Life without a home charger?

[sgt4hed]

Perhaps do a weekly shopping at a Tesco or similar where you can charge the car (for free), and have a cup of coffee .
You might need to get a type 2 charging cable (check with car dealer if they are supplying one)

It isn't going to be free forever though... I see too many people banking on relying on free charging at supermarkets... The supermarkets are getting wise to the fact that someone might be plugged into it and not even in the supermarket. With rising energy costs, they won't be free indefinitely.

 

[slmorgan42]

It isn't going to be free forever though... I see too many people banking on relying on free charging at supermarkets... The supermarkets are getting wise to the fact that someone might be plugged into it and not even in the supermarket. With rising energy costs, they won't be free indefinitely.

Personally I am hoping to take advantage of it while free and do my shop. But I am more counting on charging while I shop whether free or not.

 

[hmadsen]

Just make it "Parking for costumers only" and if someone is seen parking there, and then wandering of away from the supermarket, they get a ticket.

Or limit the charge to 1 hour.

 

[JohnInFrance]

In addition to the above, it is worth a look at route planning, in many cases i find motorway alternatives that really dont add mutch to the time, but use much less battery (slower speeds = less power used). Its also more relaxing.

Very true - we always travel to Bordeaux via the A10 motorway (16€ toll return) - turns out avoiding the motorway adds 10 minutes to the journey time and obviously, saves 16€ - I'd have never even thought to explore this option if we'd not have got the EV.

 

[Kithmo]

Just make it "Parking for costumers only" and if someone is seen parking there, and then wandering of away from the supermarket, they get a ticket.

Or limit the charge to 1 hour.

Most of them do limit the parking time, at my local Tescos it's 3 hours for customers and only half an hour if you don't but anything in the shop and validate your parking with your till receipt. Minimum spend £5 if you park for more than half an hour.
Seeing as the 4 chargers are only 7kW, it's not worth plugging in and wandering off for half an hour.

 

[slmorgan42]

Source London is almost always available, as expensive as Ionity. Ubitricity is half that but hit and miss in terms of availability. You will have to fight cabbies and Uber drivers for free Tesco juice.

So costwise it’s cheaper to run than dino juicers but you will have so many more headaches compared to people with allocated home charging. The trick is to have a local rapid like InstaVolt or ShellRecharge that you can use when in a jam.

While I wait for my EV to one day turn up I still check out charging everywhere I go now. To be honest and the cabbies and Ubers don’t use the free ones at Tesco as it is too slow for their needs. They tend to take up the fast charges. But currently my area seems to be good and there is always fast and slow chargers available. Let’s hope the council keeps adding more they way they are.

Cost wise I have done the numbers and even paying up to 30p a kw it is cheaper than my petrol car. But it is more than money that has mean changing. As you say less headaches.

 

[sgt4hed]

Just make it "Parking for costumers only" and if someone is seen parking there, and then wandering of away from the supermarket, they get a ticket.

Or limit the charge to 1 hour.

How many miles do you get out of a 7kw charger when it's there for an hour... almost completely pointless

 

[Alb]

For me it would be about 25 miles.
My local Tesco is about 6 miles away so for a 1 hour stay, I'll end up with 13 more miles than I started with.

 

[sgt4hed]

For me it would be about 25 miles.
My local Tesco is about 6 miles away so for a 1 hour stay, I'll end up with 13 more miles than I started with.

<deleted>

My math at this time is terrible

 

[Nutnut]

For me it would be about 25 miles.
My local Tesco is about 6 miles away so for a 1 hour stay, I'll end up with 13 more miles than I started with.

That's more than I was expecting, so well worth it! I'd be happy just to get back my journey miles for a free ride. May as well utilise a free charge if available.

 

[hmadsen]

How many miles do you get out of a 7kw charger when it's there for an hour... almost completely pointless

Better than nothing, and i dont think they would agree that you going in and bying a pack of gum, would allow you to let your car charge there for hours.

Mostly those chargers are a bit of a gimmick, they try to attract EV owners by essentially giving them the opportunity to charge the car while shopping. It's not a lot, but maybe you get about what you used to go to and from the supermarket.

If people just park up there for hours until their car is fully charged and go shopping for hours, and not in their supermarket, it will just be a bad experience, because the chargers will not be available to very many people per day.

 

[fnkd]

I just picked up my ZS EV SE standard range last Monday. I don’t have a home charger so using a mix of free Tesco 7kW podpoint charger and also at work there’s an outside 13A socket which gives me roughly 10% in 3 hours or so. So if I use it for commuting I can top it back up again at the 13A socket for work.

I just did a 85 mile journey to Luton Airport starting off at 97%. I did one stop at Toddington South services and topped up from around 40-45% up to 80% and was done by the time we had a Costa.

It’s now sitting with 73% and saying 117 mile range on the app. So I’ll see what the journey back home is like when I get back to the UK and will probably stop off and rapid charge at some point on the way home.

