Cars (all fuels and electric)

Different people have different car usage patterns, but the overriding factor is the “filling up”.

As I wrote before, my neighbour has bought a mid-range EV (and squarely for the 1st reason I posted above: to be “green”) and, because they are really nice people, they sometimes park in our drive when their battery gets low, with a mains lead running through the hedge There is a charging point at a pub nearby but is broken. The whole thing would be a joke if it wasn’t for the money they have spent, and continue to spend.

OTOH I could easily have an EV. In fact I could make money by charging EVs for the nearby pub customers

Now, guys and gurls, you will say this is purely from a British perspective (because Britain is fairly unique in being happy to be criticised) but, somehow, I don’t think so. It just takes balls to admit this. The scenario is probably typical of large chunks of most countries, and not typical of small chunks of some other countries.

Admittedly, the iPace is made by Jaguar which is probably on a Tesla level of QA, or maybe lower still. I expect the makes of reliable cars (Toyota, Honda at the top of the list, historically) will produce much better stuff.

@Peter, you are presenting exactly one data point, and seem to suggest that all or most EV drivers experience such drama. If that were true there would have been massive uprisings and EV manufacturers going bankrupt. Maybe the poor sod should just plan a bit more as to the range. He clearly is not a pilot.

There are millions of EV-drivers out there, extremely happy with their quiet, comfortable, cheap in running cost EV (I wont mention green because I’ve learned that that’s like swearing in church on an aviation forum).

Let’s see in a few years what the uptake of EV’s is. I think you’ll be surprised. Do you really think that so many car manufacturers who are clearly betting their future on EV’s are completely deluded?

Of course the charging infrastructure will improve in density. And the capacity of these chargers will increase too, in concert with the amount of kW’s that these cars can absorb, so that it really becomes like filling up a tank of Diesel. Even in Good Old Britain

I said The scenario is probably typical of large chunks of most countries, and not typical of small chunks of some other countries. and that can be true without impacting sales much.

Do you really think that so many car manufacturers who are clearly betting their future on EV’s are completely deluded?

Not at all. I think they are covering all bases. There is no downside to stating that by year (say) 2025 you will make only EVs. It gets you a huge amount of wonderful free PR which no money could buy, and nobody will hold you to the promise, so you can continue with a product mix. If they really did go all-EV that would be suicide because it would reduce sales by a huge amount – probably 80%.

aart wrote:

Of course the charging infrastructure will improve in density. And the capacity of these chargers will increase too, in concert with the amount of kW’s that these cars can absorb, so that it really becomes like filling up a tank of Diesel

They are never, at any point in the foreseeable future, going to be able to be charged to a ~500 mile range in ~1 minute, which is what you do when you fill up a diesel car.

The charging speed will improve, sure, but it will always be a ‘go and do something else while you’re waiting’ activity.

So it’ll never be like filling up with liquid fossil fuel.

What’s more, because each car has to sit on the charging point for some non-trivial amount of time, to give a majority-EV world the same ubiquitous availability situation as we currently have with petrol and diesel pumps (pull in anywhere with zero planning, there will always be one available) the charge point density will have to be many, many times denser than the current provision of petrol and diesel pumps. The space required. The power supplies required. The mind simply boggles.

Graham wrote:

They are never, at any point in the foreseeable future, going to be able to be charged to a ~500 mile range in ~1 minute

That is probably true. But what is also probably true is that ~1000 mile range is likely not too far away.
That is likely to cover most people’s home to home travel. So they can always charge at home and leave on a full battery and return home again before needing to charge.
And if they must charge enroute, then after after 8-10 hours driving they will want a break anyway.

I might be biased by the fact that I live on an island, where I’m unlikely to need to recharge on a single day’s drive. A charge of 350-400km will get me to any place in the country.

The only times that I’d likely need to recharge would be if a charger was not available at my destination (eg some of my hiking/camping trips where I’m parked overnight in the middle of nowhere). But on those, I’m usually glad of a nice warm meal on the way home, so wouldn’t mind a stop.

Even in the current situation, if I have to stop for 30 minutes to top up on a long journey, while that is going to be annoying at the time, for me it would be more than made up for by the fact that I don’t spend 10 minutes at a petrol station + 5 minutes driving out of my way, every week. An occasional charging up vs a weekly filling up is a good trade off.

