Hi Rob
Fortunately the £1000 deposit is returnable if after a test drive of a demonstrator the EV3 is not for me.
For my planned usage I will almost always charge from home, let’s be honest the EV3 is not really a practical means of transportation, it is a (very nice) toy and I am probably going to use it more than most as I have a great commute from home to work through beautiful country roads which I loved in my Elise with the top off.
The EV3 does not seem to have a fast charge capability which if that is correct is a shame as it will limit long distance tours, but with a little planning you can arrange a tour where you call in advance to make sure you can charge and top up at stop offs, lunch, tourist attractions etc. But let's wait and see what the final spec is.
Re. the queues for charging, the network is growing as quite a rate. As of today there are 4215 charging locations and more than 11000 chargers, see Zap map
statistics for details of the rate of growth!
The
Map map here shows where they all are too.
I do not think it is reasonable to expect charging points, free or otherwise from Morgan, they will be making handfuls of cars and charging points cost a lot of money to set up and maintain which would add a huge amount to the cost of each car even if they were subsidised from increasing the costs of the petrol Morgans, and I don't think any boy wants that!. Leave that to the big boys like Nissan, BMW, Renault and Tesla who are setting up EVs to be genuine replacements for internal combustion engined cars.
Personally I think Morgan should be given credit for the years of forward thinking research they have been doing into alternative drive trains which puts many of the big boys to shame!
Hi 8Rich
Re: “I just hope they get this one right unlike the M3W which was seriously underdeveloped at launch and the early adopters had a torrid time”
You and me both! But I am going into this with my eyes open, it is well known that most low volume car makers use their customers for a degree of shake down and debug, and I have plenty of experience with that. I have found the key is to find a good dealer and keep a good relationship with them, which has served me well through TVR and Lotus ownership. However looking at the 2015 date of the video I have posted earlier they have had the EV3 up and running for a while so it looks like they are spending a good deal of time getting it as bug free as possible!
Re the Ecotricity card, unfortunately is is no longer free they now charge £6 for 30 minutes charging – see their announcement
here and I suspect many (apart from Tesla who put the charging cost into the price of the car).
Hi Steve, The value of the electronics is not really a worry for me with an EV3, once I buy the car I will be driving it and the electronics are just part of the whole package and it’s costs. The Morgan will depreciate but I hope that will be tempered by the low volume. But it is worth bearing in mind that 2nd hand Leafs and Zoes can be had for a few grand, which is weird as they still function as very low cost and highly comfortable motoring (providing the range suits your usage). Alternatively the reducing parts costs may allow for upgrades!
Hi Muck Adam, I am also an engineer and just about everything in my kitchen from dishwasher to microwave has been fixed at least once by me. Failures tend to be down to cracks in PCBs or solder joints which are pretty easy to fix. Another example is that I have touch dimming lamps which have lasted a year due to under specced triacs, I replaced these with higher spec devices and the lamps still run another 5 years later. In terms of finding sensors, there are many ways to skin that cat, such as finding equivalents or making and interface board which makes an available sensor look to the rest of the system like the original part. However I will refresh my high voltage safety training after the warranty expires and before I touch anything on the car!
The phrase “no user serviceable parts inside” is just a challenge!
Hi Dave, I am not sure "normal use" is the right phrase to use for a 3-Wheeler!
of any e - vehicle is the practical range in daily use. That's the unknown factor with the EV3 until they roll out into normal use.
.