Monkhai

Lifetime filter... Sounds nasty.

I'd put it all on the comparison sites, it looks like I will have to do some more digging.

I hear you George... I actually phone up the insurance and found similar across all models I asked about. Kia EV6, Hyundai Ionic 5, VW ID4, Volvo XC40 Recharge, Skoda Enyaq (All long range versions mind). I guess it's just a case of sucking it up or finding an EV that works on that front.

Just seen that supermarket branded insurance quote on the EV...

I'm old enough now that a diesel costs £250-300 and an EV was £350 if you were lucky, but more like £550-600. These are prices for long range EV. What I found interesting was that the excess on EV was more like £250-400 mandatory excess vs £0-£100 on a diesel. Interesting, we're driving an ID3 shortly so shall compare, but anything on the longer range or AWD bracket seems to jack the prices up high. Was it an ID4 max or just an ID4 with the standard battery if you don't mind me asking?

Which was held in an unpressureised, essentially open tank made of fabric. As opposed to double walled, resilliant tanks with suitable pressure release valves and consideration of the problem due to the above. https://www.msn.com/en-gb/video/viral/fire-bursts-out-of-car-when-motorist-fills-it-up-with-petrol-in-central-china/vi-BB1cX25N Because no petrol car ever caught fire....

The sad thing about the 69p per kWh is that that's about £20 more than buying diesel for the same range (at only 50mpg and £1.40/l). Of course if the over range journeys are not too much and you can charge cheaply at home at a lower rate, then it's still going to work out in your favour due to tax, ULEZ etc. Insurance is a sore one though as EV insurance is a lot more than a diesel/petrol equivalent. Add in the high purchase/lease prices and it's not clear cut. I'd say it's getting there, but not there yet. I can see a future of short range (Sub 300 mile) vehicles are battery and HGV, Vans and longer range cars are hydrogen Fuel Cell. Bit like the early days of diesel you'll have to fill up and the firty pump, outside away from the cover etc

EV is the Kia EV6 with the 320 mile range . The 18 minutes is I think from 10-80%, (using a >=250kW high power charger) so that's enough to get you well on your way over a quick stretch and a bathroom break at the services. On a 150, I guess it's going to take 30 minutes for similar, but you know still enough if you're pulling in around 20%, adding 60% then going along again. Of course the problems are the lack of the highest power chargers and the high cost of the vehicles is a big problem (It's around 50k, which is too much for a family car for most people.)

To be honest a range of 320 miles and a charge time as little as 18 minutes is here. The chargers need to improve, but it's not a million miles away. How you get all the batteries, then recycle them, then make the cars affordable however....

No more than a car full of petrol and brake fluid. If there's an event that pierces the tank, then it will very quickly vent and be gone, as opposed to petrol/brake fluid that sit around and burn like nobodies business. At least it would be quick in the event it did go up vs being burnt alive in a petrol fire.

I drove one a couple of weeks back. They just gave us the keys and let us have it. Got a couple more to drive next week but I’ll put comments up once I can compare a few EV. General so far, good but a few odd/niggly bits.

Quite…. TBH EV weigh loads and comparing a 208 to an SUV is a bit of a joke. The lithium and cobalt in batteries is horrible for both the planet and people. Hydrogen fuel cell vehicles would probably be better in terms of weight etc, especially when full of fuel 😂😂 So why am I considering one? Too many ULEZ in the places we go combined with plenty of 1mile journeys for SWMBO.

Just because there is electric everywhere... Doesn't mean you can charge at a usable speed off it. Out in the town and country (Eg away from big cities with better transport links already), it's charge at home or the motorway network, with an occasional charger at a supermarket/hotel if you're lucky. EV wise, it's definately only going to be one car of two that goes that route, with the other going diesel and either FWD or AWD. No chance whatsoever you could give up ICE totally here.

Plus I'm sure they'll find a way to charge BIK on it too.

That's really good, as long as you have redundant everything in the central cab, plus a pair of cabs each sharing half the chargers. Otherwise you basically end up with nothing if the control logic in the central cab fails...

double post...

Which is exactly what I do. Eco engine mode, sports steering, everything else normal 👍

So a heat pump opperates constantly. I get what you're saying about keeping heat into the system, but as we already have a pull close to 100A single phase, then it isn't about just that. I will either need to put in 3 phase (Bonus of 11/22kW charging) or add a battery/panels. Both cost significant sums up front so when added to the higher price of the car makes it harder to self finance. With this, it's all down to personal opinion and risk aversion. I may be right, you may be right, neither of us may be right. Servicing wise of course it's lower on an EV, but then you still need to do brake pads, the coolant ciricuit and the usual gubbins. What I find odd is that as may garages won't touch EVs, you find the cost to do things for EVs on the network appears (admitedly only from what I've read) to be substantially higher than non-EV cars. Well you combine the charge data with the MOT data and if the car has done substantially more miles than logged against it it's a fine and you need to prove you don't owe the tax. Where there's a will theres a way... plus arguing with HMRC is rarely a good idea for an individual. Not saying it will happen, just that it's not hard to see how it could happen.

