lol-lol

An unknown factor where Nissan and Renault have been making EVs by the hundreds of thousands over the last more than a decade. Where buyers have decided that the Model Y is the car to buy making it the best selling car in the world and in numerous countries. Insurance companies have already computer via the actuaries what the risks are and whilst insurance is not cheap for a TESLA the fire risk is clearly not a big factor in their EV premiums as it is not with my Zoe's premium. There are some 35 Million EV, including a few million PHEVs and the total is expected to reach 40M by the end of the year and most of them have been on the road one and ten years so we have a lot of data.

You are sounding like a Vogon. We would still be in the oceans thinking oh that land looks dodgy etc.

Those of us who source our own EVs, some of us use our EVs for work, some of use will use mild and full hybrids as well but the big change to miles drive with EVs compared to ICE will be by goods transporters. My office at Heathrow uses EVs which pick up freight from the airline sheds to our off airport transit shed but the big change in use of EVs for moving goods is with companies like DPD who now have over 3,300 EVs used on delivery. DPD have teamed up with Glasgow HQ company Oncharge but using the DPD Bicester depot as a base. https://green.dpd.co.uk/ 50 kwh battery packs can be dropped off (must weight a bit) and used by those two thirds of drivers who do not have home chargers. Trying to find out more but sounds interesting. Presumably put inside the van during the night to do the charging and then Oncharge pickup in the morning. Questions like is it doing 7.4 kW AC charging rather than DC ?

The Electric Viking is the YouTuber reckon is very good. Makes the odd statistical error but most of what he says is very interesting and full of concise facts. Born Nylald is the world EV fountain head of knowledge. Robert llewelyn is and has been the UK informative source. EV fires and all the other crap is massively overstating a minor issue whilst missing the evolution that is occurring in transport and power.

He has gone down hill big time clearly loving the extra revenue from clicks. He does have some engineering knowledge, cannot remember him publishing what degrees or whatever he has. He seems just be regurgitation news which much we have heard without quoting meaningful stat. Yes if some idiot takes a half ton battery pack out of an ev and leaves it next several other evs for days that is not smart same if you left 15 gallons of petrol in plastic cans for days. Darwinian behaviour. I lost respect for him some weeks ago and he is on my no watch list now as he says nothing new and distorts news for clicks.

Good time to beat Clarkson in his 2.7 litre S type Jaaaag with its 200 hp or so. Many drivers think that a road diesel cars are pretty good on the track due to their high torque figures but the way the power disappears so abruptly and peak power is often nearish to the redline actually makes them not the suitable for a track day as Clarkson and Hamster has said several times I recall. Better with a good auto box rather than manual maybe but not as good as a petrol with the same hp but better spread across the rev range and less weight both in the chassis and in the inertia of the spinning crankshaft etc. Mind you Sabine did beat Jeezers 10 minutes and was closer to 9 minutes and one wonders if the 9 minutes 50 seconds for the electric mini is more of a Ring Specialist time rather than a Jeezer time. Respectable, is it limited to about a 100 mph when it gets a chance to go flat out between the Gantry and the Bridge ?

Danny Pedrosa is world class still. KTM MotoGP bike is also a demon starter with it's lowering system and perfect weight transfer. Super impressive.

It was tongue in cheek. Out of Spec Reviews has about 200k followers, he mainly is US dealing with US infrastructure and TESLA, occasionally pops over to Europe. Had about 50M views of his Youtube vids. Zoe was doing not bad in the corners, suffers from being limited to 90 mph but sounds like handling and brakes wer not bad. The 135 hp Zoe like mine, up to about 80 mph is similar to the 150 hp 2 litre diesel Superb in performance. Both would probably take over 10 minutes round the ring, probably closer to 11 minutes. https://zeperfs.com/en/duel5908-8148.htm This is the Zoe some of us want to get but I gather the Alpine A290 (Renault 5) with twin motors and 270 hp in the little car will be the future hot small Renault car....

Or even 430 hp like the £36k MG 4 Extreme. Some place, I think it is one or more of the Australian states, will not let learners drive most EVS, it seems, due to the "electric" acceleration from standstill unlike all ICE cars which take several tenths of a second to get going due to power = 2 x Pi x revs x Torque and ICE cars do not produce max power until the top third of the rev range where EVs do so in the bottom third of the revs range and tail off as revs climb. Great for getting out at roundabouts etc and off at the lights but EVs can catch the uninitiated out hence the Ozzy restriction it seems.

US has had minimum MPG targets/fines for cars made or imported since Jimmy Carter and the Arab oil economic power struggles of the seventies. Eventually the only way to stop over using gas was limiting vehicles to the double nickel ie 55 mph, effectively 60 mph with tolerance. Do that reduces tax intake of course. TESLA, as usual, has the right idea, build a car with a aero drag coefficient of around 0.2, make the most efficient drive train, good regen tech. Same applies to EV or ICE. Fuel efficiency, as the speed, costs money hence we have £20k plus for a "basic" car.

