All those you mention are factors to consider and are legit reasons not to buy an EV. But what about someone like my coworker where most or none of those factors affect him? I would dare to say his main reasons is based on bad information

 

Even if gas was $1 a gallon and electricity was .50 cents a kWh (which compared to gas would be like $14 $16.85 a gallon), I would still opt for EV's. What would make me consider something like a Sienna hybrid would be...I need a Minivan

I drove an IS350, which not only took expensive Premium, but averaged around 19 mpg! If I didn't buy the Polestar, I would probably be driving a 2021 IS350 F-Sport or an M2 or M3

 

Yeah, she knows that. Now. That's the problem. There are other EVs that would definitely fit her lifestyle better, but you really have to dig to figure some of these things out.

The sticking points between ice and evs really come down to 2 things. How you refuel and what is the range.

With ice, most don't think about range, and the thought process around refueling usually just involves cost. So, if you are going to switch to EV, you have to if the pluses and minuses of those difference fit your lifestyle based on a lot of criteria. And as you mentioned with the Leaf, not all are created equal, further complicating the decision.

In summary, it's a lot to figure out if you aren't someone that is really into doing the research, not only between ice and evs, but also the difference between different EVs. How fast they can charge. Where they can charge. How accurate are the range estimates. There might be an EV that is the best choice for someone. But pick the wrong one like my coworker did with her Leaf, and EV life isn't so rosy.

 

The good news is, that most EV's 2023 and on have a minimum range of 200 miles or more. Most of these also have a charging curve of 150 kW to 350 kW. It looks like 300 mile "real world range" will most likely be achievable in the next couple of years without having to have a giant battery pack. Tesla will be opening up their chargers to other brands will help alleviate charging, someone posted in Europe a picture of their Polestar charging at a Tesla Supercharger. Unfortunately, extreme cold weather will be remain a hurdle, but that will probably be solved as well

 

Also, people who drive gas guzzlers... cheap gas again really makes it moot. I didn't care about the gas mileage in my LX, but now I realllllllly don't care. I gun it to hell and back constantly. Filling up for $45-50, it used to be double until recently.

Hybrid owners and the plug ins with both will reallllly have teensy gas bills.

 

It's a mistake to think that EV customers buy what they buy because they want to save money or that they pay much attention to gas prices either. Any operating cost savings are just an added bonus and don't really factor in. The main reasons I and everyone else I know who has an EV are because they are faster, quieter, more refined, have unique features and because they generally improve over time with OTA upgrades.

 

Is there any EV that charges at 350kw and maintains that speed throughout the charge? Looking at Jerry Rig Everything charge his Tesla truck his charging speed was 215kw and to go from 20% to 80% was going to take him 40 min. He arrived to the charger at 2%. Sounds like it’s a pretty good size battery but the charging speed could be better imo. I wonder if he maintained 215kw the entire time he was charging.

I spent exactly 1hr charging at a public charger couple days ago and my kids were getting antsy. The only thing that saved me is they were occupied by an iPad. I could’ve switched to gas and bypassed charging but I wanted to experience it with kids in the car. My experiment could compare if I had a Tesla truck looking at Jerry charge his Tesla truck

I won’t be experimenting that public charging experience again with kids in tow. I will just switch over to gas and keep driving

 

My friend bought his MYLR to save money. At least that’s what he told me. When he switched his insurance over he told me “so much for the gas savings when you factory in the cost of insurance.” Then the following months his electricity bill obviously increased by a lot. One feature he misses at times, Apple CarPlay. And according to him his MYLR isn’t as good in inclement weather as his previous AWD SUV. With that being said, he loves his MYLR

swajames, do you off-road and/tow with your lightning?

 

An hour with a Rav4 Prime with an 18.1 kWh battery?

It takes my 131 kWh truck about 40 minutes to charge from about 10% to 80%. That's roughly 90kWh onboarded, more than the total capacity of many EVs. Charge curve is key. Some vehicles take a high rate for a short time but quickly drop off, some might not have as high a peak but sustain higher charge rates for a longer time.

 

We do, we have a house at a lake in the country and we have a boat so yes. With that said, we also have a Land Rover that tows roughly 8500 lbs and that's more set up for off roading with multiple locking differentials, air suspension, underbody shielding, underbody camera views and off road tires. The Lightning tows like there's no load, it's quite remarkable. I'd probably use the Land Rover to tow longer distances, but the lightning is an excellent towing vehicle. We used to have a V8 jeep as our tow vehicle but we don't use that any more.

 

Level 2 charging and I only added 4.14kwh in that 1hr.

Level 1, level 2, using the engine to charge are the only charging options.

 

For shorter distances correct? In other words, you haven’t had to unhitch your boat to charge your lightning for longer tows.

 

That makes sense now. That's actually a nice real-world example of the point that I brought up the point about the experience of living, with an EV as public charging with DC fast chargers s obviously a very different experience than charging at L2 speeds like we all have at home. With that said, if you're stopping anyway and can use the time you're stopped to add some charge then anything you can add is good

 

Yes mostly shorter distances, we usually keep the boat down there. It's about 150 miles from here and I probably could get it home with the Lightning in one shot. JerryRigged got 130 miles with a heavier and less aerodynamic load than my boat so 150 is probably doable. With that said I'd probably want to do a short charge to top up. For other truck things it works great. We moved our son into a new apartment and the truck moved all the furniture plus I've got a collection of original 1980's arcade machines and those things can be surprisingly heavy when you move them around. Brings up another interesting feature, it's got onboard scales that weigh the load for you.

 

What's funny is you are willing to do the work that's pointless - 4kwh in 1hr, but you feel like doing 100 kwh in 1hr is so terrible, you would never be able to do it.

I have had an ev for 2.5yrs now, and i consider phevs worst of both worlds.

I would never spend effort needed to charge 4kwh in 1hr. To me that's completely pointless.