Cheaper holidays EV charging
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Seen it-€7 billion was Euros👍🏻
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I wish we too used the €Euro it would make my life much easier & less expensive. I have no historical nor emotional attachment to the £pound. I’ve always & still do identify as European👍🏻
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My eldest son charges his EV overnight at home and I suspect rarely uses public charging points and as you say at pretty good rates. He has just been on a camping trip (tent) to Hunstanton which is about a 200 mile round trip from MK and he reckoned he would not need to charge whilst away. I would accept that there is probably more planning involved for long journeys but as Andrew Ditton points out in his video its just a question of planning.
David
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We've just had a good holiday in Pembrokeshire with our EV, plenty of fast chargers around in public car parks. We went with trepidation but found things greatly improved regarding charge points. It's a pity the club are charging such a lot for a very slow charge that depletes the paid for van electrics as it charges. We did fast top up charges for under £6.
It's feasible to tow a van with an EV but the lack of drive through charge points makes it harder for those who've taken the plunge. A lot more planning needed, maybe with positive input from CAMC?!
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Do local councils get a government hand-out for installing public chargers? I ask the question because whilst out and about a couple of days ago I saw a bay with six chargers in it. Not one was being used. In a way this didn't surprise me because the bay was not on a main through route, so no or very little 'passing' traffic and the town in which they are situated is, regretfully, both economically and socially deprived to some extent so I doubt that many locals have an EV.
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Planning is definitely key, but the 150 miles of towing per charge is almost here.
As I say, I can manage 130 to 140 already on my 78kWh (75kWh usable) battery. The new version of the Polestar 2 (2024) has an upgraded battery to 82kWh and a more efficient drive train. My guess is that the combination of those two things would mean the ability to get to about 150 miles in a single charge. The forthcoming P4 has a 102kWh battery that should easily see 170 to 180 miles towing. Thats a comfortable 150 with buffer to get to a local rapid charger ready for the next day.
And charging times are dropping too. On our return journey on Saturday, we chose to break at 94 miles in with about 86 miles to go. That stop took 37 mins of charging while we used the loo and had a coffee. Actual wait time - about 3 mins, and about 6 mins of un-hitch / hitch. But my car tops out at 155kW charging speed. The new P2 is 200kW, and the P3 and P4 250kW. That would bring the charge time down to around 20 - 25 mins.
Its also interesting to see the proliferation of ultra-rapid chargers. The first map (from Octopus Electroverse) shows the current 150+kW ultra rapid chargers. Extend that to 50kW+ and the map gets a bit busy.
Now - granted - Spain is not quite so well supplied with ultrafast chargers, but even there the situation has improved dramatically over that last couple of years.
AD - I am not trying to change your mind - everyone needs to make their own choice. But from where I sit, the future is looking pretty bright. Just 2 short years ago, using an EV to tow a caravan was all but unheard of. Now sites are installing fast (not rapid) chargers for overnight charging, and rapid charging companies are learning and installing towing bays to allow for rapid recharging without unhitching.
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There was (and maybe still is) a pot of money available to councils to fund charging schemes, many of which were deployed pre-covid. Unfortunately, a lot of councils made there deployments with little or no guidance as to how charging is used, where it is suitable and where it is not. In my town we have 34 council installed "fast" chargers in 3 different car-parks. In the parking that is unlimited time the chargers are very well used, often all full. In the car parks with a 4 hour limit, far less so. It seems that employees in the town will come and plug in before going to work, and then un-plug at the end of the day. In the 4 hour parking, only shoppers and visitors to the town use them, but we are not a 2 to 3 hour destination town, more like 30 to 90 mins. And for that time span, slower chargers are less useful.
As with running an EV, when installing EV infrastructure, planning is important.
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It’s not an issue👍🏻😊
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Nothing whatsoever👍🏻😊
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+1 ChocT, once the distance numbers are up to an acceptable level(to me) I expect within 1yr plus I’ll be looking forwards not backwards. Right now? not so much🤷🏻♂️
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John
I would imagine there are all sorts of incentives for local councils to take up grants to install EV charging points. It often depends on how forward thinking the councils are. Here in MK the council have really grasped the nettle and I don't know if its still the same but we had the greatest number of charging points outside of London. As far as finding them you just use an App which will take you to the nearest point. OK not so clever if you have a caravan in tow but solo its easy enough.
David
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Charge points are being developed by various companies. We signed up for this one in Wales to get access by easy payments on our card. This is just one example of what's happening.
https://www.dragoncharging.co.uk/
If you read the "about us" bit you can see multiple agencies are involved.
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Go for it, Rocky. I’ve never met a driving experience like it. The superb smoothness and power has to be tried to be believed 👍
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I guess the more advances in battery distance & efficiency the cheaper the EV becomes. I’ve been in one but not driven yet. I guess it’s a bit freaky at first😊
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I’m sure they will become cheaper in time just as all modern tech has.
It is a bit freaky at first but I soon got used to driving it to the extent that when I get in our other car I wonder why it’s got stonking great handbrake and auto gear change levers instead of small switches. I find myself looking for flappy paddles too😂
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That’s nice.
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When you drive your EV tinny do you feel very relaxed as I imagine. My truck is geared & takes a certain amount of concentration. EV’s seem to be way more relaxing, a kind of zen thing going on👍🏻😊
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It's definitely relaxing, Rocky. All the controls are light and easy. It’s effortless and there’s no sensation of the car changing gear either as it’s just forwards or backwards in linear drive. A really laid back experience. 🤙
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I agree with all that you said Tinny - until you floor it. Then it not so much laid back as pushed back. And when you do (which I do if I need to over take, but very very rarely from standstill) that linear drive with no gear changes is pretty astonishing. The closest thing to the experience I can recall is the relentless push into your seat that you get from a small jet on takeoff. But (much) more aggressive...
We get the sensation from both our EVs, the little Fiat 500E and the Polestar, the Polestar is just far more powerful.
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I’ve had Sorentos, Rufs, so I understand the joke 😂😂😂
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It’s G-Force at play, ChocT😀. G-Force in an armchair 👍🏻
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my diseasal Merc has a little column shift, a leccy parking/hand brake and it even has flappy paddles. 🙄
Closest to driving an EV (other than a forktruck 😉) is my sister-in-law's hybrid Renault ??? .... from what I remember that was pretty much like any other 2 pedal car I've driven
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