Thoughts on eGolf

[FC]

A few more comments that will answer some of your questions.

Car is very cool in that it tells you the ETA to full charge - neat.

So far, drives have been very short and charging times to top off have been easily under an hour.

Yesterday morning it was sub 20F and a short round trip of 5 miles made the miles remaining go down by over 10 miles. That freaked me out.

Later that same day, when temperatures were in the mid 30's and sunny, we did a ~30-mile round trip (longest by far) and the miles remaining only went down by 25 or so. So clearly the car adjusted based on the consumption rate of the later drive.

When we got home, the car read ~37 miles remaining. I plugged it in when we got back and it said 1:55 to full charge. That was pretty accurate and the final range read 83 miles. Note that the charged range has varied from 78 to as much as 85 miles.

I'm charging during the day these first few days just so I can keep an eye on stuff before I do the overnight .

I'm very impressed with this car and how well it fits us. Again, it is very quick to 40, which is is what it will mostly do in its life. Handles pretty well and brakes (especially with regen) are very good. With regen braking on, you hardly have to hit the brakes as you approach a turn. It also teaches you to modulate the accelerator very finely, since just lifting off crates a mildly unpleasant jolt of deceleration.

Wife loves how incredibly quiet it is. I really life the Golf size, room, and high-end feel. Sound system is great.

[JST]

Originally Posted by John V

Any idea why Tesla won't allow pre-warming of the battery when the car is plugged in?

Nothing definitive. The best I can guess is that they are trying to prevent customers from heating the battery at a high state of charge and then letting it sit. Heat + full charge is the worst combo for degradation.

The battery heater does come on when you charge (and of course charging itself heats the battery), so you'd really only need a separate "warm the battery" setting when the battery is already fully charged (or nearly so). Tesla may figure the risk of having people heat the battery and then have it sit isn't worth the marginal range improvement of warming up the battery on shore power.

You can get around this (mostly) since there is a timer on the charger--just set the car to start charging at a time when it will finish right about the time you plan to leave. That's a bit of a pain, but not that tricky.

[Sharp11]

The Chevy Bolt is the first electric car I'd consider - it's got a 200 mile range, is sized right and isn't too badly priced - about 30 grand with incentives.

I like the way it looks.

Still, with the optional 240 v charger, it takes 9 hours to a full charge, and about 25 miles worth of charge per hour.

As a second car, it could work.

http://www.chevrolet.com/bolt-ev-electric-vehicle.html

However ...

The new 2016 Civic base LX comes with a 6 speed manual, and by all accounts, is a really nice automobile - and it's about 20 grand.

Paying a third more to go electric would be a tough choice.

[GimpyMcFarlan]

Based on this conversation I was thinking the eGolf would be a good replacement for my wife's Corolla. Unfortunately it is not available in Ohio yet. 😕

[Josh (PA)]

You'd think Tesla would link a weather location profile to battery heating algorithm. The car has WiFi and knows location, it wouldn't be hard to create a best practice heat profile for owner's normal use case based on local weather conditions.

Maybe JST should draft a provisional for this idea and license it back to tsla to cover his Apex charges.

[John V]

Originally Posted by Sharp11

The Chevy Bolt is the first electric car I'd consider - it's got a 200 mile range, is sized right and isn't too badly priced - about 30 grand with incentives.

I like the way it looks.

Still, with the optional 240 v charger, it takes 9 hours to a full charge, and about 25 miles worth of charge per hour.

As a second car, it could work.

http://www.chevrolet.com/bolt-ev-electric-vehicle.html

However ...

The new 2016 Civic base LX comes with a 6 speed manual, and by all accounts, is a really nice automobile - and it's about 20 grand.

Paying a third more to go electric would be a tough choice.

I'm pretty much in the same boat. I want a Bolt (as much as I can want something without having driven one). On paper it looks phenomenal, and I'm sure they'll depreciate quickly, making a one or two year old model pretty attractive.

[ZBB]

Originally Posted by Sharp11

The Chevy Bolt is the first electric car I'd consider - it's got a 200 mile range, is sized right and isn't too badly priced - about 30 grand with incentives.

I like the way it looks.

Still, with the optional 240 v charger, it takes 9 hours to a full charge, and about 25 miles worth of charge per hour.

As a second car, it could work.

http://www.chevrolet.com/bolt-ev-electric-vehicle.html

The footnote on charging indicates 240V 32A -- which is 7.2kW. The 9 hour charge time only comes into play on a road trip. For normal commuting, it's fine for charging overnight.

It appears the bolt does not have DC charging -- if so, that makes it less useful for road trips -- DC charging would cut charges down to under 90 minutes (assuming a 50kW DC charger)...

[JST]

According to this, the Bolt will have the SAE combo DC fast charge port.

http://cleantechnica.com/2016/01/08/...t-drive-video/

[FC]

Brief update:

In frigid temps as we had last weekend, range plummets. Especially when trying to warm up the car. After all, it's like warming up your car with hair dryers running on batteries. Once the interior is reasonable and heated seats are on low setting, range settles at a not great but far from frightful reading.

While on the subject, how this car (or any other EV) doesn't have a heated steering wheel is beyond me.

Also, having driven the car a lot, a few comments on performance. This is the best "automatic" car I've ever driven. I mean, I miss the manual gears, but it's hard to bitch about having instant, lag-free torque 100% of the time. It made the torque rich LR4 feel laggy and unresponsive in comparison. No surprise as the LR4 normally lugs around at 1300-1500rpm, but to get that level of response (if even possible), I'd have to have the LR4 2-3 gears lower with the rpms on boil.

[JST]

Originally Posted by FC

Brief update:

In frigid temps as we had last weekend, range plummets. Especially when trying to warm up the car. After all, it's like warming up your car with hair dryers running on batteries. Once the interior is reasonable and heated seats are on low setting, range settles at a not great but far from frightful reading.

While on the subject, how this car (or any other EV) doesn't have a heated steering wheel is beyond me.

Also, having driven the car a lot, a few comments on performance. This is the best "automatic" car I've ever driven. I mean, I miss the manual gears, but it's hard to both about having instant, lag-free torque 100% of the time. It made the torque rich LR4 feel laggy and unresponsive in comparison. No surprise as the LR4 normally lugs around at 1300-1500rpm, but to get that level of response (if even possible), I'd have to have the LR4 2-3 gears lower with the rpms on boil.

Does the eGolf have just a resistance heater, or does it also have a heat pump?