Increase in Anti-EV Media Articles

Slightly Kwackers

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122136163#Comment_122136163

I have no idea as to the decision making. I wanted an estate and later when my work took me to Ireland a lot, a long wheelbase transit van, both were denied.

EV's would be out full stop. I had difficulty sometimes simply finding fuel, although after twenty years driving for the company only ran out twice. The satnav took me to a few closed stations, on top of that I needed to find garages that accepted my fuel card. Things may well be different now, but stopping to charge an EV isn't like fuelling up.

I suppose the one saving grace with EV's is you don't have to wait around to have the battery "pumped out" when you put the wrong kind of Volts in :-)

I am fully aware that most petrol cars have turbos, maybe it's a simplistic approach, but when buying my own car I would not have a turbo, The fuel economy seems around the same as a turbo model, or so I was told by the dealer, and the power is adequate. If I shift more fuel in and at a faster rate, then I assume that the engine will wear sooner, but I have no foundation for this approach, bar the Mazda of course.

I assumed a "plodder" would be cheaper on the insurance too.

Don't get me wrong, I think EV's are an excellent approach, but I never seriously looked into buying one because of the vastly different cost of my petrol plodder and an EV, plus of course the power unreliability here, although the last major network upgrade was designed to remedy this. I will wait and see :-(

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122136476#Comment_122136476

The reason petrol cars are increasingly turbocharged is not because they are "plodders" as you describe them. But it gives them...

"...better fuel economy and lower emissions, without comparable loss of performance...."

https://www.bbc.com/news/business-34731463

Certainly less complex the engine it will "probably" be cheaper to maintain. I've got a non turbo petrol manual myself for the same reason. But it's not been as reliable as older cars I've owned. I think modern cars are just not as reliable as they were back in late 90s.

Unless you're doing massive long trips for work (or pleasure) now. It's irrelevant to what car you use now.

With respect I don't think you can understand how charging works on an EV. Unless you use one.Because you don't charge them in the same way you fill a petrol car. You tend to top up along the route which means your never actually stopped for much time at all. Only at the start of end of journey would you doing a full charge. At which point a car is parked for hours anyway.

All that said someone doing mega work mileage non stop would mostly be best in a diesel. But only a tiny % of people do that.

Slightly Kwackers

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122136686#Comment_122136686

Thanks.

I am no longer working so circumstances are different.

Brief stops would be out when working, I hated interruptions to the route.

I never did the research for the current vehicle, the dealer was someone I knew from way back when I first started to rent cars from him for holidays here. Frankly I am more than happy with the fuel consumption. The only really noticeable thing is that I tend to remain in third going up Connor Pass. The Focus needed fourth for the steeper bits.

Reliability was never an issue with petrol engines. The Fords were fine, alternators went and water pumps too, but that was at over 100K.

The only oddity was that most never used oil, but one or two seemed very thirsty for oil from new. I bought my "thirsty" one from the administrators when the company hit problems, I topped it up every two or three tankfuls of fuel, but it never increased in consumption, even when I dropped down to the cheapest stuff I could get hold of.

I must admit an EV would tend to fit in with my current driving. Although I visit them rarely these days, I know every petrol station with customer toilets around here. I assume most charging points have a toilet in the vicinity?

On the whole I'm happy with the Seat, although I dislike the software. In town sometimes when I try to move off at lights the car wont go and I get a message saying that I need to manually restart. The auto stop is only for the journey, so I cannot switch it out permanently. The only way to avoid the problem is not to wear the seatbelt.

The other little surprise was the application of brakes for no reason. I called into the dealer who suggested it might be leaves on the road blowing into the sensor path.

The days of something mechanical with a carb and nothing more new fangled than flashing turn indicators seem quite heavenly :-(

Flinty997

Carbs were their own nightmare.

There are good and bad petrol engines. You can't make omelettes without breaking eggs. So it's not possible that every older engine is good or every new engine is bad. Theres good and bad in everything.

Flinty997

If the idea is that older petrols without turbos are less complex and thus should have less problems. Then an EV is vastly less complicated with far less parts.

RoboRat

Converted another doubter today. Was driving to an event and she grabbed a lift of me.

Straight away she noticed it was an ev and asked to genuinely give my opinion as she heard bad things.

I was very honest and she asked the usual questions about range, battery, what happens if I run out of power. She loved the quietness and comfort but her jaw dropped when I told her it cost less than an entry level golf and that I was paying less than 1/10th to power it, about 1/4 of the tax I was i paying and half the insurance cost.Then I gave her a demo of the acceleration and she was sold.

She was planning on getting a new car next year and she's definitely going electric now. Just goes to show if people are open to the idea and can see its actually a great option, they'll embrace it.

pah

🤷🏻‍♂️

https://www.newstalk.com/news/electric-vehicles-weigh-almost-double-traditional-family-cars-1725132

Flinty997

So compare and EV with something from the 1970s. Makes sense.

1970 - 980kg

Honda E - 1588 kg

BMW 3-Series - 1520 kg

Model 3 - 1684 kg

Tiguan - 1490 kg

Audi A6 - 1720 kg

ID4 - 1966 kg

Volvo XC90  -2052 kg

maidhc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122139538#Comment_122139538

An average car park in 1970 would be full of mk1 escorts (800kg), minis (600kg) and the odd cortina or hilman hunter weighing a slight bit more.

new cars are obscenely big and heavy, let’s just accept that as a fact and move on.

