@Winston_WoofWell that is not happening in the next 5 years or even 10 so people will just have to whistle.  Certainly not to much of England.

People will just have to drive what they have using petrol, diesel, lpg, hydrogen as there is and electricity for those with a BEV. 

 

This will suit those that are against getting BEV,s surely. 

 

As to Destination chargers. 

Fine, if you are parking for a few hours. But i would like to see Electric Man if on crutches in winter getting a few hundred yards from home to a car park or where ever a 7 / 11 kw AC is if he was without home charging.

Or actually anybody really that has to walk back and fore any distance to just leave the car and collect the car.

Plenty do it, now and many have no intention of doing anything of the sort. 

 

Once the billions of compensation due is paid out the Council Workers that did not have equal pay, those that got inflected blood or family off, post office post masters & building cladding and RAAC rebuilding maybe they can find the apprentices & trades people to be doing the charger instillation.

& getting the drinking water & sewage in the UK sorted out.

Fill in millions of potholes,build the new roads and improve travel on public transport, house the homeless etc etc

The Wind Farms, Solar, Hydro and nuclear energy can be transmitted on the super new national grid & the countries will be better cleaner places.

Edited 17 June, 20241 yr by Ootohere

On 14/06/2024 at 15:22, Winston_Woof said:

errrrm I think you missed the point  that they were doing a "how far can we go " type of test and  were merely commenting on the state of the facilities available at the time of their stop, they didn't actually intend on using them.

Yes of course there are apps that can tell you in advance but again that's you having to adapt to the car. How many times when driving a traditional ICE car did you ever need to check in advance if the petrol stations on route were working ?

Oh and the most ridiculous one was the services where (I believe it was when they visited previously) the chargers were out of action with a sign saying the power supply to the site wasn't sufficient. What a load of c*ck. And this is with a relatively low number of EVs in use, imagine what it will be like if/when they are pretty much the only vehicles available)

who mentioned apps? My car shows whether they are available. As for ICE I have turned up at petrol stations plenty of times to find covers over the nozzles saying they are out of fuel. On the way back from France last year I called in to Costco for fuel in Birmingham, we wueued half an hour for fuel. If I had been shown in advance the state of play then I would have gone elsewhere just as I do in my Skoda. 

as for the covers, MSAs were built without the grid connections to support EV charging. The government has promised funding to provide grid upgrades but it is running roughly 18 months behind schedule - it's not Gidserve's fault, it's the UK government.

5 hours ago, Winston_Woof said:

Ok so lets have more of a think about my range requirements  and other criteria (and yes I am fortunate enough to be able to charge at home if I did ever make the switch).

I originally stated "400 miles"

The 2 longest one way journeys I do regularly are either
a) to my parents in Doddington (Shropshire) which is 110 mile one way via the M6|M56|A49
b) down to my GFs daughters in Nottingham which is around 98 miles one way via M6|A500|A50|M1|A52

Both of which are comfortably done without needing a stop.


Now taking the MG5 above as an example that that has a theoretical max range of 214 miles however as we all now most vehicle ICE/EV rarely attain their stated ranges.

That being the case I don't think it's unreasonable to set a range expectation of say 300 miles minimum (ok previously I said 400 but I am prepared to come down a little) to cover a round trip to either of those destinations given that neither destination has the ability to even allow use of a Granny charger to partially top up.

Yes there are EV charging stations on route but I have no other need to break the journey.

My parents live on in a Park Home and the parking is the red x




Meanwhile my GFs daughter there's a big patch of grassed area between her house and the road

My car has a notional range of 240 miles but realistically it does 215 in the summer, 200 in the winter. That is fine because my regular trip is just Livingston to Milton Keynes which is only 380 miles. It takes 6 hours by train or 7.5 hours by car (including stops). I stick by the Army's rules on driving which require me to take  a break every two hours. In those breaks I plug the car in while I wander over to the loo. Like I said recently, the last trip back needed 12 minutes at Stafford for the loo and to grab a coffee to go, and 24 minutes at Tebay for dinner. I simply would not drive a whole day without a break as it would be foolish in the extreme to do so. 

