Electric Vehicles-Infrastructure

[myglaren]

[CitroJim]

^^^ Many a true word spoken in jest

[NewcastleFalcon]

Morrisons picnic, and a small opportunist drink for the BB Leaf in one of Berwick-upon-Tweed's finest atmospheric deserted car parks.

Neil

[Dormouse]

I ended up with a Corsa E courtesy car recently and it made me have to work out how to charge it. The system near me is that you need to belong to an EV charging group and sign up. The only non group chargers which would just take a credit card were located in the new railway station at Cameron Bridge. The ones at Leven station still aren't hooked up and working. Anyway, at 57p per kilowatt hour it worked out more expensive, mile for mile, than filling our car with dirty diesel! Now, I don't know what sites are available that are cheaper but I am reliably informed that EV charging costs have steadily risen over the past year or so, which leaves you wondering, is this just another carrot being taken away to get people into electric cars with their eyes shut?

[NewcastleFalcon]

Welcome back Dave, some time since your last post on the forum. Following the energy crisis excuse, very rapidly all on the road charging leapt up in price. You can still get a "top up charge" at the Chargeplace Scotland 7KW chargers at 30p/kWh, but the rapids went up to 60p /kWh and haven't come down. Many other providers are higher. Northumberland County Council rapid chargers have gone from free, to 35p/kWh to now 65p/kwh, and the likes of osprey, ionity Instavolt etc are all more than that.

Still even with a what is now by 2024 standards, a tiny 24kWh capacity Leaf we rarely charge up on the road, and home charging done in my bargain basement fashion is under 30p/kWh, and if I could be bothered with smart meter shenanigans it could be considerably lower than that.

Was always going to happen. I think I prophetically made such a post somewhere on here. Proper competition hasn't hit on the road charging, but increasingly with larger range vehicles, and plenty using "fuel pumps at home" the real need to charge up on the road is reduced. Some just do it of course, see a charger and they top up on-the road whether they need to or not and from observation aren't particularly bothered about the cost. Why would you be? If you can afford an over £40,000 ev you aren't going to baulk at the relatively minor cost of charging it up on occasions on-the-road

If anyone can predict the relative pricing of fossil fuels vs home electricity/ on the road electricity over the next decade good luck to them. So many factors at work but I just assume that "cheaper" motoring will never arrive with electrification, companies seeking profits will see to that whether they are "oil" or transitioned energy companies selling mainly electricity, and taxation will catch up.

This is a good time to get a used EV. Enjoy the home charging at half the cost while you can, and let someone else pay the heavy depreciation over the first 3 to 4 years.

Neil

[Gibbo2286]

This is our local Tesco pricing.

Payment Access: Pod Point app Pricing: Fast: 44p/kWh - 49p/kWh, Rapid: 62p/kWh - 69p/kWh

[Dormouse]

Chargeplace Scotland recently increased it's charges on the ones in Leven to 40p per unit. Not that long ago they were still 15p.

[GiveMeABreak]

(Grant for EV home chargers opens up to motorists WITHOUT driveways )

https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/ele ... llout.html

This fits in nicely with that Gibbo, spotted today. This is the solution which the owner of this car was using to charge up their car. Looks neat enough. I have seen worse with Cables draped through upstairs windows to the offside rear window of the car at such an angle to allow the cable over pavement bit to be well in excess of head height.

Neil

[Dormouse]

Just to make everyone aware, I am not totally Anti EV. In it's favour, the courtesy Corsa E drove just like our Hybrid4 and, once I had played around with the Regen settings, I was back to feeling happy driving the beast. Not physically comfortable but pleased with the way it drove and responded to the right pedal. I found the foot brake overly sharp and dead in it's short travel. Unfortuneately it "died" before I could get used to the brakes.

[mickthemaverick]

In my eyes that cable cover solution is equivalent to the speed humps in the roads we all hate. For a youngster on a skateboard or scooter it is simply dangerous. Why not dig a shallow trench and keep the surface flush for the benefit of pavement wheeled vehicles like buggys and kids bikes etc?

[Gibbo2286]

In my eyes that cable cover solution is equivalent to the speed humps in the roads we all hate. For a youngster on a skateboard or scooter it is simply dangerous. Why not dig a shallow trench and keep the surface flush for the benefit of pavement wheeled vehicles like buggys and kids bikes etc?

A few companies already in that game Mick, one here fore example:
https://www.kerbocharge.com/how-it-works

[mickthemaverick]

That is an improvement on the earlier one Gibbo but it still seems to have a slight ridge which will play havoc with skate wheels and cause infant buggies to jolt I reckon. This looks a much better solution to me:
https://eparksolutions.co.uk/2019/12/03 ... -chargers/

[Gibbo2286]

Here's a podcast about battery chemistry............... i watch them just to see the beautiful and brainy Imogen.

[NewcastleFalcon]

Here's a podcast about battery chemistry.

Thanks for posting Gibbo I have reproduced that on the Batteries thread which no-one apart from me probably remembers seeing as I haven't gardened it for a while.

Imogen is an excellent addition to the Fully Charged team. She did a double review on the "What's Available " thread of the Dacia Spring and the new Renault 5. Nothing astounding but a pleasantly delivered decent review of the vehicles. Nothing not to like there.

Link here for anyone who wants to see them

DACIA Spring
viewtopic.php?p=811082&hilit=spring#p811082

New Renault 5
viewtopic.php?p=793615&hilit=renault+5#p793615

Neil

[NewcastleFalcon]

Nice autumn scene at good old Tesco, Peugeot-ish Day today.

Neil