lol-lol

Not sure I would want to be part of the consortium who put quarter of a billion in to Gridserve. They need to smarten up and quick. First thing to do is to agree to accept the Octopus Elelectroverse card and really with the little but significant 5% discount that Electroverse normally has. The nice thing about Electroverse is not that little 5% but the fact it just goes on to Octopus house billing system, shows up quickly but I am probably in credit and effectively it is not going to specifically pay it as it gets rolled in to my Octopus account along with my referal bonuses, DD, wheel spins, not won big yet, free electricity day credits etc etc. Come on Gridserve, get with the program. Come under the one card to rule them all. You too Tesla.

The 80% for pure Lithium is just a warning not to keep doing as it will eventually harm the battery's capacity but doing it one a week/weekend, over night, before that long trip seems to cause no perceptible effects in the first 1100 days I have had the Zoe ZE50 and that does not even have the more advanced systems of the Scenic where you go in the car before charging and set it to 80, 85, 90, 95 or 100 % the night before a substantial journey. Going to 100% once a week seems fine of Lithium, just not good to charge it to 100% every night and leave it for day or days, that is not so good. As said above with LFP just charge it right up and have it sat their on full charge. LIke Lithium the batteries are getting several percent better every year on energy density but Lithium seems to maintain a bit of a lead over LFP fairly constantly. I always have one of the cars sat on the drive with 80% ie 200 miles range if I need to go somewhere and on occasion we have used my son's full hybrid Clio, little 39 litre tank but with 500 mile range. I think we will keep a hybrid until 80% battery is 300 miles plus, which it would have been if I had gone for the 87/92 kwh but that is not 300 motorway miles. Renault are very honest and if one really bats it purely on the motorways, probably in technically illegal speeds, say indicated 80 mph in UK, indicate 130 kph plus a bit, then I don't think one would get 200 miles or about 300 kms. The Scenic comes with a modular battery pack, in about a dozen chunks, and with the every falling price of battery packs, LG Chem in Renault case for the Lithium batteries, mot LFP come from the People's Republic of China. we need that Cornish Lithium mining being ramped up ASAP and the Somerset battery factor also got on lines ASAP if the world is to enter Trade Wars as predicted under the Trump era.

Just a pointer outer that Lithium Iron Phosphate batteries are cobalt free. Renault have been slowish to adopt LFP batteries but in 2025 the R5 and R4 will have LFP options that might take about half the sales. TELSA and BYD are already massive LFP battery users. LFP batteries are much safer upon piercing that pure lithium but have a lower energy density, not massively, something like 20% but they can be charger to 100% no bother whereas Lithium pure are advised to only be charged to about 80% on a regular basis. The future appears more LFP, and maybe sodium and other base materials rather than what we call NMC, Nickel Molybdenum Colbalt ie Lithium batteries which are still popular to use due to energy density but LFP and other are expected to become the major EV battery over the next year or so.

Octopus now allow the thousands of their clients on the GO tariff to export back to grid and they can earn 15p a kwh. So GO customers can now download power at 8.5 p per kwh during the night period and sell back to the grid at 15p therefore making 6.5p per kwh a few hours later. This is effectively turning us GO client's as micro battery storage for the grid. Whether we use our batteries or cars, if V2G capable, this should have a positive effect on stopping using gas etc peak demand hydrocarbon plants. Not worth it for me yet as I think one needs lithium iron phosphate or similar batteries as pure lithium batteries deg would outweigh any marginal payment between import and export values. Wider differential might occur. I recall reading that lecky production could sell for up to a £1 a kwh at some times and as we know Octopus will sometimes supply lecky for free and Agile customers have even been paid to take surplus lecky.

Pity the fairer sex.

Zap map is unofficial default App but many of use Electroverse or the individual Gridserve, Ionity or the inbuilt Google 12 as I have in the Scenic. None are perfect and it is not easy when there are 2,000 new charger being added each month on average. Think a new status is needed ie working but limited to 100 A ie 38 or so kWs as I had a few days ago as I think the cable cooling had failed on the 350 kw ie circa 500 A capable charger which I presume could do 800v instead of just 400v as my EVs aritecture is.

Some Japanese and especially Italian bikes and cars, I am sure, deliberately were overreacting by 10% or sometimes a bit more. Ie I have just had my Jota, Guzzi etc up to over 140 mph. Guy on Triumph or Norton said, I only had 125 mph on my Smiths speedo ! Helps sell these none English bikes in the speedo lies big time. Not cricket.

Like my motorcycles with digital display they also over read by about 5%. I think it is deliberately made so. Therefore with tyres with absolute minimum tread, maybe a bit underinflated too it will still not under display tge speed so vehicle makers, even when they can be within 1 or 2 percent, overread by 5 % or so. Find it odd that at least with Renault the distance measuring seems to under read by about 3 or 4%, odd.

Think it was Beford Police Commisioner who wanted to, raise some money. He has the M1 running through his patch. Think he was put down eventually.

