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Going electric

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Going electric

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g8rpi said:
A few years ago I had the option to lease a Leaf for half the normal rate. I did the sums and even if I charged it for free at work it would still be cheaper to pay for fuel and scrap my 1.9 16V Multijet Croma after 3 years.
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Bit of a silly comparison, of course an old fiat estate, which was never particularly expensive to start with, is going to be cheaper than leasing a new car.

Even back when the the Leaf was new the, newest croma would still be 4-5 years old.
 
Most Easterly Pandas said:
As with any used car you pays your money and take your risk.

As I say, been there done that with a Bravo I bought at 3.75 years old, a year later and major gearbox woes. Luck of the draw unfortunately. I wasn't happy but it was what it was and there is little else you can do when you're in the situation.
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I was trying to get an idea of how risky it is. A gearbox may fail but it's not that common - you were unlucky I get that - however, if after a certain time and certain number of charges a battery is likely to fail then you might say, at that point, the risk is high. If it's not likely before 20 years then - the risk is low if I buy a second hand low mileage example at under 3 years. I can't afford to purchase an electric car new and a used one is an unknown quantity. Which is one of the reasons why I bought a new ICE car in the end. The technology is still new and expensive - that will change pretty quickly, hopefully the choice of models will improve too - right now it's quite limited.
 
JCarp16 said:
I was trying to get an idea of how risky it is. A gearbox may fail but it's not that common - you were unlucky I get that - however, if after a certain time and certain number of charges a battery is likely to fail then you might say, at that point, the risk is high. If it's not likely before 20 years then - the risk is low if I buy a second hand low mileage example at under 3 years. I can't afford to purchase an electric car new and a used one is an unknown quantity. Which is one of the reasons why I bought a new ICE car in the end. The technology is still new and expensive - that will change pretty quickly, hopefully the choice of models will improve too - right now it's quite limited.
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Plenty of 6-7 year old leafs driving about with the original battery, infact most cars will be on original batteries still.

Drivers of electric cars have a different mind set to owners of mobile phones.

People put their phones on charge every night and max them out, this isn’t good for long term battery reliability.
Electric car owners will only charge the car when it’s needed and even then they might do an 85% charge if a full charge isn’t required.

This way they get many many years of battery reliability.
 
AndyRKett said:
Bit of a silly comparison, of course an old fiat estate, which was never particularly expensive to start with, is going to be cheaper than leasing a new car.

Even back when the the Leaf was new the, newest croma would still be 4-5 years old.
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Not really silly, real world, It was the actual situation. Did I go green or stick with what I had? Note that the Leaf was being offered at half the normal lease rate (part of a deal that required feedback on the car) but was still not economically viable. That's apart from the higher trim and features on the Croma and it's capability to do long runs without stopping for a re-charge.


Robert G8RPI.
 
g8rpi said:
Not really silly, real world, It was the actual situation. Did I go green or stick with what I had? Note that the Leaf was being offered at half the normal lease rate (part of a deal that required feedback on the car) but was still not economically viable. That's apart from the higher trim and features on the Croma and it's capability to do long runs without stopping for a re-charge.


Robert G8RPI.
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So what you are saying is, a new car is more expensive than a used one, Correct?

With out getting into the vagaries of why people lease/PCP new rather than buy old the phrase "economically viable" is a very broad church. It didn't make sense for you but if you didn't have the Croma and needed a car..you would probably have found the Leaf was one of the nicest cars available at that monthly. Given it was half price it would probably be a choice between it and a bargain bucket fiesta.
 
JCarp16 said:
But it's an electric motor - surely it can do that all electronically? After all - '1 speed' was fine up to now. It's not comparable to an ICE powertrain.
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An electric motor has an almost flat and linear torque curve from 0 - maximum RPM. this means there is not really any need for gears, if the motor is capable of maximum speed without additional gearing, which they usually are.

You can basically take the properties of the motor you have and install one gear appropriate to achieve the level of acceleration you want for the top speed you want.

It is possible where they are installing a second gear maybe to reduce motor/transmission noise. ICE engines need gearing as the power drops off with speed, needing to then up the gear to put the engine back in its power band and allow it to continue accelerating and to maximise economy. Hence modern automatics having as many as 9 gears now.

Electric cars are far, far more efficient in the way they turn energy in to motion, so we won’t be seeing electric cars needing lots of multiple gears any time soon.
Additional gears are unlikely to make the car any more efficient.
 
AndyRKett said:
Plenty of 6-7 year old leafs driving about with the original battery, infact most cars will be on original batteries still.

Drivers of electric cars have a different mind set to owners of mobile phones.

People put their phones on charge every night and max them out, this isn’t good for long term battery reliability.
Electric car owners will only charge the car when it’s needed and even then they might do an 85% charge if a full charge isn’t required.

This way they get many many years of battery reliability.
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Couldn't have put it better myself.

My main plan is to run it between 15-80% locally, only use full capacity when needed for longer runs, or when charging is free :D
 
Most Easterly Pandas said:
Couldn't have put it better myself.

My main plan is to run it between 15-80% locally, only use full capacity when needed for longer runs, or when charging is free :D
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Most car battery controllers already limit the charge to less than the full rated capacity of the battery and never let you run it into deep discharge. This results in much improved battery life at a slight expense of range. Some laptop computers allow you to set charge to 70-80% of and it makes a big difference to the life if you manly use it connected to the mains.


Robert G8RPI.
 
g8rpi said:
Most car battery controllers already limit the charge to less than the full rated capacity of the battery and never let you run it into deep discharge. This results in much improved battery life at a slight expense of range. Some laptop computers allow you to set charge to 70-80% of and it makes a big difference to the life if you manly use it connected to the mains.


Robert G8RPI.
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Indeed, however the closer to the middle of the range you can keep it yourself the better also, this is why most Hybrid Toyota's are still on their original traction battery after 15+ years, they only use the centre 55-60%.

EV's however use a much larger range, the Soul I'm collecting tomorrow for example has a 30.5kwh battery with 27kwh useable. So around 90% if the the battery is used.
 
My brother sent me this pic from Bristol.

Looks ripe for a 'trip' and a compensation claim.
 

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For a long time we have worried about electromagnetic fields from our mobile phones, leading to people holding them away form their heads using the speakers, or using the earbuds. Most phones nowadays have the transmitter at the base instead of the top, although only a slight move away from the brain.
Now we are proposing to create much bigger electromagnetic currents in order to charge our cars. Is this really a good idea?
The bonus of course, is that an inductive charging point in the road might prevent mobile phone use above it, so may reduce the number of people wandering aimlessly whilst on calls.
 
portland_bill said:
Now we are proposing to create much bigger electromagnetic currents in order to charge our cars. Is this really a good idea?
The bonus of course, is that an inductive charging point in the road might prevent mobile phone use above it, so may reduce the number of people wandering aimlessly whilst on calls.
Click to expand...

Although for a long time now it’s been proven that there is little to no risk from mobile phones, you do have to raise an eyebrow at a large high energy electromagnetic field in the road or in your drive way, powerful enough to charge cars or busses quickly.
The thing with phones is you can choose to not be that close to them and any fields around them do not extend very far and are very low energy.

If these charging pads are dotted everywhere out on the street then it’s not going to be something you can easily avoid, more of a concern for small children.
 
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