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The most interesting finding from using EVs in winter is not that they consume more energy (which they do), but that charging is really slow if you don't have battery preheating. Yesterday, I arrived at a 240 kW charger with 33% SoC, the outside temperature was 0°C, and the charging power was only 35 kW (the maximum charging power of the car is 118 kW). With this charging power, it would take 40 minutes to charge to 80% SoC. We don't mind too much because we primarily use the car as a city car and do 95% of our charging at home, but if you want to have an EV as your only car and drive long distances with it even in winter, definitely get one that has battery preheating.

#EV #electricVehicles #emobility #electricCars

#electriccars #ev #ElectricVehicles #emobility
in reply to Ondřej Pokorný

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Jiří Eischmann

@ondra yes, you can improve it by this, but I drove 50km on highway speeding 120 km/h before charging, so it wasn't completely cold. I don't think you can get the battery to the ideal temperature range (25-30C) just by driving it when it's zero outside.
I would definitely have gone down to a lower SoC if I could, but the next suitable charger was 50 km and I would arrive with like 5% SoC. While travelling with the family I rather play safe. And even with a lower SoC I don't think the charge power would go above 50 kW with a suboptimal battery temperature.
@Ondřej Pokorný
in reply to Dan Čermák

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Jiří Eischmann

@Defolos thermal control which keeps it in safe range (operation/battery life) is standard, but not thermal control that keeps in the ideal temperature range although it's becoming standard with the newest EVs. We have a 2022 Audi Q4 e-tron and this model got preheating with the 2024 facelift.
I wrote this as a warning that you may get a car with a large battery, but if it doesn't have preheating, it won't be a good car for long distances in winter.
@Dan Čermák
in reply to Jiří Eischmann

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Thomas

For me the most annoying part is, that German cars only charge with this low rates. My company has an ID7 and when I first plugged it into an super charger of 400kw it was stuck at 156kwh, whilst the Smart 5 beside me used 350kwh. I thought I did something wrong and went to the other ID7 driver and asked him about it, he said 160kwh is max.

To be clear: ID7 is Germanys answer for long range business cars like Passat.

in reply to Thomas

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Jiří Eischmann

@tpheine Yeah, but at least it was close to its official maximum (170kW). It's a fairly reasonable charging rate given it's the 400V architecture. For a car that should be used for long distances I would go for the 800V architecture these days. E.g. Audi A6 e-tron isn't much more expensive than ID.7 and it can charge up to 280 kW. But VW has a strong position in enterprise fleets and IDs is usually all you can get. My sister is getting an ID.4 now.
@Thomas
in reply to Jiří Eischmann

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Thomas

Following the discourse in Germany on why Germans deny eCars, one issue is the long charging times for long distance travel. This comes from the enterprise fleets, which make up most of the new car sales of German cars.

And I never understood the discussion, until I used my companies ID7, which is Germany's top of the pops enterprise long range car, which needed 2x 30min stops for 500km.

4 people, wasting in total 4hrs paid by company. I understand companies.

in reply to Thomas

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Jiří Eischmann

@tpheine yes, it is still limiting, my brother-in-law drives to customers spread across the whole country and time is of essence. He says he still cannot afford an EV because of this, so he has a diesel Škoda Superb. I think this will be pretty much solved with the 800V architecture which is slowly getting into this segment. A good example of this is the new BMW iX3. Its drive range is over 500km even in winter, the maximum charging rate is 400 kW and can charge for 350km in 10 minutes. Once EVs with such parameters are more widespread, most of the opposition will disappear. It's already a completely different world than my 3-year-old Audi with 35kW charging in winter. 🙂
@Thomas
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