Any GTAM'ers own an electric vehicle?
- Thread starter PrivatePilot
- Start date
I doubt they'll be down to my target dollar value by then, and I'm not sure I can justify a bunch of extra money for the extra 19 Kilometers of electric range, honestly.
I talked to my wife more about things today and there's a very good chance that she will be able to get a plug at work - the maintenance facility for her employer is a part of the main head office she works in...so with a little bit of conversation with the right people & I'm reasonably confident now that she could even get access to 220, so level 2 charging is likely a reality. At the very least, 110v should be easy to achieve, so even with only a 40-50% charge (based on an 8 hour work day) it still gets her half way home without using a drop of gas.
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I don't think the trend is necessarily to do anything with EV's .... MT is slowly going doesn't matter whether you or I like it (the sales and fuel economy guidelines determines that). Look at the ICE cars MY 2017 you can buy today with MT in Canada ... not many. Until a month ago, all my car purchases were MT. But I needed to replace my Golf TDI MT and the cars I was considering are only available in AT. So here I am with first AT I actually paid for. Honestly like AT now more from Mon-Fri during commuting. For weekends there's always sport mode ....
... And if that doesn't suffice, there's a second car in the garage with MT my wife still drives.
I don't think the trend is necessarily to do anything with EV's .... MT is slowly going doesn't matter whether you or I like it (the sales and fuel economy guidelines determines that). Look at the ICE cars MY 2017 you can buy today with MT in Canada ... not many. Until a month ago, all my car purchases were MT. But I needed to replace my Golf TDI MT and the cars I was considering are only available in AT. So here I am with first AT I actually paid for. Honestly like AT now more from Mon-Fri during commuting. For weekends there's always sport mode ....
VW seems to be one of the last brands with a substantial MT takeup. Subaru is probably second. Try selling a used MT Mazda 3 and it is hard, selling a MT VW is easy.
I thought so too originally based on the perceived conception of most of the parking lot style chargers you see at malls etc, but many of the consumer level versions are really basically very similar to the stage one plug-in chargers with the exception of a different plug on the end , typically the style with the one prong sideways to differentiate then from a standard 110v plug.
Yes there are lots of hardwired versions as well, however the portable ones are readily available – they are even on Amazon.ca.
In the end, any plug that carries 220 can be utilized with a home made adapter in order to use one of the portable stage 2 chargers, so for example if the shop at my wife's work has a welder, dryer, or stove/oven plug somewhere, with an adapter I can make for $30 or $40 myself...boom, level 2 charger.
As I mentioned way earlier in this thread people figured out how to rejig some of the original 110V Volt chargers to work as a 220v stage 2 as well, so with some wiring to the breaker panel to get 220 to my garage...stage 2 at home as well.
The thing to keep in mind is that (on the Volt at least, pretty sure all EV's are the same), the charger hardware it's self is actually built into the car – the cord is basically just a glorified extension cord with some diagnostic and protection circuitry in the black-box part.
True about VW ... but their 4% or so market share in NA makes them close to irrelevant.
Couldn't tell you honestly, hadn't really thought about it until now – if I was an underwriter though I might consider them somewhat lower risk as people who own EVs and hybrids tend to be amongst those who drive very conservatively in an effort of achieving maximum efficiency. But of course we all know there's not a lot of rhyme or reason to insurance rates sometime, so I have a sneaky suspicion it's still based on overall risk, drivers record, and vehicle value more than anything - same as any other vehicle.
It it would be interesting to find out. Maybe someone could invite some or our resident agents to the thread.
-D-
Banned
I am not getting the math for this savings.
I get it if you use a Volt for some sort of business (delivery business or UBER) where as you are on the road non stop.
But for personal use, you can buy a car that does the job with decent fuel economy and save $10k off the top.
By the time you burn $10k in fuel both cars would be worthless.
What is the depreciation on the Volts?
I get it if you use a Volt for some sort of business (delivery business or UBER) where as you are on the road non stop.
But for personal use, you can buy a car that does the job with decent fuel economy and save $10k off the top.
By the time you burn $10k in fuel both cars would be worthless.
What is the depreciation on the Volts?
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I can see some high smog areas banning emissions from vehicles out right
I did the math on both of these earlier in the thread, and in the used market it's pretty clear cut. Comparing a same year Volt and Honda Civic (ie, a vehicle with "decent fuel economy" the Volt costs about $1000-$2500 more depending on options, based on listings on trader.ca.
That amount can be saved inside the first year of ownership on the Volt, and you continue to save on every Kilometer driven. So, depreciation is very similar in the end but the benefits are much better.
