Things you wish you'd known when researching / buying your electric car

MarkN

What would be your top 5 things?

declan123

Real world range

Effect of cold weather on range

Motorway effect on range

Poor public charging infrastructure and particularly unsuitability of 22kw chargers to modern large battery evs

Tazium

1. Wait times for new car delivery
2. Removal of features by manufacturer due to chip shortages (always covered by terms and conditions favouring manufacturer)
3. Tyre size impact on range
4. Dealership mandated 'service costs' build into delivery costs
5. B mode disables cruise control (on mine anyway!) attempting to engage throws an error that doesn't advise B mode is enabled

fits

That I’d never need to use public charging and shouldn’t worry too much about it.

also not to allow smart meter be installed.

eagerv

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058228997/things-you-wish-youd-known-when-researching-buying-your-electric-car

That we didn't do it earlier (Only 2 years now).

That we didn't listen to all the nay sayers, range and charging not a problem for us. (Have never waited anywhere but there are places such as Kilcullen we would not dream of charging unless 4am!)

Black_Knight

A tethered home charger vs the untethered one I got.

Range anxiety is mostly just the fear of an unknown technology. I've had 1 instance of actual range anxiety in the last 3 years of EV motoring.

How you'll never go back, so there's a certain legitimate financial commitment you're making when going EV.

The impact of coldgating (fast charging a cold battery = :poop: charging speeds)

That I could switch to a night rate immediately, and not have to wait until my next bill cycle.

CoBo55

That phev's are Shoite, practically no battery range in cold weather, dial up charging speed making public charging useless, it's full ev for me next time probably an MG.

CoBo55

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118505327#Comment_118505327

What's wrong with a smart meter? I got a letter saying I'm getting one this year, should I decline it?

Old diesel

That they are like getting new toys from Santa for Christmas as a child.

And that you will thus be planning the next super EV replacement not long after buying the original one.

At least that's my experience

Black_Knight

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118506437#Comment_118506437

Check your electricity rates for day/night (you'd want a night rate meter if you've a BEV) vs Smart meter rates. Smart meter rates are a good 30% more expensive i'd say.

Gile_na_gile

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118506437#Comment_118506437

Smart meters are better for the general electric network, and enable variable pricing around demand for consumers and providers. Our existing meters are archaic and should have been transitioned years ago. Lots of providers are offering equivalent night rates based on smart meters if you have it installed already, it is just that not all providers have created these pricing schemes yet as the meters are still being rolled out (and as I type in my area).

Gile_na_gile

And on Things etc... No regrets and couldn't afford one until 2019. Main issues with takeup are dealers still pushing ICE cars because they are often clueless and don't own or believe in EVs (at least in 2019/20 but that is changing now). Best thing I did when shopping around with my father back then was to chat to owners at the fast charging point out the back of the dealership (a taxi driver and a holiday-maker both in mark 1 or 1.5 LEAFs).

KCross

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118506975#Comment_118506975

... Lots of providers are offering equivalent night rates based on smart meters if you have it installed already...

I dont think thats true at all. Have you seen a smart tariff with a night rate <9c/kWh inc vat?

All the ones I've seen have night rates 14c+ and the day rates are terrible too.

General day/night rates now are 17c/8c inc vat for day/night. If you can get a smart tariff for those rates I'd like to see it.

KCross

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058228997/things-you-wish-youd-known-when-researching-buying-your-electric-car

I dont have a top 5 myself but just from looking at what gets posted on the forum alot, is confusion around the home charge points (tethered, untethered, priority switches, grants, costs, features like Solar integration and app support etc).

The cost of them, I think, catches alot of people out as the charge point is usually only something they look into once they've already put a deposit down and then they come here for info on the charge point. Everyone knows what a car is and how to drive, most have no idea about electrical stuff and its a key part of EV ownership.

I know you are primarily a car reviewer and not an electrician but since everyone buying an EV needs to know how to charge it, it might make sense for you to do some home charge point reviews? Show the various types, positives, negatives, costs etc. Maybe poll the forum to get volunteers for each charge point (EO, Zappi, Andersen, Rolec etc) and do an interview type thing where they/you show it and discuss it with the owner. One for each charge point.

Dubwat

That you should check your house wiring is capable of taking a home charger and you don't get stuck with an unexpected €10k+ bill to rewire the house.

eagerv

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058228997/things-you-wish-youd-known-when-researching-buying-your-electric-car

Well done Mark, you were very quick editing this into your latest video🙂

Gumbo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118505286#Comment_118505286

Curious why you think the 22kw destination chargers are unsuitable?

crisco10

Just how cheap they are to run when you do mostly home charging on night rate

the myriad of apps “required”

Gile_na_gile

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118507697#Comment_118507697

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118507697#Comment_118507697

No, not yet many there. Look at electric ireland, though, talking of 5-6c for a limited night period: https://www.electricireland.ie/smart-meters/home-electric-plus.