I can give the other side.

3 Years from new, first MOT, no issues. Total maintenance cost in 3 years – 300 pounds for replacing the desiccant for the aircon (really annoying, should be 20 pounds for the pack, but it can only be done by de and re-gassing the Aircon) and checking the water content of the brake fluid. Not even new brake pads, they are only 20% or so worn. One new set of tyres, which were more expensive because of the weight rating, maybe 200 pounds more than on an equivalent petrol car.

My car probably benefits from the Tesla head-start – the iPace in the negative story above, bought in 2020, was in production for maybe 2 years; Tesla had 8 years of debugging at that point, which means that despite their mediocre build quality they probably have fewer issues overall. Or maybe Jaguar is just going back to their age-old tradition ;-).

Poor reliability is not inherent in an EV.

Two negative aspects of electrical driving will always be with us, because, chemistry

• Charging will always need planning, the reality is that you have to have a Plan B in range if the Plan A charger unavailable, so you have to almost apply the same mindset we are used to when flying rather than driving. This is unfixable because even if you have ample chargers en-route, once a queue develops it will take 5-10 times longer to resolve than the equivalent petrol queue.
• Charging will always add to the time taken for long trips. Some will enjoy the breaks, many won’t.

Two things will need MASSIVE investment in infrastructure

• All these charge points need to be built, including the cabling to sustan the required loads
• People without overnight charging or at-work charging are screwed unless overnight lamppost charging becomes a reality

Some idiocy will hopefully stop

• The crazyness of separate charging networks with stupid individual apps (not a UK problem, it is universal in Europe) needs to go.
• Prices need to be transparent at the point of charge so points can compete.

And there are several big misconceptions that people will eventually learn are not true

• You don’t sit at a charger for hours. People will learn that the best way to re-charge en route is 2 stops charging fro 30% to 70%, not one stop to charge from 10% top 90%, unless you like a lunch stop in which case it is just fine.
• The problem of needing massive charging stations is limited to the long distance road network. 100% of all petrol car fuelling takes place at fuel stations, but for those who charge at home, not that many trips need on-trip charging. I have not seen estimates here, but I would guess maybe 20% is needed, concentrated on the long-distance road network.
• While these (motorway) service stations will need a massive increase in the number of charging points – instead of maybe 20 refuelling points used 5 minutes on average (for every @Graham “pit stop” style refuelling, you get 10 people who walk into the shop, pay there, and maybe buy a snack) they need 200. But all have massive car parks so can easily fit the hundreds of charge points required.

The problem of needing massive charging stations is limited to the long distance road network. 100% of all petrol car fuelling takes place at fuel stations, but for those who charge at home, not that many trips need on-trip charging. I have not seen estimates here, but I would guess maybe 20% is needed, concentrated on the long-distance road network.

This would most definitely not be valid for me – I don’t have a home anywhere near where I travel. And are you asserting that all long distance road travel worldwide will in the future be constrained to motorways?!? That wipes out most of the world as a destination.

The concept of pre-planning an entire days driving in detail and sticking to published and approved routes might be acceptable to some European IFR pilots who have already been pushed by dysfunctional airspace infrastructure into that unfortunate box, but I’m pretty sure most people in any free society wouldn’t like accepting more broadly applied dysfunctional transport infrastructure, eventually to be mandated for everybody.

Here’s the best of both worlds!

This discussion is going nowhere. What I and other EV-positive people have stated over and over again is that EV’s are not for all, at least not at this point in time. Yet some EV-negative people repeatedly claim that their personal (or other individual) situation should be taken as the norm and therefore EV’s are not usable for anyone.

Frankly, I couldn’t care less if some individual has a travel pattern where (s)he needs to go 500 km every day without knowing where to or otherwise with no access to charging stations or with no desire to take any breaks. Then don’t use an EV but stop complaining about the concept just because it doesn’t fit you.

Once the timing belt in my petrol car broke 1 mile from home, destroying the engine. (And yes, with my kids in the car!) I don’t use that data point to argue that piston engined cars are unreliable.