Graham Butcher

I think this video is interesting the Cybertruck already has quality issues??

Thats going to be interesting in the future as more street chargers get installed, I mean parking anywhere these days is hard enough what with many car parks being sold off for house building, so where do people park when the streets are also under attack with chargers?

I guess that they are so loaded that they don't give F**k or they are still in ICE mode and want a full tank?

You can rest assured that if push comes to shove and the world needs that oil, they will find a way of extracting it without doing too much damage to the sacred lands.

That is precisely why I said variables, nothing in life is 100% guaranteed except of course death will come to us all at some point, the ethical supply lines may or may not happen, someone could start a nuclear war, or some other event may take place. You cannot be certain that population decrease will occur within the next decade, unless there is some sort of nuclear affect across large parts of the globe, I doubt that will happen.

So have we ceased mining for iron, copper and other metals, after all we already have a circular economy going in that sector, and yet... we still need ever-increasing amounts. The worlds population keeps growing and this growth will lead to increased demand on everything from water, food right down to metals, oils and batteries. Are seeing or planning a cull on humans, then?

This is why I thought you wanted to know about the McMaster getting the keys to a new EV in the video that you posted, so if it wasn't that, what is the context of what video are you referring to?

I'm speaking about the huge amounts of pollution and highly toxic lakes which are seeping into the water tables where these minerals are mined, rendering the ground unsuitable for the production of food crops, the health issues of the workers doing the mining to say nothing of the vast amounts of water that the mining process uses, in an area that is already suffering from water shortages as these minerals are often located in deserts for instance. This is what I mean about the pollution being created away from the point of usage, we in this country and most other, never get to see the vast damage that these batteries are creating in other areas. Not to mention the other issues like devastating fires, rare maybe but as EVs become the largest share of vehicles on the road in the fullness of time, these will grow in intensity and may have far more consequences. Yes, I know that oil also burns and that there have been some simply horrific fires and explosions around the world caused by oil, but don't for a single moment think that oil is going away anytime soon, if ever. The world relies on oil for plastics etc, so, the battery risks will be in addition to the oil ones. Then there is also the problem with the highly contaminated water resulting from fighting a battery fire with water, it has to be prevented from running away seeping into the ground etc. These are variables I refer to, ones that we are still grappling with but are not in our vision as many of these are happening thousands of miles in the middle of nowhere, out of plain sight.

Correct, I think that most of the EVs of all types are largely purchased as company cars because of the lower BIK and other tax concessions that business users can claim and the lets be 100% honest here we keep on hearing that the average private buyer does not want them, so why would the company car driver be any different? They don't pay for their fuel so have zero interest in saving fuel so it is even possible for these hybrid cars to actually pollute more than their pure ICE equivalents because they are driven harder to compensate for the lack of power, thus use far more fuel. Plus of course, they have been enjoying the benefits of being able to drive in the congestion zone and low emission zones freely when in reality many should have been paying.

@lol-lol sorry, I meant PHEV, a full hybrid I think is like the mild hybrids such as the Qashqai I had for 2 months. If I'm right they are fully automatic in there switching into and out off electric mode, is that correct?

@Ootohere If you are referring to the McMaster picking up the keys to another EV, then yes I do know about it. He and Geoff Buys cars are doing a road trip to Benidorm and his Taycan is going into the dealers to replace his cooling fans (I think for the 2nd time) under warranty and they need the car for a day or 2 to do it. So the dealer is lending him another electric car while his off the road, having the fans replaced and other bits down in preparation for this road trip.

@wyx087 I think that we are going to have to agree to disagree about if BEV is the golden ticket, there are still so many variables with them yet, we might just find that we exchange one highly damaging thing for the planet with another, the full impact I believe might still be around the corner. I do agree however that at the point of them deployed, there are advantages in reduced emissions. In this country, we already have just about the best air quality of any country anywhere in the world. If we could get the rest of the world, including some parts of Europe to clean up their act, then the pending doom that some are predicting would probably never happen. As to ICE vehicles not performing as well either in the winter, no argument on that score from me, it's perfectly logical, both kinds of vehicles also perform worse in rain than they do in the summer months on dry roads and I've pretended otherwise.

Well thats rather odd, he claims EV sales are up in April 2024, I just had a quick look at the SMMT figures and report for April 2024 and they say that sales to actual consumers are down by -21.9%. ICE> Petrol sales are down by -3.1% Diesel sales are down by -25.3% Now, lets put this into perspective-- HEV sales are up by +16.7% PHEV sales up by +22.1% That is good news I hear you say, but both of these types of vehicles still have internal combustion engines and it is also highly likely that most of these will never be used in electric mode, they are just a way of getting green credentials and advantages on the fleet markets, and it was discovered recently that many PHEV's never are charged. BEVs this is the only sector that has been broken down into fleet and private buyers, so fleet sales are up +10.7% while private sales are down by 21.9%. Also there as always these days many of these "sales" are pre-registrations done by the dealers themselves. I know of hundreds of pre-registered cars standing around on small airfields, many are sporting last year's plates, so the SMMT figures are not a true reflection of the market, the figures are being manipulated, so I'd hold off with the champagne for the time being at least.

