First case of Range Anxiety

[pjmmk]

The charging infrastructure still isn't at a level where you can actually rely on being able to charge at your chosen stop. It's a good idea to do what we used to have to do in the early EV days, always have a backup plan - an alternative charger that you know you'll be able to reach, just in case your first choice has been blown up by zealots of some form or another or is otherwise unusable.
Back then, I had an old LEAF with a range of about 60ish miles - that occasionally gave me some range anxiety in the winter!

 

[Chrisdriving]

Still enjoy the limited Leaf range myself.

 

[Bradford Chap]

This morning I needed to do a 25 mile round trip, and I started with an estimated range of 31 miles, so I thought I'd go for it.

I wouldn't normally risk such a journey, or let the battery get so low, but I have free electricity all day tomorrow, courtesy of my Energy Provider, so I didn't want to charge up before today's trip.

Anyway, once you get down to 6 or 7% battery remaining, there is very little power left, and you find yourself creeping along at about 40mph, which reduces as the energy gets even lower. The last bit of battery energy, and the driving miles remaining, seem to diminish very quickly as you're creeping along at eventually less than 20 mph.

It's actually quite scary, and Mrs Clive asked me what would I do if the car stopped and we were stuck at the side of the road, I had to say I didn't actually know, but I reassured her it wasn't going to happen.

In the end we made it home with a couple of miles to spare, but we both agreed we shouldn't experience this again.

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I've had a zs standard range for 2.5 years, and until recently have not experienced range anxiety. We even took the car from Bradford through the Outer Hebrides, around the north coast 500 to John -o- Groats & back down to Bradford without experiencing anxiety (forward planning was required). We travel to SE London for grand parenting duties & usually charge at Peterbourough services. Recently on a cold morning with 100% charge I didn't have enough range to comfortably get to Peterborough (126 miles) so set destination to Macdonalds Colsterworth (102 miles). I drove conservatively to maximise range, but 5 miles from destination & with only 5% left, the distance went to zero & I got the message "aggressive driving not recommended". We made it but had to change my underpants.

 

[MG Clive]

I never understand people who do this, the car was very low when you parked it up, surely having having the X-Power you are not hard up for a few kWh of electric are you? Just for the peace of mind. I assume you are on Octopus Go or similar so 10 kWh would cost 70p - good value to stop the wife worrying and being able to drive your car properly rather than holding up the sensible people on the road.

No, obviously I'm not hard up for a few quid, but as well as the 16 hours of free electricity I wanted to take advantage of the following day, I also wanted to find out for myself what would happen when the battery level got down. I knew I would have enough for my journey, and I'm certainly not one of these 'people who do this', it was just a one off thing, which now that I've done it, I won't ever need, or want to do again.

Just as a footnote, once you leave the duel carriageway, and get onto the A and B roads where you don't need as much speed, the drive feels perfectly normal, and you wouldn't know the battery was so low unless you needed to accelerate.

 

[pjmmk]

Still enjoy the limited Leaf range myself.

It was a nice car to drive but when my parents health started failing, I had to make a regular trip back and forth and the distance was borderline (each way) for the LEAF. I didn't need the added stress from that.

 

[bedsev]

I was day dreaming earlier about a coming time when range anxiety will be for ice drivers. It's clear that in the UK the tide has turned towards EVs as people realise how much they can save (economics are the greatest l driver for change), so in future we are going to see fuel stations closing and ice drivers having to plan around where they can refuel.

 

[gwig66]

This morning I needed to do a 25 mile round trip, and I started with an estimated range of 31 miles, so I thought I'd go for it.

I wouldn't normally risk such a journey, or let the battery get so low, but I have free electricity all day tomorrow, courtesy of my Energy Provider, so I didn't want to charge up before today's trip.

Anyway, once you get down to 6 or 7% battery remaining, there is very little power left, and you find yourself creeping along at about 40mph, which reduces as the energy gets even lower. The last bit of battery energy, and the driving miles remaining, seem to diminish very quickly as you're creeping along at eventually less than 20 mph.

It's actually quite scary, and Mrs Clive asked me what would I do if the car stopped and we were stuck at the side of the road, I had to say I didn't actually know, but I reassured her it wasn't going to happen.

In the end we made it home with a couple of miles to spare, but we both agreed we shouldn't experience this again.

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Thank you for your honesty. I think it helps to share our bravery/folly!

 

[Dafc1fan]

I never understand people who do this, the car was very low when you parked it up, surely having having the X-Power you are not hard up for a few kWh of electric are you? Just for the peace of mind. I assume you are on Octopus Go or similar so 10 kWh would cost 70p - good value to stop the wife worrying and being able to drive your car properly rather than holding up the sensible people on the road.

Love the honesty, I think loads of us are thinking the same! I love reading about all the range anxiety posts. They are so amusing. All the newer EV’s actually do between 12-40 extra miles from 0% 0 miles. The YouTube video testers are aplenty. Some go round and round race tracks for miles, they slow down, turtles appear on the screen, different EV’s all have differing warnings! But Range anxiety is the exciting new phenomenon for EV drivers and amazingly 2 years later of EV driving, it is just a fleeting adolescent memory!

 

[gwig66]

Sometimes you get home and it's pelting down with rain, or you have bags to unload or you need the loo. It's easy to forget or not bother when you have no big travel plans.
When I almost bricked my standard range 70 plate ZS, the rudimentary range display went from 9 miles to a disaster flashing readout. There is a battery percentage display in the next model but not the 70 plate.

 

[Tuareg]

For remaining 'range', I would much prefer a standard 8 bar display as found on ICE vehicles. That would mean, for example, driving 30-40km would still show all 8 bars rather than the childish 'countdown' from a percentage. Effectively, 100% is 100 bars on a traditional fuel guage, which of course, is crazy and you'll never see a percentage countdown on any ICE for very good reasons because clearly, t's totally unnecessary, just as it is on an EV. A shame owners can't choose the type of energy level display, it would be a vefy simply function to offer.

 

[siteguru]

I must be imagining analogue fuel gauges in my previous ICE cars.