Why would every car need to recharge? I haven’t recharged on a motorway apart from going to and from Edinburgh (380 mile round trip) in my EV
For completeness I will confirm that the Edinburgh trip in v cold weather is done in wife’s car due to huge charging desert between Gretna and Edinburgh- Ecotricity useless, CPS at Moffat doesn’t work on the ipace at all, CPS at Abington village was broken when I tried to use it and is again broken this weekend
A mate of mine had to wear a hat and gloves in his Nissan Leaf otherwise he wouldn’t have enough power to get home again. And an ice scraper for the inside of the windscreen. 
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You’re really clutching at straws now.
Oh dear. Your anecdote surely spells the end of electric cars.
I never said it did. But a 60 mile journey was only doable if you drive without the heater on. This was a 1st gen Leaf so maybe the new ones are better.
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That will depend on the degree of car thermal insulation - which I guess is very much less than a typical house - and the external temperature. If the external temp were to drop to, say, -10C it will take a lot of energy to keep inside warm. Easily calculated in KWh if anyone wanted to…
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Slightly…far off topic, but hey it’s electric and interesting.
If anybody had any doubt how serious industry is in developing electric propulsion, this Rolls Royce development is interesting.
Until they make an affordable electric or hybrid car with a range of 300 miles and can tow a caravan then I’m not interested. Apart from the Rav 4 and Mitsubishi there is nothing below £40k
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Here’s a question for those with an electric vehicle.
In the use cases when you need to make a long journey and need to recharge ‘en route’, how do you find availability of charge points at motorway service stations ?
Generally can you get a slot?
Has it got more difficult to find an available charger?
How do you know before you rock up if there will be one available?
There’s a possibility to opt in to a salary sacrifice scheme at work (ie. a benefit in kind, but reduced tax, and a seemingly very good lease rate) and I am seriously considering it, but just working through my use case.
Here in Norway, Oslo, the government will very soon stop electric and hybrid cars using the special lane for buses and Taxis because there are too many electric cars using the bus lane preventing the buses keeping their time slots during heavy traffic periods.
This of course does not suggest a problem with the electric car itself but the infrastructure keeping up to speed with electric car use. I believe that last year was the first time, in history, electric and hybrid cars outsold combustion engine cars in any one country.
The uptake of electric cars in Norway is an unbridled success mainly due to strategic government tax penalty’s and tax relief, and partly due to social responsibility. Having severe winters and at least half the population owning a second holiday home, often in mountainous areas with dirt tracks, has also encouraged electric car ownership with regards to the ‘all wheel drive’ aspect.
Culturally, the general populous in Norway have a positive view of electric cars, not a cynical one.
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When I have used our i3 for longer journeys ie motorway etc I have never not found a working charger at a convenient location. You can use apps like zap map to check a charger is available and has not been reported broken. I think it is accurate, have not used it enough to be certain as I do still have an ICE car too which is more often used for long trips.
I think people are still stuck thinking that in future cars will be used exactly the same but they will just be electric. Ideas of personal transport will change. Ownership models will change. Towns and cities will change. Taxation will change. Public transport will change. You might just rent a vehicle to carry all of you 300 miles for two holidays a year or subscribe to a pool with a choice of vehicles for use. We are seeing through COVID how commuting to offices for work is no longer a given.
These things will happen quicker than we think. We are not at the tipping point in terms of infrastructure or technology but look how much things have altered in the last five years.
Bruce
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As with some other places, where I am electric cars are free from road tax, as an incentive to buying (“road fund licence”, “tax disc etc). But they’ve identified that it is not sustainable as ownership increases because they need the money, so it is only a temporary incentive.(Here, road tax is used solely for road maintenance.)
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Thanks Bruce, makes sense and good to know.
In my head I’m thinking the minimum range I would consider is a vehicle that could do a return journey of 50 miles each way (return journey to family) without a recharge.
That would replace my current vehicle.
We also have a 2nd small car that we could use for longer journeys, I was just replaying in my mind what would happen if I did have to take an electric car on a longer journey.
But yes, I think the way we will use transport in future will change a lot.
Bit by bit…!
depending on what is on offer in your scheme, some manufacturers offer the loan of a conventional car for the longer trips where an electric one may not be ideal.
However, if you have another one you could use, and the electric one will to to and from work 9in the winter) without a charge, there’s little to stop you.
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Maybe the original operating model for the Smart Car will resurface - a small town car for daily use, and instantly available large car on good rental rate when needed for occasional long journeys or larger payload. It never took off with the ICE vehicle, perhaps the concept being ahead of its time - but the future would need to be all electric of course for the future approach.
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We use a plug-in Hybrid and aren’t quite ready to go all electric yet.
In Aviemore this summer we were doing a quick top-up when a chap in an all-electric Jag swept in, duly connected the charger and nada, no charge and the plug jammed fast in the Jag’s socket. The phone help was unable to free him.
We hung around for a bit to try and help but eventually just had to leave. He could still be there for all I know!
G
What is the good manners protocol for visiting people when using an electric vehicle. Should the host offer an electric topup, or should the visitor expect the host to provide a top up. Could be the end of visiting the rellies hundreds of miles away.
We have a petrol powered Audi A3. It’s 150HP and ok for towing our little caravan, which weighs about 1,100kg. We’d love to get an electric car but other than Teslas they cannot tow, as far as I know. I hope this will change, as there are so many people with caravans. One option is to keep a petrol or diesel just for towing, and have an electric for everything else. But we only have one car and wouldn’t want two.
The electric tech seems to be changing fast so we will probably keep the Audi for seven or eight years and then see what’s happening at that point.
Maybe it depends on whether you want to make the visitors welcome! If you don’t have an EV yourself and therefore do dedicated socket, can a car be charged from a standard 13A socket? What is the cost of a full charge, and is that a burden on the people receiving the visitors? (How many KWh does it take to charge? I think tariffs of 18p or even 19p per unit are not uncommon.)