As of right now a physical night rate meter is cheaper for many suppliers if you can push usage onto it, but there is no reason that a smart meter setup could not offer similar variable pricing. It is just the current pricing setup is preliminary while they are being rolled out. Plus smart meters are needed for a feed-in tariff for solar (but I have no panels). More smart meter tariffs for EVs will appear.

ELM327

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118505327#Comment_118505327

+ a million to both of these.

finbarrk

Is it to allow a smart meter to be installed, or not to allow a smart meter to be installed? I'm confused.

ELM327

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118510444#Comment_118510444

to NOT under any circumstances. They do not benefit the consumer. They only allow price gouging.

MuttonDagger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118510466#Comment_118510466

I still cant believe the amount of mongs championing them on boards and elsewhere.

They were fooled into them and now they want every one else to get fooled too. ignore them

eltoastero

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118506413#Comment_118506413

I don't fully agree, yeah the winter range in my old PHEV was about 25km in winter (and I'd to drive carefully to get that) - but a lot of my journeys were done on full electric despite that limitation. It was annoying to have to plug it in basically after every drive but that was the compromise of getting a nice affordable car to dip my toe into the EV world.

I only charged in public to test my ability to charge in public, 3.6kW on a home wall box is ok when it's plugged in overnight, but i wouldn't hog a public charger for 2.5hours to fill my 8kWh battery.

Having a PHEV for 3 years convinced me to go full BEV, so I was converted, hopefully the new owner of it gets converted too.

zg3409

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118509218#Comment_118509218

I think he means 10 hours to charge a 70kWh battery at a rate of 7kW on a 22kW charge point. As in most 22kW chargers are pointless for mid trip stops, for most cars. 50kW+ chargers tend to be 7 times quicker. 22 equals 7 for the most part.

As a small battery Ev owner what shocked me was unreliability of 50kW chargers and 1+ hour queues at peak times, and risk of a wait is getting higher in Dublin.

The upside was 80% savings compared to petrol, half price daily tolls, and I tend to use the EV for as many trips as possible with the diesel only for two car trips and full holiday type trips. I switched to EV when I realised it would work out cheaper and every month I delayed was costing me in fuel costs

As a small battery EV owner the upfront cost of large battery EVs still puts me off upgrading, due to relatively short commute the maths don't work.

They really need to simplify the home charger minefield, free chargers with new cars go some way towards this.

Gile_na_gile

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118510466#Comment_118510466

Their benefits ARE primarily to the ESB network and the actual creators of electricity as they can attune to and shape demand through variable pricing. Now to the customer, I can understand this gets bagged up with the evil water meters and the pay by weight for waste changes, yet both of these have environmental objectives but the whole water thing occurred at the peak of horrible cuts and bailout demands and were just not politically acceptable.

Once smart meters are installed, and they will be to all but a handful of holdouts, there will be demand and pressure to favour consumers and avoid overly expensive peak demand costs for electricity. As a consumer, it suits me to have a moderate difference between day and night due to heavy daytime usage and no car commuting, but that might change.

Del2005

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118506866#Comment_118506866

Going OT but night rate electricity is never going to last. Its a legacy from having a few large power stations that couldn't be spun down so a demand had to be made to get people to use the excess power.

Now with most of our grid being renewable night rate electricity will be the most expensive, how much renewable was produced the last few nights, and the cheap, or free electricity, will be during the day. No good for people with home charging if they work but good for those with storage heating as they will heat during the day now.

crisco10

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118512736#Comment_118512736

OT alright, but a lot of wind power gets curtailed during the night. Partly due to nights tending to be windier and also low demand across the grid overnight. Nightrate still solves this oversupply issue - all be it it doesn't happen every night.

harderthanf

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118505322#Comment_118505322

Did you get an EV that had some features removed? I am waiting on an EV and would be well p!ssed off if they removed something from it.

harderthanf

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118512729#Comment_118512729

I think you need to have look at the current rates that are being provided by suppliers to customers with smart meters. There are none that are comparible to people on standard non-smart meters.

I understand what you are saying about how it benefits the network, but at the moment, anybody moving to smart plan is paying a lot more than people who don't. I really don't think that once there is a majority of smart meters in the marketplace the suppliers are going to suddenly start dropping prices.

turnfan

You simply MUST be able to open your charging flap from outside the car. Either by pressing the flap, keyfob etc

Drives me crazy every day on my Ioniq28.