The math is different in the new market, but a new Volt can be had for only about $5000 more (maybe up to around $7000 if you load it up) after the rebates. Again, the math I did for someone running similiar miles to my wife and able to charge at work as well (and run home on electric) makes the break even point (based on savings) in a little over a year, potentially less if you do a lot local weekend running around solely on electric as well. And once again, every year of ownership beyond that there's a very significant savings enjoyed with every kilometer.
Go back and look through my earlier posts with the calculations if you want to see exactly how big those savings can be, but as it's looking like it might shape up for my wife being able to make almost her entire commute on electricity alone - we are talking 150 Kilometers return for a little over $1 total vs the current $16 or so in gas.
$15 in savings. Every. Single. Day....on just her commute. That's not hard math to understand with a not particularly higher cost of ownership.
blackcamaro
Well-known member
A similar year, mileage and options Civic is significantly less then a Volt, not $1000-2500. I still think its hard to beat civic/accord or corolla/Camry in terms of cost of purchase, depreciation, running costs etc.
Not that is happens a lot but, how do you think a EV would perform in a traffic jam? Unscheduled, road closed due to a truck roll over or something during night, rain or ice rain?
That is where my range anxiety would set in.
I'd love a cheap mode of transportation and embrace advancement in technology.
As it stands, I'm on the road a little too much and require a range of 200 to 400 kms or some quick charge stations splattered across SW Ontario GTA etc. I could do some emails etc while waiting to charge if needed.
Get the price point into the $25k to $30k with a range I need and I'm all in.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
That is where my range anxiety would set in.
I'd love a cheap mode of transportation and embrace advancement in technology.
As it stands, I'm on the road a little too much and require a range of 200 to 400 kms or some quick charge stations splattered across SW Ontario GTA etc. I could do some emails etc while waiting to charge if needed.
Get the price point into the $25k to $30k with a range I need and I'm all in.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Not based on my searching on trader.ca it isn't.
For example, the 2012 Volt I was looking at had about 75,000K on it, was reasonably loaded (short of heated seats, something we would want) and was priced at $16900.
Looking at trader.ca a similar equipped & mileage 2012 Civic is in the $15,000 to $16,000 range. To get cheaper than that in the same model year you are looking at base models, or significantly more mileage.
Depreciation, again, based on the above facts, about the same. Cost of purchase, again, see the details in my last reply above.
As for your statement about running costs it's well known EV's that spend most of their time in EV mode have significantly lower cost of maintenance. An oil change might only be needed once a year, for example, brake pads & rotors last virtually forever due to regenerative vs friction braking, drivetrain is low or zero maintenance, etc.
This is why I'm focused on the Volt - no range anxiety. As for efficiency (from the EV mode perspective) in stop and go traffic I would guess there's certainly a penalty to some extent simply because it takes more energy to get a vehicle moving again from a stop vs one that remains in motion, but with regenerative braking some of the otherwise lost energy is recouped and time sitting still is basically zero consumption short of HVAC usage.
EVs use significantly less energy when stuck in traffic compared to a normal gasoline engine vehicle as long as you can keep the HVAC demand low.
The Volt will have the gasoline engine shut down in those situations. All the time you are stopped, it's using nothing.
Really? Care to elaborate? NOx emissions (the smog forming one) from a modern vehicle are extremely low, outside of Diesels. Maybe we can ban industry lol
http://urbanaccessregulations.eu/overview-of-lezs
Low emission zones have already started in Europe with plans to ban ice cars with in 10-15 years. It's a matter of time.
Europe is much different in many things. As such it's not a very useful data point to be measured up against. First of, most Euro cities have a meaningful public transit (we do not). Part of it is their density when compared to ours. Secondly, the uptake of diesel cars vs. gasoline cars were up to VW dieselgate 70/30% (we do not have that .... we are more like 5/95% when you consider passenger cars and light trucks ... I am estimating here, since it's hard to find the meaningless number).
So we can talk all we want how cool it is in Norway, that they will ban ICE cars in 10 years and that 40% of their vehicles sold today are EV's, but that is not a feasible path for Toronto, Ontario or Canada. Also, countries like Norway, have no auto industry, so there's no jobs at stake as they import all of their cars and don't manufacture much to support such important industry to us.
Anyway ... I digress from PP's thread.
So we can talk all we want how cool it is in Norway, that they will ban ICE cars in 10 years and that 40% of their vehicles sold today are EV's, but that is not a feasible path for Toronto, Ontario or Canada. Also, countries like Norway, have no auto industry, so there's no jobs at stake as they import all of their cars and don't manufacture much to support such important industry to us.
Anyway ... I digress from PP's thread.
Unless, you crank up the heat ... which he might be referring to since he mentioned ice rain and pro-longed stop. The car would also start conditioning the battery at some point, right?