On 14/06/2024 at 15:50, Graham Butcher said:

I doubt that it was done for clicks and engagement, not with having 9.3Million subscribers anyway, CarWow is a well established and respected channel.

 

Don't forget that none of those cars were actually looking for a charge, they were on a range test so they were being driven until they ran out of power, and the services were just being used to allow Matt Watson to change cars and do a quick review of each car after he had driven it. While they were there at the services, Matt just checked on the state and number of chargers at them as an extra. They were driving up the M1 and onto the A1M and A1 to Scotland which are pretty important and busy roads and you would normally expect there to be chargers at the those service locations, would you not?

my point is you can see from the driver's seat the availability of "fuel" ahead of you. You go to the places where there is availability (plenty of it along that route) and avoid the places where there is limited availability. Sadly not available on petrol cars as I know from turning up at forecourts to find those yellow covers on the nozzles of the pumps. 

14 minutes ago, domhnall said:

not available on petrol cars as I know from turning up at forecourts to find those yellow covers on the nozzles of the pumps.

Unlucky.  This hardly ever happens to my sister or myself even without the illegal use of a mobile phone.

Luckily the Forecourt Maintenance Contractors operative is there within hours or maybe next day, and if the tanks need filling the tanker is not travelling far from a depot.

 

When EV chargers are down, especially in Scotland it can be weeks or months before they get a technician to them, if they even get on.

Then 7kw ones might be operating at a lowered output.  eg half.  

That being down to the Charger owner and their maintenance contract which is not that great with many of Scotland's 32 councils. 

38 minutes ago, domhnall said:

my point is you can see from the driver's seat the availability of "fuel" ahead of you. You go to the places where there is availability (plenty of it along that route) and avoid the places where there is limited availability. Sadly not available on petrol cars as I know from turning up at forecourts to find those yellow covers on the nozzles of the pumps. 

You are still missing the entire point of that video. At no point in that were they looking to charge at any of the services, they were merely a suitable place to stop and swap drivers for the next leg of the "drive it until it stops" test that they were doing in order to discover just how they stacked against the maker's claims. If you watched that video and was paying attention all of that was made clear at the start and yes, you are right, you can see the availability of chargers up ahead, if you were wanting to charge. The drivers did that as they all pulled off the main roads when they knew that they would run out before the next charger on the route.
 

If you was on a long trip or up against a deadline for an appointment/meeting, nobody in their right mind is going to come off and away from the fastest and most direct route to hunt for fuel of any kind, be it electric or fossil fuel when they know that the next services are only a few miles away.

Edited 17 June, 20241 yr by Graham Butcher

57 minutes ago, domhnall said:

who mentioned apps? My car shows whether they are available. As for ICE I have turned up at petrol stations plenty of times to find covers over the nozzles saying they are out of fuel. On the way back from France last year I called in to Costco for fuel in Birmingham, we wueued half an hour for fuel. If I had been shown in advance the state of play then I would have gone elsewhere just as I do in my Skoda. 

as for the covers, MSAs were built without the grid connections to support EV charging. The government has promised funding to provide grid upgrades but it is running roughly 18 months behind schedule - it's not Gidserve's fault, it's the UK government.

You had the best car for charging (Tesla) and the best software for information on routing from A to B including charge stops, it calculates it all for you, not all cars are equal in that respect.

Edited 17 June, 20241 yr by Graham Butcher

1 hour ago, domhnall said:

My car has a notional range of 240 miles but realistically it does 215 in the summer, 200 in the winter. That is fine because my regular trip is just Livingston to Milton Keynes which is only 380 miles. It takes 6 hours by train or 7.5 hours by car (including stops). I stick by the Army's rules on driving which require me to take  a break every two hours. In those breaks I plug the car in while I wander over to the loo. Like I said recently, the last trip back needed 12 minutes at Stafford for the loo and to grab a coffee to go, and 24 minutes at Tebay for dinner. I simply would not drive a whole day without a break as it would be foolish in the extreme to do so. 

completely agree and for longer trips I would probably be stopping every 2 hours or so which If I was driving a BEV would be the ideal opportunity to top up (and in fairness Tebay is quite possibly the best services on the motorway network to have a meal).

