Electric Car Diary

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Slim

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Days 1-3: Collected a year old VW ID.4 this week from the VW dealership. Very detailed and thorough handover but it's difficult to take everything in. Car was charged up to 94% by dealer. After a frustrating 30 minutes on the Aviva app and two calls, transferred the insurance over. It seems the app would not accept '0' as engine size despite assurances from the customer care rep on the phone. Anyway, at 94% charge, range was showing as 330km, far short of the max 500km promoted for the 77kw battery. Assured that the range on screen reflects the previous 100km of driving not actual range left and the cold weather will reduce range. Anyway, drove home, some local trips, totalling some 100km in total and battery charge has dropped to 38%. Charging now on plug in charge so will be very slow.
Applied to SEAI for home charger grant, online, on Tuesday, approval email arrived yesterday. Applied to ELLI, that's VW associated company which arranges installation of the home charger. Ordered the basic kit, €1,329 installed. Applied Wednesday, phonecall and email yesterday. Looking at approx 3 weeks before installation. Bord Gais is the installer.
The car is a delight to drive. Smooth and very quick acceleration, have to watch speed limit as it reaches the limit quickly and smoothly.
The adaptive cruise control is amazing. You could literally set it and just steer, it slows down for speed limits, bends and keeps a set distance from the vehicle in front. So far so good. Will update after charging and longer trip Monday.
 
“Assured that the range on screen reflects the previous 100km of driving not actual range left”

EV’s constantly recalculate the range left, based on previous kms driven, all, perfectly normal.

“Applied to SEAI for home charger grant, online, on Tuesday, approval email arrived yesterday.”

Once installation certification hardcopy issued by installer, grant claim form completed + picture of car in driveway + chargepoint (up to recently at least), you can only claim the grant by hardcopy, by post, and its a little slow, can take 6 weeks minimum, to receive payment.

Good luck with the EV, you’l never go back !
 
Slim said:
Anyway, drove home, some local trips, totalling some 100km in total and battery charge has dropped to 38%.
Click to expand...

So,based on recent driving, range of battery is 179km. I'd find that worrying.

Did dealership measure the reduction in capacity of battery since manufacture? If you have not been provided with this figure I would ask for it.

AFAIK with the ID4 you have a warranty that the battery will maintain over 70% capacity for 160,000km or 8 years, whichever is sooner. This should provide some peace of mind.

Surprised that the dealer had car charged to 94% given that Volkswagen's advice is not to charge battery above 80% routinely. However I'm not sure if other EV manufacturers give this advice
 
Thank you all for reading and commenting. However, this is only meant to be an account of the first week or so of EV ownership in a real world, first timer setting.

I'd rather that the thread didn't go off to the debate on EVs versus ICEs. I've taken the plunge and I want to inform the others who might be considering a change.
 
Slim said:
I'd rather that the thread didn't go off to the debate on EVs versus ICEs. I've taken the plunge and I want to inform the others who might be considering a change.
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Guys

This is a very interesting thread. If you want to discuss Slim's experience or ask him questions do so.

If you want to let off steam about EVs generally, do so in another thread. I have deleted 8 posts.

Brendan
 
Overnight, plugged in via the 3 pin plug in the garage, from 38% to 82% between 4.20pm and 8.45am. Range is showing 293km on the app. I have capped it at 90% for this charge. The app is great. It can pre-heat the car interior to a selected temperature in the morning and you can start/stop the charging as long as the cable is plugged in.
 
It will be interesting to compare your charging costs to what filling up at the pump was costing you.

What is your typical mileage/weekly commute like?
 
PaddyBloggit said:
It will be interesting to compare your charging costs to what filling up at the pump was costing you.

What is your typical mileage/weekly commute like?
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FWIW my Leaf is showing 18kWh/100km average consumption, about a 50/50 mix of 120km/h motorway and suburb driving. I don’t have a night rate meter, so it’s costing me 20c per kWh to charge at home.

That’s the equivalent cost of a petrol car doing 2.1L/100km (112mpg) at current fuel prices of €1.70. On a competitive night rate meter you’d get this down to 1L/100km equivalent.

Not sure if that’s a good way for you to compare or not. The Leaf has really poor efficiency, so the bigger ID4 probably beats my figures.
 
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PaddyBloggit said:
It will be interesting to compare your charging costs to what filling up at the pump was costing you.

What is your typical mileage/weekly commute like?
Click to expand...
Well, prior to Covid, I was doing 500-700 most weeks. That's not going to be happening again so my very comfortable and economical diesel was just sitting outside most of the time. The local runs just not enough for that car. I figured that the trade in value would plunge if I waited another year.
 
