I’m on my 4th EV having had my first one back in 2014. That was a Renault Zoe with a range of around 100 miles. The photo is from the delivery
For >90% of my driving, including driving to a client site around 40 miles away every day, it worked well. I had off-street-parking and there was a charger in the client’s office car-park.
Longer journeys were not great. But we were a two-car family, so could always use the ICE for longer journeys.
Then I had a BMW i3 for a few years.
That had a longer range (around 150 miles) and also a range extender, which was a small petrol generator which would charge the battery as you drove. I rarely used it, but it was very handy for occasional long journeys to locations without decent charging.
I liked it a lot, except for 2 things.
The first was the doors. It has a “clever” design where there was no central pillar between the front and rear doors. The rear passenger door opened the opposite way around from normal (aka “suicide door”) and would not open unless the corresponding front door was opened. The seat belt was attached to the front door frame. This meant that, to let a rear passenger out, the front seat driver had to take their seatbelt off and leave the car. It was also impossible to let anyone in or out of the back seat when parked next to another car.
The other thing I hated was the sat-nav/infotainment system which just sucked. The BMW satnavs have a well deserved reputation for being poor. But the user interface on the whole system was awful, using a central jog-dial wheel which was supposed to be safer than a touch screen, but was far more distracting and dangerous to use, plus the general look and feel of the user interface was dreadful. They also rolled back their plans to implement Android Auto, so I ignored the BMW screen and used a phone in a cradle. I hated it so much, it prompted me to write this blog entry.
My last car was a Hyundai Kona E. Photo is on arrival day, with the i3 in the background waiting to be taken away.
That had a range of around 300 miles. That was a very nice car, and was a breath of fresh air after the BMW; it didn’t drive quite as nicely but about everything else about it was better.
Given how impressed I was with the Kona, for my current car I’ve gone for the Hyundai Ioniq 6.
This has a range of around 340 miles, so slightly more than the Kona, but it’s based on a dedicated EV platform, and has an 800V system. This means I can charge more than twice as fast as I could on the Kona; in theory up to 233 kW, whilst the Kona is limited to around 75 kW. Although, so far, most of my charges have capped out at around 175 kW.
It’s also a lot bigger car, mostly lengthways, which has taken a bit of getting used to having spent the last 10+ years driving smaller cars. It’s a bit trickier to park, but I’m now getting used to it. Where it shines is on long motorway journeys where it’s simply the most comfortable car I’ve driven for a long distance. It has funky cameras instead of wing mirrors which are kind of cool, but I worry about them getting damaged. I probably wouldn’t chose them again.
I recently have done a couple of trips from near Reading to Glasgow, Scotland. A journey of at least 6 1/2 hrs with not stopping or traffic. I did it in about 7 1/2 hours because I hate driving long distances, and I’m quite happy to stop for 45 minutes whilst it charges; I’ll stretch my legs and get something to eat.
If I start with a full charge, I could do the journey with one stop, but I’ll normally have 1 or 2 short additional stops to stretch my legs and visit the loo, grab a coffee and wake myself up a bit before continuing.
I also, quite frequently, visit family in The Wirrall and I can do that journey (normally about 3 1/2 - 4 hrs with traffic) without stopping to charge. I usually then stick it on one of the low-power lamp-post street chargers overnight (we almost always stay overnight) and have a full charge in the morning ready for the return journey.
I have had, from the start, a home charger fitted and also solar panels. But I also take advantage of electricity supply deals and normally only charge overnight at around 7.5p/kwH which means it costs me less than 3p per mile in fuel.
Have fun with the Ioniq. They are nice cars.
Cheers,
Keith
I understand your dislike for the UI - and interestingly, I much prefer it to tons of buttons and knobs. But to each his own! And seriously - removing the steering wheel stalks? No thanks…