Yes, it must be Democrats attacking Tesla dealerships with zero evidence of that.
I mean, it's not as if Elmo's not pi55ed of hundreds of thousands of people from all backgrounds with his DOGE bros firing people left right and centre.

Then Vs now...

3 hours ago, wyx087 said:

Are big mirrors often mounted like this?

😉

Edited 21 March, 20251 yr by Stonekeeper

Octopus Go rates from April Fool's day........

Surprised at the regional variation.....

Daily standing charge down £36 a year but day time lecky up 2.4p per kwh and I use about 5 Kwh during the day so 12p a day of day rate lecky so roughly cost neutral. I use more like 12 kwh at night mainly the twice weekly EV charges but that is not costing more ie staying at 8.5 p per kWh........

@lol-lol it is not unusual, we also see the same thing done but on an even more local level with filling stations, the more affluent an area is, the more they charge for your ICE fuel, even at supermarkets, even for your normal food shopping, they do this.

Just now, Graham Butcher said:

@lol-lol it is not unusual, we also see the same thing done but on an even more local level with filling stations, the more affluent an area is, the more they charge for your ICE fuel, even at supermarkets, even for your normal food shopping, they do this.

The Energy guy on Martin Lewis said it was sharing the cost of the local infrastructure so dense population areas were cheaper than sparsely populated areas which made some sense.

Octopus not the cheapest dual rate tariff but they generally have good customer service and I think their day rates maybe better than those with a cheaper night rate.

The referral scheme and sometimes the free or savings scheme also nice side bits ie worth quite a few quid at times.

Think I will probably stay with Octopus despite not being the cheapest but I will continue to add portable solar panels and more batteries to further reduce my day time usage even more. Some dual rate tariff users have got their day time rate use down to just a few percent so their average lecky tariff is way under a 10p per kwh average which is what I am aiming for.

One only has to see the disaster after the sub station fire at Hayes and Heathrow area to see the benefits of local generation and electrical storage to allow continued living and working when there is such a massive outage due to the grid dropping out for many hours. The effect on cargo coming in to our Heathrow depots has been massive. Losses will be in the hundreds of millions no doubt. All preventable with current tech on electrical storage and generation.

On 21/03/2025 at 23:08, lol-lol said:

The Energy guy on Martin Lewis said it was sharing the cost of the local infrastructure so dense population areas were cheaper than sparsely populated areas which made some sense.

Octopus not the cheapest dual rate tariff but they generally have good customer service and I think their day rates maybe better than those with a cheaper night rate.

The referral scheme and sometimes the free or savings scheme also nice side bits ie worth quite a few quid at times.

Think I will probably stay with Octopus despite not being the cheapest but I will continue to add portable solar panels and more batteries to further reduce my day time usage even more. Some dual rate tariff users have got their day time rate use down to just a few percent so their average lecky tariff is way under a 10p per kwh average which is what I am aiming for.

One only has to see the disaster after the sub station fire at Hayes and Heathrow area to see the benefits of local generation and electrical storage to allow continued living and working when there is such a massive outage due to the grid dropping out for many hours. The effect on cargo coming in to our Heathrow depots has been massive. Losses will be in the hundreds of millions no doubt. All preventable with current tech on electrical storage and generation.

I just don't buy into that theory at all.

1 of 3 Substation was on fire. Not a very large Substation as can be seen with the flyovers on the telly.

As it is Data Centres that use huge amount of electricity were not down, and yes a different area, but then it is The National Grid.

Heathrow best be one of the first places to get a Small Nuclear Reactor when the UK Government stops talking about them and gets on being sure where they are being allowed to be and who is going to pay for them.

If Internet Companies in the USA can have their own Nuclear Power generation then surely the Biggest, busiest airport in Europe can.

Not just passenger flights but all the freight we are told they handle.

Surely a very good profit making business with the Huge Airport / runways, so where does all the money go to.

Major Shareholders.

