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With all this stuff in the news (and affecting Tesla's stock prices) about the Tesla owner who ran over some metallic debris that punctured his battery, shorted it, and made it catch fire, I sure am glad I drive a gasoline-fueled car that cannot catch on fire.
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Oct 3, 2013 19:26
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grover posted:Someone with a commute like that probably drives, what, about 5000 miles per year?  Well, 45 miles a day times 5 days a week times 50 work weeks a year is actually closer to 11000 miles (getting pretty close to the average american yearly total). Divide that by 45 mpg for a Prius doing urban driving (50 is tough.. i own one) and multiply that by the price of a gallon of gas and you're closer to $900/yr in gas price. But that's the price for SLOW driving. I was talking about hoonage. A prius being hooned all over the place is going to get low-mid 30s at best. Then you're talking about $1100+/yr in fuel. But it's still not really comparable because a Prius is nowhere near as quick at <50mph speeds (again, i own one) as a Leaf which is kinda the point of my whole statement. And, assuming you have to fully charge the leaf from bottom to top every single work day, at my local rates that would be ~700/yr vs 1100 for a much less entertaining prius. Obviously there are lots of assumptions (within a pretty narrow range) to come up with the numbers in these calculations but im pretty confident the real numbers would work towards my point and not against it. Of course, i dont want to clog up the thread with too much math talk if it's going to hurt Thwomp's feelings. Nobody likes talking about car numbers when we could be talking about subjectives. That's the reason nobody that's cool knows how much HP a ZR1 or Civic SI or Focus ST has or how much they weigh or any such immodest concerns. We've got to leave SOMETHING to the imagination! Actually, i totally agree with his point that you can't discount the amorphous value of non-dollar concerns. I just don't have a problem talking about numbers as long as they're not the end-all. That's kind of why i made a post about the Leaf based on 'fun to drive' factor vs pure optimization of commute efficiency. Vigo327 fucked around with this message at 00:04 on Oct 4, 2013 |
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Oct 3, 2013 23:55
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atomicthumbs posted:With all this stuff in the news (and affecting Tesla's stock prices) about the Tesla owner who ran over some metallic debris that punctured his battery, shorted it, and made it catch fire, I sure am glad I drive a gasoline-fueled car that cannot catch on fire. Gotta drive a nice, high quality safe gas burner, like a Pinto.  In similar news, solar panels also want to kill you. Now that global warming is completely 100% fake, lets all go back to paying ridiculous prices to destroy the environment.
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Oct 4, 2013 01:05
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atomicthumbs posted:With all this stuff in the news (and affecting Tesla's stock prices) about the Tesla owner who ran over some metallic debris that punctured his battery, shorted it, and made it catch fire, I sure am glad I drive a gasoline-fueled car that cannot catch on fire. Reminds me of that company that did to crash test on the Chevy Volt, then left the battery sitting without coolant for a month and surprise it caught fire.
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Oct 4, 2013 01:20
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Sretsah posted:Reminds me of that company that did to crash test on the Chevy Volt, then left the battery sitting without coolant for a month and surprise it caught fire. Actually i would still consider that surprising. I would guess something like 90% of the time, you could poke holes in the battery, drain the coolant out of it, leave it under your child's bed for TWO months and not have a fire. You may have a hazmat situation under your child's bed, sure, but probably not a fire.
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Oct 4, 2013 17:03
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The Electric Mayhem and I made it from Paine Field to Bellingham on one charge  I'm now sitting on the ferry, which will take two-and-a-half days to get back to Juneau. Time to catch up on some reading. Pretty much everybody who I talked with asked how on Earth I was getting an electric car back to Alaska. I really think the ferry needs to start calling in downtown Seattle again just for advertising.
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Oct 5, 2013 01:43
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Advent Horizon posted:The Electric Mayhem and I made it from Paine Field to Bellingham on one charge Hot drat, that is some pretty good distance. Did you drive it in Eco mode? Stick to the speed limit? I still can't shake my paranoia of running out of juice somewhere, so I never putter father than 40 mile in a charge, but that's not bad with freeway driving.