Wanting an ICE car in 2035 is going to be wanting a Motorola analogue phone in the days of the iphone, or Samsung S23. To extrapolate the incremental EVs have been following for the last ten years until a dozen years in the future they will be incredible. ICE's plateaued about the turn of the millenium, since then they have just be polishing the turd, oh look better sat nav, sound. Auto Gearboxes have got much better ie Merc 9 speed, BMW 8 speed, VAG 7 speed boxes, a part from that ICEs have reached their limit and only viable when more and more EV hybrid gubbins is added IMO.

Yes I do this in the Zoe now and then. Particularly when the battery is 90% to 100% full and regen does not work full, nowhere for regen to go. Just slot the gear shift lever in to N, keep hand on the shifter lever and pop back in to Drive/B mode when needed. Zoe is single gear, some cars have two gears, that gear give max torque from about 1500 revs which is about 12 mph hence the good acceleration, 0-30 in three point two seconds but the motor maximum spin revs is 11k revs which is "only" an indicated 90 mph. So a bit weird compare to my Arkana's 7 speed EDC gearbox but Zoe single gear works pretty well, it actually has a clutch apparently but it does not feel like a ICE clutch and it is totally under the control of the car's electronics but it feels like the clutch is disengaged and one is free wheeling when in N on the gearstick but rolling along at 30, 50, 70 or 90 mph indicated. At 100 mph the dashboard shouts the electric motor is over revving as seen on Zoe ZE 50 doing a lap on the Nürburgring, 9 min 30 second in. Think coasting in neutral helps give an extra few miles range. seo

I heard that Saudi was refining Russian crude which I did not know they did and there is reports that this one million barrel a day cut by Saudi is disproportionately hitting diesel prices rather petrol due to the heavier specific gravity giving more diesel than petrol hence we are seeing again the divergence in the pump price of the two fuels. Wall Street Journal earlier this month.... https://www.wsj.com/livecoverage/stock-market-today-dow-jones-09-05-2023/card/diesel-fuel-prices-harder-hit-by-saudi-arabia-russia-production-cuts-ExaqjHU1NFAaf9mTLfYl The price of diesel fuel used in trucks has been rising faster than regular gas—and that trend is likely to continue. On Tuesday, crude oil rallied after Saudi Arabia and Russia said they're extending their oil production cuts. Diesel fuel surged even more. Russian and Middle Eastern crudes tend to be heavier and yield more diesel, jet and marine fuel than U.S. shale oil, which is lighter and more prone to producing products like gasoline. It's why OPEC production cuts and Western sanctions on Russian crude oil have had an outsized impact on those heavier fuels.

Put some fuel in the Ark this afternoon, nearly £70 and it only took about 45 litres. Think that works over £7 a gallon. I see Tescos now allow up to £120 in a single transaction as presumably several drivers complained that £100 was just not enough only giving then 14 gallons when they wanted to put more in. Must use the EV more which is getting easier with the new chargers popping up.

£70 nearly to fill the little 50 litre tank in the Renault Ark, think petrol price, E10, was £1.56 a litre in Stone, probably was cheaper in Stoke. Range only showing 610 miles as I think my mpg was drop from nearly 70 mpg I was getting to more like 60 mpg as the ambient temperature drops, darker, wet roads. That £70 would buy me about 3,000 miles range in the Renault Zoe EV. Q car park chargers are out of action, again, in Liverpool. Inflation may be edging downwards and UK Gilts well off their peaks from a few months ago but diesel, particularly, and petrol price rises look like pulling inflation the wrong way.

What is the feeling on Scotland over the SNP recent history as in England we got the pictures of the tents in sturgeon's House, the expensive motor home but have not heard any real conclusion. I am hoping that Labour stay on course for a majority in the dozens and do not need SNP votes for any actions in a new government though i do forlorn the position of Scottish Labour and hope it can back a chunk of its previously held number of seats and lessons have been learnt. Did not know Scotland has different EV and ICE phasing dates and whilst Glasgow as such a big city does suffer pollution issues proud of them taking their own stance ahead of national implementation. As you mentioned earlier the colder temperatures in Scotland are a factor but if Norway can then Scotland cannae too.

It's called irony. Do not know if I will go for a heat pump but it is compelling when uk government are stumping up so much of the dosh and from where ? They going to borrow even more money when essential services chronically need the money ?