Zenith63 said:
FWIW my Leaf is showing 18kWh/100km average consumption, about a 50/50 mix of 120km/h motorway and suburb driving. I don’t have a night rate meter, so it’s costing me 20c per kWh to charge at home.

That’s the equivalent cost of a petrol car doing 2.1L/100km (112mpg) at current fuel prices of €1.70. On a competitive night rate meter you’d get this down to 1L/100km equivalent.

Not sure if that’s a good way for you to compare or not. The Leaf has really poor efficiency, so the bigger ID4 probably beats my figures.
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Can you calculate the units I have used? 77kw battery charged from 38 to 89%, took 19 hours on plug in charger. How is this calculated? Thanks.
 
Slim said:
Can you calculate the units I have used? 77kw battery charged from 38 to 89%, took 19 hours on plug in charger. How is this calculated? Thanks.
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You added 51% to a 77kWh battery, so about 39kWh. 1kWh tends to cost around €0.20 if you have a regular electricity tariff. So your cost to add that amount was about €7.80.

As discussed on another thread last week, you could try to use the number of hours it took to charge and the speed of the charger, but it won’t charge at a constant rate so this tends to be misleading.
 
Ah. I didn't realise it is that straightforward. Thanks. Just under €7 for that top up. Is it cheaper with the 7kw home charger or just faster?
 
I have a Hyundai Kona almost 3 years now. There's 70,000 km on it. If I take the average consumption of 15-17 kWh/100km, that would work out at between €1,050 - €1,200 fuel cost for 3 years (assuming I've calculated it correctly). That would be at night rate electricity. My actual cost is much lower as I have access to free chargers at work.
So far, servicing has cost about €500, including 2 new tyres.
 
Slim said:
Ah. I didn't realise it is that straightforward. Thanks. Just under €7 for that top up. Is it cheaper with the 7kw home charger or just faster?
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just faster, the cost is per kWh, not the speed of consumption. getting a night meter will help further reduce that cost, we charge over night at 9.5c per kWh making it the cheapest "milage" option
 
Slim said:
Ah. I didn't realise it is that straightforward. Thanks. Just under €7 for that top up. Is it cheaper with the 7kw home charger or just faster?
Click to expand...
Same cost, but nearly 3 times faster, as the 3 pin domestic plug, can only deliver roughly 2.5kw per hour,(versus 7 kwper hour) hence the now common name “granny” charger. The 3 pin plug charging option, is really only for emergencies, or, for people who are waiting for their home charger installation.
 
Slim said:
Days 1-3: Collected a year old VW ID.4 this week from the VW dealership. Very detailed and thorough handover but it's difficult to take everything in. Car was charged up to 94% by dealer. After a frustrating 30 minutes on the Aviva app and two calls, transferred the insurance over. It seems the app would not accept '0' as engine size despite assurances from the customer care rep on the phone. Anyway, at 94% charge, range was showing as 330km, far short of the max 500km promoted for the 77kw battery. Assured that the range on screen reflects the previous 100km of driving not actual range left and the cold weather will reduce range. Anyway, drove home, some local trips, totalling some 100km in total and battery charge has dropped to 38%. Charging now on plug in charge so will be very slow.
Applied to SEAI for home charger grant, online, on Tuesday, approval email arrived yesterday. Applied to ELLI, that's VW associated company which arranges installation of the home charger. Ordered the basic kit, €1,329 installed. Applied Wednesday, phonecall and email yesterday. Looking at approx 3 weeks before installation. Bord Gais is the installer.
The car is a delight to drive. Smooth and very quick acceleration, have to watch speed limit as it reaches the limit quickly and smoothly.
The adaptive cruise control is amazing. You could literally set it and just steer, it slows down for speed limits, bends and keeps a set distance from the vehicle in front. So far so good. Will update after charging and longer trip Monday.
Click to expand...
once you get the charger in take a look at the best day night tariff you can get, you can then set the charger (or the car) only to charge between 12am and 8pm or 1am and 9 pm whichever it is at the moment so you only pay night rate, will bring the cost of charge down a lot.

Your range wont be 500km, you might see closer to the that on a mild summers day but winter range will be well down on that, youll get used to the range fluctuating between seasons and youll soon know roughly what range you will have regardless of what the 'guess o meter' says.
 
A very interesting thread. However what strikes me most clearly is the whole issue of 'range anxiety' or should it be 'charge anxiety' in this case is evident from the moment the owner leaves the garage. Call me a luddite, but when I fill my diesel car, I know going to bed at night exactly how much fuel is in the car in the morning and how far it will take me!

Where is the enjoyment in the car if there is a constant nagging feeling of always worrying how much charge is left in the battery and how far away the next charger is and indeed if it is actually working!
 
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