Sadly however as far as I'm concerned a real world range of 215/200 miles doesn't cover me (in a BEV) for the trips I'm most likely to make without having to make an additional unrequired stop to charge up due to neither destination having any form of home charging available (nor are ever likely too even If I have it)  which again is back to @Graham Butcher's point about the haves & the have nots

FWIW, my wife just told me she noticed Leaf list one more health bar. So it's at 10/12 bars health now. Car is just over 9.5 years old. 

Health has dropped below 78.75% state of health. https://mobility.lk/2020/10/11/soh-capacity-bars/

12th bar was lost September 2019.  6.25% health were lost over 4.5-5 years. 

 

 

BTW, @domhnall has a Skoda Enyaq. I think all VAG cars has those features mentioned. I'm sure @Luckypants can verify with his ID4.

All Android automotive cars (Polestar, Volvo, Renault 5. Ford Explorer see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Android_Automotive) has similar feature set: nav with charging, see charging availability, predict arrival %.  

Before @domhnall got the Enyaq he is replacing with another Enyaq he did have a Tesla. 

So he has been driving EV,s for a good while.

@wyx087, yes I know @domhnallhas a Skoda Enyaq now, but his bio states he did have a Tesla and hence why I said that he HAD the best car and not have. I said HAD because he did not state if he was referring to Tesla or not. But this not the issue here as he still seems to think that they were trying to top up their cars at these services, which so clearly is not the case.

Aberdeen airport park and ride.  47 pence as kWh. Chargers working and loads of emptiness at this time of evening.  Another park and ride 5 miles away with charging and loads of commercial ones near now.  Changed days.    Fast enough charging for the MINI . It was at 52 kW.

Edited 17 June, 20241 yr by Ootohere

I went up to Speyside over the weekend in an MPV that had an LPG conversion (lift sharing). Those LPG filling points are proper rare and hard to find, often being in some old gadger's yard. As a comparison I was metally noting all the places I could have charged my car if we had taken that - they were very frequent and available and fast. BEV on the road is easy - truth. The only time charging might have been awkward was Sunday lunchtime at Tebay services as they were rammed but as alluded to above my car would have informed me of this and I could have planned to charge elsewhere. I've decided to avoid Tebay in future if travelling on a Sunday, not because of a possible queue for a charger but because of queues for every other amenity.

As an aside, we were visiting distilleries and most had destination chargers - ideal as most visits were 2 hours or more (taking the tour) to give a really good boost while doing something fun.

PS Cairn Lodge services are a better bet if on M6/M74, not as busy as Tebay but run by the same company to the same standard.

Edited 18 June, 20241 yr by Luckypants

17 hours ago, wyx087 said:

I think all VAG cars has those features mentioned. I'm sure @Luckypants can verify with his ID4.

Yes i can. I can also tell the nav to only use those with x chargers free. The 2024 model V4.0 software improves on this even more, allowing preferred operators etc and now includes Tesla chargers open to all (Tesla nav only uses Tesla chargers)

@Luckypants When i ran LPG V8,s LPG was no problem in Scotland with plenty ASDA having it (& some Morrisons & ESSO) and when it was 2 pence a litre off @ Asda paying with an ASDA Credit card that suited as i used double the amount of litres of LPG to petrol and i stopped using LPG when Petrol was £1 a Litre & LPG was 50 pence a litre.

There were plenty places around Tayside & Aberdeenshire back then as there were Grants for TAXI,s to go to LPG.

OK around the Borders & the West coast for places and the cheapest was outside Kilmarknock at a busy Service Station & HGV stop.

(Well the cheapest was actually at some farms with Grain Driers, but that was nod and a wink to a blind HMRC person.)

Edited 18 June, 20241 yr by Ootohere

I think maybe a fair number have closed since you stopped using LPG. We had an 'LPG Finder' app (remarkably similar to EV charging apps) and there was nothing on / near our route home from Grantown-on-Spey down the A9. There was an out of service one at Perth. We got filled with LPG at Hamilton Morrisons south of Glasgow which we had a short wait for as both nozzles were in use. The reduction in filling points is making the remaining ones a little busier. My driver was a little shocked at the lack of filling points as he is new to LPG. Using mainly petrol for running about made a pricey weekend fuel wise. (Whisky made it a pricey weekend anyway!)

