First EV - anything I'm missing?
Discussion
Hi all
I have a EV option through work and have only just recently considered it, and it does make reasonable sense Vs taking the cash and getting my own car on PCP which I'm doing currently on a VZ2 Formentor.
I can get out of my current car at the moment just at enough price wise to settle it and walk away, or I could wait a bit longer but I feel like I could get to a point where that won't be an option and I'll have to give it another 2 years then until I can exit without paying out of my own money to settle it.
I have driven a few in the last few weeks
Ioniq 5 - really nice but quite pricey these days once you start adding a spec you actually want, colours are all extra and so on. Drove well, not quick unless go for the AWD which again is a good chunk more cash.
Ford explorer - same again, colours extra and only the premium has the all the stuff I want and even then heat pump is extra. It was the RWD long range I drove, fairly quick for a big car. Little underwhelmed with the interior around the dash and doors, the premium has nicer seats etc but still the same grey trim everywhere, it looks like hard creme plastic but it's actually soft, just doesn't look premium at all. 350 mile range so realistically what, 280?
Ex30 - tiny, felt very built to a price, I don't see how you could get more than two adults in it remotely comfortably.
Scenic E tech alpine - tried this to check if a less premium car was worth considering, was massively disappointed. It's actually a really nice car to look at and the trim and spec is really nice.. but it has an absolutely awful ride that made me feel ill after 20 mins, not something I've ever experienced before. Also a bit sluggish, picked up fairly well when rolling but from a standstill felt slow.
Which lead me to test driving a BYD Seal Excellence yesterday which I was honestly blown away by. Couldn't really fault it, comfy, felt of high quality, looks pretty smart.. way better to look at than any Tesla IMO. Yes it's Chinese but I think that is a very old fashioned stigma and so much stuff is made in China these days anyway... It's party piece was how effortlessly quick it picks up as well... But also how massive the standard spec is, it has everything you need, pick the colour you like (not extra £) and the price is what it is.
I can basically get the top spec seal for about 150pcm less than a middle ISH spec n line ioniq...
I wasn't really intending for this to be a performance car but it's nice to have the performance on tap when required. I'm still mulling it over, but nothing else appears to come close. I can get the seal with insurance maintaince tyres all included with a 16k mile a year limit for the same as just the PCP on the Formentor.. which I then have to maintain and insure.
It's not an absolute requirement that it's fast but I also don't want something sluggish. The ford was fast enough, the BYD was in another league, albeit probably unnecessarily so.
So long story short, I've gone from never really wanting or considering an EV as a complete petrol head, to actually trying a few and being impressed with how they drive, in a very short space of time .. so I'm looking for any advice or anything you guys think I should consider that I might not have, as once I made this decision I am stuck with it for a while.
Anything you have learned from EV ownership that you hadn't considered before hand etc.. any nuggets of advice would be appreciated?
I have a EV option through work and have only just recently considered it, and it does make reasonable sense Vs taking the cash and getting my own car on PCP which I'm doing currently on a VZ2 Formentor.
I can get out of my current car at the moment just at enough price wise to settle it and walk away, or I could wait a bit longer but I feel like I could get to a point where that won't be an option and I'll have to give it another 2 years then until I can exit without paying out of my own money to settle it.
I have driven a few in the last few weeks
Ioniq 5 - really nice but quite pricey these days once you start adding a spec you actually want, colours are all extra and so on. Drove well, not quick unless go for the AWD which again is a good chunk more cash.
Ford explorer - same again, colours extra and only the premium has the all the stuff I want and even then heat pump is extra. It was the RWD long range I drove, fairly quick for a big car. Little underwhelmed with the interior around the dash and doors, the premium has nicer seats etc but still the same grey trim everywhere, it looks like hard creme plastic but it's actually soft, just doesn't look premium at all. 350 mile range so realistically what, 280?
Ex30 - tiny, felt very built to a price, I don't see how you could get more than two adults in it remotely comfortably.
Scenic E tech alpine - tried this to check if a less premium car was worth considering, was massively disappointed. It's actually a really nice car to look at and the trim and spec is really nice.. but it has an absolutely awful ride that made me feel ill after 20 mins, not something I've ever experienced before. Also a bit sluggish, picked up fairly well when rolling but from a standstill felt slow.
Which lead me to test driving a BYD Seal Excellence yesterday which I was honestly blown away by. Couldn't really fault it, comfy, felt of high quality, looks pretty smart.. way better to look at than any Tesla IMO. Yes it's Chinese but I think that is a very old fashioned stigma and so much stuff is made in China these days anyway... It's party piece was how effortlessly quick it picks up as well... But also how massive the standard spec is, it has everything you need, pick the colour you like (not extra £) and the price is what it is.
I can basically get the top spec seal for about 150pcm less than a middle ISH spec n line ioniq...
I wasn't really intending for this to be a performance car but it's nice to have the performance on tap when required. I'm still mulling it over, but nothing else appears to come close. I can get the seal with insurance maintaince tyres all included with a 16k mile a year limit for the same as just the PCP on the Formentor.. which I then have to maintain and insure.
It's not an absolute requirement that it's fast but I also don't want something sluggish. The ford was fast enough, the BYD was in another league, albeit probably unnecessarily so.
So long story short, I've gone from never really wanting or considering an EV as a complete petrol head, to actually trying a few and being impressed with how they drive, in a very short space of time .. so I'm looking for any advice or anything you guys think I should consider that I might not have, as once I made this decision I am stuck with it for a while.
Anything you have learned from EV ownership that you hadn't considered before hand etc.. any nuggets of advice would be appreciated?
