan.

Certainly agree about the Cybertruck though.

Whilst it's not for everyone I think the Aptera is amazing https://aptera.us/vehicle/ and it gets a 0.15 Coefficient of Drag which is insanely good. It's unlikely everyone will be driving around in these anytime soon but some of the ideas in a toned down form would be great in future car design. Mostly people have to get away from their idea of what a car looks like at the moment, which is hard.

I would certainly have a Aptera though, 20miles a day free driving from the inbuilt solar panels (in the UK, California would see more like 40) seems to be fantastic idea. I can't imagine many people complaining if their ICE cars got an extra 20miles just by leaving it in a sunny position.

Going to struggle to get the grandchildren and the dog in that though.

 

[NorthernSteve]

I would be interested to know how many of those without off street parking don't want to drive, how that would effect the percentages. When I lived in London the last thing I wanted was a car. If I was late for work I used to walk as it was quicker than the bus but not in a white shirt as it would be gray by the time I got there.

I don't personally like cities

I live on the edge of a mill town in Lancashire. There are rows and rows of terraced properties and parking is a premium. Whoever gets home from work first gets the parking place sort of arrangement as there is not even sufficient space to have an agreement that the space in front of each house is 'reserved' for the home owner/ renter. How these people would manage to charge vehicles I have no idea. Multiply this by millions and you have the extent of the challenge.

 

[Agent_zed]

Going to struggle to get the grandchildren and the dog in that though.

I'd be more concerned about where I got grandchildren and a dog from....

You'd also struggle to get an entire football team into a BMW X5, but that is why there are different vehicles for different situations.

In your example though, it would make a lot more sense for grandparents to have a small car and if and when they have to transport their grandchildren they swap cars with their child (who presumably has a larger car to accomodate them). Rather than everyone having huge cars for the off chance that they might possibly need it at some point but probably not for 95% of the time.

 

[AJB Temple]

Good posts from Dabop above.

Re performance. I was naively under the impression that all EVs had broadly similar performance until I had a courtesy MG EV for a few weeks. The acceleration was much more akin to a typical medium sized ICE car. The Teslas we have had accelerate from a standstill very quickly, but using all of the acceleration habitually kills the range. Very useful now and again for overtakes though.

 

[AJB Temple]

I live on the edge of a mill town in Lancashire. There are rows and rows of terraced properties and parking is a premium. Whoever gets home from work first gets the parking place sort of arrangement as there is not even sufficient space to have an agreement that the space in front of each house is 'reserved' for the home owner/ renter. How these people would manage to charge vehicles I have no idea. Multiply this by millions and you have the extent of the challenge.

This suggests there is a problem with all cars, not just EV ones. Eventually EV "garages" will be more commonplace that will solve this. There is always a solution.

 

[Agent_zed]

I live on the edge of a mill town in Lancashire. There are rows and rows of terraced properties and parking is a premium. Whoever gets home from work first gets the parking place sort of arrangement as there is not even sufficient space to have an agreement that the space in front of each house is 'reserved' for the home owner/ renter. How these people would manage to charge vehicles I have no idea. Multiply this by millions and you have the extent of the challenge.

whilst I'm not sure EV is that answer (environmentally at least), you are missing the other challenge which is even bigger:

Oil is finite! it will run out, and as it gets less and less easy to get hold of, it will get more and more expensive. Many countries won't want to export it if it is getting scarce. As we saw with Russia, geopolitics also comes into it. It doesn't matter how many fuel stations you have if there is no fuel there.

I may well be wrong (and to a certain extent I hope I am) but I imagine the people in power aren't pushing the green agenda purely because they think it's the best for the planet, but are thinking at some point if we continue on this path with fossil fuels we are stuffed when it runs out (perhaps sooner than they let us know).