Del2005

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118512823#Comment_118512823

We don't have a constant oversupply at night anymore which is why they are pushing the smart meters so they can price electricity cheap when the wind blows/sun shines and make it expensive when the wind doesn't blow and the suns not shining. Cheap electricity from 23:00 to 08:00 during the winter isn't going to be around much longer, all new homes are going electric heating and they want thousands more BEVs, demand for electricity during winter is going to explode and they want to use demand based billing to reduce the demand.

Wind hasn't blown for weeks

crisco10

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118514334#Comment_118514334

Yeah don't disagree with all that per se, I suppose I really meant to say that there will still be periods of over supply, and a lot of them will still be at night.

Anyway back on topic!

Gumbo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118513255#Comment_118513255

That must be so annoying.

My old 2014 Leaf could be opened from the key fob!

Gumbo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118514403#Comment_118514403

I don't know where you've been, but back here, in the real world, there's been plenty of wind.

turnfan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118514571#Comment_118514571

I see no reason for this flap to be locked when the car is unlocked.

Last time I saw something like this was on an old 1999 Toyota Yaris, with the little lever on the floor.

DublinDilbert

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118513255#Comment_118513255

Just bring the emergency charge port open pull cord up above the boot floor. You can just open the charge port there, while you are getting the cables out.

turnfan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118527472#Comment_118527472

I never take those cables out, this is for tethered at home charging (or rapid charging).

My type 2 cable is buried so far under my boot I'd have to get Indiana Jones to find it 😁

DublinDilbert

Ok for that I would attach a wireless relay across the switch contacts up front for the pop mechanism.

You'd probably able to make something out of a very cheap wireless door bell. Mount the wireless bell push at your charge point. :)

The fundamental issue is that car originally was developed with ICE / hybrid in mind, hence refueling was only once a week at most.

finbarrk

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118514577#Comment_118514577

There hasn't been any significant amount of wind in recent weeks.

crisco10

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118543760#Comment_118543760

A quick back of the envelope spreadsheet off Eirgrid Dashboard shows Renewables (mostly wind) as about 36% of Energy Mix in last 30 days.

Gumbo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118543760#Comment_118543760

Plenty of wind here.

as demonstrated above, 36% renewable generation to me seems like a lot of wind.

that figure goes above 50% at times.

Alkers

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118513170#Comment_118513170

Just so you are aware, smart meters and the smart meter tariffs are not one and the same.

You can get a new smart meter and stay on the day / night tariff. You can't obviously get a smart tariff without a smart meter

KCross

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118548773#Comment_118548773

You can get a new smart meter and stay on the day / night tariff.

that appears to be very much provider based. Lots of people (me included) have been told otherwise by their provider. Maybe that has changed recently. I’ll ask again when renewal time comes around

what is certain is that you can get the smart meter and stay on your normal 24hr rate but getting a day/night rate seems to be harder to do.

Gumbo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118549507#Comment_118549507

I’m electric Ireland.

I got a smart meter and stayed in my legacy 24/7 plan.

fits

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118548773#Comment_118548773

Which provider can you go on day night rate with?

I’d consider breaking my contract if I could do this. SSE told me there’s no going back when smart meter installed. I’m a bit half hearted about it anyway so not going to fight.

Comer1

The one thing I missed in my research prior to buying my EV was that AC charging is limited to the charger in the car. Didn't even realize that the car had a charger and thought I could get the full 22kw charge rate that most public AC chargers are.

The J Stands for Jay

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118554801#Comment_118554801

Could you explain this one? I don't have an EV yet, so I'm not completely au fait with everything about them.

Comer1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118554859#Comment_118554859

AC charging needs a charger between the outlet and the car to "convert" the electricity to DC. My ID.3 has an onboard 11kw charger to do this so that's the max speed you can charge on an AC charger. I believe the Zoe has a 22Kw charger. DC charging is much faster with the charging speed depending on the car

innrain

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118554801#Comment_118554801

This is a very often found misconception, although you can pick it up quickly if you pay attention to the charging times published by manufacturers. During my chats with EV drivers at chargers I had to explain this numerous times as they were expecting full 22 kW. One was a Tesla driver in Dingle at the old AC unit. He was so shocked about the doubling of the time required to fully charge. There are plugshare comments at various locations where people are disappointed about not reaching full advertised power.

So when we were discussing that it is wrong to call the AC point, charger some called on us as pendantic. But using correct terminology could avoid confusion. Battery charging happens in DC. The AC points are mere outlets, glorified sockets if you whish. Your home socket is rated 13A or 3kW but your phone charges at a 1000th of this power dictated by the phone charger.