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[Field Marshal Dr. Opti]

I'd like to pick their brains.

But the only one I can think of is Jimmy. If memory serves I think he bought an electric BMW that fell from the ugly tree and hit every branch on the way down.

[Sir Tigger KC]

I sense the Lord Opti EV window is shifting. 

[Field Marshal Dr. Opti]

I sense the Lord Opti EV window is shifting. 

Not my car. I just have to tolerate it.

All cars should be petrol by order of the big man who lives in the sky.

[Viral_Jim]

Yes, I am the proud lessee of Munich's most aesthetically challenged motor. Previously I've had an e-golf and an id3. Probably around 70k miles combined over the three cars.

What would you like to know?


As for other forum ev users, I seem to recall that DTM bloke ran an i-pace for a period of time, and is probably intimately acquainted with its internals through work. 

[Sir Tigger KC]

I wonder how long it will be before you trade your BMW for something like an electric Porsche with warp speed like acceleration? 

[GastronomicKleptomaniac]

Had a new shape Leaf as a bifffabout car at work. Hated it. Felt like it had been designed by a team of people who didn't like cars, driving  or each other 

[Field Marshal Dr. Opti]

Yes, I am the proud lessee of Munich's most aesthetically challenged motor. Previously I've had an e-golf and an id3. Probably around 70k miles combined over the three cars.

What would you like to know?


As for other forum ev users, I seem to recall that DTM bloke ran an i-pace for a period of time, and is probably intimately acquainted with its internals through work. 

Well, I know next to SFA about milk floats, Jimmy. Something I share in common with many other topics. 

I've just discovered the car comes with a heat pump (something I hear doesn't work very well even in our home homes, yet the government, and mad Ed Milliband in particular, wants us all to install one) How does this work in the context of a car.

Also, it comes with an onboard 11KW charger for use when away from home. What is the point of this when even 50KW charging is seen as glacial in 2025.

[Field Marshal Dr. Opti]

I wonder how long it will be before you trade your BMW for something like an electric Porsche with warp speed like acceleration? 

I have to admit that the new 1000BHP Taycan has a certain appeal. Apparently it drives like a proper car.

[Field Marshal Dr. Opti]

Had a new shape Leaf as a bifffabout car at work. Hated it. Felt like it had been designed by a team of people who didn't like cars, driving  or each other

Yep.....a car designed by people who have no interest in cars for people who have no interest in cars.

Committee car.

[Sir Tigger KC]

I wonder how long it will be before you trade your BMW for something like an electric Porsche with warp speed like acceleration? 

I have to admit that the new 1000BHP Taycan has a certain appeal. Apparently it drives like a proper car.

I followed and electric Porsche once on a duel carriageway and when he accelerated off a roundabout up a steep hill, he must have been doing 60 or 70 by the time I got into second!   

Never seen anything like it, I was just like Wow! Look at that thing go! 

[Migv6 le Frog Fan]

If you join up to the Autoshite forum, there are lots of threads, discussion, info about them in the modern section there.
Theres even a bloke who buys them up and sells them on.
If my little C1 gives up the ghost in the next two or three years I may well buy a cheap used one to take advantage of the free charging at work.

[LC0112G]

I've just discovered the car comes with a heat pump (something I hear doesn't work very well even in our home homes, yet the government, and mad Ed Milliband in particular, wants us all to install one) How does this work in the context of a car.

A heat pump is just an inside out fridge.

If you look at the back of your fridge/freezer, you'll see a black radiator. That black radiator gets hot. The inside of the fridge/freezer gets cold. The whole thing runs on electricity. 

So in thermodynamic terms what happens is you put in (say) 1 watt of energy to the fridge motor. That 1W of motor energy ultimatley ends up as heat somewhere. However, the motor is pumping a gas around the system, which extracts energy from the inside of the fridge (it gets colder) and dumps that energy into the back radiator (it gets hotter). So say it extracts one watt of energy from the inside of the fridge, and dumps that 1w into the radiator.