The parallels between scarce LPG filling stations and charge points were interesting.

Edited 19 June, 20241 yr by Luckypants

VW investing $5 billion in Rivian is just their usual when it is others technology and knowledge that they need. 

Why develop it if you can buy it already to go and it seems a good system. 

As they tried with Suzuki to get the knowledge but that cost them when because of their greed and bad behaviours the whistle was blown and the Defeat Device scandal was revealed.   Suzuki bought back their final shares on the eve of VW losing first place as the biggest manufacturer back to Toyota who might just go and lent Suzuki the money for the buy back.      

The EU Emissions Trading scheme is about to move in to phase two ie EU ETS 2, where all EU members will need to deal with carbon/CO2 goods further upstream which means dealing with the carbon side for fuel on its import and distribution which could add ten s or even hundreds of Euro per tonne of fuel.

 

Whilst UK is not in the EU this could have massive consequences anyways.  Whilst tank dipping on trucks on raised its head for a few weeks when the Single market came into being ie controls like some EU countries tried to implement that trucks should not have more than 200 litres in their tanks when crossing borders it is well known that some European trucks fill to brim in the EU with 1,000 litres of fuel and drive hundreds of miles on British roads only using EU bought fuel think would likely change with EU ETS 2 as EU fuel becomes much more expensive.  Maybe the EU would restrict amount of fuel in UK trucks etc arriving in the EU so fuel is bought within the EU.

       

As the UK has less refineries than it use to maybe the UK, like TESCOs does, will buy fuel from the EU but if it is more expensive then it will have to come farther at greater cost.

Diesel and Petrol is bound to get more expensive as less and less drivers use that form of fuel but the spill over from the new EU ETS 2 could also magnify this cost to get fuel to the pumps for those who still but that form of fuel.  

 

 

The UK is tiny really as far as the world goes.

I hear from Candidates for Westminster that it is the 4th biggest exporter in the World.    Really?

 

There must be a very large amount of whatever coming into the UK as Imports before then being Exported because the UK certainly has not huge amounts of resources or an over abundance of anything has it?

Not even enough energy to power the countries industry or feed the population of the UK.

 

.............

 

Tesco buys fuel from Greenergy that they have partial ownership of or did.

Greenergy that partner with Royal Dutch Shell for importation and storage and the distribution of fuel to many including Branded big retailers and Independents big and small.

 

Fuel OIl, Oils & other ingredients of fuels are traded world wide, so globally, and transported all around the globe.

 

http://greenergy.co.uk

 

 

 

Edited 26 June, 20241 yr by Ootohere

Octopus Go rate for Midlands:-

 

Nighttime charge rate down from 9 p per KwH to 8.5 p

 

and day time from about 26p to 22 p per kWh,

 

results !!

 

 

 

 

Edited 26 June, 20241 yr by lol-lol

Indeed. Octopus Intelligent Go now 7 p/kWh off-peak.

 

EV home charging now at 2 p/mile for 3.5 mi/kWh, easily achievable year round average for most EV's. 

 

 

23 minutes ago, Ootohere said:

The UK is tiny really as far as the world goes.

I hear from Candidates for Westminster that it is the 4th biggest exporter in the World.    Really?

 

There must be a very large amount of whatever coming into the UK as Imports before then being Exported because the UK certainly has not huge amounts of resources or an over abundance of anything has it?

Not even enough energy to power the countries industry or feed the population of the UK.

 

.............

 

Tesco buys fuel from Greenergy that they have partial ownership of or did.

Greenergy that partner with Royal Dutch Shell for importation and storage and the distribution of fuel to many including Branded big retailers and Independents big and small.

 

Fuel OIl, Oils & other ingredients of fuels are traded world wide, so globally, and transported all around the globe.

 

http://greenergy.co.uk

 

 

 

 

Sky debunked this.  It is only from some Gold movements, presumably on the LME,  the UK bounces from seventh to fourth, we really are a firm 7th without the Gold movements they seem to be saying.