Talk Morgan Forums Community The Malvern Arms Electric Cars

Mix of grain and bread Graham. The swans seem to be chasing for food. They came right up to me despite Monty on a short lead. Grandchildren moved him away. It is the closest contact ever. One even checked out a coat pocket. This winter they seem to be more active watching people as if hungry. They still graze on the grass. In summer the weed growth is thick but they seem to be doing less underwater arse up grazing. Less weed visible. There is a plan to clear out gudgeon ( invasive species) early in new year. Clear out the carp, kill off the gudgeon, replace carp. Meeting in the overlooking pub Jan 5 to tell us the plan details. It’s a decent size lake about 1mile circumference but not very deep. Man-made when the steelworks was removed. There is the Penclacwydd Wetlands centre a couple of miles away up the Burry Estuary. Whole area was redeveloped from heavy industrial . Another £90m+ improvement just started.

That close contact must have been fantastic Phil! Closest I've been is a couple of feet. Food mix noted
Well I hope all the plans go off without problems, sounds like a fair exercise. Also I hope all your feathered friends escape the Avian 'flu. Various areas were closed off at Slimbridge.

This picture came up on Facebook this morning:



It's alleged to be a 2.5 hour wait for chargers at motorway services in Wales.

Tesla owners need to use an adapter to use non-Tesla charging stations, so I expect they didn't have one as all these queuing pictures appear to be only Tesla related.

Best to feed waterfowl birdseed, frozen peas, chopped lettuce and sliced grapes. Bread, cereal and similar products like crisps are a no no as it swells up in their tummies can cause all sorts of issues.

There seemed to be a problem here with the arctic cold we recently experienced in that the charging stations stopped working. My neighbour told me they had to stay two nights in a hotel in Denver because they couldn't find any working charge stations to obtain enough charge to get "up the hill". He told me he ran out of battery power because the cold sapped about 56% of the cars efficiency, which he wasn't expecting.

Come back ICE all is forgiven.

Even the mild UK winter of 2021/2022 sapped about 20% range from the Tesla. So Im not surprised that the ferocious cold in the USA last week really crippled all EVVs, not just Tesla cars.
Not only is battery efficiency reduced but the heat pump used electricity, as did the heated seats.

EVs have a place, but they are not, in my view, a universal replacement for ICE.
But I'm warming to the concept of plug in hybrid ICE cars. I used to think they were the worst of both, but I now believe that they may be the best of both.

More an indictment of Tesla / Musk's software team (and doesnt bode well for his Twitter investment). His software should have been able to tell where cars were heading / likely to want to charge, and dispense advice accordingly (aka likely 2 hr wait at X, try Y). For big demand scenarios like the odd holiday like this some prebooking would be a good idea.

As an interim a PHEV makes more sense than the self charge hybrid. I had one as a courtesy car last year. Battery capacity was very small. It kept switching from EV to ICE far too frequently. Seamless yes but annoying. In kick down the battery drained in seconds. Nice boost but , to me in that car (Kia) it was a waste of time. Basically, battery capacity was way too low. They didn’t have a pure EV available for a test drive so I couldn’t compare. I bought an ICE Sportage with turbo engine. A big improvement over the earlier Sportage. A lot of tech in it but after a few thousand miles the useful bits are worth it. The lane sensing is annoying though as it activates at weird places. It seems to pick up non lane markings, especially on bends, or fails to pick them up if old and worn. In the handbook there is a LONG list of possible false reading situations.

I agree with Sospan re the MHEV with the tiny battery and 48v integrated boost/starter engineering. When the lorry went in for a service they loaned me an E220d MHEV it had this little bar on the electronic console which showed the state of charge/use. As much as I could adapt my driving to learn how to maximise it's benefit I could not see any help relative to the pretty efficient dirtyderv lump under the hood. I can see why Germany is awash with D220 E estates as taxi's following my E estate ownership.

I rented a Prius in the US once as the airport was almost picked clean. I am bot the primary audience for that car clearly. CVT, gutless engine, weight etc etc. Uber is welcome to them as they seem to work for their use case.

I have switched off most of the "safety" features on the Lorry as all they do is annoy me when I am driving and distract me from the road and other loonies I am sharing it with.

I think the government pushing the BEV agenda this fast is distorting the real value they could bring to the table, soundbytes as usual. A more developed push around introduction of local charging for short range trip replacements to bring in smaller cars would make more sense. A min-e/eHonda limited range short trip vehicle makes more sense from a real use point of view. Less expensive up front, less charging needed for those shorter milk journeys so lower speed charges are more useful, home solar can recharge them etc etc. Also short journeys were the bete noir of ICE engines ask any Jaguar 3.0L diesel owner. They forced through the region broadband program to push out into the community - where is this program for power delivery and attachment?