Make sure all the radiators have standard TRV valves as that way if you do go evohome, then you can just unscrew the old head and put the evhome TRV on. You might also want to look at getting your new Rads oversized sufficiently that they could heat the room from a lower temperature heat source (45 degrees water temp is what I've been told). That way if you ever go heat pump, you don't need to necessarily change them. They do a low input temperature special version of many rads, but I don't know if they can cope with the higher input temperatures too. 👍 This was HR91 kit I used, although sadly the price appears to have increased a reasonable amount in the last couple of months (hardly a surprise with gas prices). https://theevohomeshop.co.uk/honeywell-home-evohome-connected-value-packs/321-honeywell-evohome-essentials-pack-atp926g3001.html I added 1 additional TRV whcich i fitted to the middle floor halls, which allows the hall radiators to be dropped lower. This probably wasn't necessary. The rooms not on HR91 which are either on standard TRV or bypass, just run whenever any other radiator runs, so this gives me the ability to shut off the other rooms and run the hall/towel rails (on standard TRV) for 30 minutes if we have guests in the summer. The only other thing I added was the controller wall mount plate, which i placed in the position of the previous thermostat. It allows charging of the face plate and keeps it out of the way, which we like. Finally useful to know, the controller uses 2 x NiMH batteries, which last ages. The TRV use 2x Alkaline batteries, that last 2 heating seasons approx. I just changed the first pair, however replaced them with enerloop batteries that work fine.

Again if battery tech changes, then actually the old batteries become a disposal cost, not an asset. I'm not confident enough things won't change enough in 5 years, that the current batteries/cars will be worth more. Like options on a new car, they make make it more desirable vs a 5 year old petrol/diesel, but doesn't necessarily mean it'll get 50% of initial value @ 3 years. Fuel duty on home charging is relatively easy to do, as all new chargers at home are mandated to be smart chargers if you want the grant. So all you do is ask the smart charger how much went into the car and add that the the electric bill. If it can't talk to the government approved servers at the energy provider, then it can't charge. Not really hard to do. Mileage based car tax, I can see. Rapid charging being heavily taxed, less so, because then you get people hanging onto older diesels to do the 600 mile round trips. Long and short, so far it seems that the lease and care or even subscriptions are the models that make sense.

I agree about the space/size not being an issue. Having sat in a golf and an ID3 back to back, even though they're almost identical in external length/width, the ID.3 has much more interior space. This is mostly down to the lack of bonnet length vs the golf as it doesn't need to hide an engine under there. I'd say an ID3 has at least as much room as a golf and you could probably compare to vehicles half a class up, rather than a class down.

Tried that, and if the other half can cope with the horrible touchscreen interfaces VW have, with a real world winter range of 250 miles, then she'll have it and I'll have a diesel as I do the longer journeys. That 250 miles is for a real world visit to families, with almost no charging bar a 3 pin plug, so it's her condition. Sadly the VW user interfaces from the mk8/ID3 platform are truely toxic as she is complaining about it a lot. At that point she will get a small diesel estate and I'll end up in electric. Luckily my longer routes tend to involve a good amount of motorway, so I can start nearly full, DC charge either at the end of the motorway up to 80% or at the destination, then go from there. Still I'd need a real 250 miles to make it viable too. A second hand leaf/zoe is tempting and the range on the newer zoe is not too bad, albeit not quite in the stated range. It's a tough one to try and balance right now. I imagine that's why the lease and care deals are what most dealers are pushing for EV. Pay lots per months and we have a nice care to sell in 3-5 years. Sadly one of the cars is over 15 years old, so there's no chance on that one. This last MOT was expensive and wouldn't have been done had the second hand value of cars not been so high. As it was a banger of unknown standing was more than the repair bill. You really think so? I'm not convinced, but then I was lucky enough to have a previous diesel on PCP not outright so didn't get exposed as badly as I could have to the diesel price drop caused by dieselgate. The sums I've been working on are over 5 years, but the maths on the leccy make sense. However how to finance the substantially higher purchase price when we've already got to factor in 3 phase/solar and batteries to manage it is the main issue. (Our peak load is already pushing up against the 100A before heat pumps/EV/etc). What I will say is servicing is not zero, as you've got coolant changes (battery cooling circuits I believe) and some other items are inexplainably more expensive for an electric car.

Just to clarify here, when I say "buy", i'm not talking outright, but leased/PCP etc for 2-4 years.

The HR91 rather than HR92 TRV's minus the displays help massively as they've about 60% of the price. Then add in a starter home pack of the controller (Which now includes the gateway, saving more money), the relay and 6 TRV at a very reasonable price and it makes a big difference. I agree when I looked at some of the old configs and all the parts or not using a starter pack, it stacks up quite quickly.

My Logic is that I don't intend to dump 40-50k on a car that in 4 years time is likely to be useless in terms of range/charging vs what's available at the time. I have a feeling that second hand values would be toast if somebody comes out with a 400-500 mile range, super fast charging that actually works and the like. It's a huge risk, which would mean if that was the only way, then it'd be another diesel instead.