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Oct 5, 2013 02:10
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I've been driving it in Eco and B modes because I like the linear acceleration/regen feel and it makes putting it into normal like a sport mode when I want it. I'm coming from a 4 cylinder pickup so it's still more than quick enough in normal driving for me. I got in behind some trucks and set the cruise control, that kept me moving with traffic and I didn't have to try to keep up with the car traffic (truck speed limit is 60 vs 70 for everyone else). I figured I'd see where I was at when I passed the quick charger in Burlington and the GOM showed 10 spare miles so I went for it. We had 13 miles showing when I pulled in to the quick charger in Bellingham. Speaking of, there's a pretty decent Thai place at the Bellingham charger. When we were done and went inside another new Leaf owner pulled up and ended up eating there, too. Seems like that charger just might be good for business...
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Oct 5, 2013 02:52
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Advent Horizon posted:
I stop at that thai place when im at REI. I agree its good. I haven't seen any cars charging there yet, but maybe there are more on the road now. I see a bunch of model s's driving around near the boarder.
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Oct 5, 2013 20:28
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Vigo327 posted:Actually i would still consider that surprising. I would guess something like 90% of the time, you could poke holes in the battery, drain the coolant out of it, leave it under your child's bed for TWO months and not have a fire. You may have a hazmat situation under your child's bed, sure, but probably not a fire. It was left outside in the junkyard. Turns out crash damaged battery poo poo don't like getting rained on constantly.
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Oct 5, 2013 20:34
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doritos posted:It was left outside in the junkyard. Turns out crash damaged battery poo poo don't like getting rained on constantly. I think we should also throw in that a Volt battery doesnt exactly get rained on unless you leave the car UPSIDE DOWN in a junkyard, which that one was. You have to hit a lot of pretty ridiculous 'ifs' before you have a high probability of a fire.
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Oct 6, 2013 00:24
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Random bonus of taking an EV on a ferry: after two-and-a-half days at sea, when everybody's car is cold, you're not allowed to start your engine until it's your turn to exit. I'll be sitting pretty with the heater going, thankyouverymuch 
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Oct 6, 2013 23:51
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Have to love that. It's silly, but I love the tiny little things like that. There's a sign posted outside the Chamber of Commerce near where I work that says "No Car Idling - Cut Down on Bad Air" or something silly. I deliberately have parked in front of it three times in the last week and just laughed. It's pointless, it's silly, but I love it.
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Oct 8, 2013 03:39
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Anyone have a Clipper Creek EVSE? It's time to get an EVSE and that thing seems to be highly recommended and simple (I like simple). The only thing that gives me pause is that they appear to only do UPS, and 'ground' to me would be $150 for an LCS-25.
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Oct 8, 2013 06:15
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Clipper Creek makes good stuff.
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Oct 8, 2013 11:49
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Tyro posted:Clipper Creek makes good stuff. Yep, no problems from mine. They have a long, good reputation in the EV world and recently extended all warranties to 3 years (retroactive).
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Oct 8, 2013 11:53
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Make sure you are buying from them, there are a lot of "stolen" clipper creeks around. Someone ran a massive credit card fraud on their Canadian distributor.
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Oct 8, 2013 15:32
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I contacted them and they will ship USPS if you ask nicely. $40 for 3-day shipping via USPS vs $150 for 5-day shipping with UPS. I'll probably order it when I get off work tonight.
