Electric Vehicles-Infrastructure

[NewcastleFalcon]

Schoolboy error from me on the recent trip up to Scotland, which may slap me with a £10 reminder not to do it again.

Part of the arsenal of the "fair use" of on road chargers is the overstay fee.

The small print of the Chargeplacescotland charger at Lauder says something like "45 minutes maximum charging time, overstay fess of £1 per Minute applies. 10 minute grace period."

With no one waiting I decided to charge up over our normal 80% and stopped the charge at 50 minutes 22 seconds.

How did the schoolboy error occur...

1. My behaviour has been conditioned over 2½ years of using Chargeplace Scotland chargers that were free.
2. They have only recently ( since May 1st introduced charging in the Scottish Borders Region)
3. I have never read the small print of any notice on the charger re Conditions of use.
4. This is a round the back of an industrial estate charger in the borderland country, quite old and no fancy toony carpark type notices telling you overstay charges apply...chatty notice on the machine as I found out.


I will know next time, fingers crossed I won't have to pay £10 extra for my lesson. You get invoiced once a month. Currently it's not showing an overcharge but maybe that will be in the reckoning at the month end.

Quite a few charger operators do the overtime penalty charge, Geniepoint at Morrisons do, and some car parking conditions also impose time limits on recharging sessions, some the max is 30 minutes.

Regards Neil

[mickthemaverick]

The problem with using an overtime penalty fee in this part of the world is that there are far too many people with too much money. There are several 'known' villains in Hertford who own £200k + cars and consider it costs them £50 to park outside the bank! A reasonable fee in their minds to save 10 minutes walking from the nearest car park etc. I'd like to see a simple xx minutes charge time followed by a short grace period before discharging commences at a much higher rate, ie emptys the battery to 10% within the next 5 minutes, and logging the car as unchargeable at that site for say 3 months. I'm sure people would then make certain to get back in time so that the car is charged!! The 10% is to leave them enough charge to get to another chargepoint where they may be a bit more sensible!!

[Rp0thejester]

With the current high electricity prices is it worth investing in an electric vehicle and home charging point? Just wondering if petrol stations are going to keep increasing fuel prices to pay for electric stations as the country is supposedly trying to get away from oil purchases.

[NewcastleFalcon]

With the current high electricity prices is it worth investing in an electric vehicle and home charging point? Just wondering if petrol stations are going to keep increasing fuel prices to pay for electric stations as the country is supposedly trying to get away from oil purchases.

viewtopic.php?p=712907#p712907

Still a big advantage for electricity...its not going to last. Long term, taxation and profiteering in a more mature market will ensure that is the case when they catch up, but its not going to be anytime soon.

The pioneers have already had years of next to nothing on the road electricity, and low home rates which before everything kicked off, on the right tariff you could get 5p per kWh home charging. I myself had 18 months of free charging and the 2½ free years Chargeplace Scotland charging in the Borders has only just come to an end May 1st this year.

Currently as Gibbo confirms Mr Tesco is still dishing it out for free

Regards Neil

[Rp0thejester]

Electric seems the way to go, very popular. I remember the gas conversions were supposed to be the new thing and never really took off. But if everyone drives electric will it be high electricity prices for even those who don't drive? Remember when petrol was more expensive than diesel, everyone changed, now diesel more expensive. Also, battery's, we've all had a flat battery, how many times have you recharged it before having to buy a new one? A car full of them scares me. Only time will tell.

[Gibbo2286]

Electric seems the way to go, very popular. I remember the gas conversions were supposed to be the new thing and never really took off. But if everyone drives electric will it be high electricity prices for even those who don't drive? Remember when petrol was more expensive than diesel, everyone changed, now diesel more expensive. Also, battery's, we've all had a flat battery, how many times have you recharged it before having to buy a new one? A car full of them scares me. Only time will tell.

If you look up 'Fully Charged ' on you tube there's a lot of information, try this in your search box 'Return of the Leaf FVxEOETTWnQ ' for starters.

[Rp0thejester]

Wow, thanks for that point in the right direction. I didn't realise how far the technology had advanced. The EV conversions look very interesting.

[bobins]

Nothing particularly new in this article, but a nice article all the same -

Will swapping out electric car batteries catch on?

"Without even a touch of the steering wheel, the electric car reverses autonomously into the recharging station.
I won't be plugging it in though, instead, the battery will be swapped for a fresh one, at this facility in Norway belonging to Chinese electric carmaker, Nio.
The technology is already widespread in China, but the new Power Swap Station, just south of Oslo, is Europe's first.
The company hopes that swapping-out the entire battery will appeal to customers worried about the range of electric cars, or who simply don't like queuing to recharge.
It was certainly straightforward to book a slot on Nio's app, and once inside the station, all I have to do is park on the designated markings and wait in the car.
I can hear bolts being undone as the battery is automatically removed from underneath the vehicle and replaced with a fully- charged one.
In less than five minutes, I'm ready to go again."

More at: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-61310513

[mickthemaverick]

Hmmmm:

https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/16142 ... est-update

[NewcastleFalcon]

Hmmmm:

https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/16142 ... est-update

One of the reports mentioned the six vehicles caught in the fire were 4 diesel buses, and 2 hybrid buses. It may be some time before "who/what started it" emerges, although the press are writing their stories already. They tend to use Lithium Iron Phosphate batteries in buses which are much less prone to catching fire than any other Li-ion chemistry.

I dont have any concerns that my leaf is going to catch fire anytime soon, but I do have reservations about all of these super high power chargers to save the impatient motorist 10 minutes at a chargepoint, by zapping a large lithium ion battery with 350kW to charge it up.

Will there be enough left to investigate and nail down the cause? Time will tell.

Regards Neil

[bobins]

I dont have any concerns that my leaf is going to catch fire anytime soon, but I do have reservations about all of these super high power chargers to save the impatient motorist 10 minutes at a chargepoint, by zapping a large lithium ion battery with 350kW to charge it up.

Will there be enough left to investigate and nail down the cause? Time will tell.

Regards Neil

There'll probably be some pretty urgent forensic examinations of identical surviving buses to see if any of them show signs of 'issues'. Maybe some additional monitoring of components to see if there's any degradation going on. .......or just have a look at the CCTV of the site to see if any arson is involved !

[myglaren]

Increasing charging costs

The cost of rapidly charging an electric car has risen sharply as energy costs soar, the RAC has said.

[Gibbo2286]

No mention in that report of the Pod-point chargers now situated in most Tesco (and other) supermarket car parks, still free to use for the 7Kwh and 22Kwh charging, you only pay for the 50Kwh speed chargers.

[NewcastleFalcon]

Even with the rises this is the time when incentives are in place to make the switch. By the time the late adopters arrive the incentives which they could have enjoyed will have vanished. Taxation will have caught up, as will the price of electricity.

REgards Neil

[NewcastleFalcon]

For future reference two pod-point chargers at Bellingham. Useful stepping stone if I can get my "telephone them to start a session" method to work. With those chargers not being the rapid ones, not sure but you may be able to get 15 mins gratis without using the app. Never tried it and didnt need to today.

Well its simpler than I thought, to get the 15 Minutes free. I didn't think it would work, but with "just give it a try", I did and it worked. Just plug the cable in to the socket and into the car and it gives out 15 minutes gratis, before it requires the smart phone and app to start and stop a charge.

Then, the Northumberland EV infrastructure has had a bit of development, there is now a rapid charger in Bellingham. Plenty visitors to Kielder pass through and it is a very useful charge up place. Also 4 outlets on 7kWh posts.

Regards Neil