Electric power points for e-vehicles

[Mick F]

Windows cleared in seconds?
Ours never mist up because the CC is always on and the car internals are never damp enough to mist up a window.
Not seen a misted-up window in years ........ at least on the inside.

Outsides are different of course, so we have front and rear wipers, and the side windows can be cleared by lowering and raising them.
Frost and ice in the winter is always on the outside, and warm water from a jug will sort that out PDQ.

[kwackers]

Windows cleared in seconds?
Ours never mist up because the CC is always on and the car internals are never damp enough to mist up a window.
Not seen a misted-up window in years ........ at least on the inside.

Outsides are different of course, so we have front and rear wipers, and the side windows can be cleared by lowering and raising them.
Frost and ice in the winter is always on the outside, and warm water from a jug will sort that out PDQ.

Yeah but can you press a button on the remote and have the car pre-warm so that it's nice and snug as soon as you get in?

Me neither - but only because the last round of privacy stuff means the European version of the car has it disabled.
But lots can.
I still get warm air out of the vents within seconds though, no need to drive a couple of miles beforehand.

What's "CC"?

Don't know how you manage to never have the car mist up inside - you've never got in with wet gear on?
Opened the door first thing in the morning and let all the dank air in?

[willcee]

Interesting contris, locally my area has got 2 ..and another at the local university... charging facility of ? type.. there are 20 in the distant county area closest would 15 miles away. so not much thinking has gone into 'E' and this rural area.. the town Coleraine is afaik the largest in a two county area next biggest would be LondonDerry.. yet we have many decent car marques in the town BMW.VW,NISSAN,KIA,FORD , All of these marques build several types of E machinery, we are 5 miles from the coast with 3 resorts locally. and none of those has any Points either if the list I googled was accurate, so i think in this area indeed in any wide rural farming district there is still a need for self charging machinery..A young chap I know well, known him and his folks since he was 4 years old ,now a seasoned racing driver in his early 30's, hillclimb champion, Building a special Rallye car at present, regaled me with a tale of him and his lady in USA last year , fly drive and they pushed a Tesla vehicle to him .. he drove it for 2 days and left it back, why i says, ''no bloody noise , like you I need to hear the revs'' !!. 'nuff said..old petrol heads ... will

[Jdsk]

ZapMap has four charging points in Coleraine:
https://www.zap-map.com/live/

Jonathan

[willcee]

thanks i found that later.. on another site and amended my piece however these are not sited where one would expect in any service station, they are hap hazard in car parks.. and one again in a car park at the uni... the yellow one is Nissan and it only does for their yokes.. will

[kwackers]

thanks i found that later.. on another site and amended my piece however these are not sited where one would expect in any service station, they are hap hazard in car parks.. and one again in a car park at the uni... the yellow one is Nissan and it only does for their yokes.. will

In Germany they have to put EV charge points at service stations...

I'll be honest unless you can't charge at home public charging stations are a bit of a red herring.
Most folk charge at home (or work) and only those doing decent distances zipping up and down the motorways tend to charge at public chargers.

[thirdcrank]

That seems to imply that either there are lots of people who cannot charge at home or there are lots of surplus public charging points, with lots more being installed all the time.

[Jdsk]

The growth rate for EVs is unpredictable, and the need for public chargers follows. (IMHO that's one of the areas where the government should be trying to add some stability.)

kwackers has already made the points (!) about how much charging will be done at home and at work and on motorways and the like. Beyond that it's still unclear whether there will be anything similar to current (!) petrol stations. The infrastructure is different, and many cars and occupants will be there for longer...

Jonathan

[kwackers]

That seems to imply that either there are lots of people who cannot charge at home or there are lots of surplus public charging points, with lots more being installed all the time.

I think on the main routes the charging points are fairly well attended - for the current numbers of EV's.
However a lot of the local charging points from what I've seen rarely get used.
The exception may be supermarkets - who wouldn't be averse to sticking 30 miles free motoring in their car whilst shopping?

As I've hinted at several times the biggest barrier to EV use is perceived rather than actual issues.
Folk who mainly use their cars to drive 20 miles to work and back and perhaps a 30 or 40 mile run at the weekend will oft say "I'd get an EV if there were more charging points".
Except they don't need them.
The majority of EV users simply charge at home or work. A small handful can't so rely on public chargers.

What's going to be interesting is how it pans out when typical EV's have ranges in the 300-400 miles.
What will that mean for rapid chargers? Folk coming out of their houses to a fully charged car - why would they bother with a rapid charge?
Perhaps the future isn't a huge number of chargers after all.