The voice from the outer world, well Cornwall, has got a 6 months ban for speeding, wonder if it was in an EV ? Is it you have to either have several speeding tickets for the 10% plus 2,3, 4 mph or be clocked at over 30 mph over this nominal plus 10% + 2 mph etc Think it might be the former as he said this last court session for speeding gave him another 4 points taking him to 13 point in total hence the 6 month ban. Sorry to hear it has curtailed his livelihood and especially sorry to hear he has cataracts which need to be treated but sounds like he was not adhering to systems that most professional drivers have. One can see truck drivers playing the percentages ie driving at what we see on our speedometers as 53 or 54 in a 50 mpg zone. The know there actual speed is probably 51 or 52 and within tolerance. It would be nice to hear him praise the systems that EVs particularly have ie digital instrumentation, Google maps, traffic signal reading, and over speed warning. Even sped limiting, my Scenic will not do over an indicate 71 mph in ECO mode and it has a top speed of only 90 mph. A story of education for many of us who need to driver for our jobs which I will take away. The days of my motorcycle buddies doing the near 120 miles from Bristol to Ivybridge or Plymouth in not much over an hour, it is about 120 miles, or the M25 orbital, 117 miles, in an hour are long gone. Just sit back stay within the limits, calibrate your speedometer with GPS and do not get in to the situation of this wally. Keep speeding on the race track please.

Zoe ZE50 implies 50 kWs, actually 52 usable and actual 55 kWs if you want to run in to the Turtle Zone and get another dozen or so miles.

Snow White and six dwarfs. Have to be the EV9 then.

A bit basic and many cars have more than 3 option. SCENIC has 4 and in all but ECO you can do some configuring. ECO limits to 71 mph, hardly a tight limit but is still a bit of a pain sometimes. Some cars have regen on the gearstick, oft only low or high, Megane and Scenic have 4 levels on paddles, left paddle raises, right paddle lowers. Level 1 is no reg which is great for freewheeling and preserving momentum then a low medium and high but not quite one pedal driving. I am already exceeding tge WLTP of the Scenic by about 5%, as I already do in the Zoe. Highish tyre pressures help, bit of drafting sometimes. Both the Zoe and Scenic have one or two kwh below zero percent. Only seen the turtle once in well over 3 years.

It does look like even a good fake. Musk head on a different body photo chop it looks to be and not what Musk is suppose to be focusing on at the moment.

Most of us can spot fake news in a second.

Thanks the above. £110 in second year beyond is cool. Presumably be just under a tenner per month with ice and even hybrids paying nearly twice this. Happy to pay some tax for the EVs. Might take the off the road for February and put back on in March if the "retaxing" does not work for my two September anniversary cars. Q."When is your cars birthday ? " A September 15 th. Q. which year ? A. Every year ! (Hot Fuzz in the pub Sgt Angel questioning under age drinkers).

See what the budget in an hours time does for this. 6p a litre if the previously introduced 5p reduction in excise is scrapped as RAC mentioned should happen.

The giant clay mining areas of Cornwall and South Devon are a site to behold. We regularly would get the Dr Who film crew down there when they wanted an alien landscape.

Great to see this. Lots in Cornwall and some materials in South Devon too I think.

I am thinking the Renault 4 will be the more useful car though I gather it might be more expensive R5 which is reverse logic. I think the 40 kwh LFP versions should sell well but dealers will push to the 50 kwh lithium I suspect. Be interesting to see prices and whether R4 is a good repayment for my Zoe.

The ZE50 interests me as it is the model that local Renault did not want back, though ok to have my mild hybrid Arkana back, as it was worth about £5k less than my PCP pay off amount, that was 3 months ago when I was doing the deal for the Scenic etech. Roll on 3 month, and despite coming up to winter and the values are up around £11k from the £9k it was. https://www.autotrader.co.uk/car-search?advertising-location=at_cars&aggregatedTrim=Riviera&make=Renault&model=Zoe&postcode=wr40lx&sort=relevance Now "wise youtube men", like the self appointed expert above, seem to think those who drive EVs despair over EVs losing their value quickly overthe first 5 years or so, the truth is far from it in most case. As most EVs are on PCP a low market value can mean that the local dealer who is obliged to take back the EV after 2, 3, 4 years, is in a tough spot as is the nation marque importer. I can easily just say "take the car back", having paid my two hundred and something pounds a month for having the car, which costs next to nothing to run and I have made money on mileage claims from HMRC or he can, and it has been intimated, he will cut me a deal on buying the car I have grown to like over the past 3, 4 years. As Renault do not really want a car worth much less than the balloon payment, unless I do a deal for a new Renault 5 or 5 EV, which is highly likely, I understand they will offer to sell my Zoe Riviera for thousands below the balloon payment ie round about between the trade in and re-retail value. So no, quite happy for the market value to be on the low side ie residual of around a third after 3 years but some, probably many, EVs are bouncing back in value on Autotrader and in the auction houses quite well. Winners and losers of course as some EVs are exposed as poor value as not reaching their WLTPetc by a huge margin whilst other are seen as gems.

Apparently, if one plugs in to a powerful DC charger ie over 100 kws, but one only sees 35/36 kwh when one is expecting over 100 kw charging as the car is capable of over 100 kw and battery is half or less charged it means the cable cooling has failed and that is quite common, even happened on Ionity chargers which are normally quite good. Live and learn.

I got Flame Red and it was a "free" colour, yeah.

With my Zoe I have only used AC three times in 3 years and that was as much just to see the what happened as good have made it home without charging even though 200 kms from charging at home. Scenic has even greater range but both can charge on 22 kw AC when around. I am not sure we going to need a hundred thousand rapid chargers because the pace battery capacities are increasing people will charge even more so at home or destination at the almost or actually free juice.

Majority of are type 2 for AC and CCS combo plug for DC. That must cover the majority ie non TESLA and weird LEAF and a few other Asian built cars mostly years ago.