Here's my babies, just finished doing all the body work on the yellow one 16td, green one 16d has been my daily while sorting the yellow one out... green one now for sale and just started building an engine for the yellow one, bit of porting, fettling and a bigger exhaust should see it at around the 120bhp mark which is about the same as original GTI.

 

At Alicante airport I walked past a Tesla model X with Norwegian number plates.

Knowing of Spain's distinct lack of fast charging points(or modern infrastructure in general) , one has to wonder how many stop overs did it take to do the trip and if in a hotel, was a extension lead ran out of the lobby to the car park?* Which could really mess up someone's trip if the cleaner unplugged it to do the vacuuming and didn't plug it back in

* Assuming it was driven here and not trailered or there was a big generator in the boot

 

3KW petrol genny in the boot running all the time. I suppose a diesel one on a trailer might work.

 

Like the first ICE cars fuelling infrastructure wasn't in great supply, infact it was rare. Battery technology is here and will only get bigger and bigger whilst petrol/diesel will dwindle in use. It may take 20 years or so. Driving cars will also be a thing of the past aswell, driverless tech is coming to our roads very soon

 

I think it's still not going to happen even in 20yrs ... it's the thing of the moment right now... and the media haven't started slating the not quite so eco battery production and disposal... let alone where all the charging capacity is going to come from and how it's going to be built, what fuel will be used.

Then when average joe that can't even afford to buy a house because his rent is so high realises that it's a choice between a new battery and sending his eldest to Uni, paying the rent or putting food on the table... I don't think they'll be too popular either.

Right now EV's are the preserve of the better off... a new toy for the middle classes and something to discuss at dinner parties... hows your council estate macdonalds worker going to be able to afford one??? right now he drives a £500/1000 banger... wheres the money coming from and don't say savings on fuel because leccy will be going up in line with fuel prices if we ever get to a stage where we're all driving EV's.

 

batteries will be recycled. once cars become as cheap as fiesta price money everyone will get them. they cost a third of the price to run as a petrol/diesel equivalent. I plugged it in last night at 7pm, car started charging at midnight on cheap economy 7 electric. Walked dogs this morning unpulgged charger. Being nosey checked the car, fully charged.

 

All I'll say is remember how cheap diesel was before they got everyone to change to the "New Greener fuel" remember how cheap vegetable oil was before the government realised people were using it in their diesel cars... out here LPG is popular... that's doubled in price in the last 5yrs as did heating oil when everyone fitted oil burners to heat their houses and businesses... they're all back to using wood now.

Enjoy it while it lasts because they gravy train WILL hit the buffers... sooner rather than later.

 

The difference being is that its electric, and we all use it for home consumption. So governments will have to be very careful. Also with a 5KW PV solar system cost can be offset.

 

you seen the price for a ton of wood now, it's also crept up due to the amount of people who have installed wood / multi fuel burners
I thought about pellets, and then thought it's too easy to get trapped into one kind of fuel and if they hike the prices your stuck having to buy
wood you can get anywhere, especially if you have a chainsaw lol

 

I doubt that anything will stop the government raising taxes from EV's as and when the time comes.... solar/ wind isn't all that great either once you factor in all the costs involved and lifespan, less so now the tariffs have dropped for feeding the national grid... and anyway what's to stop them taxing that too... more so once the oil revenue stream dries up.

If there's one thing I've learned in this life, it's that they always get you in the end... one way or another.

 

I don.t doubt that the governments of the world will try and extract some funding from EV adoption, but it necessary to adopt cleaner emissions, so a balance will be needed.

Wife's first test drive of the Leaf, no negative comments, she made it go like stink to satisfy her speed demon. Great sound system standard with a Bose upgrade on some models. virtually committed to getting a Leaf. Final test will be 100+ mile journey later this week.

 

Good Luck with that - You'll be fully clenched when your 10 miles away.....

Am tempted by a Leaf for the missus - she literally does 5 miles a day.... upfront costs are high though buying/leasing the thing!

 

The problem here is that all that braking and other stuff independent of the engine is releasing equally dangerous toxins into the environment

 

Not really there is a free to use 50kw charger a couple of miles from her stop. 20mins will be more than enough

 

Yes, I agree there are further steps to be made to encourage walking and cycling for local journeys. Reduce reliance on vehicle transport. Until we have flying fusion cars with plasma drive and brake propulsion from the flux capacitor then battery technology is the way forward-presently

Serious note the likes of Denmark a large chunk of local trips less than 3 mikes are done by bike. Now that should be encouraged massively and get parents to send their kids to school on foot like I did, not in cars

 

Returned the Leaf

Cons
no parking sensors
no adjustable seat other than height. forward back
range not satisfactory for 100 mile journey(actual range with 30kW battery 105 miles, not 155 advertised)

Plus
roomy car
drives very nicely
quick acceleration from 0 to 30mph
excellent regen braking-basically hardly use brakes for general driving
perfect 30 miles commuter car


I'd expect the leaf to drop in price hugely next month with a new model coming out with bigger range, safety features galore.(Tesla influence)


No going for Tesla test drive, when we can arrange it.

 

We will all be using hover cars by then

 

This is 90% of the problem in the UK; Far far too many people live too far from their places of work, education and shops. Not only does this cause too much private transport it also overwhelms public transport.

HS2 as an example is only being built to allow people working in London to live further outside of London. Reaping the reward of a London wage and Northern property prices. People could argue this is not the case, but this is exactly what happened in France with its high speed railways into Paris.

Ergo; The problem isn't fixed by building more/faster public transport and using electric cars. It needs a whole lot more pragmatic investment in wide ranging solutions; The prime one is encouraging employment outside of over-congested cities for footloose employment roles; Do you really need to travel to the centre of London, Birmingham or Manchester just to sit at a office desk 9 to 5?

The other factor is our road network was/is a bodge; The original plans drawn in the 1930's had much more motorway connectivity between cities across the entire UK from tip-to-tip North, South, East West. What we actually ended up with was a half-arsed partially compete motorway network. Which was ok for the demand at the time in the 60's and 70's, but nothing was done to properly complete it 90's onwards at a time when we reall really needed it; Not for commuting, but for transport of goods from our major import and export routes.

 

^^^^ Amen to that

 

We could be chomping through EU cash on public transport infrastructure . Probably bit late now

 

Way too late: Already guzzled by our fellow member states.

Spain and Italy was the major benefactors in outright amount. However in terms of GDP Slovakia, Estonia and Greece were the main recipients.

If our MEPs had more influence combined with our government's foresight of our future needs twenty years ago then we would have no grounds to moan about current ailing infrastructure.

 

How are the people to charge their cars overnight if they don't have off street parking?
Thousands of people (I don't know how many) live in high rise buildings, how will they manage when we stop using petrol and diesel?

 

It will require infrastructure changes like it once was when petrol vehicles were invented. High rise and property with no off street are generally inner city/town development s. Use of public transport, god forbid walk or cycle for local journeys. Else polluted air is only going to get much worse

 

Yep; All those councils granting planning permission for racked and stacked new build family homes with off street parking for one small car...some of the posher ones with a garage thats too small to even fit a Ford Focus! The streets of these estates are more crammed with parked cars in the streets than a street of Victorian terraces!

 

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com...funny-pics.jpg

 

Electric cars are the future, but batteries arent! Not in the traditional sense anyway.

Electric cars driven by H2 from sustainable sources, with a tiny battery (or bank of capacitors) just to capture brake regen and provide peak acceleration.

The techs here already just people are distracted by the big battery salesmen and picking up on the few cons to see through it to the all the pros of the bigger picture.