Luckypants

We've just come back from a touring holiday of the Scottish highlands and want to say the cost to charge has been amazingly low. I didn't seek out free chargers or anything but happened to get quite a few. Those I did pay for were very reasonable from Chargeplace Scotland. We got a free charge on a Geniepoint in Kendal on the way home courtesy of Bonnet. £95 for 1900 miles. I'm well content with that.

🤢🤮

A new MfG charging hub at the end of the M180 at Barnetby opened last week. 8x150kW chargers. Not on Zap Map yet, but can be seen through the MfG Connect app or on Plugshare. Handy for trips to South Yorkshire.

The chargers in the video went live last week. MfG are currently subject to a takeover offer.... https://news.sky.com/story/abu-dhabi-state-oil-giant-weighs-5bn-bid-for-motor-fuel-group-12626882 That'll make that tory doner much richer....

There is some enforcement to prevent charger hogging. Some charge point operators charge 'overstay' fees to prevent cars blocking the charger, which is usually implemented by a connection time limit or a time limit after your car stops charging. There is also the parking time limit way of preventing charger hogging by letting firms such as 'Parking Eye' enforce a time limit - this method is common at supermarket chargers. Overstay fees / time limits are not ubiquitous by any means, which means charger hogging is still a problem. It also leads to legitimately charging vehicles being issued a PCN if the driver does not check the T's&C's, so in general is a bit of a mess. Being aware of what the state of play is helps EV drivers, but a universal protocol needs to be adopted to help prevent confusion amongst drivers. IMHO Rapid chargers should implement overstay fees when charging completes like the Tesla model (including limiting charge to 80% at busy sites) and 'fast' chargers limited by time via parking restrictions.

Useful to know all that/ The Porsche chargers are a very handy option that is little known, although I guess as EVs become more common they might go Porsche only. I'm very jealous of the Powerpass card, it seems to give a much better deal than the VW version. Do you have to pay a monthly subscription to get the 25p rate?

Sorry, was unaware but understand.

On the subject of cost to charge, I have recently been using the Bonnet app. to access rapid chargers. The most expensive PAYG tariff is 35p. If you opt to pre-buy charges via their 'refills' that can go as low as 25p (per kWh). All offer a significant saving over current rapid charge prices. They are not partnered with many big CPOs, the most notable being Osprey, Ionity and Geniepoint in terms of numbers but there are plenty of places to charge. They are quite generous with free charging codes too, try FIRSTCHARGE2 to get your first charge for free. more details - https://www.joinbonnet.com/ If you decide to give it a try, please ask me for my referral code to get £15 off. Note I also get £15.

One of the benefits of the new version of ID software will be faster charging on DC. For my car thats going from 38 minutes 10-80% to 30 minutes, so a useful improvement if I ever do that. More likely to benefit from higher charging speeds at higher SoC due to the new charging curve. That's if the update ever appears......

Missing the Cardiff SC, 15 sites opened.

I've installed the Tesla app. for a look see. The app is neat and works just fine. The map shows me just the chargers I can use as a non-Tesla driver. The price is pretty steep, but it is a safety net after all. Making them expensive will deter the casual user and get those who want to charge then go lining up. I expect that more sites will be added after a month or two like they have in Norway and France. On a personal level, they have opened almost all the Welsh sites so that is a win.

Quite a major, but much anticipated announcement today, covering many charging hubs. Tesla is opening up the UK SuperCharging network to non-Tesla vehicles. https://www.electrifying.com/blog/article/it-s-official-tesla-opens-up-uk-supercharger-network-to-non-tesla-drivers EDIT: Link to TESLA map showing SCs open to all (15 Sites) https://www.tesla.com/en_gb/findus?v=2&bounds=60.60630786089475%2C18.903900211843165%2C48.26553927505605%2C-23.283599788156835&zoom=6&filters=party&search=Wakefield%2C UK

Officially open it seems. https://transportandenergy.com/2022/05/17/scotlands-largest-ultra-rapid-charging-station-opens-in-hamilton/

As @roottoot would like road tests with vehicle loaded, Bjorn Nyland has obliged.

Here are South Mimms chargers on Plugshare https://www.plugshare.com/location/350611 Their website https://www.applegreenelectric.com/ Plugshare entry suggests 49p/kWh

So some more rapid charging hubs I heard have opened this week. 12 x 350kW Gridserve chargers at Thurrock services opened today, both older 60kW units remain. Applegreen (new to market) have a 6 x 150kW charger hub at South Mimms which opened this week.

Gridserve has also just announced a price increase.... Standalone Low Power AC Chargers : 39p/kWh Electric Forecourts® : 45p/kWh Medium Power Chargers : 48p/kWh High Power Chargers : 50p/kWh https://www.gridserve.com/2022/05/02/gridserve-electric-highway-pricing-update/?LeadSourceCode=crm1017 I guess everyone else won't be far behind now

I think most companies are going down the hub route now. (see the other thread about new hubs) Osprey are doing them, Gridserve (obvs) and Instavolt - MfG EV Power have adopted the filling station model it seems . Most recently Instavolt have expanded their Banbury hub and are about to open an 8 charger hub near me on the A5 in Corwen. Sure they are putting in single / double chargers some places as quick fixes as these often do not need new infrastructure from the DNO, but in general multi-charger sites are the new normal. 57p/kWh is steep and would put my fuel cost on the ID.4 about the same as my diesel costs would be in my previous Karoq 2.0TDi (based on £1.75/l). That's more than I want to be paying, so Instavolt will be near the bottom of the list of chargers to go to.

Is it madness? Who is driving the uptake in EVs right now? In my experience its mainly company car drivers who like the BIK rates. Private buyers are much fewer. If the majority of drivers are company car drivers, they are the ones on the road needing rapid charges and they won't care about the price as the company is paying. They may have worked out they can cash in on perceived high energy costs with the company car market. We don't know the reason they've increased prices, but they will have factored in the possibility of losing sales over price.

Instavolt announced another price increase yesterday. 57p/kWh from 4th May! https://instavolt.co.uk/instavolt-price-statement/

I thought they all got a rev counter on the standard dash? A small clock on bottom left of dash? What model did you buy? PID does display a temp. gauge if you want it to.

A preview of the new VW MEB software shipping "soon" to existing models. For those that don't know, VW have announced a service campaign to replace the 12V battery with an improved one, upgrade firmware in several hardware modules to make the software updateable over the air (OTA) and install software version 2.4 into the cars. After this, software version 3.0 will arrive via an OTA later in the year.

Gridserve have opened their second Electric Forecourt charging station today in Norwich. 22 HPC chargers, 8 Tesla SC and a dozen A/C charge posts. https://www.gridserve.com/2022/04/21/gridserve-opens-new-electric-forecourt-in-norwich-transforming-ev-charging-in-the-area/?LeadSourceCode=crm1017

WattsUp is a useful route planner as it shows chargers along your route. A Better Route Planner (aka ABRP) is helpful and accurately predicts your car's range if you update the settings correctly.

They are Tebay services only? I don't think two Ecotricity (now Gridserve) chargers on the North bound side count as a hub. The 6 Tesla superchargers on the southbound side would count if open to all.