I mentioned earlier in the thread that VW were offering 48 hour demos of their E Golf. I had my 2 days worth earlier in the week, and it is my first experience of electric cars, so my impressions may be of interest.

The first few miles are quite impressive, even coming from a quiet and powerful auto X5, it was the seemingly magic way the car gathered speed and just kept going, apart from a small amount of road noise, there was nothing else to indicate power. The range on the current E Golf is about 150 miles, but in real life driving is probably no more than 100 miles, so it isn't long before range anxiety creeps in, particularly on a longer journey, when you don't know where any charging stations are situated. It can take up to 4 hours on fast charge and 9 on a standard 13a socket,

However, there is a regenerative facility, which effectively is like driving around in 2nd or 3rd gear whenever the car is on the overrun, so with careful driving the range can be extended quite appreciably, which is quite fun and requires economy driving techniques. Sadly however, that is the only fun to be had. Driving just becomes a necessity and a slowish one at that.

I have no doubt that once electric cars can do over 300 miles to a charge, and this can be done in under half an hour, everyone will have one, but oh, they seem to be so boring................


Paul
[At last, I have a car I can polish]