Flinty997

I wonder what would happen if a XC90 ran into cortina. Which would you choose to be in.

maidhc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122139715#Comment_122139715

There wasn’t too many XC90s running into cortinas in the 70s.

New cars are undeniably safer. There were 4x the road deaths in the 70s despite far fewer cars and a much smaller population. They are twice the size though, that’s an absolute fact.

Flinty997

Classic example of anti EV article. Misrepresenting facts to feed the fud hysteria.

ICE cars are also heavier and bigger.

But the safety, roadholding, breaking, performance of modern cars is light years better. Try a 1970s car on a busy fast moving M50 or 120kph motorway and see how they get on.

It's disingenuous reporting.

maidhc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122139949#Comment_122139949

EVs on average are heavier, maybe because they are bigger cars on average also.

It’s a fun game pretending everything is fud, but there is only so much mileage in it.

Having owned an early 70s car (in recent times) I would be of the view modern cars are inferior to drive, there is no joy in driving a 2ton dead lump with a whirring motor and electric power steering.

My 1970s car (a 2.0 capri) had about 140bhp and was well able for modern traffic.

prawnsambo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122139974#Comment_122139974

The headline and subhead single out EVs in particular when this is a factor with all modern cars. Average SUV kerb weight is around 1.5 tonnes compared to the 700-800kg 1970s car. And since these make up the vast majority of the fleet (60%), the average extra 25% weight of EVs (2.5%) is negligible in comparison. So yeah, FUD.

pah

EV's are prob 10 to 20% heavier than similarly sized ICE. Grand. Comparing EV's to cars from the 70's is pointless. What is the actual point of the article? 🤷🏻‍♂️

liamog

We may as well see articles how about how much damage is done to cars now from minor accidents compared to 1970's models. Cars have gotten bigger since we decided to move surround the passenger compartment with an energy absorbing crumple zone instead of having the car fold in on the passenger. It would be impossible to build Issigonis Mini to modern safety standards.

josip

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122139709#Comment_122139709

No problem accepting it as a fact if the article wasn't so poorly written (aka crock of sh1te). It's all over the place with no thread of continuity, development of point/argument. It's like some lad went down to the pub for the night, had a few pints and scribbled down some stuff that came into his head on small pieces of paper. Got up in the morning and assembled them in no particular order for a media post.

Allinall

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122140186#Comment_122140186

The point is the car parks were built in the 60s and 70s. Hence the comparison with cars of that era.

pah

So it's like comparing apples and oranges in a bowl from the 70's, designed to hold plums. Now the oranges are heavier than the apples and the reporter says oranges are terrible and will break the bowl but it's got nothing to do with the apples. Got it.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122139974#Comment_122139974

I wonder will a capri be well able for diesel XC90 hitting it at motorway speeds.

There are modern coupes like a Cayman, BMW M2 etc.

Often the weight difference is 3-5 people between an EV and ICE. Obviously they realised this isn't a story. So they had to go back half a century to get a significant disparity in weight. Then ignore that it also applies to ICE as well.

If car parks have a layout designed for car from 50yrs ago they've only themselves to blame. They should mark it out for modern cars. That will reduce the number of spaces, and number of cars and thus the weight.

liamog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122140186#Comment_122140186

As a cynic I'd say, to drum up business for a structural engineer with a specialisation in car park design, particularly with regard to retrofits.

mfceiling

It's Newstalk.

Every day on twitter they post deliberately provocative posts to get engagement.

It will either be EV's or immigrants. And like night follows day they will get the usual bunch of head the balls posting nonsense in the replies.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122140241#Comment_122140241

It's like a maths question from primary school and they got it wrong.

If 100 cars fit in a field. Then you make the cars 50% bigger. How many now fit in the field.

journalist - EVs cause fields to collapse and explode like a every car chase and crash scene from movies.

Allinall

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122140496#Comment_122140496

Weight doesn't equal size.

Hotblack Desiato

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122139709#Comment_122139709

Some of 'em have ramps and spaces only really wide enough for a BL Mini or Mk1 Escort, too! Tallaght hospital multistorey car park is an abomination. Plenty of multicoloured scrapes on the ramp walls. Can't be fixed either without demolishing the whole thing. And this one was built in the 90s.

Hotblack Desiato

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122139974#Comment_122139974

Except most people in Ireland in the 70s were driving VWs, Minis, Renault 4s, 1.1 Escorts… there would have been only a handful of 2 litre Capris on the roads here.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122140504#Comment_122140504

I wasn't the one who said..."....they are bigger cars on average also..."

josip

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122140547#Comment_122140547

I fell in love with one in a magazine back in 1979. Asked my poor father could we get that next instead of a 2nd hand 127. At that age all cars cost the same.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122140589#Comment_122140589

M15

https://youtu.be/OJASt0sKbWo?si=U07uq99MQiprCSKx

ColemanY2K

I remember in the 80s being taken to primary school in a neighbours Ford Capri.

It was a ball ache for a 5 year old getting into the back seats, can only imagine how difficult it was for adults to get in. Must have been a death trap in a crash.