We now have a system where putting 1W of electrical energy in results in 1W of cooling, and 2W of heat (1W in the motor, 1W in the radiator). So we are 'making' more heat that the energy we are putting in. We are 'pumping heat' out of the fridge into the atmosphere.  The figure of merit is called COP (Coefficient of Performance) An electric heater has a COP of 1. You put 1W of electricity in, you'll get (almost) 1W of heat out. With a heat pump you can get COPs of 3 or more. Put in 1W of electrical energy and you can get 3W (or more) of heat out.

So now mount the fridge in your wall, with the door open to the outside world, and the radiator part inside your house. Turn it on. You will be pumping heat from the outside world into your home. You won't be able to cool the outside world, so the 'inside' of the fridge won't get noticibly colder.

There are also semi-conductor based heat pump devices - called Peltiers. Here is a datasheet for one https://tark-solutions.com/products/thermoelectric-cooler-modules/peltier-cp-series/CP2-127-06-L1-W4.5 . These don't need a pump, plumbing and gas. They are totally solid state with no moving parts, and you can get COP's in the 3-4 region. What happens is when you apply power, one side of the device gets cold, and the other side gets hot. The hot side gets hotter than the cold side gets cold, because you're 'pumping' energy (heat) from one side to the other.

Peltiers are reversible. If you swap the power the other way round, then the 'hot side' gets cold, and the 'cold side' gets hot. You can therefore put one side of peltier inside the heater (HVAC box), and use it to either heat or cool the air entering the cabin.

[ronnyd]

I've just discovered the car comes with a heat pump (something I hear doesn't work very well even in our home homes, yet the government, and mad Ed Milliband in particular, wants us all to install one) How does this work in the context of a car.

A heat pump is just an inside out fridge.

If you look at the back of your fridge/freezer, you'll see a black radiator. That black radiator gets hot. The inside of the fridge/freezer gets cold. The whole thing runs on electricity. 

So in thermodynamic terms what happens is you put in (say) 1 watt of energy to the fridge motor. That 1W of motor energy ultimatley ends up as heat somewhere. However, the motor is pumping a gas around the system, which extracts energy from the inside of the fridge (it gets colder) and dumps that energy into the back radiator (it gets hotter). So say it extracts one watt of energy from the inside of the fridge, and dumps that 1w into the radiator.

We now have a system where putting 1W of electrical energy in results in 1W of cooling, and 2W of heat (1W in the motor, 1W in the radiator). So we are 'making' more heat that the energy we are putting in. We are 'pumping heat' out of the fridge into the atmosphere.  The figure of merit is called COP (Coefficient of Performance) An electric heater has a COP of 1. You put 1W of electricity in, you'll get (almost) 1W of heat out. With a heat pump you can get COPs of 3 or more. Put in 1W of electrical energy and you can get 3W (or more) of heat out.

So now mount the fridge in your wall, with the door open to the outside world, and the radiator part inside your house. Turn it on. You will be pumping heat from the outside world into your home. You won't be able to cool the outside world, so the 'inside' of the fridge won't get noticibly colder.

There are also semi-conductor based heat pump devices - called Peltiers. Here is a datasheet for one https://tark-solutions.com/products/thermoelectric-cooler-modules/peltier-cp-series/CP2-127-06-L1-W4.5 . These don't need a pump, plumbing and gas. They are totally solid state with no moving parts, and you can get COP's in the 3-4 region. What happens is when you apply power, one side of the device gets cold, and the other side gets hot. The hot side gets hotter than the cold side gets cold, because you're 'pumping' energy (heat) from one side to the other.

Peltiers are reversible. If you swap the power the other way round, then the 'hot side' gets cold, and the 'cold side' gets hot. You can therefore put one side of peltier inside the heater (HVAC box), and use it to either heat or cool the air entering the cabin.