Edited by Yazza54 on Monday 9th June 08:47
The most important thing for running an EV "privately" (i.e. paying for your own electricity) - can you charge at home?
Charging at home can end up being basically free if you get the right tariff and shift some household usage to the cheap periods.
Using public chargers can be 3 times the cost of petrol.
I'm on Octopus Intelligent Go, and by shifting appliance use and the heat pump to the cheap periods as much as I can, I'm saving enough to make my car usage free (compared to a standard tarrif) in the warmer months, and I'm making money in the winter.
That's without having solar or house batteries.
Apart from the charging thing, running a modern EV is no more complicated than ICE, and just better in so many ways.
Charging at home can end up being basically free if you get the right tariff and shift some household usage to the cheap periods.
Using public chargers can be 3 times the cost of petrol.
I'm on Octopus Intelligent Go, and by shifting appliance use and the heat pump to the cheap periods as much as I can, I'm saving enough to make my car usage free (compared to a standard tarrif) in the warmer months, and I'm making money in the winter.
That's without having solar or house batteries.
Apart from the charging thing, running a modern EV is no more complicated than ICE, and just better in so many ways.
As above - charging, charging, charging.
Do you have a charger at home? Can you have a charger at home?
If the answer to the former is no, you need to factor in the cost of getting one.
If the answer to the latter is no, you need to really rethink the whole EV idea.
Someone may come along in a moment to tell you that they do 40,000 miles a year in their Tesla off the public network and it's fine and they do trips to mongolia in it every summer and home charging isn't necessary.........real world, it 100% is necessary and a pain in the arse without it.
Do you have a charger at home? Can you have a charger at home?
If the answer to the former is no, you need to factor in the cost of getting one.
If the answer to the latter is no, you need to really rethink the whole EV idea.
Someone may come along in a moment to tell you that they do 40,000 miles a year in their Tesla off the public network and it's fine and they do trips to mongolia in it every summer and home charging isn't necessary.........real world, it 100% is necessary and a pain in the arse without it.
Cheers guys - don't have one but I can get one installed.
I reckon 90% of my journeys can be done without need for charging away from home if I get a wallbox fitted. Rapid charging can go on expenses so it's really just any personal rapid charging that I would have to consider but overall I'd expect it olto be cheaper to run..i think..!
I reckon 90% of my journeys can be done without need for charging away from home if I get a wallbox fitted. Rapid charging can go on expenses so it's really just any personal rapid charging that I would have to consider but overall I'd expect it olto be cheaper to run..i think..!
Yazza54 said:
Which lead me to test driving a BYD Seal Excellence ... pick the colour you like (not extra £) and the price is what it is.
Any colour except Ice Blue on the BYD Excellence are £1,000 / £1,100 (4wd) extra https://www.byd.com/uk/order-seal
Edited by Tye Green on Monday 9th June 10:37
Tye Green said:
Yazza54 said:
Which lead me to test driving a BYD Seal Excellence ... pick the colour you like (not extra £) and the price is what it is.
Any colour except Ice Blue on the BYD Excellence are £1,100 extra https://www.byd.com/uk/order-seal
A bit different use case from yours (cross-continent trips, often more than 1000km days with a full car). Trying to make sense of our logic after 2.5 years/65,000km with an Ioniq 5 (AWD)
- The average charging speed (e.g. 10-80%) matters more than range on road trips. With four people and a dog on board, we need to stop quite often anyway. Tweaking the driving style can extend the range a lot with minimal extra time on the road. 15-30 minutes of additional driving time can buy you up to 100km extra range when needed, and you'd still be breaking even compared to a car that averages a 100 kW.
- Wanted a heat pump, but got a car without one that was available sooner. Might have been a blessing in disguise. one less thing to go wrong, the "goldilocks" temperatures are less common here than in the UK (and tweaking HVAC settings can drop the power draw massively).
- If you don't need space, the Ioniq 6 and KIA EV6 share the basic architecture. KIA EV6 was the only other option at the time for our use case when we were looking.
- You might not need the AWD, but I think I would have gotten a bit frustrated with RWD on the hilly/mountainous parts of the trips.
- UK financing deals and specs are alien topics... But I'd still check if you could save some money by getting a 25k£ used Ioniq 5 (2023 model, 15k miles) vs a new one with the same(?) spec based on 55k£ list price. In 2022, buying used wasn't an option for us, today I wouldn't consider a new one.
- If leasing, it is good to keep in mind that your mileage might go up: less fatigue over long trips compared to ICE, driving around locally is cheap, and you don't need to override mechanical sympathy when doing cold starts.
Edited by PetrolHeadInRecovery on Monday 9th June 11:36
Yazza54 said:
Cheers guys - don't have one but I can get one installed.
I reckon 90% of my journeys can be done without need for charging away from home if I get a wallbox fitted. Rapid charging can go on expenses so it's really just any personal rapid charging that I would have to consider but overall I'd expect it olto be cheaper to run..i think..!
I suppose I'm the person you were warned about (non-trivial mileage, almost exclusively using public charging). If installation is inexpensive and a Level 2 charger is required to reap the full benefits of smart tariffs, then by all means. It should pay for itself quite soon.I reckon 90% of my journeys can be done without need for charging away from home if I get a wallbox fitted. Rapid charging can go on expenses so it's really just any personal rapid charging that I would have to consider but overall I'd expect it olto be cheaper to run..i think..!
However, a level 1 charging should be more than enough for typical driving. Ours is limited to 1.8kW (instead of ~3.5kW, which a 16A/220V socket could provide), and plugging in for 10 hours adds almost 100km of motorway range (or over 150km of city/local road range).
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