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Oct 8, 2013 22:20
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Holy poo poo, I almost can't believe this, The Cadillac ELR, (which was originally the beautiful Converj concept) literally a 2 door Chevy Volt with a nicer interior, is going to start at a pathologically insane $75,995. No drivetrain changes, still ~35 mile electric range. Early reports said it would be no more than $50-55K. Are the banking on people who just won't want to go through the hassle of buying a Model S, especially in somewhere like Texas where they can't directly sell them? I can't fathom a reason to buy this car at all, poo poo you could almost buy two volts. http://green.autoblog.com/2013/10/11/2014-cadillac-elr-priced-from-75-000/
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Oct 11, 2013 19:51
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Voltage posted:Holy poo poo, I almost can't believe this, The Cadillac ELR, (which was originally the beautiful Converj concept) literally a 2 door Chevy Volt with a nicer interior, is going to start at a pathologically insane $75,995. No drivetrain changes, still ~35 mile electric range. Early reports said it would be no more than $50-55K. Are the banking on people who just won't want to go through the hassle of buying a Model S, especially in somewhere like Texas where they can't directly sell them? I can't fathom a reason to buy this car at all, poo poo you could almost buy two volts. Haha Has GM priced the 2014 Cadillac ELR appropriately? Yes, it's right on 282 (7.7%) Yes, it could even be more expensive 78 (2.1%) No, it's too expensive 3115 (85.6%) I'm not sure 166 (4.6%)
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Oct 11, 2013 19:54
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Well, my boss has given permission for me to charge at work. This makes everything a hell of a lot easier for me now. I have a 44 mile round trip to work and home, all of that at 55 mph highway with stoplights all along the way, really chewing up my battery. Tuesdays and Wednesdays I don't get home until 10PM with a 7AM depart time the next morning, and only have a 110 charge option at home, so I don't get back up to 80% charge the next day and coast in on (electric) fumes. Now that it's getting colder, I'm having to use the heater and that's probably going to make it impossible to actually drive to work on Wednesday/Thursday. If I can plug in at work, even on 110, that's a savior. Now I just have to figure out how to rig up my house so I can take my charger with, but I think I can just run the extension cord out my garage door and buy a waterproof caddy of some type. I'd really rather upgrade to 220, but my dryer and outlet are inside the house, and I'd have to run a cable across the kitchen and through two doors, plus rig up some sort of switch on the outlet itself. I'm hoping to buy a house next year so it's just not worth the hassle right now. Rigging up 220 would make my life a dream, though. First World Problems.
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Oct 11, 2013 21:50
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Mortanis posted:Well, my boss has given permission for me to charge at work. This makes everything a hell of a lot easier for me now. I have a 44 mile round trip to work and home, all of that at 55 mph highway with stoplights all along the way, really chewing up my battery. Tuesdays and Wednesdays I don't get home until 10PM with a 7AM depart time the next morning, and only have a 110 charge option at home, so I don't get back up to 80% charge the next day and coast in on (electric) fumes. Now that it's getting colder, I'm having to use the heater and that's probably going to make it impossible to actually drive to work on Wednesday/Thursday. If I can plug in at work, even on 110, that's a savior. If your main breaker box, or even better, your meter and box, are in your garage, running a dedicated 30a 220v circuit for a charger is child's play. I considered doing it in a rental property, due to the ridiculous proximity of both the main box and the meter to my charging location.
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Oct 11, 2013 22:24
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Squibbles posted:Haha In my opinion, 60k with all the options was the sweet spot. I think GM hit it out of the park on the car and blew it on the price.
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Oct 11, 2013 22:37
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Mortanis posted:Well, my boss has given permission for me to charge at work. Lucky. My company gave 'permission' but due to the paranoia over tripping over cables / the logistics and tax credits around installing actual EV charge infrastructure and parking spots, they gave a token / impossibly small budget to complete the task. If I could charge at work I'd probably be closing in on six months with a Leaf by now.
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Oct 11, 2013 22:37
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Voltage posted:Holy poo poo, I almost can't believe this, The Cadillac ELR, (which was originally the beautiful Converj concept) literally a 2 door Chevy Volt with a nicer interior, is going to start at a pathologically insane $75,995. No drivetrain changes, still ~35 mile electric range. Early reports said it would be no more than $50-55K. Are the banking on people who just won't want to go through the hassle of buying a Model S, especially in somewhere like Texas where they can't directly sell them? I can't fathom a reason to buy this car at all, poo poo you could almost buy two volts. One word: Escalade.
