Vauxhall Ampera/ Chevy Volt

[jamoor]

Am I the only one that thinks this car seems a good idea?

50 miles for £1 on electric, not many people commute for more than 50 miles round trip per day. Once you run out there is a petrol engine to take care of things.

Most people pop to the shops a few miles away etc, so removes the need for petrol entirely, as long as you plug it in when it's low.

Only problem is the price..

[anonymous-user]

The only problem is the price?

Isn't that a bit like dating Kera Knightly (or some other hotty of your choice), but finding out she's a crazy knife weilding mentalist after 10pm at night, and she wants your B*LLS for a new mantlepiece ornament??? ;-)

[BarnatosGhost]

I think the whole genre is great. If they were 10 years old and £3k, I'd be there.

What I'd like is a battery/motor/range-extender module to be fitted under the bonnet of a Mercedes W124 or BMW E39 'donor'.

[RedWhiteMonkey]

Saw one in the flesh on the road in Germany last week, it looks surprisingly good.

[martin84]

Its a pretty cool looking thing. I've never disputed that the electric car in theory is a good idea. People think I'm anti-EV but I'm not, I just feel right here right now they're no use for those who actually need the low running costs of an EV because they can't afford to buy the car, thats why I'm irritated everytime someone cites an EV as an alternative to being ripped off on petrol.

[AlexiusG55]

martin84 said:

Its a pretty cool looking thing. I've never disputed that the electric car in theory is a good idea. People think I'm anti-EV but I'm not, I just feel right here right now they're no use for those who actually need the low running costs of an EV because they can't afford to buy the car, thats why I'm irritated everytime someone cites an EV as an alternative to being ripped off on petrol.

Well, 110 years ago a car wasn't an alternative to a horse for people who couldn't afford to keep a horse. Hopefully EVs will likewise get cheaper.

[martin84]

AlexiusG55 said:

Well, 110 years ago a car wasn't an alternative to a horse for people who couldn't afford to keep a horse. Hopefully EVs will likewise get cheaper.

Yes I'm sure they will. Everything gets cheaper eventually. It wasn't that long ago that having a computer in the house was a hugely expensive luxury, now people have PC's, laptop's, Playstations and the like all in one room. Likewise 40 years ago a minority of households in any given street had a car, now everybodies got one. The more EV's get made, the more car makers buy into them then the cheaper they'll get. They'll also presumably get better as issues about battery life and range are gradually overcome. Some of the earliest 'cars' only had a range of about 10 miles.

I like the idea of an EV, I like hybrids as I feel they're a decent stop gap and proof that electric powered cars do work and are useful. My only argument against them usually comes back to the price of fuel in that EV's are not yet at the stage - or price - where they can make a significant market dent so the price of fuel needs to come down. Those who need a car which can do 50 miles on £1 can't afford it, eco cars are mostly still rich persons playthings. Thats not a downer on the car, thats just me sayign the Government needs to cut fuel tax.

[matthias73]

Max_Torque said:

The only problem is the price?

Isn't that a bit like dating Kera Knightly (or some other hotty of your choice), but finding out she's a crazy knife weilding mentalist after 10pm at night, and she wants your B*LLS for a new mantlepiece ornament??? ;-)

I still would.

[dvs_dave]

martin84 said:

Those who need a car which can do 50 miles on £1 can't afford it, eco cars are mostly still rich persons playthings. Thats not a downer on the car, thats just me sayign the Government needs to cut fuel tax.

And how long do you think being able to do 50 miles per pound is going to last before some spurious new electric car charging tax is created in order to maintain the same tax revenue stream lost from petrol taxes?

Exactly.....

[martin84]

dvs_dave said:

And how long do you think being able to do 50 miles per pound is going to last before some spurious new electric car charging tax is created in order to maintain the same tax revenue stream lost from petrol taxes?

Exactly.....

Well the Government can't keep increasing tax on movement forever because eventually there will be no movement as a result and they'll make no money. Tipping-point-curves and all that. Of course they need to start decreasing fuel duty now and getting used to the £28billion not being there. If they want us all in EV's they need to give us a massive carrot because the badgering stick approach of bankrupting us out of normal cars won't work. We weren't bankrupted out of 4-star and into unleaded were we? We were incentivised to buy diesel due to lower prices, we werent priced out of unleaded to impliment the change.

The fact is though any system to tax EV usage is likely to be horribly expensive to administrate, the Government would much prefer we keep driving normal cars. Its easy to tax because its essentially just typing a number into a computer and they make plenty of money out of us. Its in their interest for us to afford petrol, its not in their interest to price us off the road so eventually they'll have to drop the price. 20 years ago we all had cars which did 25mpg, now we have cars which do 50mpg. The fact is if we all drove V8 luxobarges they could afford to put the fuel tax down to 10p a litre.