@Ootohere My son purchased a Ford Focus a couple of years ago and he was not impressed with the level of service or the preparation of his car and swears he would never buy from them again. I have heard many similar tales about them as well from other folks.

But, if it is cold, then why would you not want to take the heat into the cabin, even without having the fan on? Modern cars are designed to have some through air flow unless the recirculation system has been activated, but even then, that is only for a limited time before the system opens up again. With a car on the move there should not be a need to crack a window to get air flow.

I was saying that it was guff because you posted another of his videos as if you approved of it.

The car should never have been sold by Arnold Clarks with faults on it, a 2-year-old car should not have faults that could affect its range or performance, its a low miler even. Considering the makers claim for that car is the worst case for combined cycle195 miles, based on -10C and use of heating and best case for combined is 255miles @ +23C (no AC). The driver claims he was expecting around 150 miles worst, so he had already reckoned on 25% lower than the brochure claimed. He said he was getting nowhere near his downwards revised figure. For ICE, Parkers say that you should expect to achieve a figure of around 15% less than the maker's claimed figure, so a car claimed of doing 61mpg then a realistic expectation should be around 52mpg Plus November 2022 was so it happens, the warmest on record with the average temp of +8.4C, some 18.4C above Audi's claimed worst range figure of -10C, so its not unreasonable to expect a little better performance? I know that "What Car" claimed to have some tests on cold batteries and have seen drops from what's claimed of about 38%, in itself that figure is misleading and does not reflect reality. We all deserve more honesty in these claims. The 10 years is agreed, I hesitate to agree that it should be sooner You misunderstood my meaning here, I was asking how do we know that in a few years time, the authorities would not come to a conclusion that BEV's are not the golden ticket they thought it was, just as they have with regard to diesel not being the fuel of the future that they once claimed it was.

That's just guff.

@Ootohere I can't comment about EVs being driven with steamed up windows, however I can understand what you're saying and I agree, it is very dangerous. But heat is a waste product with ICE so the impact on range is the minute amount of power for the fan, also there is some ram air effect with the fan switched off.

I've not singled out EV, all I did was post a report where a claim had been made and won. I never said you mentioned diesel either, I did and asked why is diesel having claims? Why is PPI also having claims, I did that as an example. The only chip I have on my shoulder is about people having the option of ICE cars being slowly removed from them. Ask yourself the question, when ICE was first introduced all those years ago, do you think that bikes and horses and steam were removed as an option? ICE became the dominant means of transport by people favouring it over the other choices. Do you actually know that the same won't happen with EVs?

IIRC from the original broadcast, heating was used, but AC was not as the compressor robs engine power regardless of whether the AC is actually cooling or not, it serves another purpose of dehumidifying the air.

Why is diesel being singled out, we have all seen and heard the adverts, but the fact remains that it is because these companies pressing the claims all make serious money from every successful claim, the same applies to all the PPI claims.

Just trying to be helpful and prevent folk going off at a tangent with OTT reactions all the time.

To answer your question, no, he did not do it without stopping. He even stayed overnight in Edinburgh and this was even highlighted in the short videos. Seeing as this was 21 years ago, there was zero reference to EVs so that was not the reason the trail was carried out for. I think the reason was that it was around the time that diesel was being hailed as the fuel of the fuel and how economical it was seeing as it was 4 litre engine and at the time was the worlds most powerful diesel engine fitted to a standard production car. TBH I only posted that as a response to the post made by Ootohere about Audi getting into bother 11 years ago claiming better MPG than drivers were supposedly able to get from their cars, and that 10 years aft the Top Gear experiment which I expect was done in support of showing diesel as being a good choice of motive power. We all know that the actual mpg you get from any car regardless of it being an EV, Petrol or Diesel, will be considerably lower than claimed if you are using all the gadgets and AC, carrying extra weight and or driving in a spirited fashion or with under inflated tyres.

@wyx087 Thanks for sharing that video, but he did still have to stop and charge on that trip, whereas the Audi filled up in London and drove to Edinburgh and back to the same garage in London without any further filling, only filling after reaching the garage, so not quite the same is it, but still pretty impressive though. But I do wish people would not always use the "home charging" guff when not everyone who has an EV has the ability to do home charging and so very often have to rely on the public network which can around 79p a kW which completely blows the cost comparison to shreds. Why can't they assume the usage of public charge network as a given, the reader will be well aware that if charging from home, then the costs would far more favourable for the EV. Grrr.