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Oct 11, 2013 23:12
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Voltage posted:Holy poo poo, I almost can't believe this, The Cadillac ELR, (which was originally the beautiful Converj concept) literally a 2 door Chevy Volt with a nicer interior, is going to start at a pathologically insane $75,995. No drivetrain changes, still ~35 mile electric range. Early reports said it would be no more than $50-55K. Are the banking on people who just won't want to go through the hassle of buying a Model S, especially in somewhere like Texas where they can't directly sell them? I can't fathom a reason to buy this car at all, poo poo you could almost buy two volts. Well, this is going to make me need to buy a house for real. Can't wait to see them parked in my building's charge point for 8 hours a day every day while my S has nowhere else to charge. I'd be more sympathetic if they didn't have a petrol engine, but they do.
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Oct 11, 2013 23:21
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Mortanis posted:I'd really rather upgrade to 220, but my dryer and outlet are inside the house, and I'd have to run a cable across the kitchen and through two doors, plus rig up some sort of switch on the outlet itself. I'm hoping to buy a house next year so it's just not worth the hassle right now. Rigging up 220 would make my life a dream, though. Clearly you need one of these: http://www.ebay.com/itm/40-000-Watt-DIESEL-GENERATOR-SET-COMPLETE-/271294267230?_trksid=p2054897.l4275 IOwnCalculus posted:Lucky. My company gave 'permission' but due to the paranoia over tripping over cables / the logistics and tax credits around installing actual EV charge infrastructure and parking spots, they gave a token / impossibly small budget to complete the task. If I had an electric car I could charge it at work on 440  However, I cannot afford an electric car that I'd actually want (Tesla). As for that Cadillac, how could GM really believe that someone would pay Tesla prices for something with less performance and 1/10th the range?! This seems insane to me.
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Oct 11, 2013 23:23
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IOwnCalculus posted:Lucky. My company gave 'permission' but due to the paranoia over tripping over cables / the logistics and tax credits around installing actual EV charge infrastructure and parking spots, they gave a token / impossibly small budget to complete the task. There's similar worry with my charging, but the only spot with 110 access is a little alcove where we park our trash bins. I have to roll them out of the way to pull in and get to the outlet, so there's little worry about anyone stumbling over my cord, save for the smokers who have a tendency to congregate there. MrYenko posted:If your main breaker box, or even better, your meter and box, are in your garage, running a dedicated 30a 220v circuit for a charger is child's play. I considered doing it in a rental property, due to the ridiculous proximity of both the main box and the meter to my charging location. My main breaker box is in the garage, but I know nothing about doing such things and no one I know is electrically inclined unfortunately. My landlords are absurdly old fascists regarding anything and everything, so if it's not the sort of thing I could quickly undo when they weren't looking, I'm not sure if I could get away with it. I'm fairly certain there's an unused 30 amp breaker, but actually wiring and running an outlet would probably be more than my landlords would like.
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Oct 11, 2013 23:42
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Disgruntled Bovine posted:If I had an electric car I could charge it at work on 440 Real men plug their Leaves straight into 12KV three-phase.  It's no matter of "is there power available", I think they literally approved something stupid like $50 for it which wouldn't even cover the wiring. And given the choice across the board of EVs, the Leaf is about third-to-last on my list, but it's the only one available in AZ with a proper lease program that makes the lease payment roughly equal my gas bills, and isn't a Smart or iQ. Hell, I'm not even sure if the latter two are available in AZ either. I'd take a Tesla in a heartbeat, but no amount of handwaving can come up with the actual cashflow needed for me to make that payment. The Fiat 500 EV would be good as well but it's coastal-only for now. For all of these places where people are running out of charge outlets... does nobody make an L2 (or even L1) EVSE that can take multiple cars and charge the second one when the first is done? Seems like you could have more cars present and at least partially charging if the limiting factor is how much power you want to run to your parking lot.