But we just got a new extension lead over to Denmark. !! Think I am going to get me some more batteries to use all that lovely cheap overnight lecky. It is not that England is short of lecky it is just they want it at certain peak times ie tea time and brecky/work start. Nice the Grid is going to pay me to not use it for at least a dozen tea times during the winter. Many pounds to harvest there. Think it was about a ten to one ratio last winter during the Octopus pay back system. Just need to make sure I use loads the other tea times so it looks like I am saving loads when they tell me of the time they want me to save. At only 29p per kWh should not be too hard. I see we are pulling 33 GW currently. Who has wimped out and put their heating on today ?? https://gridwatch.co.uk/

All academic. The car makers will only produce hybrids and EVs by 2030, even if they are luke warm ones like my Arkana. Rishi speech at 1630 today was so little boy lost. Who has his ear ? Must be a bit of the Express, Mail and Telegraph and a bit of GB News and Talk Radio thrown in to as it was a mishmash of directionless pandering which did a fantastic job of saying something to **** off just about everybody. Talk about an own goal. Keep it up Rishi. Even though I just fitted a new gas boiler might get one of those heat pumps as well so I can have the choice of which system to use depending on the price of electricity and gas at any time, nice. Octopus was doing one for free, under certain circumstances, at £5k subsidy, what can I get for £7.5k bung ? Maybe have downstairs on the heat pump and upstairs on the gas boiler. The choices. Ten years of subsidising electric cars and home charging points and now massive subsidies for home heating, they really are the people who just cannot stop giving, where do they get all the money from I wonder ?

I think you are all being hard on Richie, he has just upped the heat pump UK government subsidy up from £5k to £7.5k, wow. I can upgrade my heating system, pay even less on my monthly energy bills, and the UK government, ie you the other tax payers, are going to pay for it, and the value of that system just goes on to the overall value of house. Winner, winner chicken dinner. Those of us with big detached house can slip that noisy air heat pump great big thingamabob down the side part of the house, that bit we rarely go, keep the odd ladder and let tradesmen in rather than come through the front door. Thank you PM, and (wooden) cabinet for giving the already well oiled a way of adding thousands to house value and cutting energy bills all with UK government money, I will raise a glass if PIMMS or maybe a brandy tonight. God knows where UK Gov getting the money from, suppose money that could have gone to the NHS or something but hey ho, cheers boys !

Only a mother could love the looks of a mark one Superb. I heard the mark one was a 100 mm stretched Passat which it felt like they did without bothering to retune suspension. Passats and Superb are useful and almost the go to car for the freakishly tall. Potential son in laws brother is 6'10 I gather and his choice was limited to Passat, Superb or Chrysler 300. After that one excursion of owning a Superb went back to Octavia which I thought ticked boxes for size of car in the boot and cabin and meant I did not have to take the hit on acceleration and fuel consumption over the Octavia but always was jealous they got the 280 hp 4 wheel drive model which is the only Superb I would give a second look to.

Does not need to be 48V, Arkana is all 12V including hybrid. I gather TESLA have decided to go for 48V for all of the auto systems, wow that is a going your own way !

And sadly UK does not get all the models and sometimes have stopped getting the best models. Out of all the Fabia and Octavia VRSs, Felicas and Superb the best car was the 1.8 TSI L&K, Mk2 Octavia. Engine revved to 7k, the short stroke EA888 I think. If that was 160 hp I am a Dutchman. Tested as 0-60 of 7.5s, was still pulling hard at 135 mph and had a long list of luxury features but also good on juice, around 50 mph I recall thanks to its 7 speed dry clutch DSG. Worst Skoda out of the 15 or so, mark 1 Superb. Handled like a barge, worse than the Felecia I think. 1.9 PD was OK, lots of room for 3 kids and their stuff butt ugly and bad handling. Why did I buy it, never mind the quality, feel the width.

I had some of the earlier 6 speed DQ250 gear boxes, thought it was a good pair up when it was either a 5 speed manual or the 6 speed wet DQ250 but then I had a SEAT with the 2 litre 140 hp Common rail diesel and wonder why it was slower and much thirstier than the 1.9 PD, that when I realised diesel had had their day compared to the new turbo petrols with 7 speed DSG/EDCSs that were coming up about 13 years ago. DQ200 needed no 40k servicing, oil change etc, seemed more efficient and was a lot lighter than the DQ250, could not handle the bigger torque ie over 250 Nm, although they can actually handle 380 Nm but probably not for 400k kms as was the original design brief. Audis/VAGs etc started getting the better DQ380, then DQ381 from 2015 but Skoda, no doubt for reasons of being cheap, continued to use the DQ250 gearbox which I regard as a bit of an old nail and they are all 7 speed I think. I rate the DQ250 so poorly, it was OK up until 8 years ago when the DQ380 etc appeared, the DQ500 was already around but overkill for a two wheel drive Superb and as well as the 7 speeds the DQ200 and DQ380/1 just were newer more advanced gearboxes and the DQ250 just got left as the cooking auto gearbox. I some tests it even produced worse mpg than the manuals whereas the 7 speeds were the other way usually showing mpg a couple better than the manual and even lower CO2 as well. Year of manufacture does not indicate a car is using the latest tech gearboxes or anything else. If VAG were still finding buyers for tech that is several years old then they will, and have.