Talk Morgan Forums Community The Malvern Arms Electric cars - a question.

I drive my Hyundai with the aircon on all the time. If I turn it off my range goes from about 385km to 420km on a full charge.

A simple question which I have pondered over for some time now is this:

If I had an EV and I was returning home from work with lets say 60% - 70% charge in January and the weather was wet, freezing, and grim.

On the journey home I was on a motorway and a lorry 1/2 a mile ahead shed it's load and resulted in the motorway being closed. The clear up and reopening took 4 hours, being that it was January and given the weather conditions needing me to use the lights,heater and wipers would I run out of charge and cause a further delay in opening the road along with possibly many other EV's now needing to be rescued?

I don't know the answer i'm just wondering.........

Evidence from the recent freeway holdups in the US indicate that it's not much of a problem. A stationary car with just lights and heat on low would use 1KW maybe 2.

So if we were to take your example using a typical EV like a VW ID3 which has a 58KWh battery.

On 60% charge it would have about 35KWh capacity. In winter conditions, assuming a consumption rate of 3.5m/KWh this means a range of just over 120 miles.

If you hit a 4-hour jam and insist on keeping toasty warm, you'd lose 8KWh or 28 miles of range, ie down to 92 miles.

It was on one of our local news station broadcasts during the recent cold spell -27C to -35C that a "large number of Electric Vehicles had stopped working and needed to be recovered". They didn't say how big large was but the authorities were asking EV owners not to drive into the mountains. I assume from this that the cold weather does effect the EV vehicles.

Yes indeed, temps of -27C would be very difficult for EVs. But so it would for diesel vehicles too, as you'd get fuel waxing at those temperatures. Good advice to stay out of the mountains if you own a vehicle that can't cope with extreme weather.

Tesla is conducting a recall required by the US "NTSA" to modify Model 3 and Model Y cars to make them resistant to extreme cold. Whatever that means...
EV batteries need to be at about 40C to work efficiently, if the heating/cooling system can't keep the battery above 25C then the range of the vehicle falls, possibly to zero.

EVs are not as robust or resilient to climatic extremes as gasoline ICE engines.
They are not good at towing, especially in the winter.
They are wonderful city/urban/metropolitan vehicles.

That's exactly right. It's a shame that the minority of people who live in remote locations or who are subject to extreme weather conditions on a regular basis or who have significant load/range demands are unable to take advantage of the benefits of EVs, but the overwhelming majority of drivers fortunately don't have those constraints.

We are delighted with our Mini EV, but we don't hold the fact that it can't tow a trailer with 2 tons of logs against it, we've got the Landy for that - and as it's only 20 years old and has done barely 120k miles or so, it's got easily enough life left in it to see us out.

Hamwich ... as someone who's rural lifestyle involves all the things EVs don't like I'll be content if they just don't ban me from using my Landy until I'm no longer fit to drive ... my worry is that in so many areas polarised urban-centric thinking is seen as the 'only acceptable way' and worry about falling foul of 'one size fits all' legislation that appeases the noisy Twitterati but leaves disadvantaged country folk out of sight and out of mind.

K

What nonsense, they heat up and clear windscreens quicker than any fossil car i've ever had

That's always been the case though, hasn't it?

I can't see ICE being actually banned in our lifetimes, but if society survives then there will probably be a boom in working horses in remote areas, as in Romania today.

Ian Anderson predicted it all 45 years ago:

But one day when the oil barons have dripped dry
And the nights are seen to draw colder
They'll beg for your strength, your gentle power
Your noble grace and your bearing
And you'll strain once again to the sound of the gulls
In the wake of the deep plough, sharing.

Heavy Horses, Jethro Tull