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Oct 11, 2013 23:42
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No, and that's something I've seen mentioned multiple times on the MyNissanLeaf forums. It seems like a stupid-simple idea, too. What about just plugging in to 120v at work and doing an L2 charge at home? Do you really need to add more than 25 miles of range during the day to get home? If I had thought in advance, I would have ordered up an EVSE upgrade for my Leaf before picking it up. Recharging on 120-only sucks, and I have a welding outlet I could use in the shop until getting the LCS-25 installed. I did 60 highway miles on less than 80% charge in the cold and rain the other day - I really don't suggest anyone else try that ever. Especially since I have yet to get back up to 80% (not helped by the wife taking it to her study group last night and forgetting to plug in again when she got home...).
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Oct 12, 2013 01:53
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Mortanis posted:My main breaker box is in the garage, but I know nothing about doing such things and no one I know is electrically inclined unfortunately. My landlords are absurdly old fascists regarding anything and everything, so if it's not the sort of thing I could quickly undo when they weren't looking, I'm not sure if I could get away with it. I'm fairly certain there's an unused 30 amp breaker, but actually wiring and running an outlet would probably be more than my landlords would like. For the gain from having it verses the slight risk of getting caught, I'd have to get it installed. I bet you could find an electrician who understands your position and, if possible to do it, install it in such a way that it's not noticeable. And if ya get caught, just claim the 240v line was there when you moved in, well dang the last tenant must have done it.
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Oct 12, 2013 03:20
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If you have two outlets in your garage on different legs of the breaker box you have 220 in your garage. I would just have an electrician put in a 220 outlet for $200. You would still need a evse or get your 110 one upgraded.
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Oct 12, 2013 06:47
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IOwnCalculus posted:It's no matter of "is there power available", I think they literally approved something stupid like $50 for it which wouldn't even cover the wiring. Given my daily commute (52m 1-way) I'd need a reserved spot that was guaranteed to be open for me at work. The crazy thing is, that they'd probably do it, because they are on a big kick about trip reduction, but it's a cart before the horse thing. I need to have an electric before corporate will pay to have it installed, and I can't drive to work without it, so no reason to buy one unless the charging station exists. Sadly, they won't buy me a Tesla that might actually be able to make my round trip commute. So instead, I convinced my boss that I should be on a pilot program to work from home for two or three days each week, starting sometime in the next few weeks. I think I like this solution better all the way around.  Now to order a couple new monitors to make the home nerd-station awesome for sitting at all day.
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Oct 12, 2013 07:30
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Is getting a Leaf a bad idea if your home charger can only be Level 1? Like so many other folks, running 220 out to the garage is a non-starter in my rental. My average commute is stupidly short (like 10mi round trip) and leaving it plugged in for 8hrs+ is no big deal. Also, pricing-wise: in Colorado we can get a 199/mo lease on an S with 2k due at signing. This is drat tempting since we have a Corolla as well for longer trips and now the car essentially costs what a nicer Civic would. Bad idea? This is actually a cheaper lease than a base model Prius in my area. Radbot fucked around with this message at 15:23 on Oct 12, 2013 |
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Oct 12, 2013 14:31
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Radbot posted:Is getting a Leaf a bad idea if your home charger can only be Level 1? Like so many other folks, running 220 out to the garage is a non-starter in my rental. My average commute is stupidly short (like 10mi round trip) and leaving it plugged in for 8hrs+ is no big deal. That's my exact situation and it's worked fine.
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Oct 12, 2013 15:02
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duz posted:That's my exact situation and it's worked fine. Cool, good to know. I found out Colorado is still offering tax credits amounting to ~$5,800 on the Leaf SV and ~$5,100 on the Leaf S for purchasers, and around ~$1,200 for lessees. $31,820-($7500 federal credit+$5,800 Colorado credit)=$18,520 - that's a drat tempting price for a nicely equipped model with the CARWINGS system. I can't justify paying MORE for an electric car, but paying the same as I would for a Corolla or Civic that isn't anywhere near as well equipped might work. Plus, at that price, even if I sell the thing for like $9k in a few years it's still not a bad deal.