Ardian, Qatar Investments, Public Investment Fund, GIC, Australian Retirement Fund, China Investment Corporation, etc etc.

So much for UK and any type of security, Import / Exports, Travel etc etc.

Nationalise Heathrow...

Edited 23 March, 20251 yr by Ootohere

I wonder if the CTP will find any link to terrorism. This has shown just how easy it would be cripple the country to an adversery once we go all electric as the infrastructure is on display for anybody to see. We already have Russia mapping where all our communication and feeder cables are located with their spy ship active off our coasts.

For decades the Gas Pipelines, Aero Fuel hubs and pipelines, substations and national grid have been at risk.

The Forties Pipeline coming ashore on the North East Coast and crossing Scotland to Grangemouth has been as are pumping stations and where LPG / Gas is removed are. Many points at the side of public roads and marked.

One such under 2 miles from me.

Sometimes the Security is at higher levels like when the UK was involved in attacking Libya.

Sewage / water treatment plants attacked will have a huge affect on the population in that area, or wider areas.

Edited 23 March, 20251 yr by Ootohere

Tesla troubles continue.......

^^^ He can do better than that for a Gurning face .......

But it is not a bad attempt, Lol.

2 hours ago, Tilt said:

^^^ He can do better than that for a Gurning face .......

But it is not a bad attempt, Lol.

I guess that Elon will be on to Wrigleys for an improved grade of gum to stick his Cybertrucks together.

True life for part of a day for a couple of BEV drivers and Youtube Vloggers.

It can be a faff like this for any BEV drivers public charging.

16 hours ago, Ootohere said:

True life for part of a day for a couple of BEV drivers and Youtube Vloggers.

It can be a faff like this for any BEV drivers public charging.

Sky is using a Taycan for their League of their own 1000 mile trip to Turin plus a BMW 120D and some Ford big thing...

I had a chuckle at this video, but it could turn out to be true in a while.

I've posted this in the 'Cost to Charge' thread too. Posting it here as it is a truth about EVs that it is costing me a lot less to run than the equivalent diesel.

I've just done my annual calculation of overall cost to charge, which I do on the car's birthday. Last year I did 12017 miles at an average cost of 3.53p/mile. Most charging was done at home and getting onto Octopus Intelligent Go in December has helped enormously to reduce that down from 5.96p/mile for 23/24. (although that higher figure includes 2500 miles around France on public charger rates in September 2023.)

Additional costs this year has been the biennial service @£170 and MOT approx. £50.

Not sure if the extended warranty I purchased is a 'running cost' but taken as a hedge against the fact most EV problems will be a main dealer to resolve (with associated £155/hour rate!) £260 per annum. I did make use of it last year for suspension issue and door locking issue (new car design issues but not EV specific issues)

Edited 2 April, 20251 yr by Luckypants
Apparently every two years is biennial I've learned.

Just echo Lucky, this is my calculations, also costing a lot less than visiting petrol stations:

According to my data logger, I've charged 6930 kWh. 550 kWh of which not at home. So let's be really pessimistic and say average of 60p/kWh (I mostly use Tesla superchargers at daytime offpeak <40p/kWh), rest let's say 8p/kWh (IOG is 7p/kWh).

I averaged 3.92 p/mile, 3.1 mi/kWh gross

(including not driving such as sentry mode that is always on, sitting in the car parked, any consumption when in P)

£0 spent on servicing so far. I DIY'd a tyre rotation front and rear. I have wipers at £25 a set ready but not fitted yet. Some washer fluids at a few £.

MOT due Sep this year, I do plan to carry out an end of warranty check next spring. "Just Get A Tesla" youtuber recently done it on his with good results.

I finally took the plunge last week and ordered a Cupra Born via salary sacrifice at work. Hoping it will arrive around the end of May (it was a pre configured one that they had a good deal on).

It's to replace my wife's Polo GTI but will mostly be driven by me. Plan is to do all my short journeys (15k commuting miles per year) and as many other short journeys as possible on the Cupra and keep the Skoda for our longer trips.