[rfryer]

What's going to be interesting is how it pans out when typical EV's have ranges in the 300-400 miles.
What will that mean for rapid chargers? Folk coming out of their houses to a fully charged car - why would they bother with a rapid charge?
Perhaps the future isn't a huge number of chargers after all.

I think that rapid chargers will remain important, but not something that most drivers use everyday.

I've been driving an EV with a 300 mile range for the last month, and until this weekend I've just been charging it at home, overnight, around once per week.

This weekend has been a trip from north Cumbria to near the south coast, so my first time to use rapid charging. The sat-nav routed me via a charge point, told me how long to charge for, and the level of charge I'd arrive with. After 3 hours on the road I was ready for a break, and I was the only user at the bank of around 10 charging points.

In summary, using an EV has not delayed my long journey at all, and has saved me needing to stop in at petrol stations at all over the last three months. It's all good!

[thirdcrank]

... As I've hinted at several times the biggest barrier to EV use is perceived rather than actual issues. .... .

Never mind hinting, car marketing depends on perception and that marketing tends to avoid practicalities; disbelief is one outcome. As I've said, economy with the truth over range has increased scepticism.

[Oldjohnw]

What's going to be interesting is how it pans out when typical EV's have ranges in the 300-400 miles.
What will that mean for rapid chargers? Folk coming out of their houses to a fully charged car - why would they bother with a rapid charge?
Perhaps the future isn't a huge number of chargers after all.

I think that rapid chargers will remain important, but not something that most drivers use everyday.

I've been driving an EV with a 300 mile range for the last month, and until this weekend I've just been charging it at home, overnight, around once per week.

This weekend has been a trip from north Cumbria to near the south coast, so my first time to use rapid charging. The sat-nav routed me via a charge point, told me how long to charge for, and the level of charge I'd arrive with. After 3 hours on the road I was ready for a break, and I was the only user at the bank of around 10 charging points.

In summary, using an EV has not delayed my long journey at all, and has saved me needing to stop in at petrol stations at all over the last three months. It's all good!

Might I ask how long your service station stop was? The (almost) only long journey I do is the awful trip from north Northumberland to Royal Leamington Spa to visit my daughter, well over 300 miles.

[kwackers]

... As I've hinted at several times the biggest barrier to EV use is perceived rather than actual issues. .... .

Never mind hinting, car marketing depends on perception and that marketing tends to avoid practicalities; disbelief is one outcome. As I've said, economy with the truth over range has increased scepticism.

I'm not sure there is an economy with the truth.

IC or EV in this country range is usually given using WLTP which in my experience is slightly pessimistic, just looking ahead a bit allows you to beat it hands down.
Obviously if you're one of the many people who like to drive at 80-90 on the motorway continually accelerating and braking with the rest of the motons in the outside lane, like to accelerate up to lights and brake at the last second etc then you're never going to see the quoted range or MPG.

In some countries they use EPA which does seem pretty optimistic though.

One of the amusing things about EV's is that people seem to like to game the range and efficiency. Getting over 4 miles per kwh is seen as a badge of honour, over 5 then you're part of an elite club.
You can't get those sorts of efficiencies by driving like a t*t.

Ultimately though the real issue is folk don't actually know what they really use a car for.
The average vehicle drives a few miles to work and back with a longer trip at the weekend every blue moon.
Yet those same folk will spout all sorts of nonsense about what they need a car to do.
10,000 miles a year is the average mileage. 200 miles a week, not far off the real world range of an average electric car these days and significantly less than the next crop.
That's one full charge per week.

[thirdcrank]

kwackers

I've no doubt that if at the time when society was beginning to switch from horses to horsepower, had there been a choice of steam, hydrocarbon or battery-power as we know it today, then the latter would be what's nowadays called a no-brainer. The reality is that there's well over a century of development and marketing which has influenced people's current decisions. Logic really doesn't come into it, or rather applying logic needs to look at the history to make sense. IMO a good example here is personal ownership of the private car. Every logical argument is against it, but that hasn't stopped an awful lot of people arguably wasting an awful lot of their money to have a car.

[willcee]

Not over here but there was a niche amongst rich city dwellers in the states who used EV's... one of the leading US N Western restorers Wayne Carini , total car afficinado had a series on TV about his business and I watched him using one ,looked like a 4 wheeled Buggy, bench seat ,open hood, not much windscreen if any ,steered with a tiller, and seemed to reach a fair old lick at 100 years old.. he was impressed even as a real petrol head..period would have been late 1890's forward..will