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Oct 12, 2013 17:35
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I'm interested in a Leaf but the 70 mile range terrifies me. I'd feel so restricted. My commute is 10 miles one way so that isn't a problem, but going to the other side of the city (Indianapolis) would basically be impossible. For longer trips do you just rent a car and call it a day or is the Leaf really designed to be a second car?
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Oct 12, 2013 17:52
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Well, it'd definitely be a second car for my girlfriend and me. We like to go into the mountains every few weekends, and we make road trips to Taos, NM and Yellowstone once or twice a year. I figure we only need one car that can make those kinds of trips - our second car being electric makes sense since 98% of days that we drive, we drive fewer than 70 miles. I agree that the Leaf still isn't there yet from an only-car perspective if you are a road tripper. But it seems like the perfect second car.
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Oct 12, 2013 18:23
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Test drove a Leaf today. The amount of power it has is definitely surprising, especially once I found out how to turn off eco mode.
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Oct 12, 2013 21:24
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Elephanthead posted:If you have two outlets in your garage on different legs of the breaker box you have 220 in your garage. I would just have an electrician put in a 220 outlet for $200. You would still need a evse or get your 110 one upgraded. I have the unique position of having the most absurd wiring for my garage. There is one 110v outlet. It shares the wall with the kitchen, on the West wall. The breaker box is on the North wall, which also shares the wall with the Living Room. About a week after I got my leaf, the outlet stopped working, so I threw the breaker labeled "garage" and disassembled the outlet. Turns out you NEVER trust the labels on the breaker box without testing them first. I somehow got lucky that I didn't electrocute myself. There is no garage circuit. That single outlet that shares the wall with the kitchen is somehow sharing a circuit with my living room. Which is a feat of engineering, since that outlet as noted is nowhere near the wall that's near the living room. From a linear perspective, it's two rooms away. Which means I don't really get to have anything in my living room for fear of tripping the breaker while charging my car, but that's not really a big deal to me at the moment. Like I said, I'm planning on buying a house next year and I'll just try to find something that has a garage with 220v wired up or a breaker box right there for easy upgrade. ijustam posted:I'm interested in a Leaf but the 70 mile range terrifies me. I'd feel so restricted. My commute is 10 miles one way so that isn't a problem, but going to the other side of the city (Indianapolis) would basically be impossible. For longer trips do you just rent a car and call it a day or is the Leaf really designed to be a second car? I kept my old gas guzzler. I've driven it once in 6 months, but now that I can charge at work I doubt I'd need it unless I'm trucking the 60 miles south to Seattle. I probably could make that trip if I charged to 100% (that usually gets me 112 miles on the GuessOMeter), but I'm a worrier and I'd be paranoid I couldn't find a CHAdeMO free to get back home and be stuck charging on some 220v for 5 hours or so. It's honestly not a concern for my day to day life. I drive 44 miles every day on a highway, and that's pretty draining on my battery, and I still have 4 bars left to putter around and do my shopping on. The only reason I'm getting worried and bargained with my boss to charge at work is because the heat pump draws off the battery (not that much - about the same as Eco mode being turned off, so 6ish miles on the GuessOMeter), but two days a week I don't get home in time to charge more than 7 hours on the 110. I have no problems with my day to day commute otherwise, and I routinely make trips to the town 28 miles to the north of me and back on a single charge, all freeway driving. The Leaf isn't a road trip car, for certain, but I decided I wasn't going to purchase a car for the 1% of my travels. I head to Seattle about 3 times a year or so, which works out to less than 1% with 365 days a year. I just rolled 5000 miles since May this week, and at current gas prices and power prices, I've saved just about 400$ - and given that my old gas guzzler was at 210k miles, I'd have had to have bought a new car anyway, so the price of the lease washes out for me. You're right about power - if you don't care about batter usage, smoking people off the line at a light never gets old. I can't imagine the looks people must give me as they realize that an electric car just left them in the dust.
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Oct 13, 2013 01:00
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