I tried to be very pessimistic about the numbers and in a worse case scenario it might not save me that much money but I'm hopeful that if all goes well and I can get most of the charging done for free at work then it could save quite a chunk as well as leaving me with less to worry about (insurance, maintenance etc).

And of course I get a brand new and what looks like a nice car (and a free home charger thrown in for good measure).

1 hour ago, Dieselgate said:

and a free home charger thrown in for good measure).

Excellent, £1k saved there. What charge point do they install?

Can you say "scummy price tactics"?

electrive.com

Vauxhall cuts EV prices in UK in response to tax changes...

Vauxhall has announced that all of its electric cars are now priced under £40,000, following the introduction of the UK government's changes to the Expensive

This isn't the first time, when government cut EV grant way back around 2017, EV RRP prices magically dropped by same amount.

As I keep saying, we don't need more government grants for vehicle themselves. Car manufacturer crying for government grants are only self serving so they can have higher asking price at expense of tax payer.

15 minutes ago, wyx087 said:

Excellent, £1k saved there. What charge point do they install?

It's the Ohme ePod. There was an option to pay £100 and go for a tethered charger but I was feeling stingy so decided against it in the end. As I'm hoping to do the majority of charging at work then I shouldn't hopefully be using it every day, perhaps just a couple of times at the weekend.

Any idea if it's any good? I didn't particularly research it but it looks fine to me. Nice and compact which I like.

27 minutes ago, wyx087 said:

Can you say "scummy price tactics"?

electrive.com

Vauxhall cuts EV prices in UK in response to tax changes...

Vauxhall has announced that all of its electric cars are now priced under £40,000, following the introduction of the UK government's changes to the Expensive

This isn't the first time, when government cut EV grant way back around 2017, EV RRP prices magically dropped by same amount.

As I keep saying, we don't need more government grants for vehicle themselves. Car manufacturer crying for government grants are only self serving so they can have higher asking price at expense of tax payer.

What we need is a thorough public investigation into the profit levels on EVs, since it seems the RRP is "flexible" which suggests possibly excessive profit margins leading to prices that are high enough to discourage the switch from ICE to EV for many less well off drivers.

15 minutes ago, Dieselgate said:

It's the Ohme ePod.

Any idea if it's any good? I didn't particularly research it but it looks fine to me. Nice and compact which I like.

It's very good, compatible with both Intelligent Octopus Go and OVO charge anytime. My neighbour has it, very compact and easy to hide behind a potted plant.

Only possible negative is that it doesn't use WIFI, it has built-in SIM that may need small monthly payment after some years.

There should have been an investigation when overnight the UK government dropped the grants for EV,s and BMW knocked many thousands £ off i3,s. The kidoligy with giving nice handouts was £5,000 grants and £3,500 grants so that people were buying over priced vehicles.

Edited 2 April, 20251 yr by Ootohere

2 hours ago, Ootohere said:

There should have been an investigation when overnight the UK government dropped the grants for EV,s and BMW knocked many thousands £ off i3,s. The kidoligy with giving nice handouts was £5,000 grants and £3,500 grants so that people were buying over priced vehicles.

Same happened with my Zoe. RRP, £34k before subsidies ended and I was getting about 6k off from Renault central and local dealer which pretty sure the car dropped by a couple of K when grants of 2.5k stopped.

But then there are always several variables, mainly the rate of exchange Euro to pound and interest rates bot in Euroland and UK.

Interest rates dropping and their should be some good deals in q2 and q3 this year, already seeing loans rates at 3.9% down from 5% a few days ago.

Edited 2 April, 20251 yr by lol-lol

Some models of BMW i3,s had reached £46,000 plus and they were selling or being leased. Motability were offering for £1,000 advance payment. They were and are a great car but how much profit on then BMW were making might have been the issue. Maybe like Audi A2,s an expensive built car ahead of its time.