I was worried about having the standard range because of not having a home charger but I’ve began to realise that with doing a rapid charge to get back to around 70 or 80% and trying to keep it around the 80% mark with free chargers and granny charger isn’t actually going to be too difficult.

I was originally in the market for a long range but with the Clean Air Zone in Birmingham my permit was about to expire on my diesel and would cost me £160 a month to drive into the zone so I just had to take whatever was coming into stock and was at the right place at the right time.

 

[Nibloprice]

We have a 2020 MG, and live in London without a home charger. There are loads of lamppost chargers on the surrounding streets, and some are starting to get dedicated bays too. It's never been a problem to find one, that isnt within 5mins walk. We use the car for shorts trips and the occasional long weekend (when we use Rapids), generally letting it get down to 5miles over the course or 2/3 weeks and then charge overnight.

After the initial worry about a new way of doing things, we now don't even think about it. And would never go back to an ICE. Sure, you can always do with a bit more range, but twas ever thus. Just require slightly more thought...but only slightly.

 

[Lambo51]

This is what I do for short periods now and again as luckily I have a public charger around the corner. This is apparently legal depending on the council

 

[EVready]

I live in a third floor flat in Edinburgh, and usually need to park away down the street, so neither granny charging nor a home charger is an option for me either. But like many other respondents I make good use of the Tesco Pod Points. Fortunately I live 5 min walk away from a Tesco with 4 free chargers and 3 hour parking. I also look out for destination chargers near any places I happen to be going - it’s an extra incentive to visit the Zoo! Here in Scotland there are still a number of free ChargePlace Scotland chargers, though I’m sure more charges will be introduced with rising energy prices. I’ve found having a car with a long range to provide maximum flexibility about when to charge really important.

I have always used rapid chargers for long journeys, but after handing back my company leased Hyundai Kona EV have recently leased a Renault Zoe from ONTO who provide Shell Recharge, BP Pulse and InstaVolt charge cards at no extra cost above the monthly lease so I’ve started using them a lot more now.

I’m very envious of those of you with nearby lamppost chargers. Here in Edinburgh we seem to be way behind London in introducing on-street charging, despite the huge numbers of residents who live in flats like mine. There are plans in train but they sound woefully inadequate so while I’ve been perfectly okay with an EV and no home charger for the past couple of years, I confess I am concerned about how viable it is going to be here as uptake of EVs increases. But with the right vision and investment, there’s absolutely no reason why it shouldn’t be sustainable.

 

[slmorgan42]

This post was under ZS EV and I asked for it to be moved to General Electric car as wanted to get wider audience point of view

 

[AK OK]

Perhaps do a weekly shopping at a Tesco or similar where you can charge the car (for free), and have a cup of coffee .
You might need to get a type 2 charging cable (check with car dealer if they are supplying one)

You'll not get much in a LR in an hour or two max at 7kw? Some free supermarket chargers have parking time restrictions too...

 

[AK OK]

Just make it "Parking for costumers only" and if someone is seen parking there, and then wandering of away from the supermarket, they get a ticket.

Or limit the charge to 1 hour.

Yeah I think the limit will come as otherwise someone needs paying £20k p.a. to spy & issue tickets, or anpr systems need paying for...

(A friend of mine is a theatrical costumier ? ?)

 

[hmadsen]

Yeah I think the limit will come as otherwise someone needs paying £20k p.a. to spy & issue tickets, or anpr systems need paying for...

(A friend of mine is a theatrical costumier ? ?)

Could just be ANPR, and a "Max charge 1 hour per week"

I work with CCTV camera's and i can tell you that nowadays, even "cheap" (Sub £1000) CCTV camera's can be had with License plate reading. If placed at the right hight, it can easily read the license plate and then it is not very hard to make a snippet of programming that only unlocks the charger if a plate is read, and then stops after 1 hour, and locks the car out from starting the charger for the next 7 days.

But to be honest, the "free charge if you shop here" is mostly a gimmick, and when "everyone" has an EV, they are not going to do it, simply because it will be to expensive.

 

[AK OK]

Could just be ANPR, and a "Max charge 1 hour per week"

I work with CCTV camera's and i can tell you that nowadays, even "cheap" (Sub £1000) CCTV camera's can be had with License plate reading. If placed at the right hight, it can easily read the license plate and then it is not very hard to make a snippet of programming that only unlocks the charger if a plate is read, and then stops after 1 hour, and locks the car out from starting the charger for the next 7 days.

Interesting.
I wonder though about who would be willing & able to modify (& maintain) the charger's systems to be involved in the locking out part of the process? (I presume they would otherwise naturally work on a "more hours = more money, bring it on!" model)

Also the locked out car(s) would need to be encouraged to not block the charger bays (that they now can't use)...

But to be honest, the "free charge if you shop here" is mostly a gimmick, and when "everyone" has an EV, they are not going to do it, simply because it will be to expensive.

Even now at my local stores there are definite peak hours when one shouldn't expect to get on a free charger. Of course the rapid pay for charger is right there next door for those who've miscalculated or are on a crucial picnic run or some other worthy necessity that they should be paying for a charge to complete...