Que?  Joking aside, that is very informative. 

[TheBoy]

There are also semi-conductor based heat pump devices - called Peltiers. Here is a datasheet for one https://tark-solutions.com/products/thermoelectric-cooler-modules/peltier-cp-series/CP2-127-06-L1-W4.5 . These don't need a pump, plumbing and gas. They are totally solid state with no moving parts, and you can get COP's in the 3-4 region. What happens is when you apply power, one side of the device gets cold, and the other side gets hot. The hot side gets hotter than the cold side gets cold, because you're 'pumping' energy (heat) from one side to the other.

Peltiers are reversible. If you swap the power the other way round, then the 'hot side' gets cold, and the 'cold side' gets hot. You can therefore put one side of peltier inside the heater (HVAC box), and use it to either heat or cool the air entering the cabin.

And thats how heated and cooled seats work if you have a posh car, or clapped out 2010 Jaguar....

[Viral_Jim]

Well, I know next to SFA about milk floats, Jimmy. Something I share in common with many other topics. 

I've just discovered the car comes with a heat pump (something I hear doesn't work very well even in our home homes, yet the government, and mad Ed Milliband in particular, wants us all to install one) How does this work in the context of a car.

Also, it comes with an onboard 11KW charger for use when away from home. What is the point of this when even 50KW charging is seen as glacial in 2025.

To add to what LC0112G said regarding heat pumps, their purpose on an ev is to extend the range during cold weather. This can add as much as 10% to the range and work well in the UK where we don't often get *really* cold weather. Its something I would look for if I were to be looking to push the range  of the car on a regular basis. If its just a second car for knocking about in, I wouldn't worry about it.

In general, I would say regarding range, look up on the 'net what people are getting in the real world and use that as your guide. I'm sure I will get derided on here for saying it, but battery degradation really isn't the issue that most non-ev drivers would have you believe. As an example, I follow a guy on youtube that runs Cleeveley EV - they are an independent EV servicing company that run a fleet of converted MG5 estate cars as their 'vans. The degradation on those seems to be about 10-12% at 100,000 miles and about 18-20% at 200,000. Considering the average mileage of a scrapped car in the UK is around 125,000 its not that big a deal. Also, as more EVs hit the road, the used packs become cheaper to buy. The exception to this general comment is nissan leafs, they don't have any facility to actively manage the temperature of the battery packs, so their battery degradation can be significantly more severe.

To answer your point about the 11kw charger, this is actually how much power the AC-to-DC inverter can handle. 11kw is only any use if you have access to a 3 phase supply, otherwise the max is 7kw. Where these make a lot of sense is workplace car parks, for example here we have some 7kw and some 11kw charging posts and the difference is noticeable. We get told to shift our cars after 3hrs in the charge bays to let other people charge so the higher power rating makes a big difference then.

Being honest its extremely rare I use public DC rapid charging, probably two or three times in the last 11 months / 23,000 miles. When I do I find taht anything over 100kw is fast enough. Starting out with about 200-220 miles on the BMW, taking 15-20mins will add 100 ish miles and its rare I would want to do more than 300 miles in a day. Again if its your only car this may not hold true, but given the average mileage driven in the UK is about 8000 per year, it would certainly apply to most people.

Overall I like EVs very much for daily commuting. The BMW is good for overtaking and quick enough for a family bus. It isn't "fun", but neither is any SUV, short of a RR sport SVR, its not designed to be.

Tried it before I signed up for the BMW (although mine would have been the boggo 400bhp version) but my ar$e didn't fit in the seats, so it was a non starter. If I had my own and could throw some VW golf seats in, I might be tempted  .
I wonder how long it will be before you trade your BMW for something like an electric Porsche with warp speed like acceleration? 

I'm also now divorced and really don't want to work past my mid 50's so I suspect I might end up with something a bit more modest as my next car (iPace looks tempting, but I'd want to chat to that DTM bloke first as I know they had some battery issues).